by Brook Wilder
“A plan like this is too risky, Junie… if the government catches onto the Rebels’ transactions as well, that means we’re both going down,” Aiden said, unzipping his leather jacket and tossing it aside.
“Oh, but you’re missing something,” Junie said knowingly. “I can always start my own business… launder your money through it. That way, no one has to find out.”
Aiden paused for a second. At that point, he was seriously considering it.
“Sounds like too big of a risk to me,” Will said, kicking his feet up on the table. “What do you think, Johnny-Boy?” he asked.
“Same thing,” he said, raising his eyes to Junie. “A shootout is easier, more efficient.”
“Hey, the police already got their eyes out,” Amy said. “The risk is way bigger if we conduct another operation involving firearms,” she continued.
“I agree,” Aiden said, stroking his beard. “Alright, well, I think I need to sleep on this… but either way, we’re going to need to act fast.”
“Also one more thing,” Junie said, her eyes growing wide. “You have an advantage that Lee doesn’t; you have a clean record. Lee’s track record is pretty bad… there’s no way he can start a business of his own to launder money through,” she continued.
“She has a point,” Amy said.
“Alright, well, I’m halfway there… we just need to figure out a way to avert the government’s attention to our cause,” Aiden said with his hands still clasped in his lap.
“I’m honestly not sure if this is a good idea… but the final decision’s up to Aiden, here,” Will said. Jon-Boy nodded in agreement.
“Just let me sleep on it,” Aiden said again. “I’ll figure something out.”
CHAPTER 26
“Did I ever mention democracy’s a beautiful thing?” Junie asked, stepping out of her representative’s office. She grabbed Aiden’s hand, the two of them hurrying down the stairs and out of the city council building. Junie had spent the entire night typing up a bill to propose to the council, one that she and Aiden liked to refer to as the “Kicking the Mercenaries’ Ass Law”, but preferred to disguise as the “Anti-Tax Evasion Law”.
“I can’t believe they took it,” Aiden said, breathing a sigh of relief.
“Let’s not get our hopes up too high… they still have to propose the bill to the upper board… they’re the ones who are going to decide whether or not the law will pass.”
“Yeah, I know,” Aiden said, checking the window shops as they walked. “I’m still relieved though… hopefully they get back to us soon.”
Junie smiled to herself. For once, everything was coming together. She and Aiden were on the same page; at that point, it was evident to her that nothing could come between them. “I’m really hungry,” she said, her eyes landing on a nearby store sign. “That a new food place that’s opening?” she asked while fixated on the large crowd lining up outside the red brick store. The couple walked closer to what seemed to be a burger place, and when Junie raised her eyes to the sign, a big cursive “Lee’s” filled her vision. “Um, is that what I think it is?” she asked, turning to look at Aiden.
“Nah, it can’t be,” he said. “Can it?” Suddenly Aiden was filled with doubt. Something was telling him to push his way through the crowd and just go in there. He pulled Junie with him, the two of them squeezing past the people standing in line and finally reaching the cashier. Behind it was the door to the kitchen, a beaded curtain hanging from its frame.
“Hey, how’s everything going?” a broad shouldered man burst out from behind the curtain. He was addressing the cashier, and when his gaze met Aiden’s, he couldn’t help but smile and look away. It was Lee. For a second Aiden thought he had seen a ghost, and when he turned to look at Junie, she was dumbfounded as well.
“Oh my,” she said. The two of them turned to leave. Outside, they found another queue, and this time, it extended out to the street. Junie looked up and the sign said “Lee’s Arcade”.
“This is a literal nightmare,” Aiden said, stumbling a few steps back. He couldn’t keep his eyes off the pink neon sign that read “Lee’s Arcade” in squiggly thick lines, and neither could he stop hearing the kids as they laughed and chatted, the games inside beeping loudly.
“Let’s get out of here,” Junie said, tugging at Aiden’s sleeve. The two of them crossed over to the other side of the road, unable to process what had just happened. Suddenly Junie felt weak, like something had come over her. She looked over at Aiden and he was tongue-tied. “Let’s just go home,” she said again, holding onto his hand.
***
“Hey, Aiden, pass me the sponge, will you?” Junie asked, her pearly teeth showing through her smile.
“Here’s ten, twenty, thirty bucks,” Aiden said, flipping through a wad of cash, pulling out some change and handing it over to a little boy standing at the door of the arcade. “Here,” he said again, throwing Junie a wet sponge.
“Thanks,” she said, squeezing it dry and smoothing it over the roof of the car parked in the arcade driveway. Two months had passed by and Aiden couldn’t be more grateful. He couldn’t be more grateful for Junie, and all that she had done for him. Together, they decided to open up an arcade to compete with Lee’s business, but theirs wasn’t just an arcade, but a car wash, too.
“I love you,” Aiden said, planting a kiss on Junie’s cheek. “I wouldn’t have been able to do any of this if it weren’t for you.”
“Hey, you were the one who thought about doing bike design competitions for the kids… now that’s genius,” Junie said, sprinkling water all over his hair.
“Yeah?” he said, grabbing a water bucket and bracing to pour it all over her. “You wanna piece of me?”
CHAPTER 27
Aiden was operating the cash register when he noticed a group of strange men walk into his arcade. They had their leather jackets on, but they didn’t look too intimidating. One of them took a seat beside the snack bar. “Do you have cheeseburgers?” he asked, his eyebrows furrowed.
Aiden smiled to himself. How serious can you be while ordering a cheeseburger? “Of course, we do,” he said, catching a glimpse of the Mercenaries’ logo at the back of the man’s jacket. The truth was, he wasn’t surprised. In fact, he wasn’t surprised at all, his business was taking over Lee’s. He took the men’s orders and walked away, pretending to fumble with a few things on the pool table.
“Think he would take us in if we asked him?” Aiden heard one of them say.
“Probably not… he’ll think we’re spies working for Lee,” another said. Aiden smiled to himself again. Sweet victory. Lee’s business was a sinking ship, and he couldn’t wait to see it disappear underwater.
Junie went out to buy some supplies. She had made it a daily ritual to go check on Lee’s arcade, just in case anything new popped up. This time, she noticed something different. Outside the little red brick building, two blonde women stood in string bikinis. They were bent over a Convertible, pretending to wash it. Junie eyed the passersby as they shook their heads in dismay.
“Do they still do that?” a woman asked, rolling her eyes.
“Someone tell the owner of this place this isn’t the nineties,” another said. Junie smiled to herself. Finally, something worth scoping out. It seemed to her that it was only a matter of time before Lee went out of business.
***
“Junie,” Aiden said, barging into her room. Junie jumped.
“What?” she asked, dropping her book and throwing her feet off the side of the bed. “What happened?”
“It’s Lee… he bashed our bar, the Rebels’ bar,” Aiden said, struggling to take his breath.
“Wait, wait… just calm down. Tell me what happened,” Junie said, grabbing him by the shoulders.
“I, I don’t know… one of my men told me. Those bastards are going around destroying the club’s property!” he snarled.
“Don’t let him get to you!” Junie said, trying to get Aiden to calm down. “He�
��s trying to push you just so you would do something stupid,” she continued. “You’re on the right track. His business is going down.”
“How do you know his business is going down? For all I know, he could be thinking of new ways to drive you and me out of business!” Aiden said, his eyes wide.
“You know how I know Lee’s going to run out of business any day now?” Junie asked, her lips twisting into a wry smile. “I passed by his franchise the other day… he fucking brought swimsuit models to operate the car wash for him!” she said. “You won’t believe how angry people got.”
“That’s pretty desperate of him,” Aiden said, shaking his head.
“See?” Junie said, rising to her feet. “We’re better than him… what he’s doing is just a desperate attempt to break us. But he doesn’t know how strong we are, now, does he?”
“He doesn’t.”
“Alright, now come here,” Junie said, leaning in and pressing her lips to Aiden’s.
CHAPTER 28
“Eight hundred, nine hundred, one thousand,” Junie said, tying up her wad of cash with a rubber band and stuffing it into the pocket of her jacket.
“How are we looking?” Aiden asked, leaning over the counter.
Junie’s face drooped to a scowl. “Not so good… today we made even less money than Monday,” she said, raising her eyes to Aiden, who sighed in frustration.
“I don’t know what went wrong,” he said, running his fingers through his hair. He stared down at his feet, looking deep in thought. “Sometimes businesses just die out, there’s no explanation for it.”
“That’s nonsense,” Junie said, her ponytail swinging back and forth as she shook her head from side to side. “There has to be a reason, and we’re going to find out that reason. But meanwhile, I think I know how we can make some extra cash.”
“How?” Aiden asked, staring at her like she was his last hope.
“I’m going to open up a bake sale at Matt’s school… you know, so we can cover a few expenses,” she said.
“You can even use the money for his basketball team,” Aiden said, smiling weakly. “Meanwhile, I’m going to figure out what went wrong… maybe if I go around town, do some research, I’ll figure it out.”
“I don’t want you to worry, we’ve got this,” Junie said, placing a hand on Aiden’s cheek. He grabbed her hand and kissed it.
“You have no idea how lovely you are,” he said, a glimmer in his eyes.
***
“Alright, that’s two hundred cookies,” Junie said, handing the tray over to Aiden and watching as he rushed out of the kitchen. The entire gymnasium was set up just for this event, and the truth was, Junie was a bit nervous. She walked over to the double doors and peered outside. The turnout was way bigger than she thought. As her eyes scanned the basketball court, she could recognize the faces of a few parents from her neighborhood, people she never thought would show up.
“Aiden sure did a good job running around town telling people about a bake sale,” she muttered, turning around and heading back to the oven. Suddenly she heard someone burst through the kitchen door.
“Junie, you won’t believe who’s outside,” Amy said, her eyes wide. Junie shook her head in confusion. “It’s Rupert Gales!”
“What? Rupert Gales?” Junie asked, squinting. “The politician?”
“Yes, Junie, the politician!” Amy said, her eyes growing even wider than before. “Can you believe this?”
“Wait, wait, what brought him here?” Junie asked, walking back over to the doors. There was a pause.
“Aiden did,” Amy said, smiling at her a mischievous smile. Junie couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “He managed to reach out to him after you guys proposed that bill about tax evasion… now he wants to give a speech about work ethic here, at your event.”
For a moment, Junie felt like she couldn’t speak. “I can’t believe this,” she said, suddenly bursting through the doors.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” a voice sounded through the microphones. “First, I’d like to thank Mariposa Elementary for having me here… but I’d also like to thank Ms. Junie, the owner of this bake sale, for being the role model that she is for all kids out there.”
Junie felt like her knees were about to buckle.
“Working is a challenge, let alone working honorably… and it has been brought to my attention that hard working women like Ms. Junie don’t get nearly as enough recognition as they should. And businesses like… well, I’m not going to mention any names, get way too much of this recognition. Therefore, I would like to openly condemn businesses that operate on injustice, on moral impurity. They are not models for our youth. But this bake sale, for example, and the people who own it… now those are the people we should all look up to.”
Junie heard her first round of applause. It sprouted from a single wham to a wave of sound in no time. She brought her hands together and looked over at Aiden, who was staring at her from the far end of the gymnasium. He nodded at her, as if to tell her that she did a good job. The feeling was like no other. It was like nothing she had ever witnessed before.
***
Local arcade business gets shut down after owner is arrested for gun possession.
“Aha, look at this,” Junie said, passing the newspaper over to Aiden. He spread it out and read it carefully, his lips curving to a gradual smile as Lee’s picture filled his view. He had his hands cuffed up behind him, and he stared at the camera lens with such contempt that Aiden could feel it seeping through the fine paper.
“He got what he deserved,” he said, rather to himself. He tossed the paper aside and got up to his feet. And for once, he didn’t feel that heavy weight smother him. He looked to Junie but was speechless. He owed that woman his life; no matter what he did, he knew he could never make up for what she has already done.
“Thing are looking up,” she said, her cheeks tinted a rosy red.
“And it’s all because of you,” Aiden muttered, a wide smile on his face.
CHAPTER 29
“Raise it up, boys!” Aiden said, watching the construction workers as they hung up the sign to his new store. “Just a tad bit to the left!”
“That’s a nice store, you got there,” Junie said, resting her chin on his shoulder. Aiden turned around and kissed her.
“Fifth store, baby,” he smiled against her lips. Junie raised her eyes to the giant solid “T” being erected on the storefront. She let out a sigh, pursed her lips and looked down at her feet. For the first time in a long time, Junie felt like saying a prayer. She felt like commemorating T in a way no one has ever been commemorated before. This store was only the beginning.
“I’m glad we did this,” she said, locking fingers with Aiden. She looked to the other side of the road, and when her eyes landed on a leather jacket crossing the street, she didn’t flinch. “Good morning,” she smiled, reaching her hand out to Jason, a former Mercenary.
“Mornin’, how’s your new store coming along?” he asked with his hands on his hips.
“It’s coming along quite nicely,” Aiden said, the two of them standing side by side and squinting at the sun.
“That T for Tom?” the man asked.
“Yeah,” Aiden said with his hands clasped behind his head. “Once the store is finished, you can grab your buddies and come down… drinks are on me,” he continued.
“We’re all with you, Aiden… it’s about time the Mercenaries and the Rebels come together. Lee was doing a crappy-ass job keeping the club from falling apart, and now, you get to build this joint from scratch.”
“Maybe not from scratch… but I’ll do my best to unite the two clubs. It’ll be the best of both worlds,” he said, the corners of his mouth twitching upwards, reaching a smile it hasn’t reached in years.
“Well, good luck with that,” Jason said, giving him a thumbs up before he turned around and walked in the opposite direction. Junie flashed Aiden a smirk.
“He seems nice,” she said. �
��Maybe Mercenaries have hearts, after all.”
Aiden chuckled. “Aren’t you supposed to pick Matt up from his basketball game?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at her.
“Decided to let him play with his friends,” Junie said, shifting her weight to one leg. For the first time in a long time, she knew she had nothing to worry about. With the Mercenaries either behind bars or jumping to Aiden’s side, Junie knew no one would be terrorizing her son in the streets. No dog masks, no horror. It was like everything was falling back into place again. “I should probably drive up there, regardless,” she said with a smile. “Come to think of it, I kinda wanna know how he did in his game.”