Make it Rain, Nana

“I wanna thank you all for coming out here on this somber occasion, ya know? For coming out here to celebrate the life of a terrific lady.

“My nana, Margaret O’Shaunnessy, was the sweetest old woman in the world. She always had a caramel or a hard candy in her pocket for the kids, and she was generous as hell with her money, am I right? A real standup broad.

“Those of us who were fortunate enough to know her best got to witness a real rebirth toward the end there. When Grampa Charles left us—God rest his soul—Nana went through a pretty tough time. But then she discovered this passion, you know, this zest for life she never knew she had.

“Not everyone approved, of course, but again, those of us who were closest saw the joy on her face these last few years, and there’s no way we could’ve taken that away from her.

“Sure, Nana was a stripper. And yeah, there were some—local law enforcement, the ATF, the FBI—who would call her a… ‘ruthless drug kingpin’, a ‘smuggler’, and a… ‘madam for octogenarian hookers,’ but she was still our nana, you know?

“She was still the woman who bought you your first bottle of whisky, Tommy; she got you that sweet Jack Daniels wallet, Sam—you remember?—the black one with the Velcro? And Billy, she was still the one who’d take a baseball bat to your Coupe de Ville if you ever disrespected your mother. She made us what we are today. She made us a family. She was our nana.

“So join me now in a moment of silence, eh? Bow your heads you mooks…”

Jimmy finally paused and looked down, listening to the last gasps of winter blowing over the harbor. And with a subtle movement (too subtle to be noticed by anyone who’d come) he passed one hand over the other and whispered:

“Make it rain, nana. Make it rain.”

This is my response to this week’s Trifecta Writing Challenge: Rain (hey, that’s what you get when you use Urban Dictionary for your definitions). I’m looking forward to reading even more irreverent, off-color and generally awesome stories from the others this week, so you should check them out, too.

Make it rain!