Chapter 31
CHAPTER
THIRTY-ONE
THE LOMBARDIS
Over Thirty years ago…
“Come on numbnuts, keep up!” I bellowed to my little bastardo of a brother.
We shot down one of the alleys trying to flee the sirens, wailing from all directions.
I just got done paying a visit to the Irish territory.
I hated the way their shit family crests were displayed outside their bars and clubs.
Lucky for them I have impeccable taste, helping them to redecorate their fronts with a brick through each window.
I stop just short of emerging from between two buildings, when brilliant lights and wailing alarms streak past us. I put out my arm, stopping my incompetent brother from running headfirst into the side of the passing police cruiser.
Once the coast was clear, we barreled across the street, raced along the river, and continued fleeing that defiled part of town till our lungs burned.
Tears streamed down my fica brother’s face.
I thought about leaving him there after I threw my last brick but knew my father would murder me on the spot if I returned home without him.
What’s poetic about all this is, he looks up to me, therefore the little turd will always keep his mouth shut.
It’d be touching if I actually liked him, but I’d rather see him fileted from navel to sternum, tied to a cinder block, and thrown into the Boston Bay. Not by my hand, of course.
When we arrived home, our parents were waiting.
We both got walloped pretty good.
Pops already knew what happened, of course. He has eyes and ears everywhere in this city. He carried on about how our families are allies, and he’ll be damned if he lets me trifle with their crucial network.
My face healed in a couple days, but the marks across my body took almost a month. The baby of the family didn’t undergo nearly as many lashes as I did.
That night, we both got sent to bed without suppah.
I heard Ma sneak into my little brother’s room with soup and bread, after Pops went to sleep.
I however got an extra whack upside my head from a wooden spoon.
She’s a wise woman. She knew it was all my idea, even though Charles didn’t say a word about anything.
Ma cried for a long time, both from frustration and sorrow.
I’ll never forget the day they brought Charles home. Mama thought I was too young to remember, but how could a boy forget when his ma had a swollen belly one day, then found in a pool of her own blood the next. They took her to the hospital to heal.
When she came back home, everything was different. She didn’t want to play hide and seek anymore or push me on the tire swing. She wept whenever she thought no one was paying attention, but I saw.
I knew what happened even at that innocent age.
About a year later, my Nonna came over to watch me while my parents took a trip. I liked it when she visited. She let me help make lasagna from scratch and even taught me to be somewhat fluent in Italian.
I remember Mama walking through the door with Papa at her side. Her smile was bigger than I’d seen in a while.
I thought they brought me home a puppy because Pa had a large basket in his hands. I’ll never forget peering into the large, wicker basket and not finding a pet, but a person. I was so mad, I ran to my room and screamed into my bed until my throat burned.
Then, I grabbed the paintbrushes and new paint colors my Nonna brought me from Sicily.
I snapped each wooden handle in half and threw all the wreckage into the bin.
I felt like I cried forever. At one point I sobbed so hard, my pa came in and hollered at me to quiet down before I woke the baby, or he’d really give me something to cry about.
Everything hurts and I hate him. Not my father who clearly didn’t give two fucks about my feelings, but the new child my parents brought home.
I have nothing but resentment for the imposter who took my life from me.
As I grew older, it became more and more apparent who my parents preferred. Although when I was small, I told myself if I was good, said my prayers, and made good grades; I could become their new favorite, but it never happened.
My teenage years were a bit more colorful.
I was quite rebellious and turned to drugs.
It’s easy to be a delinquent when your family has the drug market cornered.
If I was never going to be the best, I might as well be the worst I could possibly be.
I’m a committed guy when I put my mind to something.
Isn’t that what Pa always wanted? For me to excel at something?
I will admit, I was kind of a loose cannon at times.
Anyone who pissed me off or even remotely looked at me wrong, found themselves beaten to a bloody pulp.
Generally, my father knew what I was up to, he just didn’t fucking care anymore, as long as I left his precious boy out of it.
There was another time I crossed the line, when I tried to pursue a red-haired girl, at a family function.
My father said, I had no business going near a girl like her.
Even though she was underaged, the puttana was already promised to another.
I think Mr. Lombardi was more upset that I could have put a rift between his precious connections.
I was upset that I didn't get my dick wet.
On my ceremony day, when the knife and pistol sat on the table, I took a blood oath to honor this family.
My father, the captain, and other inducted members in attendance watched on as I became a man.
Everyone must have somehow forgiven me for all my fuck ups or their Don threatened them if they spoke against his decision.
Charles was younger, so I was elated to finally have something he didn’t; but I knew it wouldn’t be like this forever.
For a while, I was on the straight and narrow.
I listened when my elders gave advice, thought carefully about my actions, and strived to be the son my parents saw fit to take the reins, all in the name of the Lombardi family.
I also learned about how our family had their web stretching far across the city and how we had a symbiotic relationship with other groups like the Murrays.
They pointed customers our way and vice versa.
I was a dumb kid when I chucked stones at their business fronts.
I kept my nose clean and my head on straight, but that fiery haired girl never left my mind. What was her name? No matter how much time passed, she wouldn’t get out of my head. I needed to find out if that was her natural hair color.
Omerta is the most important code in the mob.
If you're not in the family, you're not going to know much about us. Civilians remain blissfully unaware of who controls every major construction project in the Boston area. We get kickbacks from new projects, since our family had ranks within the union leadership. Having the association in our back pocket meant we monopolized the entire industry. If contractors or the big developers didn’t pay on time, we had the ability to bring all development to a screeching halt. That’s not the only way the Lombardi family gained power, we also had middlemen circulating narcotics within our terrain.
Connections from Southeast Asia allowed an ample supply of heroin and opioids to the states.
Mr. Lombardi drew the line at cocaine. Too many hands in the dope business, not a safe bet.
It was easy money, the drug business; it doesn’t dry up either.
Our granddad always said Americans are avid consumers… there's always a market here.
Eventually, Charles came of age and completed his ceremony as well. He instantly became the star pupil. I was naive to think I had a shot at rising to the top of the mob.
My Ma and Pa were so proud to have their baby, finally learning the family business. The kid could have lit our home on fire, and they still wouldn’t be deterred from giving him the world.
Everything that was rightfully mine. I am the first-born son after all. An actual full-blooded Lombardi, unlike my bastardo brother, Charles. I’m not meant to be a fucking solider, I’m supposed to be the Don! Not him! Someone who never belonged in this family in the first place.
As I stood watching my legacy handed over to someone who never deserved it, I made an oath to myself.
I’ll play my part for now, but when the time arrives, I will squeeze every ounce of happiness from Charles.
It’s like playing chess at a snail's pace. Slowly, I will take back what I’m owed, piece by piece.
In the meantime, I’m not going to sit around, letting life’s pleasures slip through my fingers.
One summer evening, I found the red-haired princess just happening by. Like the stars had aligned, I’m going to take something for myself.
Far enough away so as not to raise suspicion, I followed the little fox all the way to the South End of the warehouse district.
Then right into Club 114. I remained camouflage behind crowds of people, as she made her way through the club, looking for something.
Maybe a group or a friend? If this was going to happen, I needed to make my move before she found someone she knew.
Before I entered the club, I spotted one of our dealers, who I purchased a cap from.
He was happy to oblige, especially when I threw an extra hundred on top, for discretion.
As my target moved through the dancing bodies, I slipped close enough to administer the small syringe into her arm.
She never saw me coming. No one batted an eye as I took what looked like an inebriated girl, out by the arm and into the fruitful night.
She was everything I hoped she would be.
I’m also happy to report the carpet does indeed match the drapes.
I learned much later that my midnight romp was a little more complicated than I anticipated.
Although I already knew the girl’s virtue I took was promised to another, I didn’t know who she was destined to marry.
A rather esteemed alliance of ours, actually.
The heir to the Murray Empire. I thought she was a nobody, a loose acquaintance my father forbade, but she would someday be someone my family worked with regularly.
Fuck. I already didn’t care about the relationship our families had. The way they conducted business was shoddy and most of their clientele were destitute has-beens or drunks. The whole Murray family was a shameful bunch of bogtrotters. If it were my choice, I would get rid of them all together.
While I was sent to do the shitty grunt work, my brother was tasked with expanding the family. It seemed as though everyone had a prized daughter to offer up to the great Lombardi legacy. It didn’t take long until he was smitten with one of the capo’s girls.
I had zero interest in settling down. In fact, the relationships I sought were more of the business variety.
I’m no rat, but finding a foothold within the Boston PD was imperative to regaining control of this city.
I understood this venture could take a considerable amount of time.
People in Southie have big mouths and small imaginations.
A little birdie told me the “Virgin” Mary wanted to devote her time to a church in Ireland, in turn, delaying her marriage to Patrick Murray. A few months short of a year, she returned to marry her betrothed.
Doesn’t take a fucking genius to realize what happened. She went there for a reason and was forced to leave something behind.
Despite my better judgement, I attended the wedding being sure to sit in a far-off pew.
I guess that’s one of the benefits of being a do-boy, rather than the face of the family.
No one really knows what I look like. The wedding was so grand that all the flower shops were sold out of yellow roses for weeks.
I schooled my features as I listened to the bride in white, made promises of chastity and commitment to her new husband.
The church may be bursting with roses, but this young lady had already been deflowered by yours truly.
A surge of intense heat consumed me, while the newlyweds kissed.
All these false pretenses surrounding me makes me sick. I need more players in the game if I’m ever going to become king.