The Unearthed: Book One, The Eddie McCloskey Series (21 page)

“I’ll kill you,” Billy threatened through his tears.

Dad took another step, moving within striking distance. He got down on his knees and opened his arms.

“If that’s what you want to do, you do it,” Dad told him, calmly. “I love you very much. I would never hurt you or your mom.”

“Jackie—” Charlie said.

Dad turned his head to look back at Charlie. “It’s okay, Charlie.”

“Billy,” Mom said. “We love you very much, more than anything.”

Billy dropped the gun but kept hold of the knife. He brought it up, over his head.

Dad reached out for him.

Billy stepped forward. “Dad …”

“It’s okay, son.”

He brought the knife down.

Harmlessly.

He let it fall to the floor and buried his head in Dad’s chest. Dad wrapped his arms around him, sobbing just as hard as he was. Mom moved over to them, and the three hugged each other tight. Billy had never felt so good in his entire life.

He was vaguely aware of the cop picking the gun and knife up off the floor.

* * * *

He suddenly remembered everything.

Eamon was sitting cross-legged on the couch in the therapist’s office. It all came back to him. That night. And what he’d done. All of it.

“What did you do when they made fun of you?” the therapist asked. Eamon hated his beard and the stupid half-eye glasses he wore.

Eamon didn’t respond. Everything came back to him. He saw it play out in his mind, and since he hadn’t been able to recall it until this point, he was seeing it for the first time. Why was he remembering now?

“Eamon?”

“I remember…”

In the blink of his mind’s eye, he remembered everything.

* * * *

“Eamon, what’s this I hear about
you doing poorly on your math tests?”

His father, John Moriarty, stood in the kitchen. He’d just gotten home from work. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbows. The tiny muscles of his forearm bunched. He wasn’t tall, but he didn’t need to be. Eamon was terrified of him.

It wasn’t fair. William never did his school work, and he never got into trouble. And how did Dad know about his grades? Who had told him? Neither Mom nor William was supposed to tell him. That was their agreement.

“Math is tough,” he said, though it sounded pathetic.

“Then why don’t you ask for help?” Dad asked. “One of the reasons we’re home-schooling you is so you get the attention you need.”

“I, I…tried to tell Mom.”

“Either you did or you didn’t. There’s no trying to tell someone something. Which is it?”

“I told her. But she just said I’d get it eventually…” And after that, Mom had gone right back to drooling over William’s stupid pictures of houses, all but forgetting Eamon’s struggles.

“Siobhan?” Dad called out.

“She always tells me to be more like William,” Eamon said.

“Siobhan!”

He wanted to tell Dad about how she’d ignored William’s grades. About how she’d told him not to tell Dad. William was special, she always said. Different, she always said. He was an artist.

Eamon wasn’t.

Mom appeared in the threshold to the kitchen. Her brown hair was frizzy and down. It fell below her shoulders.

“Eamon tells me he asked for your help with math,” Dad said.

“Wha—Eamon…” She gave him a frown.

Eamon said nothing.

“He got Cs on his last two tests, but he said he’d try harder. He told me he wasn’t studying as much as he should,” she said, looking back at Dad.

Dad turned to Eamon. “Well?”

Eamon had always defended Mom out of stupid loyalty. Today he realized there was no such mutual feeling.

“She’s lying,” Eamon said.

“Eamon,” Mom said, incredulously.

“You let William draw in class. It’s not fair.”

“You let William draw in class?” Dad asked.             

“I—” Mom looked from Eamon to Dad and back again.”

Answer the question,” Dad said.

“He’s an artist, John…”

“So that’s a yes,” he said.

“John, I want to encourage him…”

“Encourage him to neglect his studies?”

“No, John, but William is special. He’s…” She glanced back at Eamon.

“Because he’s not mine?” Dad said.

“John, this isn’t the right time—”

“That’s what you think. He’s special. He takes after his—”

“John.”

Eamon didn’t understand what they were talking about. But he was relieved that he wasn’t the focus of the conversation. In fact, that was a good idea.

“Dad, she’s talking to someone every day on the phone,” Eamon said.

“That true, Siobhan?”

“No.”

“You been running around on me?”

“I—”

Dad suddenly lunged forward and grabbed Mom by the wrists. “I want the truth now, you bitch.”

“Eamon…” she pleaded.

“And she lets William skip his homework so he can draw,” Eamon blurted out, tears burning his eyes now. It wasn’t entirely true, but it was close enough.

“That true, Siobhan?” he asked.

She tried to break free of him but couldn’t.

“It’s not fair,” Eamon said. “She lets him get away with everything because he can draw.”

“Eamon!” she said.

“He’s not going to help you.” Dad squeezed her wrists.

“You’re hurting me,” she said.

“That’s what you deserve, bitch.”

“Don’t hurt me.”

“You did it before. Now you want
a younger guy again.”

“John—
”

* * * *

…“You remember what? That night?” the therapist was asking…

* * * *

“
Where’s the phone
?” William asked, as he crawled across the kitchen floor toward Eamon in the family room. He left a thick trail of blood behind him. Each inch he moved seemed to take an enormous amount of energy. “Call 911.”

Eamon watched his brother. He felt glued to the sofa. He couldn’t get up. Part of him didn’t want to.

William tried to pick himself up, but he didn’t have the strength. Eamon watched the energy drain out of him.

“Please, Eamon. Help me. I’m sorry…”

William pulled himself across the kitchen floor.

“Please,” William said, reaching the carpet of the family room. He dug his fingers into the carpet, grabbing hold of it to pull himself closer.

Eamon stayed on the sofa. He felt paralyzed.

“Eamon, I’m sorry.”

“No.”

William looked at him, puzzled. He frowned. He reached his hand out for Eamon to take it. “Help me.”

Eamon didn’t move.             

“Eamon.”

Eamon looked down at the cordless phone in his hand. William couldn’t see it. Not from the floor.

You didn’t do anything wrong. You can just let him die, and it won’t be your fault, he thought.

“Come on, I’m sorry. Help me.”

Eamon brought the phone up. He turned it on, so there was a dial tone.

“You have the phone…”

Eamon dialed 9.

No one will ever know. No one except you. Maybe you’ll even learn how to forget about it. Just erase it like Mom erases the blackboard.

He looked at William. William’s mouth was open, his bottom jaw lowered. Eamon could tell he was having trouble focusing on him.

“Please…”

What about all those times he hit you when no one was looking? And what about all those times you told Mom he’d hit you, and she did nothing? And she’d just smile and tell you that William was special and you needed to be more like him.

“Eamon.”

Eamon thought about the times William helped him with his own drawing. Condescending ridicule, in the form of advice. How he told Eamon to use his left hand, so he could be more like him. Only that made his drawings worse. No, no, you’re getting better, William would say.

He realized now that William had been messing with him the whole time.

You wish you were me, William would say. Little William. Billy. And he’d laugh.

William coughed and brought up blood. It spilled out of his mouth onto the carpet. He stopped trying to pull himself any further.

Eamon stood.

William watched him.

He turned off the phone.

A puzzled look on William’s face.

Eamon shook his head.

“You little shit—”

Eamon waved the phone in front of him. William reached out feebly, but then he let his arm drop. He had no strength left.

Eamon said nothing. He sat down on the carpet, just out of William’s reach. William strained to keep his focus. His one eye fluttered.

Eamon stayed where he
was and watched his brother die
.

* * * *

…“Eamon, do you remember that night?” the therapist asked again.

Eamon came back to the present. 

“No. I don’t remember that.”

Ti
m
stood on the porch with Jackie and Eddie. It was a nice day. Clear, blue skies, temperature in the sixties, an autumn breeze nudging the trees.

Eddie took a long drag on his cigarette. He still hadn’t so much as spoken to Tim.

“Thank you, gentlemen,” Jackie said. “We owe you.”

Tim said, “We’re glad we could help, Jackie.”

“You did more than help. A lot more.”

Eddie said, “Doing the job right is more than doing the job.”

Jackie looked at Eddie with fresh eyes. Yeah, the guy seemed like a screw-up but there was something else there, too. It went beyond competence.

“Next steps,” Tim began. “We have to scrub the data and put it in a report. And we’d still like to rule out as many people as possible. If we can figure out who this is, you can better predict any future activity.”

“You mean you’re still not sure?” Jackie asked, sounding exhausted.

“There’s a good possibility that it’s—” Tim started to say.

“It’s William Moriarty,” Eddie said. “We’ve got the name, the drawings, the grave. It’s him.”

Tim glared at him. Eddie had just stepped way over the line, completely undermining him in front of the client. Even worse, he might have fed Jackie bad information.

“Either way,” Tim said. “We’ll give you our best guess, because that’s all it will be. Just a guess.”

Charlie came down the front walk toward them, carrying his hat by the brim.

Charlie addressed Jackie. “I just spoke to Mr. Welles. It’s an easy patch job on the coffin and an hour to plug the grave back up. He’s not going to press charges. The only other person that would have a say would be Eamon, and I’m not going to drag the McKennas into this. So no charges are going to be filed. I just ask that you pay Mr. Welles and his staff for their time, so the town doesn’t have to.”

“That’s very fair of you.” Jackie and Charlie shook hands. “Thank you, Charlie. You’ve been very good to us.”

“No worries. Don’t hesitate to call if you need anything else.” He turned and started back down the path toward the driveway. “Now if you don’t mind, I’m going home to get some sleep.”

Charlie put his hat on and tipped it. Then he was gone.

* * * *

“I need a break.” Moira pulled her headphones off. Her ears were hot from wearing them too long. “I haven’t heard a thing.”

They’d been scrubbing the data for a couple of hours, listening to all the recordings, trying to find some EVP. So far, nothing.

They were sitting in Stan’s studio. Moira had never thought she was one to be impressed by money, but she couldn’t help but be amazed by how much equipment he had.

“Get yourself a drink. We can order out if you want.” Stan played with a dial on the console and kept listening intently. She was also impressed by his work ethic.

“How much more tape do we have?” She stood and threw her arms over her head, knowing that doing so would pull her shirt up a little, exposing her midsection. Stan’s eyes roved over his display, and she caught him looking at her bare midriffs, before looking up at her.

“We should only go another hour or two. Then I think we’ll need a long break.”

* * * *

“Have you remembered anything else, Eamon?” the therapist asked again.

Eamon shook his head.

“How are you doing in school?”

“Straight As,” Eamon said. Now that his Mom wasn’t teaching him math, he found the subject easy and to be his favorite.

“That’s good. And how have you been feeling otherwise?”

“I guess I’m doing better.”

The therapist checked his watch. “Well, that’s all the time we have for today. I’ll see you next week.”

Chefaun sat in the waiting room. As usual, she was reading a magazine and had her legs crossed at the knees, humming to herself. She looked up and saw Eamon coming toward her.

“Hello there, darling.” She put the magazine back on the coffee table with the others. She grabbed her purse off the chair next to her and stood.

“Hey.”

“You ready?” she asked.

Eamon nodded.

They took the elevator down two levels and exited the building.

“Are we going straight home now?” Eamon asked.

“No, hon. Remember I told you about all those errands we had to run. We’ve gotta get you new sneaks today,” Chefaun said.

They got in the car.

“I forgot.”

It wasn’t the only thing he’d forgotten. And right now he needed to get home. Everything made sense again. He knew what he had to do.

“How about pizza in the food court? Sound good?”

“Good,” he said. But his mind was elsewhere.

“What’s the matter, honey?”

“It’s hard talking about feelings.”

“I know. But they’re the most important things to talk about. Bad things happen when you keep them bottled up inside you for a long time. They come out, one way or another.”

She had no idea how right she was.