Date: Sat, 25 Aug 2007 11:07:50 -0700 (PDT) From: Matt Wess Subject: Doube E: Part 3 Among the things that made my life interesting in Jamestown were the criminals that lacked revere for our small town. One day Mrs. Johns, the only wealthy member of our community, had a gun pointed directly at her. She lived in a big stucco house which took up half a block, surrounded by a high fence. She was mysterious person to us kids, since we knew so little about her. Apparently she was an unfortunate victim of a random robbery. The home was robbed clean of all valuables, and Mrs. Johns was left with a hole in her head. The news of her death spread around like a nasty virus, hopping from one home to the next. A small funeral was held on her behalf. To my knowledge, not one of her family members showed up. I remember looking around the sea of sullen faces and recognizing all of them as either neighbors, or shop owners who knew her well. The whole Mrs. Johns occurrence was called to mind on that dismal Sunday as I sauntered down to breakfast. Half of my family was up and milling around, tending to their own needs. Actually, as I glanced around the cluttered kitchen, I realized the only face missing was Eliot's and my grandfather. I expected my grandfather to be absent. He despised church. And he naturally associated Sunday with mass, so more often than not he spent the day in solitude cursing my family's religious practices while drinking whiskey. It took about two seconds for my mother to notice Eliot's absence. She slapped down her dish towel, saying, "Where is Eliot? I got him up twenty minutes ago. If he's still in the shower..." Genevieve, who was sitting at the table, glanced over the top of her newspaper, watching my mother slip out of the kitchen and pound her way up the stairs. Seconds later came, "Eliot! Get-out-of-the-shower! We can barely afford the water bill!" My father was sitting at the end of the table shaking his head and muttering something that sounded like, "That boy..." "What's in the news, newswoman?" I inquired from Genevieve, sitting down with cereal and mentally draining out the slamming doors from above. She shuffled the paper. "Plans for a new highway...lower gas prices...and another murder right in Jamestown..." There was a clatter as my spoon dropped into the bowl. I opened my mouth, but my father beat me to the question, "Who is it this time?" he asked sharply. Genevieve shook her slowly. "Doesn't really say...the identity wasn't released to the press, yet. The most they said was that a young girl was shot and killed in her home sometime between midnight and six this morning." I jumped at the sound of the back door, which connects to the kitchen, opening. My grandmother strode through the door frame carrying an empty milk bowl from the outside. "I don't know where Ruby is, but she sure is enjoying this milk. As long as she's eating, I suppose," she informed us. I guess it never occurred to her that the neighborhood cats were the ones enjoying the milk. Not poor-dead-Ruby. A minute later, Eliot appeared, looking disgruntled. His brown hair was sopping wet from the shower still, his polo shirt was spotted with water and his khaki pants were wrinkled. His good looks seemed so effortless. He viciously moved about the kitchen, slamming cabinet doors. Eventually he plopped down next to me, digging into his cereal and not saying a word. Genevieve leaned forward a bit, looking past me and towards Eliot. "How was your date with - ouch!" she suddenly rounded on me. "Elijah, what was that for? Don't kick me!" I subtly shook my head from side to side, hoping that she would pick up on the cue to not ask Eliot about his date last night. Even bent over his cereal bowl, I could tell Eliot was glancing up at us with narrowed eyes and picking up on my warning signals. Genevieve frowned, "And don't shake your head at me, Elijah. I was just going to ask how his date went. Or am I not allowed?" "It was fine, Genevieve," Eliot said curtly into his bowl. She forcefully tossed the paper at me, saying, "There now, did that kill him to answer the question? Jesus Christ, Elijah." With a nasty departing look, Genevieve left the kitchen. Not two seconds after her departure, my mother arrived in the kitchen. "Eliot," she said warningly, "if that water bill is up from last time it's going to be on your head. You're the only one in this house that takes a shower longer than fifteen minutes." Eliot remained silent. The next time he spoke was on the drive home from mass. He grumbled about needing his school uniformed iron for tomorrow, which was the first day of school. All day long I had been thinking about this fact. Tomorrow officially declared the countdown of days that I have left to uproot Eliot's alleged secrets. There were a lot of ways to get home from church, but when my father, who was driving, signaled and made the turn, I knew right away: he had another destination in mind. On most occasions, the road didn't even qualify as the scenic route. As we drove down Grove Road, I could see that something must have happened at the corner house. Immediately I knew my father was still thinking about the murder Genevieve read about in the paper. Now there were squad cars and media trucks parked in the driveway, and I could see police milling around the grounds. "Goodness," my mother said, sitting up in her seat slightly. "Roger, what on earth happened here?" I could tell my father wasn't all too concerned about our mini van packed with ogling passengers wouldn't look conspicuous, not among the other slow moving cars and people gathered at a break in the hedge watching the crime scene unfold. As the house slipped around the bend and out of sight, my father made a disproving sound. "This is sure to be the highlight news. A murder story around these parts usually grows its own pair of legs and runs." "Don't let your father know about this, Roger," my mother said. It was true. My grandfather is an ex-cop. His whole life in his twilight years is spent waiting to be called into action. He was an ex-cop during the murder of Mrs. Johns and when he caught wind of the story, he hurried over to the station to see if he can't help. Imagine a seventy year old man, alcoholic, approaching present day officers and claiming he was ready to "take down the grimy bastard." I would be willing to bet that the officers later turned his statement into a joke calling my grandfather the "grimy bastard." "I wonder who the victim is," Genevieve called from the back. Nobody could answer her question. Usually when people witness a car crash or a murder scene they watch with morbid curiosity. Their initial reaction is to take pity on any individual that was hurt and then maybe even say a prayer or two hoping all will get better. Then, they go on and count their blessings that the terrible accident or murder scene had nothing to do with them. On that rainy Sunday before the start of school, I could tell my family was going through those stages, especially the latter. Yet something was distinctly wrong as we turned on to our street. There was a squad car - and it was parked in our driveway. Two young police officers were waiting at the front door with my drunken grandfather. This was a scene to behold. Were they arresting my grandfather? "What the devil is going on?" my father muttered, slowing our van down to a crawl. The grim looking police officers noticed our van. My grandfather was telling them something - his mouth was moving and he was pointing at us. The one police officer, I couldn't help to notice, was quite good looking. He was no older than twenty five, with black hair, an athletic built. He wore his uniform well and it would have been a major turn on if he was wearing briefs underneath. His name, we learned, was Detective Booker. His older partner, a middle age guy with wide glasses, a somewhat pudgy figure and thinning hair was Sergeant Manning. I would guess that he was the type of guy who did wear briefs at his age, but only the colored ones. His stocky body showed muscle, but age added love handles to his waist and streaks of gunmetal gray to his slicked-back black hair. I placed him in his late fifties and decided his life hadn't been all roses. "Can I help you officers?" my father asked. He was the quickest one to leave the mini van and the first one to approach them. "I'm Sergeant Manning and this is Detective Booker. We're here investigating a murder." My mother came up behind my father and slipped her hand into his, saying, "I'm afraid the most we know about any murder is what we read in the morning papers." "Is my father a suspect?" said my father, looking directly pass the officers and at his father. His scruffy appearance, blood shot eyes, and jockey shorts made it look as though he just rolled out of bed after drinking a lot of whiskey, which he probably did. "Your son is, actually," Detective Booker, the young stud, said. "My son? Elijah?" For a split second all eyes were on me. "No, your son, Eliot." All eyes shifted to Eliot, who was standing in the back of the group with his hands in his pockets. "How - why - well, I don't see how any of my children could be suspects to a murder!" my mother said in a motherly defensive tone. Detective Booker ran a hand through his hair and said: "Maybe 'suspect' is the wrong word. We just need to ask him a few questions." Sergeant Manning took over. "The victim was Georgina Cloves. From our understanding, your son Eliot was the last person to see her alive. That doesn't necessarily mean he's responsible for the death, but he might have seen something." Manning's words hung over our heads like a rain cloud. Eliot was silent. Perhaps the shock was working like a drug through his body, to the point where he was immobilized. I know that's the way I felt. I tried picturing Eliot pointing a gun at someone and firing away. It just didn't add up. Booker sighed, breaking the awful silence. "Listen, the rain is beginning to pick up. All we need is to have a few words with Eliot here and we'll be on our way." But the rain was irrelevant. The police weren't coming right out and stating it, but I could read it in their eyes and their gestures that they just wanted to take Eliot in. Detective Booker hooked his thumb over the waistband of his jeans, ran it around the inside rim, and hitched them up. I noticed as his pants slowly slid down an inch, revealing a white Fruit of the Loom waistband. On a normal day I would have been more aroused. However, I knew his gesture was out of impatience. "Fine," my father finally said, then quickly held up his hand to stop the advancing officers. "Until you have incriminating evidence against my son we'll talk in the living room." The interrogation did not last very long, and from the looks of it, it did not go to well, either. Genevieve and I spent the better half of the questioning poised on the staircase trying to listen in. We could scarcely make out Eliot's answers; more often than not we could hear the police asking questions such as, "What was your relation with Georgina Cloves?" "How long have you known her?" "What exactly happened last night?" "Did you notice anything or anybody suspicious when you arrived back at her house?" After the police officers left around the evening time, I sat in my room and had no trouble hearing the conversation happening below me. My mother and father were taking turns shouting questions at Eliot. No matter what part of the house you were at it was hard to drone out. By eight o'clock I was still sprawled across my bed, bored to tears, but in my thinking mode nonetheless. For the most part the shouting stopped. Doors slammed, and then doors would be yanked back open with forced. My mother, I guess, would sometimes have more to say and shout a few more times at Eliot. At a quarter past eight I felt it safe to leave my room. The battle seemed to be over. It was far past dinner time and I was hungry, seeing that my mother was locked away in her room and nobody was in the mood to do anything except grumble along. The only person who could smile was my senile grandmother who I passed on the stairs. I quickly grabbed a sandwich, deciding I would bring it back up to my room to eat. Had I stayed in the kitchen, there was the risk that either one of my parents would come storming in asking me if I knew anything. I did not want to take that risk. On the way up, I noticed Eliot's door partially ajar. Clutching his right hand in his left and swearing under his breath, he shouldered open his bedroom door. His hand was bleeding. He looked around and spotted me standing there with my sandwich. Keeping the bleeding had elevated, Eliot said, "Come to convict me, too?" I shook my head, unable to find the right words. He frowned and made his way into the bathroom. While he was cleaning up his hand, I peered inside his room and saw his mirror broken in pieces. From punching it? I jumped at the sound of his voice. "If you're not here to yell, then leave." I put out my hand and stopped him from shutting his door. Casually, I stooped down and began picking up the shards of glass. I'm not sure what overcame me. Why the hell was I acting nice to him? The answer came to me: because I needed him on my side. "I believe you're innocent," I said, and stopped mid-breath as Eliot pulled his shirt over his head. I damn well almost sliced my finger by his unexpected movement. Though I knew realistically it wasn't a pass he was making; Eliot had still been in his church clothes and his polo shirt was dirtied from his bloody hand. Still his quarter sized nipples, slim chest that wasn't overly buffed and Calvin Klein waistband certainly was a sight to behold before he slipped into an undershirt, his nipples poking through. "Terrific," he said sarcastically. "You'll sound convincing in court." "They're taking you to court," I spluttered, finally slicing my finger just a bit. Eliot saw my mistake and shoved me out of the way. "What are you doing here?" he demanded. "Did you come looking for the juicy news?" Taken aback by his accusation, I hesitated, then said, "No, not at all," but Eliot had acted upon my hesitation and pushed me out of his room. He began closing the door, but with all my might I tried to open it back up. "Listen," I said quickly into the minimal open space, "Something happened last night. Someone killed Georgina and whether they meant to or not they are now framing you. We can stop it!" Despite the fact that Eliot won and the door snapped shut in my face, I had a feeling something registered in his mind. I wandered back down to the kitchen, having left my sandwich in Eliot's room and there was no way in hell he'd let me back in. It dawned on me, the plot has thickened. Now I had to prove that my brother was not straight and not guilty, both of which he might very well be.