3. Maeve
Maeve
I was fifteen when my childhood ended.
It started with the arrest. DISGRACED AGENT, the news said, my father's face above words I didn't fully understand—bribery, obstruction.
That was the trigger for my mother’s drug-induced decline.
Less than a year later, Oisin was born. My mother was already gone by then, not in body but in every way that mattered.
I ran the house while she walked around hollowed out from the inside.
She died from an overdose when Oisin was a few months old. To keep my family together, I dropped out of school and went to work.
The bus ride home takes forty-five minutes. I spend it staring out the window, my reflection ghostly in the dirty glass.
I look bone-tired. I’ve been bone tired for one thousand four hundred and twenty-three days.
My landlord is waiting for me in the hallway when I return.
Jerry’s in his late forties, soft in the middle, and has a smile like a wet handshake. He leans against the wall by my door.
"There she is." He looks me over. "You're behind again, sweetheart."
"I know. Friday. I get paid Friday."
"Mm." His eyes do that creepy thing they do. "Or, you know. We could always work something else out. Make it easier on both of us."
I smile and pretend I’m not about to puke. “I’ll have it in full on Friday.”
He pushes off the wall, close enough that I get the full scent of his nasty body odor, then ambles off whistling.
I let myself in and lock the door behind me, both locks, and lean against it.
Jamie, fourteen and furious at the entire world, sits on the couch. Cara is on the floor drawing on a scratchpad. Oisin comes barreling toward me.
“MaeMae!" He slams into me, wrapping his arms around my knees, and for that one second, everything is worth it.
"Hey, baby." I scoop him up. He weighs nothing. His shoes are too small again—I can see his toes pressing the ends.
I make dinner from what's there—pasta, the end of a jar of sauce, the last of a loaf of bread. I serve the kids then stand at the sink and eat the leftovers off Oisin's plate when he's done, because there isn't a fifth portion.
The cupboard's down to a box of rice and some flour. Tomorrow's a plasma day. I sell my blood at the center on Western for forty dollars a pop.
Forty dollars is forty dollars, and the kids have to eat.
After they're in bed, I sit at the kitchen table rubbing my forehead.
Two dollars and thirty cents in change. That's all we’ve got. We’re out of food, rent is due Friday, and despite what I told the landlord, I won’t have it. The numbers don't work. The numbers haven't worked in years. So far, I’ve just managed to outrun them.
Then I remember the envelope I stuffed into my purse when the mail came, so I wouldn't have to look at it yet.
Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.
I read the letter twice.
A scheduled home visit. A date, two weeks out.
A caseworker with a clipboard and a checklist will be walking through this apartment, opening the bare cupboard, reading Jamie's behavioral reports from school, asking Cara a question Cara won't answer, and deciding, after everything I've bled and sold and swallowed, that I am not enough.
The four of us will be scattered into separate houses. The kids will be thrown into the system that I’ve gutted the past three years of my life to keep them out of.
I look down the hall at the bedroom door. Behind it, sleeps my whole family—a family I’ll do anything to protect.
I know what needs to be done.
I've made thousands of sacrifices. What's one more?
It’s the only way.
I’ll marry the mobster.
The heavy wooden door of St. Brigid’s looms in front of me.
I can do this.
With a deep breath for courage, I swing open the door and step inside.
A man dressed in a dark suit stands near the altar.
My knees won't stop shaking, and as I make my way to him, his stare bores into me, causing me to falter slightly.
The man takes a step toward me. He’s tall, broad-shouldered, and I’m sure his suit probably sports a designer label. His presence makes the air shift.
This is him? My betrothed.
He's not old. He's not the graying, twice-my-age, pot-bellied monster I'd been bracing for. He's maybe in his late twenties, early thirties at most. Dark hair, sharp jawline, laughing green eyes.
And he's gorgeous.
Devastatingly so.
My body betrays me instantly—heat floods my cheeks, my pulse kicks up, and my core tightens in a way I've never felt before.
I hate it. I hate that my traitorous body is responding to him like this.
He's still a criminal. Still a man I don't love. Still someone my father traded me to like chattel.
"Maeve?" His voice is deep, smooth, with just a hint of roughness underneath.
I nod, not trusting my voice.
His gaze travels over me—not leering, exactly, but thorough.
I wonder what he sees. A too-thin girl with limp hair and dark circles under her eyes wearing jeans that are clean but well-worn and a blouse that—although it’s my best—has seen better days.
Then his mouth quirks up at the corner. "Well. Aren't you a surprise."
"What's that supposed to mean?" The words come out crisp and accusatory.
He chuckles, and the sound does something unfair to my nervous system. "Nothing. Just didn't expect..." He gestures vaguely at me. "You."
I cross my arms. "Sorry to disappoint."
"Didn't say I was disappointed." His grin widens, easy and confident in a way that makes me want to slap him and lean closer simultaneously. "Come on. Let's get this done."
The ceremony is quick. Perfunctory. Performed by a priest who looks uncomfortable, like he knows exactly what kind of union this is.
Lorcan O'Rourke stands beside me at the altar and says his vows as if he’s reciting a grocery list, not pledging to spend the rest of his life with me.
When the priest asks if I take this man, my throat closes up.
It’s only now that I realize maybe we should have had a conversation first, gotten to know each other. I can stop this whole thing right now. Maybe I should. We can talk first. Set some ground rules.
On the other hand, if I don’t go through with it now, I might never have the courage again.
I picture the kids scattered across the foster system, Cara trying to navigate a home where no one understands her silence, Jamie angry and acting out in a group home, Oisin confused, scared, and crying for me.
"I do," I whisper.
Lorcan slides a simple gold ring onto my finger.
"You may kiss the bride."
My heart stops.
Lorcan turns to me, and for the first time since I arrived, something flickers across his face—hesitation? Consideration?
Then he leans in.
His lips brush mine, soft and brief. Chaste, almost.
But even that feather-light touch sends a jolt of electricity through me that I feel all the way to my toes.
He pulls back, eyes searching mine for a beat too long. Did he feel it too?
I look away first.
Because if I don't, I'm going to do something stupid—like forget that this isn't real.
He's a mobster. No doubt a dangerous psychopath.
I cannot, and will not, let myself forget that.