The whiskey was shared around the Shelby family, so much that now three empty bottles sit in the middle of one table. A barman had asked to come in, but Arthur had told him to kindly fuck off if he wanted to keep his life. Dottie frowned before she spoke up.
"Is this place hiring?" She asks, breaking the conversation between Arthur and John.
Tommy quickly looks at Polly before he answers, "no."
"How do you know?" Dottie responds, looking directly at Tommy. Her large eyes glaring in to his.
"This pub is mine," Arthur replies, a glass in his hands, "well ours, but mine, mhm."
"So you could hire me?" Dottie turns her head to Arthur, "you will?"
Hesitating, Arthur looks at Polly, before looking back at Dottie, noticing the resemblance between the two. "No."
"Why not? You haven't even given me a chance," Dottie argues back, "I worked in the pub in my village. I was a good barmaid," she nudges her shoulder in to Micheal, "werent I?"
Micheal nods, however he stays silent, knowing his sister well. No matter what anyone will say, she'll argue. Unless the statement is a I'll hire you.
Tommy tilts his head, itching his chin, "women don't work behind the bar," he says making Dottie scoff, "you'll get torn apart."
"You sound so progressive!"
"We're looking out for you," Tommy argues back as Dottie clenched her fingertips in to her palms, her knuckles turning a pinky white colour.
"I don't need protecting. If I need protecting, I'll do it myself."
"Shelby's and Gray's don't work in pubs," Tommy continues, selecting his words carefully as Dottie's glare continues burning in to him, "if you want to work, I'll get you a job—"
"If I want to work, I'll get myself a job."
Tommy rolls his head towards Polly, a way to ask for help.
"Dottie, no one will hire a Shelby or a Gray in Birmingham," Arthur says, clearing his throat.
Dottie directs her glare to him, "fine then I'll change my name." She looks back at Tommy, "I'm eighteen, if I want to work in a fucking pub then I will."
Tommy opens his mouth, however he closes it when Polly speaks, holding her hand out to silence her nephew.
"Thomas," she sternly says.
Tommy nods, watching as Dottie raises an eyebrow at him.
John, who had been sitting back watching the commotion happen between his brothers and his cousin, snickers, taking hold of the toothpick between his teeth. "Well, Aunt Pol, she's definitely your daughter." He turns his head back to Dottie, "you good with numbers?"
She shakes her head, "I can't do numbers," she nudges her elbow in Micheal's side. "He can."
Polly rolls her eyes to John, "John," she warns, her voice low.
John doesn't say anything else, almost dropping the subject entirely. Dottie frowns as she stares at John.
Arthur pushes his glass up to his lips, tilting his head back and swallowing the liquid in one gulp.
"Arthur, slow down," Tommy says, leaning against the sofa booth with one arm lazily thrown over the back of it, "we have all night to celebrate."
Dottie continues to stare at John, her thoughts wondering wild as she spaces out. She only connects back with reality when John speaks again.
"Where's Ada?" John asks, fidgeting on the booth. He takes the toothpick out of his mouth, replacing it with his glass. Once he takes a sip, he continues, "she's meant to be here."
"How the bloody hell should I know?" Arthur grumbles, "she's probably out protesting."
"Protesting?" Micheal speaks up and Polly looks at her with a bored smile on him face.
"Our Ada is a communist."
"She hates us with every fibre in her body," John says, "well not us. Just Tommy. She hates Tommy."
"Why?" Dottie asks, looking at the Shelby brothers.
"Two years ago there was an inspector who came from Ireland. He hated us and communists, and anyone else who wouldn't do what they were told," John says, "tried to clear all the communists from Birmingham, and most of them fled. Including Ada's husband."
"Ada's married?"
Arthur nods his head, "she's got a child as well. They've called him Karl."
"Karl?"
"After Karl Marx," Polly answers, "her husband, Freddie, was arrested the night Karl was born, and Ada blamed Tommy. She moved to London when Freddie died."
"He died? How? Did the police kill him?" Dottie asks, her thoughts running wild with the possibilities of death.
Micheal clears his throat, "did he meet Ada's boy?"
"He died from pestilence, earlier on this year," Polly answers, "and yes, he did know Karl. He was a wonderful father to Karl and a loving—"
Tommy scoffs.
Polly spins her head, so fast Dottie and Micheal would have both thought her head would come off.
"Do not speak ill of the dead, Thomas," she spits, her voice, once full of love and warmth, full of hatred and venom.
"If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times. Ada should have had an abortion. Freddie was—"
"Your best mate, if I remember correctly," Polly responds, "he was, wasn't he Thomas? He even saved you in the war. He even helped you against Billy Kimber, if I remember correctly. He had some faults but at least he didn't speak ill of the dead."
"Polly—"
Dottie eyes Micheal, she shrugs at her brother who frowns at the dispute in front of them.
"Freddie was a good man overall, and he was our Ada's husband and our Karl's father, so do not speak ill of him." Polly raises an eyebrow, as if asking Tommy to respond back.
"Ada should have never been with him, that's all I'm saying," Tommy says, crossing one leg over the other's knee, "as soon as she found out she was pregnant she should have aborted the baby and then moved on and married someone worthy—"
"He was a communist, not a fucking horse," Polly argues back, "and that's your nephew you're talking about. Tell me, Thomas, do you think he should have been aborted when you hold him and play with him?"
"Talking about me?" Comes a female voice.
Dottie looks up from Polly to see the door open, and in the doorway stands a young woman, with high cheek bones and a pointed nose. She enters the room, her heels clicking against the floor, and shuts the door. She stands by Polly and takes off her hat, placing it on to the table. She leans down and kisses Polly's cheek.
"Hello Aunt Polly, how are you?" She says, pressing her lips against Polly's cheeks and then taking a seat beside her. She briefly looks at Dottie and Micheal before she turns to look at her brothers.
"Go on, Tommy, enlighten how my husband, my dead husband, was a bad person," she stares hard at Tommy, waiting for him to answer.
However he doesn't. Instead he says; "Ada, it's lovely to see you again. Where's Karl?"
"He's with the nanny."
"Oh you have a nanny now? I didn't think communists were allowed nannies," Tommy retorts and Ada rolls her eyes.
"I work, you know. I can't be home all day, I'm not one of your whores, you know," Ada responds before she turns her head towards the young pair of siblings sitting opposite Polly.
"It's lovely to meet you both. I'm Ada, the only sane one in this family," she smiles, "I've heard a lot about you both."
"You have? Polly said you lived in London so I presumed you've heard nothing about us." Micheal says, trying to ignore the small falter in Polly's expression.
Ada smiles, causing slight dimples to pop out of her cheeks. "Polly and I speak on the phone."
Dottie nods, "London? Do you like it? We went to London once, and we ended up lost."
Ada smiles fondly at her younger cousin, "it's not too bad, quite similar to Small Heath, just without my arsehole brothers."
"Oh right."
Ads continued to look at Dottie, inspecting every detail and every feature.
"I feel like I've seen you before."
"Bloody hell, Ada, you're meant to be the smart one. You have seen her before, she's your cousin—"
"Shut up, Arthur," Ada responds sharply, not taking her eyes off of Dottie, "did you live in Kent? Or work there?"
"Yes," Dottie says, watching as Ada frowns, "I worked in the Red Lion pub—"
"I went there! With the girls from work one evening. You was behind the bar, and there was a guy shouting at some of us... the guy was shouting at you as well, wasn't he?" Ada rambles and Dottie nods, watching how Polly raises her eyebrows subtly.
"Yeah—"
"You punched him," Ada suddenly says, stopping her cousin from talking anymore, "and then you threatened him, didn't you? Did he come back? I left soon after he punched him."
Arthur chuckles and claps his hands, "our Dottie! A peaky blinder before she knew who she was!"
"He threw at glass at you, didn't he? It missed you merely," Ada continues and Dottie nods again.
"He threw a fucking glass at you?" Micheal exclaims, nudging his finger in to his sisters thigh.
"Who is this man?" Polly asks in a grim and quiet voice, "Ada, Dottie. Who's this man?"
Dottie shakes her, "don't be so dramatic. The pair of you. I'm fine. I threatened I would shoot him if he was to come near me again, and he stayed away," Dotty reveals, "there's no need to hurt him. I did more than enough to make him stay away, plus he's a mad man anyways. The war messed him up." Dotty gravely says, looking at Ada, who continues to stare at her.
"I'll fucking shoot that man," grumbled Micheal causing Dottie to slap his hand around the back of his head.
"Oi. He threw the glass at me. I think I get to decide if I will shoot him. Not you."