The Masked Family

by Robert T. Jeschonek

  E.Q. shook his head. "She didn't mean to..."

  "But that's exactly what you're saying, isn't it?" said Baron. "She took enough pills to kill herself. Then, she started a fire that she had to know would kill all the rest of us."

  "No no," said E.Q.

  Baron lunged forward to snarl in his face. "That's exactly what you're saying!"

  This time, E.Q. didn't try to answer.

  "I don't believe you," said Baron, sneering with disgust. "She'd never do that."

  E.Q. flinched backward. "I'm not saying she planned to do this..."

  "Because she didn't." Baron jabbed E.Q. in the chest. "You're making this up to cover for Grogan and Paisley!"

  Suddenly, E.Q. snapped forward, and it was Baron's turn to flinch. "You don't know as much about your mother as you think you do!"

  Baron took a step back.

  "She had problems," said E.Q. "Depression. Anxiety. The fire wasn't the first time she tried to kill herself."

  "It wasn't?" said Paisley.

  E.Q. shook his head. "The night Grogan took you to the basement...the reason Lydia had to go to the hospital was because she'd tried to kill herself."

  For a long moment, no one said a word.

  Celeste leaned back against the front door and rubbed her bloodshot eyes. She wished she'd never found the letter to Grogan in Cary's room and asked the questions that had set off this whole avalanche of revelations.

  She wished her father had kept his secrets to himself.

  If Spellerina were here, she'd swat these secrets out of existence like flies and replace them with flowers from her sleeve and rabbits from her top hat.

  "And you never told us," said Baron.

  "I wanted to protect you," said E.Q.

  "Nice job," said Baron. "Mom almost killed all of us in the fire...according to you, anyway."

  "It's all true," said E.Q.

  "No it isn't," said Paisley.

  Finally, Celeste felt herself snap. "I don't want to hear any more!" Her voice shook, and the tears wouldn't stop coming. "I really don't!"

  E.Q. and the others fell silent.

  "BAROOO!" said Pretzel.

  "Shut up, dog!" said Celeste. "Just shut up!"

  Pretzel curled his tail between his legs and wobbled over to squat behind Baron.

  "We're getting nowhere here." Celeste yanked the car keys from her pocket and swung open the door. "None of this is helping us find Cary."

  Baron sighed and nodded. "You're right. It's just a bunch of bullshit anyway."

  "Believe what you want," said E.Q., "but I'm telling you, it's all true."

  "It's not all true!" Paisley's face was twisted into an agonized scowl. She pinched her eyes shut and scrubbed her scalp with her knuckles. "Mom didn't set the fire! Neither did Grogan!

  "It was me!" said Paisley. "I burned down the house!"

  *****

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Puerto Peñasco, Mexico, 2006

  Just as Cary's eyes were fluttering shut for what felt like the last time ever, Drill suddenly let go of his throat.

  Cary dropped to the sand like a stone.

  As he lay there, gasping for breath, he looked straight up at the starry night sky. He was amazed he was still alive to see it, though he wasn't sure why he was still alive.

  Then, he rolled over on his side and looked at the spot where he'd been choking to death. It was then that he understood what had saved him.

  Who had saved him.

  If Cary could have spoken at that moment, he would have called out his name in a cheer.

  El Yucatango!

  Drill had finally met his match. El Yucatango had him trapped in a headlock and was pounding his face with punches. When Drill managed to sock him in the kidneys, El Yucatango threw him down on the sand...then flopped on top of him.

  Drill wailed in pain.

  Just then, the kids appeared on either side of Cary and helped him sit up. He thought he shouldn't hug them, since they were all still in danger, and he was recovering from near-strangulation.

  But then he changed his mind and hugged them both at the same time.

  "I missed you guys," he whispered.

  "Who's the man with the horn?" said Late.

  "El Yucatango." For the moment, a hoarse whisper was the best Cary could manage. "He's one of the good guys."

  Late twisted in Cary's embrace, unable to take his eyes off the luchador. "He's a super-hero, right?"

  Cary laughed to himself...not because of anything the boy had said, but just because they were together again. "Yes, he's a super-hero."

  Then, suddenly, Glo cried out. "Look out!" She was looking back over Cary's shoulder at something Cary couldn't see.

  Letting go of the kids, he rolled over onto his hands and knees to face whatever Glo had seen.

  He was just in time to see Crystal driving the pointed end of a clothesline pole straight for him.

  "Run!" he told the kids, even as he dove to one side to avoid the pole. As he'd instructed, Glo and Late scattered in different directions.

  After missing Cary on her first pass, Crystal swung the pole around and caught him on the shoulder with it. Cary made a grab for the weapon, but she quickly lashed it out of reach.

  "Fucker," she said, steadying the pole under one arm and aiming the sharp end at Cary. Her pasty skin glistened with sweat, and she had a mouthful of her own black hair. "You are truly fucked in the head, you know that?" Glaring at him, she hunched, preparing to charge.

  Then, her boyfriend knocked her out.

  To be exact, his flying body knocked her out, flung through the air by El Yucatango.

  After which, Crystal lay still on the sand, and Drill lay still on top of her.

  El Yucatango planted a foot on top of both of them. Pounding his chest like an ape, he let out a high-pitched, ululating war cry.

  Cary dropped down on one knee as the kids rushed over and threw their arms around him.

  I did it.

  It had been a long journey from Wheeling, West Virginia to that moment. There had been plenty of dark times along the way, plenty of fear and doubt and suffering.

  But now he knew it had all been worth it.

  "Oh, thank God." His voice was still raspy from the strangling. "I wasn't sure I'd ever see you again."

  Glo shivered and sobbed against him. "We knew you'd save us," she said. "The Nuclear Family always takes care of its own."

  Cary laughed. The kids' hair was wet with his tears.

  "Can we go home now?" said Late.

  "Sure," said Cary. "Just as soon as we tie up your mom and dad so they can't follow us."

  "That's not my dad," said Late, looking over his shoulder at unconscious Drill. "You are."

  That did it.

  Cary had been about to let go of the kids. It was high time they got moving, after all.

  But hearing what Late had said made him scoop them up in his arms and swing them in a circle, feet flying, tears glistening in the flickering light of the burning clothesline cross.

  "I'll never let you go again," he told them.

  *****

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Cresson, Pennsylvania, 1958

  As soon as E.Q. saw the extra headlights in the Magic Castle's parking lot, he floored the accelerator. The Chevy's engine roared, and the car hurtled up the road.

  Extra headlights at two in the morning were not a good sign, not when it came to the Magic Castle. Especially not when E.Q.'s father and Mary Anne Filigree were there alone.

  Olenka hadn't been feeling well, and E.Q. had driven her home to Cresson. He'd only been gone an hour...but that had been time enough for visitors to show up at the Magic Castle.

  It had been time enough for them to do much worse than that, as well.

  E.Q. raced the Chevy into the parking lot and slid to a stop on the gravel. The first thing he saw in the headlights of the three pickup trucks pointing at the place was a gang of masked men beating up his father.

>   There were four of them in coveralls and ski masks. Max was down, and they didn't stop hitting and kicking him when E.Q. pulled up.

  E.Q. was shocked. Never before had he seen his father take a beating like that. It hardly seemed real...and yet, at the same time, it was the most horrifyingly real thing he'd ever seen.

  He had to stop them.

  E.Q. switched his foot from the brake to the accelerator, and the Chevy leaped forward. Not far from the gang beating his father, he hit the brakes and chucked the wheel hard left, swinging the Chevy to a stop.

  The men looked in his direction, but none of them moved.

  E.Q. threw on his high-beams and blasted his horn. The men looked at each other, and maybe they said something under their masks.

  Then, three of them walked away. They didn't act like they were in any particular hurry.

  The fourth man hauled back his foot and got in one last kick. Max caught it in the side, his body jolting on the ground from the force of it.

  Then, the fourth man walked away, too.

  E.Q. flung open the car door and sprang from the Chevy. As he charged across the parking lot, he heard the men laughing and opening the doors of their pickup trucks.

  "Dad!" E.Q. dropped to his knees alongside Max. The first thing he felt was relief, because Max was still breathing and moving.

  Then, he got a good look at the damage. Max was covered with bruises and cuts, and his clothes were stained with blood. His face was worst of all--lips split, nose broken, cheeks black, eyes swollen almost shut. His hair was caked with dirt and blood.

  E.Q. had never dreamed he'd ever see his father looking like that. It made his head pound and his heart slam like a mallet in his chest. It made him want to hurt somebody.

  He looked up, thinking about revenge, but two of the pickups were already backing out of the parking lot. The third was turning around to face the road.

  The four thugs were out of reach, or soon would be. E.Q.'s chance for revenge was slipping away.

  Until the fifth man ran out of the Magic Castle.

  Like the others, he wore coveralls and a ski mask. He charged out the door of the shop, breathing hard, carrying a metal gasoline can.

  As soon as he saw him, E.Q. leaped up and blocked his path. The man, who had a smaller frame than the other four, stopped in his tracks.

  E.Q. took a step toward the man, who responded by swinging the gas can in his direction. When E.Q. pushed forward again, the man took another swing and tried sprinting around him...but E.Q. sidestepped and continued to block him.

  That was when E.Q. saw the flames.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a dancing light. Turning, he saw that the Magic Castle was on fire again...this time, seemingly, from top to bottom.

  Smoke and flames churned from every window he could see, from the apartment windows upstairs to the back office and shop windows downstairs. Behind the big display window at the front of the shop, he saw tongues and teeth of fire gnashing and rising from floor to ceiling.

  The fifth man had done it. While the other four had beaten Max to a pulp, the fifth man had set the Magic Castle on fire.

  And he used it now to get away. In E.Q.'s moment of surprised staring, the fifth man quick-stepped around him and bolted for the last pickup truck in the parking lot.

  It was enough to snap E.Q. out of his brief daze. Whirling, he dashed after the man...and managed to snag him by the collar of his coveralls. Unfortunately, the man still had the gas can and swung it around to clock him in the head. E.Q. let go and dropped away, and the man continued his escape.

  But he left his ski mask behind. In a last grab, E.Q. pulled it from the man's head as he ran off.

  That was why, when the man looked back over his shoulder on his way to the pickup, E.Q. got a good look at his face. He recognized the man instantly, and wasn't at all surprised by his identity.

  It was Chuck Knave, the miner who'd made a pass at Mary Anne Filigree. The one who'd promised to come back and settle up later.

  Now, E.Q. was the one making the promise to settle up later. Chuck might have escaped, but E.Q. wasn't going to let him get away with what he and his friends had done to Max.

  For now, though, E.Q. had more important work to do...and he had to do it fast. His father and Mary Anne both needed immediate attention, assuming they were both still alive.

  When E.Q. turned back to the Magic Castle, he saw that one of them, at least, was not only alive, but on the move.

  It was Max. He'd gotten up from the ground and was hobbling toward the front door of the shop.

  E.Q. ran over and took him by the arm. "I have to get you to a doctor, Dad."

  Max pointed a shaky forefinger at the front door. "Mary Anne's still in there."

  "Then I'll get her." E.Q. tried steering Max toward the car...but as beat-up as Max was, he still had the strength to resist.

  He just kept heading for the door.

  "You have to stay out here and fight the fire," said Max. "Going in is my job."

  "Not after what they did to you." E.Q. kept trying to steer Max away from the building, to no avail. "Dad, I'm sorry I didn't get back sooner. I'm sorry I left at all."

  "Don't be ridiculous," said Max. "I told you to go."

  "I should've been here," said E.Q.

  "There were five of them, E.Q. They would've just beaten you, too."

  E.Q. managed to pull Max half a step off course. "Come on, Dad. I'll get Mary Anne, and then I'll take you to the doctor."

  Suddenly, Max howled in pain. E.Q. let go in a flash, worried that he'd been the cause of it.

  Seconds later, E.Q. was on the ground.

  Max had faked the pain. As soon as E.Q. released him, Max pushed him over backward.

  And then he ran for the door.

  Before E.Q. could scramble to his feet and stop him, Max had disappeared into the fiery shop.

  E.Q. called out, though he knew it would do no good. "Dad! Dad, come back!"

  Then, because he knew it was the best way to help, he ran for the fire truck. He switched on the pump, ran hose across the parking lot, and started spraying down the Magic Castle, trying to follow his father's path through the building.

  *****

  Moments later, E.Q. heard a loud bang from inside the building, followed by a crash. Mary Anne Filigree dove out of the back door and started screaming.

  E.Q. turned off the hose, dropped it, and ran to her.

  "Help me!" she said. "It's your father!"

  Without hesitation, E.Q. followed her into the house.

  The downstairs office was filled with smoke and flames. Mary Anne headed straight for the stairway and charged up it, taking the stairs two at a time. E.Q. did the same.

  The studio apartment on the second floor was further along than the office on the first floor had been. As E.Q. rounded the banister at the top of the stairs, he stepped into a roiling, crackling inferno blazing away in every inch and crack and corner.

  And right in the middle of it burned his father.

  Max lay on the floor on his stomach, pinned under a ceiling timber. His clothes were on fire.

  So was his body.

  E.Q. didn't waste another second. Mary Anne had already dashed over to grab one end of the timber, and E.Q. ran to take hold of the other end.

  When they both had a grip on the timber, Mary Anne met E.Q.'s eyes and counted. "One...two...three."

  On three, they lifted. Mary Anne was small and had to struggle, but she still managed to move the weight.

  When the timber was clear of Max, E.Q. and Mary Anne let it drop. As it crashed to the floor, E.Q. raced through the thrashing flames to the kitchenette sink.

  Grabbing a pot from the dish drainer, he thrust it under the spigot and ran water until it was full. He hurried back to Max, used the water to douse the flames on his upper body, and returned to the sink for more. He used the next potful to put out Max's lower body, then dropped the pot and crouched beside him.

 
E.Q. rolled Max onto his back, trying not to look at his charred flesh. Just as he was trying to decide on the best way to carry him down the stairs, Mary Anne crouched at Max's feet.

  "I'll get this end," she said.

  E.Q. nodded and moved around to Max's head. He thrust one hand under each of Max's armpits, lifting him off the floor.

  At that instant, another ceiling timber came down with an explosive crash. E.Q. and Mary Anne both looked up at once, but the timber had dropped across the room.

  Turning from the fallen timber, they exchanged looks. Mary Anne didn't show the slightest flicker of fear or hesitation. Her gaze was cool and steady and not the least bit effeminate.

  E.Q. nodded once. For the first time, he felt real respect for her and not a touch of awkwardness.

  Then, without another word, he and Mary Anne picked up Max and carried him downstairs.

  *****

  "Make things right, whether they like it or not."

  Those were Max's last words to E.Q. in the hospital two days later. He said some other things to Olenka, but those were the last words he said to his son.

  His last words to Mary Anne, who had brought him to the hospital in Altoona with E.Q. and stayed by his side ever since, were these:

  "Okay...so maybe you should move after all."

  Max and Mary Anne had laughed at that, at least until Max started into a coughing fit.

  It wasn't long after that when he died.

  *****

  Later, people said all kinds of things to E.Q. about his father. Most of them, in one way or another, weren't very nice.

  E.Q. let them go in one ear and out the other.

  As far as he was concerned, his father was the greatest man who'd ever lived. Even with his secret Klan past and the way he'd driven E.Q. crazy so often, he stood out as a guiding light whose brilliance no one else could hope to match.