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It had been a long and rough case. Eliot was still favoring his wounds from the fight he’d gotten into with Quinn and Nate had insisted that he go home and get some rest.
When Eliot had not come into the office by ten the next morning, Parker volunteered to go check on him. The lock on his door was tricky, but she enjoyed the challenge and in five minutes she was inside. Just for the hell of it she decided to try and sneak up on him, to see if it were even possible. She was nearly silent as she started up the stairs.
“Parker.” Eliot called to her from the loft.
“How did you know it was me?”
“Who else would even bother to try to sneak up on me?”
“Hey, you never know...”
“Plus, you smell like jasmine soap. Stay where you are, I’ll be down in a minute. And don’t touch anything.”
She silently mocked him, mimicking his last order.
“I heard that.”
Her eyes widened, “How did you… I didn’t...” she sputtered, “That’s just...” she pressed her lips in a pout, crossed her arms and wandered over to fireplace to warm up. Standing there, basking in the radiating warmth, she looked over the objects on the mantelpiece. In the center of the wide mahogany board was an antique clock that ticked loudly; it was flanked on either side by small, framed portraits of a man and a woman. The woman’s frame had a sliver bracelet draped over one corner. Parker leaned closer to study the faded design embossed on the links.
“Careful, if you catch your sweater on fire you’ll be a lot warmer than you intended.”
Parker startled and spun around, glaring at him, “Jeeze, could you at least make some kind of noise? You scared me half to death.”
Eliot quirked an eyebrow at her, the corners of his mouth turned up in a wicked grin.
“Oh, shut up.” She reached for the bracelet but Eliot batted her hand away.
“I told you not to touch anything.” He grumbled. Eliot carefully removed the bracelet and held it out to her. “It was my mother’s.”
She gingerly accepted it, “Is that a Fleur De Lis on it?”
“Yes. My mother was born in New Orleans.”
"Oh!" Her voice was sad, "It’s broken.” She handed it back with gentle fingers.
Eliot arranged the silver back across the frame and turned away. “I was seven when my mother got sick.” His shoulders slumped, “They wouldn’t tell me what was wrong with her but I remember that she coughed a lot.”
FLASHBACK
“You can’t be in here,” the nurse scolded, “you’re too young unless you have an adult with you.”
Eliot stared curiously up at woman, his mother was right there in the bed; didn’t she count as an adult?
“Where is your father?”
“Work.”
The nurse tucked a strand of mousey brown hair back under her starched white cap, "You should be in school, anyway.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He didn’t like her, but he’d been raised to be polite. Still, he stared at her, memorizing the tobacco stained teeth, brown eyes set too close together and a chicken pox scar on her right cheek.
She leaned over to speak quietly to him and he could read the name tag on her uniform – T. Biddlecomb, R.N.
“You run along now and don’t come back unless your father is with you, you hear?”
Eliot nodded, clenching his teeth.
“Go on.” She made a shooing motion at him. “A sick room is no place for a child.”
Eliot left his mother’s room, the sound of her wheezing coughs still audible halfway down the hall. He crouched behind a large ashtray by the elevator, watching and waiting for the nurse to go back to the nurse’s station up the hall. As soon as she came out, he was sprinting quietly back to his mother’s room, one eye on the nurse’s broad retreating backside. He slipped into the room and the door closed behind him with a soft click.
He stayed with his mother every day, sneaking in just after sunup and out just before supper. At first, he sat in the chair beside her but after a couple of close calls he began to hide under the bed, contenting himself with holding the hand she reached down to him.Whenever the door would open, he would let go of her hand and slide further under the bed, staying there until the person was gone. He came to recognize the scuffed, white, rubber-soled shoes and the snagged, milky stockings as belonging to nurse Biddlecomb, her nicotine roughened voice was unmistakable.
“You really seem to be enjoying the jello.” The nurse chuckled, wheeling the table away from the bed.
Eliot smiled, his mother hated jello but she liked to share her lunch with him.
~*~*~
One afternoon, not long after, his mother couldn’t hold onto him. She coughed louder, couldn’t get enough breath to speak to him. He climbed onto the bed to lie beside her for hours, rubbing comfortingly warm fingers across her chill face. Hearing the door open, Eliot rolled off the bed, landed soundlessly on the tile and crawled under the bed. Peeking out from under the trailing bedding, he recognized nurse Biddlecomb's shoes. She paused in the doorway for a moment then slipped inside, closing the door quietly. She walked slowly over to the bed.
"That can’t be comfortable for you to have your hand drooping over the side like that," the nurse tutted. "I’ve noticed you do that a lot. Is this bracelet too heavy? Maybe I should take it off."
His mother made a feeble protest.
"Don’t you worry, I’ll keep it safe."
Biddlecomb fussed around for several minutes, refilling the usually neglected water pitcher and fluffing the pillows. When she left and pulled the door closed, Eliot saw his mother's silver bracelet around the nurse's fat wrist.He climbed back up on the bed beside his mother and wiped the tears off her pale cheeks.
"Don't cry, Mommy. I'll get it back for you, I promise."
~*~*~
As Eliot slipped past the nurses station that evening, he heard the women in the little room behind the desk talking about nurse Biddlecomb.
“Yes, the director came up here himself.” the younger one said. “He pulled that old biddy back here but I could still hear what they were saying because the door didn’t close completely.”
“Well, don’t keep it to yourself, tell me what happened.”
“He told her there’d been accusations from some of the patients and their families about things, valuable things like jewelry and money that came up missing whenever she was on shift. He wanted to know if she’d been stealing.”
The older nurse barked a laugh, “I wish I could have seen her face when she knew she’d been caught out. I bet she lied and said someone else must have been doing it, like the cleaning crew or someone.”
“That’s exactly what she said! She said she’d seen the night shift janitor in some of the patient rooms but she didn’t have any proof he was up to something so she kept quiet.”
“I’ll bet she kept quiet… when she was sneaking in and stealing from the dying. Shameless, that’s what she is.”
“Fired too, he canned her right then and there. You should have heard the wailing and crying.”
“Well, good on him! Good riddance to bad rubbish, I say.”
The voices moved closer as they returned to the desk and Eliot darted to the stairs and ran down to the first floor. He stopped at the phone kiosk and dragged out the local phone directory. Paging through it he found four listings for Biddlecomb, only one had the address. T. Biddlecomb lived at 1324 Mesa. In the front of the book was a map of the city street, he tore it out and stuffed it into the back pocket of his jeans.
When he got home, he found a note from his father tacked to the fringe with a magnet.‘I’ll be home late. Dinner in the oven. Love, Dad’
Eliot opened the oven, pulled out the rack and sniffed. Meatloaf, again. He wished his father would learn some new recipes. Cutting off a thick slice, he put it between two slices of bread and munched on it while he poured a glass of milk. When he finished eating, he washed the glass and silverware then put it away. The meatloaf, he wrapped in aluminum foil and set it in the refrigerator.
Eliot spread the map from the phone book on the table, smoothing the wrinkles out and studying it. Mesa Street was on east side of town. Not the best place to be after dark, his father always said. Nothing to be done for it though, he’d made a promise.
Eliot got his backpack and emptied his school stuff out of it. He packed a flashlight and the pry bar from his father’s tool box. A short bladed fishing knife pilfered from his father’s tackle box, he tucked into his shoe. He changed into a black, hooded sweatshirt and left the house. He debated on whether or not to take his bike, the wheels would give him speed but if cornered, he’d have to abandon it. He left the bike in the garage; he’d take the chance that he would be able to outrun any trouble.
1324 was a small, dilapidated clapboard house with peeling paint and sagging blinds. The grass was overgrown, except where tires had pounded it down in the dirt driveway. Eliot jogged down the drive to the back of the house. No car in the ramshackle garage but he tapped on the glass of the back door just in case. No one answered and he pressed his forehead against the dirty window, shading his eyes with one hand while he tried the doorknob. It was locked. Eliot pulled off his backpack and removed the slim steel pry bar. It slid easily between the latch and the doorframe, a nearly inaudible crack of splintering cheap wood and the door creaked open. Eliot grabbed his backpack and stepped inside, closing the door quietly behind him.
The house was mess, papers strewn over the floor, cabinet doors open, drawers pulled out. It looked like someone had burglarized the place and left in a hurry. He walked quietly, instinctively keeping the beam of the flashlight on the floor. The living room held a ratty couch and a coffee table scarred by condensation rings and cigarettes. The smell of the stale smoke made him gag.
He went to the bedroom; this room too, was a disaster. The closet door was open, only empty hangers were inside it. The dresser too was open and empty. Apparently T. Biddlecomb had left in a rush, taking only the most necessary of items with her. Eliot walked over to the bed; he could see a pile of discarded jewelry gleaming on the rumpled, dirty sheets. He picked through the items carefully. There were watches - both men’s and ladies and rings of all sizes, their empty settings sharp and broken. A few bracelets, also barren of the stones that had decorated them, were tangled and snarled together with the longer links of necklaces.
Nothing that resembled his mother's bracelet. He searched the house thoroughly and found no trace of it. He left the house, taking nothing with him but burning determination to keep his promise.
Less than a block away he heard the first sound - a can tumbling in a dark alleyway and then cackling laughter that was meant to frighten him into a panicked run. Eliot remained calm, and kept walking at a steady pace. He was small for his age, but his father had taught him to defend himself.
Eliot recognized the boy who stood silhouetted in the mouth of the alley. Kyle Grake was three grades ahead of him and had a reputation as a bully and a thief.
“What cha doin' out so late, kid?” Kyle asked, flicking his cigarette into the gutter.
“I'm going home; I don't want to fight with you.”
“This is my turf and you gotta pay the toll if you wanna pass.”
Eliot shrugged off his backpack and pulled his hood off. “I'm just going home.”
Kyle laughed, elbowing one of his friends. “Well this ain't gonna be much of a work out, a shrimp like you.”
“So why don't you send your dogs on home then and just you an' me mix it up.”
“No, I think Mack and Tommy would like to hang around and watch me take you apart.”
Eliot circled slowly, watching for a way out. He had no doubt about how this would end, he might be able to take down the leader, but the other two would make sure he paid for it.
Kyle rushed him and Eliot sidestepped, landing a punch to Kyle’s back that drove the other boy to his knees.
Kyle got up, faced him and cracked his knuckles, “First one is free, now you’re gonna pay.”
Kyle punched him, Eliot managed to duck and twist just enough that the blows only grazed him. One made contact with the side of his head and he staggered. Mack and Tommy hooted, encouraging Kyle with cheers and whistles.
“Atta boy, Kyle!” the taller one shouted. “Give it to ‘im!”
“Crush the little maggot!”
Kyle moved in, fist flying and Eliot kicked him in the knee. The older boy went down with a scream. Mack and Tommy rushed in, punching and kicking Eliot until all he could do was curl up on the ground and endure the beating.
“Hey! Hey, you assholes, get off him!”
Eliot looked up to see another boy striding out of the alley. He had close cut hair and looked ready to kill.
“ ‘s matter with you, can’t fight fair?” he asked, clenching his fists.
“Fuck off,” Kyle growled, sitting up, hands clenched around his knee, “Unless you want your ass kicked too.”
“Think you can?” the newcomer challenged.
“Get him.” Kyle told his friends, “Make him sorry.”
Eliot couldn’t believe the other boy just stood still, waiting until Mack and Tommy were towering over him. The newcomer was at least seven inches shorter than either one of them and they both had to outweigh him by more than fifty pounds.
“Show me what you got.” The kid smirked.
It was over in minutes. Mack and Tommy lay on the pavement, groaning, trying to crawl away. They hadn’t managed to land a single blow.
“Next time, fight fair, punk asses.” He turned to Eliot and helped him to his feet.“You are kinda shrimpy ain’t ya, kid?”
Eliot shrugged, grinning. “You ain't so big neither.”
The other boy held out his hand, “Michael Wayne Burnett but everyone calls me Mikey.”
“Eliot,” he shook his hand, “So Eliot, how 'bout I show you some other moves while we head back to your house?”
“I'd like that.”