Hollonent: The Gathering

Chapter 8

I clench my fists, prepared for trouble. Chloe sits with her back to the young delinquents but she's as distressed as I am. The room is alarming silent, except for the sporadic sound of cutlery scraping against porcelain plates. The other customers don't seem to notice what is happening.

The tomboyish girl roughly takes one of the wooden stairs and plants her butt on it. She mutters something in Russian, which catches the attention of their 'chief''. He says something in an annoyed tone in a tongue unknown to me, yet I understand a name. Alenka. Guessing that is the name of the brown-haired girl, I continue to inspect the situation. Their small squabble is interrupted by the frightened owner. His voice betrays his fear with stuttering and a voice crack. The blonde, shady guy walks up to the owner, making him quake in his boots even more. The blonde leader grabs the owner by his collar, shaking him up a bit more, and orders something in Russian.

The owner sighs deeply as if he just gave his life away. He slaps the blonde leader's hands away. The other delinquents give a reaction to that, but the blond guy makes them stand down. Dad's hand grasps my lower arm, signaling me to not intervene. He's right. This isn't our fight.

The blonde man has trained his pack well. All four of them, the two girls and two guys listen to his command. A short silence is interrupted by the owner, going to the back of the restaurant. The young delinquents are left with us, the customers. I glare at the leader. He glares back at me from the corner of his eye. His wolf stare burns into me intensely. But I don't give in. His fiery eyes demand me to look away, but I don't. My muscles tense up and his eyes become sharper. The world around us stops. I know, as he does, that if this was another, uncontained situation, one of us would get hurt. Or even die. I don't dare to imagine who that would be.

Suddenly, the owner comes back with a large sum of money and gives it to the blond guy. He quickly counts the stash and puts it in his pocket. He then nods and leads his pack outside. The girl, Alenka, kicks the chair under the table she took it first from, leaving a dull bang to echo in the restaurant. When the door closes, everything returns to normal as if nothing happened. The owner goes back to his kitchen and everyone resumes eating.

Chloe kicks my leg. My head shoots up and I stare directly into her eyes.

"What the hell was that?" She says, disbelieved.

"I've no idea," I say honestly.

"That was for protection money," Gina mutters between two bites of her food.

"Protection money? You mean the mafia?" I whisper disbelieved.

"Yeah, those guys." Gina answers, without paying attention to me, "It happens all over the world. Where there is mafia, there are acts like these."

"Still, those guys looked pretty young." Chloe counters, "Like our age."

"Yeah. But look at us. How is that different?"

Furious bubbles build up in Chloe. Before she can let out her anger, I kick her leg. I deserve a villainous glare from her, but manage to calm her down with just a shake of my head saying: "It's not worth it."

We pay and leave. I think back to the group of "mafia" delinquents. Being our age and already on the path of crime. In some way, they remind me of us. Well, we're not as organized.

Wait...

"The same?" I mutter.

Gina cocks her head to me. "What?"

"Nothing," I say, turning away. We're walking behind the group. Chloe is upfront, probably still angry about what Gina said. I swear. To make this teamwork together, we'll need a miracle.