MeatCanyon

So maybe it's just like the little, the town.

It was the bartender of all people who encouraged the revered fishermen as I made myself even quainter on my lonely table, praying to be ignored.

Perhaps someone should pay the old bloke a visit, he said, just loud enough to be heard.

I saw glints begin to spark in their boozy eyes.

A mob, not unlike the ones from my parents' homeland stories, was forming.

Four months of this torture, they longed for someone to blame, someone to punish.

Rafe's eyes went wild as a feral grin spread over his mouth.

The others were already rousing, sloshing down their drinks and beginning to roar in agreement.

Their sticky fists pounding tables.

I shrank further into the dark.

Panic writhed into my stomach.

His eyes met mine.

Still keeping your nose out of the wind, lass?

Is it Rafe or Rafei?

Yeah, who cares?

I shook my head.

Rafe was in no mood to let anyone slip this net.

He lurched himself across the room, scratching his stool along the floorboards as his crowd of rubble and ruckus took form.

He pressed, voice low.

You want to see this end, eh?