The Big Bad Bruins, fiction by Frank Reardon

Mel moved the shotgun so he could reach down and turn up the radio.

“I love this song.”

“What’s this?” Dom asked.

“Don’t change it.”

“It’s crap,” Dom said.

“It’s the Guess Who.”

“What’s the Guess who?”

“The name of the band. The Guess Who, that’s who.”

“It’s terrible.” Dom replied. “The guy’s singing about no sugar in his coffee.”

Mel reached into his denim jacket, removed a pack of cigarettes, and lit one. He exhaled all over the front of the dashboard and put the shotgun across his lap.

“You know this song has to do with losing a piece of ass, right?” Mel said.

Dom hit the Tobin Bridge, reached into the ashtray, and grabbed fifty cents for the toll.

“How you figure? Sounds like he’s out of sugar for his coffee and real pissed off about it.”

“You’ve been heart broken, right? That Tina chick? The cokehead you met at Smugs’ Cove?” Mel Asked.

“Yeah, but I got rid of her.” Dom said.

“Why?”

“She stole my shit and sold it.”

“That’s no sugar in your coffee,” Mel said.

“How you mean?”

“It goes something like this,” Mel said. “This dude in the song, whatever his name is...”

“Burton Cummings,” Dom interrupted.

Mel shot Dom an angry look, “I thought you didn’t know the band?”

Dom dropped the toll into the net. The operator glanced at Mel’s shotgun, the duffel bag in the backseat with a crowbar sticking out, and the Bruins game sweaters. He looked the other way and waved them through.

“I know American Woman.”

“You know American Woman, fucker, but you don’t know No Sugar?”

Mel looked at Dom and shook his head, “Anyhow, this fucker in the song. He’s getting ass day in and day out from this chick, right? That’s not a question.” Mel continued, “He believes he’s in love and they are going to be together for the rest of their lives. There’s no one way about it. She’s all over his knob every day. The guy even takes her to his parents’ house to meet them, and it doesn’t matter if she’s drunk as shit and coked up. Doesn’t matter that mother is clutching her pearls because the chick’s skirt is hanging right below her cunt. It doesn’t matter, he loves this woman. It doesn’t matter that dad is hiding out in the garage with a glass full of whiskey because he’s overheated and shit because his son’s woman isn’t wearing a bra. None of that shit matters to him. He loves her. Loves her like no other woman he’s ever loved before. He believes he’ll never feel that way again.”

“You making this shit up?” Dom asked.

“Can I finish my damn story?”

“It doesn’t seem real is all,” Dom said.

“All that is irrelevant,” Mel replied.

“Why the fuck is it irrelevant?”

“You’ve been clipped before, right?”

“What’s that gotta do with the guy and the chick?”

“Everything.”

“You know this,” Dom continued, “Outside of Cronin’s that time. You were there, ‘member?”

“I’m making a point,” Mel said. “You took one in the arm. I remember because I had to cradle your head and convince you that you were not going to die.”

“That shit hurt. You ever been shot?”

“What kind of question is that? Have I ever been shot? That’s a strange way to put it.” Mel sighed. “Never mind, it’s not the point. You had no sugar in your coffee. Kind of like the guy singing the song.”

“Sounds like he had all the sugar in the world. Half-dressed chick all over his cock.”

“Like the one you took in the arm, before that everything was good, no?”

“Well, I was playing The Stones on the juke and ripping rails in the bathroom. You could say that.”

“Exactly, so this asshole in the song, he’s in love. It doesn’t matter if this woman of his was doing rails or preparing to take her vows, he loved her. You follow?”

“Not really,” Dom said, taking the car over the Tobin and onto the artery.

“So, it’s Christmas and his parents are finally in bed. He finally has her to himself. He’s got her bent over the counter and the tiny skirt hiked up around her waist. He’s giving it to her like a jackhammer. Over and over, until he cums all over the place and collapses from exhaustion. Know what happens next?” Mel asked.

“No, but she sounds pretty hot.”

“She is, but she’s a piece of shit. She cannot be trusted, and the sugar is the trust.”

“Why?”

“Because a week later she finds a bigger dick and a better source to keep her in the blow. It never mattered to her if he was the singer of The Guess Who. I mean, who are they compared to say, Zeppelin. It’s night and day money, right?”

“Zeppelin does rule,” Dom said.

“Again, not the point.” Mel said. “I’m saying, she’s only interested in the blow, the money, and size. Corner basement, kitchen counter, none of it matters. She’s a strawberry. So, this mother fucker loses his lady to Jimmy Page, and now he’s isolated and alone. What he thought would be beside him for life turns out to be an illusion. He doesn’t have dick to stand by him. He doesn’t have dick to talk to at night. He’s empty and alone. He has no sugar in his coffee,” Mel said, moving the shotgun to the back seat.

Dom does some simple math on his fingers, “Man you’re an idiot. What you said makes no sense.”

“It makes all the sense in the world.”

“Mel, it doesn’t make any sense at all. Bullet in my arm. That damn fucking bitch, Tina. Illusions. The Guess Who. Ridiculous.”

Mel lit another cigarette, the smoke floated around his black Cossack mustache, “Just put your foot on the gas, we’re gonna be late.”

Mel let the number 4 Bobby Orr sweater slide over his denim jacket and picked up the shotgun. Dom already had his number 7 Phil Esposito sweater on with the duffel bag in hand. They reached the back of the building when headlights hit them. Mel put his finger on the trigger of the shotgun but kept it by his side.

“Freeze, mother fuckers,” a voice said.

Mel and Dom felt relieved when they noticed it was Scott Polonski’s ’71 Chevy Vega. Scott stepped out of the driver’s seat wearing his number 17 Derek Sanderson sweater.

“Where’s Jimmy?” Dom asked.

“Where you think?” Scott replied.

Mel and Dom walked over to Scott’s car and saw Jimmy McGrath nodding out in the front seat, vomit crusted his number 30 Gerry Cheevers sweater.

“Scott, I told you to keep him away from the shit.” Mel said.

“Didn’t know he had it.”

Dom slapped his face, “Jimmy? You in there, kid?”

“How do you not know he had it? If anything goes wrong, shit’s on you.” Mel said.

“Yeah, sure thing. I’ll tell Billy O’Brien right after Cindy’s done giving it to him in the ass with that big black dildo he loves.” Scott replied.

“You should’ve known. We can’t just leave Jimmy in the car like that, kid. He’s the only one who can crack the safe.”

Scott threw his cigarette to the ground and let the cherry fade underneath the snow. He grabbed Jimmy by the jersey and shook him.

“You in there, Jimmy?”

“Is he fucking dead?” Dom asked.

“Nah, he isn’t dead,” Scott replied. “He’s just riding down a tilt-a-whirl of wet pussy right now.”

“We can’t waste time,” Mel said. “We need him awake now.”

Dom made a slush-ball out of the snow building up on the asphalt and rubbed it into Jimmy’s face. Jimmy snapped out of it and looked at Dom and Mel’s face. Scott stood behind his crouching friends and lit another cigarette.

“It’s about fucking time, Kid,” Scott said, turning around to get his tool bag from the trunk.

Both Dom and Mel welcomed Jimmy back to the land of the living and helped him get to his feet. Dom gave him a bandana to clean the puke from his sweater, and Mel handed him his ass pocket of gin to help him shake it off. Mel knew they were all pressed for time to get into the building and crack the safe. They all knew in the back of their minds that Billy O’Brien would be waiting for his cut. Each one of them tried not to think of what would happen if they didn’t deliver, but each one tried to pretend it didn’t matter. To be anything other than a ‘man’ about the situation was not a feeling they were willing to risk in front of each other.

“Scottie,” Jimmy said. “You have my drill?”

“Right here,” he said showing Jimmy a tan duffel bag. Dom went to the back with the crowbar and popped the door. Scott tucked his revolver into the back of his jeans and followed Dom inside with Jimmy following.

Mel looked around the back alley and noticed that the snow was coming down heavier than he thought it would. For well over a week the news had been reporting a blizzard was on its way. Mel thought it would be no different than any storm that hit Boston in the past, all talk and no balls. He ignored the warning and set up the snatch and grab so the four of them could pay off what they owed to Billy O’Brien. It was either pay the money they owed, or not see the relatives drinking the free beer around their coffins decorated in rosary beads and flowers. He looked up at the sky, and watched the snow blast its way through the clouds and streetlights. He inhaled deeply and let loose his anxieties and followed his three friends through the back door.

Jimmy’s drill hit the safe, metal shavings flew up in the air. Mel glanced at Jimmy’s number 30 Gerry Cheever’s jersey. The white straps of his Cheever goalie mask decorated with stitches pushed Jimmy’s wavy blonde hair against his skull.

“You in the game, chucklehead?” Scott asked Mel.

Mel ignored Scott and lit another cigarette. “You almost there, Jim?”

“Getting’ there, kid,” Jimmy replied, the shavings from the safe trapping themselves inside the stitching of his sweater.

Dom tapped Jimmy on the shoulder. Jimmy halted his drilling and looked up at Mel. They all listened. Dom put his index finger over his mouth to hush everyone. Footsteps tapped and clapped the stairwell above them. The shoes tapped louder as the steps made their way to the bottom floor. Mel pumped the shotgun slowly. Scott pulled out a .38 revolver and brought it down to his hip. Dom stood by the corner holding up the crowbar over the entrance to the safe room. All four of them saw the flashlight several rooms away. When he turned the corner the security guard didn’t stand a chance. Dom brought down the crowbar and split the man’s head. Blood oozed down his forehead. He didn’t realize what had hit him.

“You knocked him fucking good. I think he’s dead.” Scott said.

“I didn’t want to do it, man. Fuck. Is he dead?” Dom said.

Mel leaned over and checked the security guard’s pulse in his neck. “Nah, he’s alive. You just knocked him good. When this motherfucker wakes up, he’s not going to know if he’s in Boston or Toronto.”

Dom put his hand on his heart. He liked most anything: robbery, running numbers, but murder wasn’t something he wanted weighing on his conscience. His mother was a strict Catholic. She went to daily mass, and even though he hadn’t gone to Mass since he was an altar boy at Saint Mary’s, the guilt of his mother’s religion stayed with him. It ingrained itself deep inside his brainstem at birth and carried over into adulthood. Murder wasn’t something he could stomach. Pay for the services of hookers in the Combat Zone, no problem. Spend a few hours robbing safes; roll over Cumby’s at midnight to get extra cash for pills and beer, no problem. But to put a guy out to pasture just for doing his job for three dollars an hour, Dom wouldn’t be able to live with it. He heard his Italian mother’s broken English in his head if he even thought of it, “Dominic, my bambino, why you hurt God? He loves you, Dommie. My little bambino you listen to your mama. You listen to Jesus.”

“We gotta make this quick, Kid,” Mel said. Jimmy pulled the trigger of the drill.

Mel looked outside the door. The snow was falling hard. It had already dropped a wet heavy pile around the tires of the car. He looked at his watch, knowing they were running short of time. They had to pop the safe and get to the garage in Dedham before it was too late. The clock was not working in their favor.

“Almost there?” Mel asked.

“Any minute now,” Jimmy said.

The security guard mumbled something and passed back out.

“Billy’s gonna kill us, man.” Scott said.

“Shut up,” Mel replied.

“He’s going do to us what he did to Shawn McGuire, and you know it.” Scott replied.

“The fuck you know about Shawn?” Dom interrupted.

“Alls I know is one day he’s there being Shawn and shit, you know Shawn, all coked up and drinking beers at Smug’s n’ shit. Banging that little nasty cooch of his, and next thing you know the pigs are pulling his body out of a plastic drum that floated up on Nahant beach. His body was all slimy and shit. You ‘memba, don’t you Jimmy?”

Jimmy kept drilling.

“You guys know. He didn’t pay Billy back on time. He was running the numbers there for him, making collections and shit. He didn’t show up on time to McCarthy’s auto. Now you didn’t hear this from me, but all I’m saying is, when he didn’t show up to give McCarthy the cash so he could give it to Billy, well, we never saw Shawn until a few weeks later floating around in that drum. Shit, his legs were all snapped to make him fit in there. Ever try to bend your legs and get inside one of those fucks? Shit must hurt like a bastard.”

“You are talking through the side of your ass.” Mel said.

“You know it, Mel, don’t deny it. He took that money and went to Nashua. Thought driving across state lines into New Hampshire was gonna save his ass. I mean, how far is Nashua, like forty fucking minutes away?”

“Who told you all of this?” Dom asked.

“I’m just saying, word on the street, you know. I’m just telling you guys is all.”

Jimmy’s drill bit popped, and the steel door loosened and opened. “Got it!”

The four Bruins sweaters leaned into the safe. Scott opened the door with his hand and noticed the case inside. Mel pushed Scott’s hand out of the safe and grabbed hold of the brown leather case and opened it. They gathered around and looked inside.

“Shit glows,” Dom said. “Like little damn icicles.”

“A lot of G’s up in there,” Scott said. “Give Billy his cut, and the four of us can split the rest. The ass I’m going to get will be legendary. Pussy galore!”

The security guard reached up and put his hands on his forehead and mumbled incoherently. Mel walked over to his body and put the barrel of the shotgun on the man’s chest. The guard reached up and grabbed ahold of the barrel and tried to push it away with the power of a six-year-old child. The guard opened his eyes and looked at Mel. He saw Mel’s large thick Cossack mustache, his black winter beanie resting on his thick dark hair. He tried to push the barrel off again. Mel pulled the trigger. Blood shot up and speckled plasma and gore on the whites of Mel’s Bruins sweater. Dom wanted to tell Mel he didn’t have to kill him, but he knew arguing with his best friend wasn’t the best choice.

“We gotta go,” Mel said. “Before the snow gets any worse.”

Jimmy packed up his drill in his bag and slung it over his shoulder and made his way out the door. Dom was still looking at the dead security guard.

“His last name was Willis. I wonder what his first name was?”

“Never mind him,” Mel said. “We gotta go.”

Dom grabbed his satchel of B and E tools and made his way out the door and met up with Jimmy in the parking lot.

“When we going to split the prize?” Scott asked Mel.

“As soon as we get Billy his cut, then we go to Dago and trade it in.”

“Man, I can’t wait to get all that ass,” Scott said.

“Let’s fucking go, Kid.” Mel said, patting Scott on the back.

Scott walked out the door and into the back lot where the cars were. Dom and Jimmy were sitting inside Dom’s car.

“You aren’t going to ride with me?” Scott said to Jimmy.

He saw the snow blowing in the headlights and float up with the wind into the streetlights at the end of the alley. No one was out on the street. The weather made him feel like a child again, like he could reach into his heart and pull out all the good stories he kept locked up his entire life and share them with his friends, but he knew better. Sometimes it was best to keep the past in the heart and head. It was where it needed to stay, so he could keep finding a reason day in and day out to get out of bed in the morning.

“Looks like the weatherman was right for a change,” Scott said.

The gunshot rang out. The sound traveled along the brick walls of the alley ways, then hid itself in the asphalt and shot back up again and traveled off with the storm until it was carried off with the heavy winds. All that remained was the heat and smoke from the pistol in Mel’s hand. The bullet entered the back of Scott’s head. His legs gave out and collapsed. Blood collected in a pool next to his lifeless body and began to run out and travel into the snow. Dom had hidden his face. Jimmy looked from the front seat of the car without expression. Mel took Scott’s wallet and put it in his pocket. He grabbed Scott’s keys and got in Scott’s car. He drove off and Dom followed him a couple of miles. Mel drove the car to an empty lot facing the Mystic. He tossed Scott’s wallet, car information, and keys into the icy cold river. He picked up his shotgun from the ground and the stolen case and climbed into Dom’s car.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

Dom didn’t say anything. Jimmy opened the pint of gin and took a long haul from the bottle to help calm his nerves.

“Come on Dom!” Mel shouted. “We need to get to Dedham and quick.”

The three of them drove through the storm toward route 128. Dom had the radio on, and the meteorologist talked about the blizzard of ’78 and how everyone needed to be off the road. Massachusetts was in a “state of emergency.”

“When you think they’ll find Scott?” Dom asked.

“After the storm. BPD, the staties, everyone will be too busy with the fucking storm.”

“I don’t like it at all,” Dom said.

“You know it was part of the deal,” Mel replied, knocking on Jimmy’s shoulder to hand over the bottle of booze.

“We could’ve given Billy a bigger cut, you think?” Dom said. “I bet that would’ve been okay. I mean, killing Scott seems nuts, you know?”

“He took that money from Billy with Shawn, you know that.” Mel said.

“I know, but like paying him back with the stones is all I’m saying. Scott was one of us, shit isn’t right, Mel.”

“Billy made it clear that Scott getting clipped was part of the deal, or it was all of us.”

Jimmy rolled down the window and vomited out the window.

“Jesus, kid, you alright over there?” Dom asked.

“Put on the blinkah and pull the fuck over. I’m going to puke again,” Jimmy said.

Dom pulled the car over and Jimmy crawled out onto the vacant sidewalk and vomited.

“He was our friend is all I’m saying, you know?” Dom said. “He was with us since we were kids playing wiffle ball by Sluice Pond. You know that. I don’t like it at all, and just leave him there in the snow like that. Cops won’t know who he is. They won’t be able to tell his mother n’ shit because you tossed his wallet and trashed his car miles away. For all they know Derek Sanderson robbed the place.”

“They’re not going to Chelsea, Dom,” Mel said, watching Jimmy finish and climb back into the car. “They’ll find out who he is soon enough. They’ll put two and two together. Maybe not for a few days, but soon enough.”

They didn’t say another word. It was as if Scott never existed. It didn’t sit easy with Dom, but he let his mind drift to the money he’d soon have and what he’d do with it. Thoughts of spending money in record stores and buying concert tickets steered his mind away from his dead friend. The winds picked up speed and knocked the car around every so often. Jimmy leaned back in the seat and didn’t let his friends know how tight he was gripping the Jesus-handle. Dom pulled onto route 128, the snow was much worse. They saw abandoned cars in snowbanks. Everyone was trapped and either made their way on foot to shelter, or they remained in their cars. Every so often a cigarette lighter would ignite inside the icy and snow-covered windows of the cars unable to move another inch.

Dom maneuvered around the cars. The snow was coming down so hard that it made enormous snow drifts next to the abandoned vehicles. Dom’s car began to skid and slide, he couldn’t gas it or get it over ten miles an hour.

“I’m not sure how much further I can go,” Dom said. “I think we’re fucked.”

“Just keep going. Try to get to an exit. I’ll have to call and tell them,” Mel said.

Dom made it to the bottom of an off ramp, but the car wouldn’t budge another inch. He gassed the car, but the back wheels ripped a ditch.

“Gun It!” Jimmy said.

“I am.”

“Let’s get out and push,” Mel said.

Jimmy and Mel got behind the car and put all their weight and might into the back, the tires spun even harder and deeper into the snow.

“You gassing it, Kid?” Mel shouted.

“I am!” Dom shouted. “I think I’m stuck.”

“God damn! Isn’t this a wicked fucking pisser,” Mel shouted, sliding down the back of the car.

“We gotta get back in the car, Mel.” Jimmy said.

Mel agreed.

They sat inside the car and warmed up. None of them knew what to do, but all of them understood that they had to get to Dedham in the next few hours to drop off the case.

“I’m going to see if there’s a phone somewhere near the end of the ramp,” Mel said.

“You’ll freeze to death,” Jimmy replied.

“We got no choice. If we don’t call in and explain they’ll fucking find us and stick our asses in a plastic barrel.”

Jimmy and Dom agreed.

“Besides, we’re the Big Bad Bs, no? Best fucking team in the league,” Mel said, slightly laughing and showing the two teeth he lost when he took a puck to the mouth in a game of pond hockey years ago.

Mel got out of the car and started walking into the blowing snow and wind. From the car they could see him struggling to get up the ramp. The white of his Bruins sweater was all they could see until he vanished from their sight. Dom looked in the back and saw the shotgun and the case. He thought about pulling a Scott and Shawn but kept the thought hidden from Jimmy. It made him sick to even think of hurting his two friends.

“You think he’ll make it?” Jimmy asked.

“Yeah, Mel don’t fuck around. He’ll be back.”

Dom looked in his rearview and noticed the orange glow of a snowplow trying to move its way up 128. The plow was pushing the snow aside and burying cars with or without people in them. The plow was making room for a statie’s patrol car.

“There’s a pig behind that plow,” Dom said.

Jimmy looked out the back window. “Cut the lights, man.”

Dom turned off the car and the sound off the dark blizzard wind slammed up against the car and rocked it around.

“Think he’ll see us?” Jimmy asked.

“I doubt it. We’re stuck at the bottom of the ramp. Probably just trying to get the pig out of the storm.”

Thirty yards back the plow stopped and the Statie got out of his car. Dom and Jimmy watched him investigate abandoned cars and talk to stranded motorists.

“He’s just probably letting them know help is on the way,” Jimmy said.

“There’s Mel,” Dom said, pointing at the end of the ramp.

Mel staggered through the winds like he’d been walking for days instead of a couple hundred yards. Mel took notice of the Statie and stopped in his tracks and backed up into the dark.

The Statie got back in his car and the plow moved forward. It stopped several cars away from Dom’s car.

“He’s going to come over here,” Jimmy said.

“No suh,” Dom said. He grabbed the shotgun and stuffed it in between his door and the seat. He grabbed the case and put it on the floorboard by Jimmy’s legs. “Don’t say a damn word. Let me talk to him.”

The Statie tapped on Dom’s window. Dom looked at him fully dressed in a dark blue winter coat with a hood, the pig’s face was wrapped in the fur of the hood. Dom rolled down the window.

“You guys going to the game?” The Statie said jokingly.

“No, we’re trapped,” Dom said. “Trying to wait it out the night.”

“You got blankets? I got a bunch in my trunk, been handing them out. National guard has been deployed to help with the storm but the soonest they’ll get here is tomorrow sometime.”

“Yeah…” Dom said, “We’ll take a few blankets if you got them.”

The Statie went back to his car, and Dom watched Mel run out from behind a car slammed up against a guard rail. Mel had his face covered and Dom noticed the pistol he killed Scott with was low to his side.

“Jesus, Jimmy, Mel’s gonna kill that pig.”

Mel crept up best he could, but the Statie turned around and gripped his service weapon. The blankets hit the ground and the Statie moved back. He slipped and hit his head on the back of his cruiser. Mel jammed the pistol into the Statie’s mouth and pulled the trigger.

The snowplow revved its engine. The driver put it in gear and tried to drive, but he was too late. Mel had already climbed up, reached in and shot the poor bastard in the side of the head.

“Fuck this,” Jimmy said. “We’re in it now, kid.”

Mel made it over to the car and climbed in. He sat in the back and rubbed his hands together to get himself warm. Neither Dom nor Jimmy had it in them to say a word.

“What’s going on in here?” Mel asked.

“Why the fuck did you do that?” Dom asked.

“We were going to get found out. Everything is in the car.”

“He was giving us blankets and moving on.” Jimmy said. “He told us help was on the way tomorrow. Jesus, Mel what the fuck were you thinking?”

Mel sat there and let the anger brew inside of him. His two friends didn’t have the sack to get the job done. They kept talking the talk but when it came to it, neither of them was able to get the job done, not like he had been doing all night.

“You get ahold of Billy?” Dom said.

“Couldn’t find a phone,” Mel said.

Dom looked at his friend. He looked past the mustache and the scars. He looked past his mental state and his complete lack of empathy. Mel was the one who stuck up for him when he took beatings in the halls of Lynn Tech when they were teens. The same friend who got him drunk and laid in the Combat Zone when he turned twenty-one. Mel had a lot of good qualities, that’s why he never left his side. They’d been through small stints in prison together. They robbed stores together. They ripped rails together like a couple of Columbian drug lords, but Dom missed the guy who liked going to Bruins games. And after the game, getting in fights with rich kids from Marblehead. Dom loved watching his friend knock the teeth out of some khaki wearing douche bag like he was Terry O’Reilly.

“What are we going to do now?”

Mel thought for a minute, “Let’s take the snowplow all the fucking way to Dedham.”

“We can’t just do that,” Dom said.

“Why the fuck not?”

“I don’t know what kind of frickin bullshit is running through your head, but there’s a dead statie twenty feet away, and a dead city worker. Not to mention our dead friend back in Town. Now you want to steal the plow and drive it to Dedham? The fuck, Mel, what the fuck are you thinking?”

“I don’t see any other choice. Billy’s going to kill us if we aren’t there. Do you think a head cracker like Billy is going to give a shit about a damn blizzard? Let me answer for you two jamokes, no, he’s not. In fact, he’s getting the plastic drums ready as we speak. His guys have the saws and hammers ready to go, so they can take our bodies apart and stuff us into those drums. It was us or them. It was us or Scott. I chose us. I choose the three of us and the case. I’ll take those odds any day of the week. You want to talk to me about killing a city worker and a cop? Well, let’s have it Dom. You tell me what the we should’ve done. I’m all fucking ears.”

Mel opened the car door and stepped out with the case. He walked over to the snowplow and dragged the guy out and tossed him to the ground. He motioned towards Dom and Jimmy, neither of them wanted to move.

“The fuck are they doing,” Mel said to himself. He climbed out of the snowplow and made his way to the car and knocked on the window.

“Let’s go!” He shouted.

Dom rolled down his window. “We’re not going, Mel. Get in the car and let’s wait out the storm.”

“You fucking kidding me?”

Mel kicked at a pile of snow; the wind blew him over. He wiped the snow from his frozen pants and stood up. When he was able to regain his balance, he looked into the window he saw the barrel of the shotgun pointed right at him. Dom’s face had a look of sadness mixed in fear plastered all over it.

Mel looked to his left, then his right. He let the freezing snow tickle his face for a second and let the wind rip through his hockey jersey and hit the skin. He turned his face back towards the gun. He had a moment of reflection and took hold of some clarity that he’d forgotten about years ago.

“Well, alright, fuck...” before he could finish Dom pulled the trigger. The spray from the blast shattered the giant B on his jersey, his innards and blood ran down his sweater. Mel’s lifeless body flew backwards into a snow drift.

Dom dropped the shotgun on his lap and rolled up the window. Jimmy took his eyes away from Dom’s tears. He didn’t want to watch a grown man cry; they came from a place where crying wasn’t allowed. They grew up in a world where it was better to spend life in prison than it was to show one single tear to anyone. It’s the curse all men from Massachusetts carried on their backs until the stress of it drove them to the bottle, suicide, or an early death.

The two of them didn’t speak a word until the next morning. Dom looked out the window and saw mountains of snow. The statie, city worker, and Mel were buried. The sun was shining and neither of them could see twenty feet in front of them because of the glare.

“Fucking Snowblind,” Jimmy said.

Dom noticed the snowplow was no longer was running. The battery had died. Then he saw the side of the truck, and the shamrock painted on the door.

“Jesus Christ, Jimmy.”

“What?”

“That’s not a city plow, Dom said. “It’s one of Billy O’Brien’s plows. They were out looking for us or following us I bet. Billy was never going to give us a cut. That Statie was with the plow. Wasn’t it a fucking 128 statie that found Shawn and let Mel know about Scott?”

“Fuck If I know,” Jimmy replied.

“Billy made us do all the heavy lifting; he wasn’t going to let us in on a dime.”

Jimmy pulled out a pistol from the inside of his coat and pressed it against Dom’s temple. Dom leaned away from the gun and put his head up against the door.

“Five-hole, Dom.” Jimmy said. “Cheever never gave up the five-hole.”

Jimmy guided Dom out of the car, and they both walked towards the ramp with the case.

“It wasn’t going to be me,” Jimmy said.

From the other side of the ramp, another shamrock painted plow drove down the one way and pulled within shouting distance of Dom and Jimmy.

“I got it right here,” Jimmy said, holding up the case.

“They are not going to let you walk, Jim.” Dom said. “They never planned to.”

“We’ll see about that one, Dom.” Jimmy replied.

Three men climbed out of the truck with M-16s. Jimmy put the case on the ground and kept the gun on Dom. Their Bruins sweaters glowed in the headlights. The three men didn’t utter a word. Jimmy’s eyes widened with disbelief. The three men pulled their triggers and lit up the morning sky with thunder and fire, letting every single last bullet rip through the Blizzard of 1978.

Frank Reardon was born in 1974 in Boston, Massachusetts, and currently lives in Charlotte, NC. He’s published short stories and poetry in many reviews, journals and online zines. He published five collections of poetry with Punk Hostage, Blue Horse, and NeoPoesis. Frank is currently working on a nonfiction column for Hobart; more short fiction; and will have a short story collection completed later in 2024.