Diamond in the Rough

Fiona Nicholson shuffles together some paperwork and puts it inside her briefcase, finally ready for heading home after a very busy day. She would like nothing better than to just sit with a glass of wine, but she still has so many boxes to unpack. It will be another few weeks until she is fully settled in to the apartment and she dreads having to find a place for everything. The apartment is an old town house on Kemper avenue, the neighbourhood quite reserved since the surrounding neighbourhoods are in the thick of what was once known as the old town. As she walks to her car she juggles with her bags to answer her ringing cell-phone, the jingle irritating.

"Hello?" She says without checking caller I.D

"It's Maggie. How was your first day at the office?"

Maggie Jenkins and Fiona had been friend's since high school and had kept in touch when Fiona had left for law school. After several years away, she returned for the opportunity she had dreamed of since setting her mind on being a lawyer.

"It was great. Pretty tiring if I'm honest. There's just too much to learn all in one day, but I still can't believe I'm working for the DA"

"You've worked hard for this. You deserve it. Anyway, I was thinking maybe we could go for a few drinks tonight to celebrate you being back
here and to your new job" Maggie says quite happily.

Fiona tries to think of a logical reason not to, but she's struggling to come up with anything.

"That sounds great. Why don't you come over to mind and we can have a bottle of wine and pizza?"

Maggie agrees that it sound perfect and hangs up.
Fiona gets into her car with a broad smile. She's managed to get out of
unpacking.

******
Albert"Gloansy" MaGloan sets down a tray of drinks in the centre of the table, six beers and three shots of Jameson's irish whisky. The three thuggish looking men prematurely toast to their next job before it has even happened. Already they are contemplating the pay-out.
Gloansy is a big guy, built like a football player with a shaved head and criminal convictions for stealing cars and once dabbling in drugs as a sideline. Boosting cars had sent him twice to Walpole,but now he has a woman to come home to and a bouncing baby, the risks have become even greater.
Desmond Elden on the other hand is the complete opposite of his three partners in crime. He doesn't have a record, not even a speeding ticket or a parking fine.

Jem heads up to the bar and waves a fifty at the brown haired bar girl, probably new and looks completely overwhelmed by the high demands from customers. Finally after waiting for a few minutes, he's served which suits him just fine. He orders six beers and three shots of vodka, happily soaking up the atmosphere after nine years of staring at bars and walls.

"Jem!" A voice cries. He turns around to see Krista walking towards him, unsteady on her feet.

"Buy your little sister a drink"

Jem grudgingly buys he one beer. He doesn't agree with her excessive drinking, especially when she has Shyne to look after. But that argument had been going on for weeks and even more while Jem was locked up. He hated the way she whored herself for drinks and a high. He knows Shyne is the result of a one night stand and Krista had never once mentioned who the father might be. It just angered him more.

"You seen Doug?" He asks his sister before he drinks the dregs from his bottle.

"Back at the house. He's in such a pissy mood these days"

Jem listens to her rant. She's like this when she's drunk and wasted, bitter.

"All he cares about is himself. Guy needs a reality check" she spews out her opinion like everyone cares what she thinks.

Jem rolls his eyes. She always came to him when she couldn't have her way with Doug, when he wouldn't just do what she wanted and that bitter rejection manifested in her, making her cruel. He had listened to Krista several times in the past through plexi-glass at the prison, just whining and moaning that Doug never looked at her the same way like he used. Jem found it hard to admit, but he could see exactly what Krista was.

"Doug doesn't want you, Kris. Get over it" he finally says and walks away back to his own table. He's not here to listen to listen to his sister's sob story, the one she told every guy so he would feel sorry for her and buy her a drink. Deep in the recesses of his heart Jem knows that Doug being sober is a good thing, although he does miss his drinking buddy. Like Krista, the booze and pills had taken over Doug's life and he became reckless.

Jem laughs loudly at one of Gloansy's observations, one of Krista's friends hanging over some guy in his fifties. Des returns with another round of drinks, double shots of vodka on the menu.

Fiona and Maggie stand on the sidewalk outside Malone's bar, a mixture of cheering, singing and music working it's way out onto the street. They agree that it sounds like a lively atmosphere and decide on trying the bar out, the last bar they had been to had been almost dead.
They push their way into the queue at the bar, feeling claustrophobic.
Fiona searches the bar for an empty table, most of them already occupied by drunks. She spots a table next to three brutish looking men, irish tattoos and debates with herself whether to try and find a
table. She decides against it.

"Mind if we sit here?" She says to the bigger of the three men who has her back to her.

"Go ahead" he replies, his eyes watching them closely.

Maggie scoots along the seat, trying to distance herself from the three rowdy men. She watches them as they drink their beers like water. Greedy.
Fiona sips her vodka and orange and wonders who is in charge of the music and discovers an old fashioned jukebox in the corner by the bar. A woman who looks like she's been pulled through a field is dancing to the music, alone and completely shit faced. There's a vague similarity between the dancing diva and one of the guys at the next table. She recognises him, but can't figure out why.
As the night wears on, the bar empties and the music is turned down a bit. She can hear snippets of the conversation at the next table, their excited, playful banter pulsating.

"I need to go to the little girls room" Maggie says and walks off to the restrooms that are located downstairs.

Fiona remains at the table to watch their drinks, the possibility of someone dropping anything in their drinks vetoed. She had worked cases where young women had been attacked after someone put something in their drinks, the result of not watching their drinks. Maggie returns and Fiona heads up to the bar, her round.

She looks along the lines of various brands, several bottles of irish whiskies and liqueurs. The atmosphere is smoky, stinking of beer and various cologne's merging together. She feels someone brush against her and she takes a peak. It's one of the guys from the table next to her. The one she thinks she knows from somewhere. She can smell his aftershave, strong and musky.

He glances at her, a quick smile and waves a fifty at the barmaid.

"Six beers and three jameson's." His accent is local, Bostonian.

She can feel him watching her as she waits to be served.

"What's a classy girl like you doing in a hole like this?" He asks.

"Something different I suppose."

"I've not seen ya before in here. You new around here?" He takes a sip of his beer and leans on his elbow.
She's sure she knows him, perhaps someone from her childhood here.

"I was here along time ago,but moved away. Now I'm back" she replies.

"Sounds like some adventure. Can I buy ya a drink?"

She's indecisive. She doesn't know him and doesn't trust him.

"Sure. You remind me of someone I went to school with" Fiona says.

"The names Jem. Jem Coughlin'

'I knew I recognised you." Fiona laughs. They had grown up together and then she had moved away, their friendship broken apart.

"Since we're trading names what's yours" he says as he hands her the vodka and orange.

"Fiona Nicholson"

They had once been close, around the age of fifteen when their hormones reacted in different ways. Her parents knew about his reputation and banned her from ever talking to him or seeing him again, even as a friend. They feared that he would pull her under, get her into drugs and alcohol or even get pregnant. They knew she had a crush on him and when she went against them, they made the permanent decision to remove her from the equation.