Guess Who

by Chris McGeorge

  “You mean The Future?”

  “No, I mean The Future in Italics,” Morgan said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “You need an edgy band name if you’re going to go places. Edgy like Blur...or ABBA. Actually, maybe not ABBA...or Blur now I think about it.”

  Eren smiled, and was surprised to find it was genuine. He’d forgotten how much he’d missed Morgan’s schemes, and just the boy in general.

  “What’d you want?” Morgan said. “As you can see, I’m superbusy.”

  “I need to talk to you,” said Eren and he quickly relayed what he’d learned from Mr. Jefferies’s mother. To his surprise, Morgan was actually intrigued by it, but he was still skeptical.

  “I thought you’d forgotten all this, Eren.”

  “But you have to admit it’s weird.”

  “Martin’s a common name.”

  “But that guy was there. That day. That Martin.”

  Morgan scratched the back of his neck. “Yeah, I suppose it’s a bit weird.”

  Eren smiled. “I just need you one last time. And then if I’m wrong, I’ll drop the whole entire thing forever. I’ll accept it and move on. But we just need to do one thing. One last thing.”

  Morgan looked around at the stage with all his band equipment. He looked back at Eren.

  “Okay.”

  * * *

  The plan was simple—watch for Martin when he left school and follow him home. There, there had to be some incriminating evidence proving that he’d killed Mr. Jefferies. Eren hadn’t even considered the possibility that he didn’t have any. There must be something linking him to the murder. Eren was more confident than ever that he had found the man who’d done the deed, and with Morgan’s help, he could finally catch him.

  Morgan didn’t seem quite so convinced, but he was excited to break into someone’s house. Maybe a little too excited.

  They were in Eren’s room the night before they planned to follow Martin. Morgan was playing SNES, while Eren was rummaging around under his bed.

  “I know I saw them around here somewhere,” Eren said. He was looking for a pair of walkie-talkies that his aunt had got him for Christmas. At the time, he hadn’t really thought much of them—he’d had no one to call—but now they seemed essential. What was a tailing mission without the right tech?

  “Have you checked in the cupboard?” Morgan said, with no attempt to actually help his friend.

  “Yeah,” Eren said, sliding out from under the bed and slumping down on it. “I think they might be in the attic.” Eren watched Morgan play Mario until he heard his father go out to the pub. He always did on a Thursday night, every week since his mother had died. Eight o’clock on the dot.

  “Morgan, come on, I need help.”

  Morgan moaned all the way to the garage as Eren enlisted him in helping to carry the ladder up the stairs. Five minutes and a few future bruises later, Eren propped the ladder on the landing in front of the attic hatch.

  He went into his father’s room and found two flashlights in his tool cupboard. He threw one to Morgan. “The walkie-talkies should be in a blue plastic box.”

  Morgan smiled. “Right you are, guv’nur.” He raised his hand in a little salute.

  Eren laughed. He had definitely missed Morgan’s special brand of immaturity.

  Eren climbed the ladder and pushed on the attic hatch until it gave way. The attic was pitch-black, and Eren shone his flashlight inside. A shaft of light etched out a few boxes near the hatch, as though they were only there when the flashlight was on. There was no blue box nearby. He looked down to Morgan.

  “I’m going to have to go up there. You stay here and hold the ladder.”

  Morgan laughed. “You really think I’m going to stay down here, while you have the time of your life up there?”

  “It’s just an attic, Morgan.”

  But Morgan followed him up into the attic anyway. The ladder was not quite tall enough for Eren to easily get up. He had to push hard with his elbows to fling the rest of him inside. He helped Morgan up into the attic.

  The two beams of light explored the room as Morgan and Eren looked around. The attic was incredibly cluttered, with piles upon piles of cardboard removal boxes stacked on top of each other. Eren had no idea that his father and he had so much stuff, and he couldn’t see his blue box anywhere. He walked over to a mound of boxes, careful to pick his way over the wooden beams.

  Morgan’s flashlight lay on a clutter of loose items. He went over to a big monitor and started poking at it. “Whoa, computer monitors are tiny now compared to this monster.”

  Eren ignored him, putting the flashlight in his mouth as he shifted boxes over in his great pile to see what was behind them. There he found the blue box, depressingly, at the bottom of the biggest pile of boxes he had ever seen.

  As Morgan looked around, his flashlight dancing around on the edges of Eren’s vision, Eren started to shuffle boxes around so he could get to the pile he wanted. It took him ten minutes to finally lift all the boxes down and get to his blue box. He breathed out with exhaustion—his arms ached with the ghost of how they would feel in the morning. He opened the lid and there was the pack of two walkie-talkies still in their impenetrable plastic womb. Eren picked them up, and expected some sort of fanfare for all the trouble he’d gone to. Instead he got one word.

  “Eren.”

  Morgan’s voice, but not like before, not excited or enthusiastic. It almost sounded...worried.

  Eren looked around, but Morgan was nowhere to be seen. There was a crest of light coming from over a sea of boxes.

  “Eren, come here.”

  Eren started to pick his way around the attic, getting worried himself, until he found Morgan at the very back of the dark space, with his flashlight fixed on an old wooden chest.

  “What?” Eren said, trying to laugh it off.

  Morgan looked at him and then looked back at the chest.

  Eren looked too.

  The chest looked old and rather rickety. Painted across the front of the chest in chipped and weathered letters was the name “Lillith.”

  “That’s your mother’s name, right?” Morgan said.

  Eren nodded silently. He had never seen this chest before, didn’t even know it existed. His father had never told him about it, but had in fact said that all his mother’s things had been left behind when they moved. His father said all the things were just too heartbreaking so he got rid of them. But here was something. A chest with his mother’s name on it.

  Eren kneeled in front of the chest, running his hands over the top. Just touching it made him think of her, her warm touch, her soft hugs. It made him feel closer to her, this wooden thing he didn’t even know was here. He remembered the day she left, walked out of the house. She said she’d be back—she never was. Not that she could’ve known. Not that she could’ve predicted that car would barrel off the road and hit her. They said she had died almost instantly. His father comforted himself with the instantly, but Eren horrified himself with the almost.

  Now, in the darkness of the attic, illuminated by Morgan’s flashlight as well as his own, he felt more like a child than he ever had. A child who just wanted his mother.

  He went to open the chest, but the lid was stuck. He moved his flashlight along the seam of the lid to find a padlock.

  There was no keyhole, but instead three tumblers with the digits 0 to 9. He sighed.

  “It’s locked,” he said, looking past the flashlight beam to where he thought Morgan’s face was. “A three-digit number.”

  “Can we just guess it? Or try every combination?” Morgan said. Eren knew he was trying to be helpful, but that didn’t offset how dumb it sounded.

  “Three numbers. Ten digits on each. That’s a thousand combinations.”

  “Whoa,” Morgan said, briefly moving the flashlight to hi
s face to show his impressed look. “How did you do that?”

  Eren sighed. “We literally did that in Maths this morning.”

  “Oh, I—”

  “—wasn’t listening,” Eren finished. “Yeah, no surprise there.” He waved his flashlight around. “There must be something around here we can use to break the lock.” He got up and went over to the pile of stuff that Morgan had been looking in previously.

  “But if we break it open, your dad’ll know we’ve been up here,” Morgan said.

  “I don’t care.” Eren moved the bulky monitor aside, looking for something sharp and strong.

  “But maybe it’s not something you should see. Maybe he kept it from you for a reason.”

  “I don’t care,” Eren shouted, rounding on Morgan, pointing the flashlight in his face so it made his eyes squint. “This is my mother’s. And I’m her son. And I deserve to know what’s in here.”

  “Okay, okay,” Morgan said, pushing Eren’s flashlight down. “It would just be easier if we knew the three-digit number. I mean, maybe your father wrote it down somewhere. I have to write stuff down or else I forget it.”

  “Write it down?” Eren said, something in his brain clicking into gear.

  “Yeah. Like passwords for SNES and stuff.”

  Eren rushed back to the chest. He kneeled down in front of it again and fiddled with the padlock. “Shine the light here again.”

  Morgan did.

  Eren moved the tumblers quickly. It couldn’t be—? This couldn’t work. It made no sense. But it was the only three-digit number in his head. He finished. The padlock clicked open.

  Morgan looked confused. “What the—? Did you just—?”

  “Think, Morgan. You have to write stuff down to remember it. What’s the only three-digit number we’ve seen out of place these past few months?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Yes you do. 391. On the board. In Mr. Jefferies’s classroom. The code for this padlock was 391.”

  “Wait, what?” Morgan said. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would a code for a chest in your attic be on Mr. Jefferies’s board?”

  “I don’t know,” Eren said, touching the lid of the chest as a tingle prickled his spine. “I don’t know.”

  Eren remained motionless, feeling the edges of the chest lid with his fingers. What was this? How could this even be possible? This couldn’t be a coincidence.

  A thousand combinations and it just so happened to be that one. That one number written on the board by his dead teacher—the answers to all the questions swarming around in his head must be inside this chest, which was why he couldn’t open it.

  A shuffling beside him. Morgan sat next to him and put his hands on the lid too. He started to open the chest, and Eren found himself pushing too. The chest opened, the lid springing back. Inside was darkness.

  The two children shone their flashlights into the box, at first afraid that it was completely empty. But the chest was not. It was about half full with scraps of paper all bundled together with paperclips. There were also a few photos of Eren’s mother, smiling out at them.

  Eren picked up one of the bundles of papers and took off the paperclip. He looked through them slowly. They were letters from his mother to his father. They were love letters. They all started My love and were signed Your Lillith. They were long, all over a page and some spanning two or three. They talked of how much his mother loved his father, detailing their encounters in minute detail.

  Do you remember the café on the lake? one read. We fed the ducks, and ate carrot cake until the sun set behind the trees. I don’t think I’ve ever been as happy as you make me. When I’m with you, my soul is peaceful. Life is drowned out with how much I love you. Why do I have to keep you secret? I hide our love in a chest in the attic. The combination is the room number of the hotel we stayed in that first night, you remember—you can’t not.

  Eren blushed, and he put up his hand to mask his face from Morgan even though it was probably indecipherable in the dark of the attic. He felt like he was intruding on something private, but he couldn’t stop himself. He had never felt that his mother and father shared this level of affection although they must have at some point.

  He shuffled the letters and read another.

  My love, how much this mundane existence can be ignited by just the mere chance of meeting you. My life would be so boring if not for you, and I know I have made some choices I am not proud of. If only we could be together. But one day, we will be. We’ll be together forever. I promise I will do it soon.

  This one seemed odd. Do what? What choices? He scanned the rest of the letter, but there was nothing more of any interest. He went on to the next.

  My love, I’m sorry. I just need more time. Please you have to allow me time. I’m stuck, I’m stuck in this place and I don’t know how to get out. But knowing you are there at the end of the road is what will give me the strength to break out. I promise you, I will tell him soon.

  Eren’s stomach knotted, although he didn’t know quite why. This letter was strange, weirdly urgent. And what was his mother talking about? He read the rest and came to the bottom of the page. She signed off in her usual way, but added a PS.

  Your Lillith. P.S. I have included our photo overleaf. Look how happy we are, let’s be this happy forever.

  Eren saw a little sketched arrow in the corner of the page and he turned the paper over. Paper-clipped to the top of the page was the photo.

  Eren dropped the letter in plain shock and scampered backwards, hitting a pile of boxes so the top one fell off causing a small avalanche of boxes.

  Morgan looked up from some of the letters and looked at Eren. “What?”

  Eren was too busy processing what he’d seen in the photo. And now things were slotting into place. Things were becoming clear—for the first time in a long time. For the first time in forever.

  That feeling he had had on that day, that terrible day when he had found Mr. Jefferies—that feeling that he had missed something, an important detail. He thought it had been the caretaker. He really thought it had been the caretaker. But it hadn’t been, not at all. He had spent the last few months chasing the wrong man.

  Morgan picked up the letter with the photo on it and shone his light at it. His face dropped, his trademark smugness falling away. “Oh,” was all he could say. “What the hell does this mean?”

  He turned the photo to Eren and Eren saw it again. A photo taken in a park, by a pond. His mother smiling, looking happier than she ever had when she was at home. And with his arm around her, smiling too, was Mr. Jefferies.

  It was so simple. What he had been missing. But sometimes the simplest things were the things that got lost. He’d been walking home when he realized he’d forgotten his notebook, so he went back to school, back to the Maths room where he found Mr. Jefferies hanging from the ceiling. Miss Rain took him to the staff room where he cried and cried. And then his father came in. His father, who said he had been waiting for him outside. But his father wasn’t meant to be picking him up. Eren was walking home.

  391. His mother’s chest where she hid her love for Mr. Jefferies. The number on the board was Mr. Jefferies’s last clue. The number was his final declaration—to get justice.

  Silent tears fell down Eren’s face.

  Morgan looked at him. “Eren, what does this mean?” The boy was almost pleading.

  Eren opened his mouth and only a raw cry of anguish came out. It was all so simple. So real. “I don’t think Martin killed Mr. Jefferies,” he said, amidst sobs, “because my father did.”

  * * *

  “I still don’t understand,” Morgan said. They were still in the attic and both of them had been quiet for a very long time.

  “My father,” Eren said, his voice devoid of any emotion, as though he were answering a question i
n class, “my father killed Mr. Jefferies.”

  “But how do you know that?”

  “He was there, that day. But he shouldn’t have been. That’s what I’d been missing. It was nothing to do with the caretaker, but someone else who was there that shouldn’t have been. My father.”

  “But surely there’s some other explanation for all this,” Morgan said, staring at the photo as though trying to find another secret that wasn’t there.

  “My mother was in love with Mr. Jefferies, this is their chest. The code, Morgan, the code on the board.”

  “What does this mean, look?” Morgan said, holding up the letter with the photo. “See you on the 24th?”

  But Eren didn’t even need to hear it. He had worked it out. He was clever. He was cleverer than anyone knew. Mr. Jefferies, his father, his mother, even Morgan. They didn’t know. Because it was all laid out in front of him. And he knew with a burning certainty that his father killed his teacher.

  “My father told me what happened. She said she was going to a conference at Bank in the City. I kinda remember it—I remember my father was annoyed and they fought about it. It was Sunday 24th October.”

  Eren looked at him. The world was warped and wrangled through his tears. He thought it might never look right again.

  “She wasn’t going to a conference. She was going to see him. And that was how she died. Got run over by a car, while going to him.”

  Eren wiped his eyes and sniffed.

  Morgan looked down at the picture again. “But...”

  Eren gathered together all the papers on the attic floor, suddenly spurting into life. He threw them back into the chest and snatched the piece of paper out of Morgan’s hand. He took one last look at the smiling faces of Jefferies and his mother and threw that in the chest as well.

  Morgan got up. “Eren, I...”

  “Shut up.”

  “Did he really do this?”

  “The window was open wide. The Maths room window. He could have easily got out, snuck around to the car and waited there.”

  “How did the police not find out?”