Paint me in chains

Folktale

Heather Langley was twenty, with long chestnut hair and piercing grey eyes that always seemed to wander beyond the moment. She stood about five foot five, her frame slender yet toned. People often assumed she lived in the gym, but her strength didn’t come from lifting weights. It came from long hours spent standing at her easel, losing herself in colors and light.

She painted everything. Faces full of emotion, animals mid-motion, sunsets melting into rivers, and crooked rooftops that told their own stories. Her work wasn’t just a hobby. It was how she survived, how she hoped. Sometimes, during festive seasons, locals paid her to paint little scenes for their homes. It wasn’t much, but it helped. While other girls her age chased love or left town, Heather painted. Quietly, obsessively. Dreaming that someday, someone outside of Folktale might notice.

Heather had lived all her life in Folktale a town that looked like it had been forgotten by the rest of the world. Tucked on the outskirts of the city, it was made up of cracked roads, worn-out rooftops, and a single community school with peeling blue walls. The only government presence was the abandoned buildings left half-finished decades ago. People didn’t move to Folktale. They tried to survive it.

Lads who got a chance to leave never looked back. “We’re a small village,” they’d say, but it felt more like a place buried alive. Everyone knew everyone. News traveled faster than light. From the old Folktale River where kids weren’t supposed to play, to Greg’s tiny shop the only place you could buy groceries, detergent, and hope in the same aisle the town breathed in cycles of struggle.

Life here was hard. But it was theirs.

Heather had just secured a job at Greg’s shop, a quiet, dusty corner store that somehow carried everything the town needed. She had been checking in with old Greg for months, always showing up with a hopeful smile. Not because she wasn’t aware of the odds but because she knew Marie, the current salesgirl, was planning to get married and leave town. That job had been Heather’s only shot at some kind of steady income. And now it was finally hers.

It was her happiest day in months. Maybe even years.

“I got a job!!” She ran home that day to announce to her sick father Luca and 7-yearold Billy her little brother.

“Does that mean I get free popsicles anytime I visit?” Billy stated excitedly as he curled his little fingers around Heather’s thumb.

She looked down at him with so much grace as he smiled from ear to ear. He was just the sweetest little boy, her 7-yearold Billy holds a very special place in her heart. She has raised him ever since their mother left six years ago and she felt so close and drawn to him as a mother would to her child.

“of course!” heather responded brushing his curly hair as she looked down at him. “And we also get to bring some for papa too” they chuckled.

“Oh I’m too old for that” Luca their father chipped in while adjusting himself on his wheel chair.

He hadn’t always been in that chair. He used to come home from construction sites with dirt on his boots and stories in his voice. But ever since the accident, his legs had stopped working, and the bills hadn’t stopped piling up.

Billy pressed his face against Heather’s side. She had raised him ever since their mother left six years ago, and at this point, he felt more like a son than a brother. He was the kind of child who gave you a reason to keep going, even when everything else said stop.

“Can I go play outside before night time?” Billy asked with his eyes fixed outside the yard where one could see the heads of little kids almost above the fence, they were all laughing and chanting nursery rhymes.

“sure, but make sure not to go down folktale river and don’t skid too far so I can find you before dinner” Heather urged and he nodded before dashing out of the house

“You look so happy about your new job” Luca stated as soon as Billy left the room.

“I am papa” she responded scrunching her nose fondly as she headed towards the kitchen to drop the grocery bag

Heather dropped the grocery bag on the rickety kitchen table, still buzzing from her good news. The old stove in the corner hissed faintly, the metal rusting around the edges like everything else in their home. She reached for the kettle, planning to boil water to dress Luca’s wound, when she heard the soft hum of his wheels behind her.

“You know you don’t have to, You can always quit okay? Besides I can wiggle my toes now, I should be out of this chair in no time” Luca stated wheeling himself behind heather as she walked her way into the kitchen.

“Wiggling alone won’t get you out of the chair papa. For as long as I can remember you’ve been able to wiggle your toe for the past two weeks. Wiggling alone won’t pay Marco his money” she sounded abrupt and overwhelmed and soon realized she did not pass her statement properly

“I’m sorry,” she added quickly, turning around. “That came out wrong.”

Luca’s face softened, but only a little. “No. You’re right.”

There was a silence between them, the kind that only ever grew in homes like theirs. Thick, familiar, and full of things no one wanted to say.

Heather reached into her pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper, the edges worn soft from how often she touched it.

“I did the math again this morning,” she said quietly, her finger tracing the numbers.

“Even with Greg’s job.. we won’t make a dent. Not fast enough.”

Luca’s eyes dropped. “I never wanted this for you.”

“You didn’t give us a choice,” Heather said, voice cracking slightly. “We should’ve found another way.”

“There was no other way” He sighed and rested his hand on the table, the one with the long scar running down the side.

“The church turned us away. The town has nothing left to give. And Marco was…”

“The worst possible option,” Heather cut in before throwing her hands in the air frustratingly.

“Everyone in Folktale knows what he is papa. He’s not a businessman, he’s a butcher with a tie.”

She turned away from him, staring at the flickering stove flame like it could burn the memories out of her head.

“You remember Aunty Mel?” she asked suddenly.

Luca looked up, confused. “From across the river?” He asked and she nodded abruptly with a sigh.

“She borrowed from Marco. Said it was just a little loan to fix her roof. She disappeared four months later. Some people said she moved. But her daughter came by once, crying said her mama was gone, just like that. And the house was empty. All her clothes were still there. Her sandals were still by her door too”

Luca clenched his jaw. “We don’t know what happened.”

“Exactly,” Heather said.

“Because no one ever does with Marco. Or the men who come from that house.”

“Do you know what they say about him?” Heather asked leaning her back against the counter to face Luca.

“They say the Rizzos have always been like this. Even before Marco’s father died. And his father before him. Every generation worse than the last.”

Luca was quiet. Heather didn’t know if it was guilt or shame or both.

“They used to call them the Bone Men, back when Folktale still had stories,” she said. “Said the Rizzos didn’t just collect debts they collected people. That once you owed them, you didn’t belong to yourself anymore. They made the border their drug exchange spot too you know that right?”

“Heather…”

“I know they’re just rumors,” she interrupted, voice softening.

“But don’t you ever feel it? That heaviness in the air when Marco comes into town? Like even the birds stop singing?”

Luca didn’t answer. He didn’t have to because Heather already knew it was true. Every bit of it.

And now he was coming for them too.

Heather could already picture the silence that followed him… The sharp suits. The stillness in his stare.

The kind of man who didn’t need to chase. You came to him because you had no other choice.

She had only seen Marco Rizzo up close twice in her life, and both times, the air had gone cold. He was tall, maybe six-foot-two with the kind of posture that made people straighten their backs without meaning to. He wore black like it was part of his skin, and his eyes… they weren’t just dark. They were quiet. Too quiet. Like a storm that waited.

She didn’t know when he would come cause no one ever gets notified ahead of time!

But she knew he would.

And Folktale would fall silent once again.