by David Jester
Patrick hadn’t thought about that, but the bartender was right. If the killer was one of them, the Boyles and Dolans had just done him a favour by narrowing down the search. Unless one of them was the killer of course, in which case the murders would either stop or the killer would have to sneak back into the community.
“If it is one of us,” Patrick said.
“You’re not convinced?”
“Are you?”
Seamus held Patrick’s stare for a moment, looked around the bar. In the corner Mrs Byrne sat smoking her pipe, not paying attention to anyone or anything around her as usual, concentrating only on the smoke wafting from her toxic stick. No one else was in the pub; no one else had turned to the drink in this time of distress.
“I have a theory,” Seamus said, leaning forward.
Patrick sighed. He had heard a few theories himself. He had spent the morning doing some investigating work, walking around the community, asking everyone if they had seen anything and getting their spin on the murders. He had planned to take Aidan with him, to help speed things along, but he couldn’t bring himself to ask.
He had heard them all, but most of them had centred on the Aherns, a theory he planned to follow up himself later. A few fingers had also been pointed at members of the community, all of who Patrick had been able to rule out, as they had been in the pub with him during the murder of the McCleary boy and the Brady girls.
“I think it’s your man Aidan,” Seamus said quietly.
Patrick looked up, suddenly interested. “He was here when--”
“When the little boy and girls were killed, yes I know, but there’s something not right about him.”
Patrick raised an eyebrow.
“I know he’s your friend, but more’s the reason you must have noticed it.”
Patrick nodded in agreement without even realising it.
“He’s been acting weird since this whole thing started. Something’s not right, he’s up to something, and if not, then he knows something.”
He moved to add something else, shifting in even closer, but he stopped when the door to the pub opened and the accused, Aidan McCleary, stepped through. Seamus sprung back upright, quickly and nervously grabbed at a clean glass and began to rub it cleaner whilst breaking into a whistle.
“Pint,” Aidan said succinctly, with a nod to the anxious bartender. Seamus nearly dropped the glass, he looked around quickly, as if forgetting himself and expecting someone else to serve the accused his drink, before staggering to the pumps and pulling Aidan his pint.
“Another family gone,” Aidan said blankly, without even looking at Patrick.
Patrick nodded. “Two. Boyles and Dolans.”
Aidan shook his head. “Didn’t mean them, they left hours ago. I meant the O’Shaughnessy’s. They’re packing up now.”
Patrick was about to take a drink, he removed his lips from the glass, slammed it down on the bar. “What?”
Aidan gave a solemn nod. “Adam O’Shaughnessy said he’s had enough. He’s taking his wife and kid and getting out. Said he has friends up near the coast, up at Willow Wood.”
Patrick grunted with disgust, shook his head from side to side. “With the Aherns?”
“I think so.”
“He’s friends with the fucking Aherns?”
Aidan shrugged, “Looks like it.”
Patrick downed his glass of whiskey; it tasted bitter and unpleasant on his tongue but was a better prospect than it had felt moments earlier. He stood up, clenched his hands into fists, his emotions finally vented.
He stormed out of the pub, headed straight for the O’Shaughnessy’s lot. Adam was one of the newcomers to Evergreen. His family wasn’t part of the community, he had lived further south. They’d moved near Evergreen when Adam was a teenager, in his late teens he had taken a job on a construction site nearby, had become friendly with an Evergreen local named Patricia. He had eventually married her and had preferred to settle in Evergreen than anywhere else. They accepted him, welcomed him with open arms, now he was cuddling up to the Aherns and taking their women away. Patrick was furious.
He was packing the last decade of his life into the boot of his car when Patrick saw him. He looked up, gave Patrick a sorrowful, almost apologetic look, but Patrick saw it as something else. He didn’t see the pity, didn’t see the apology; he saw the cocky, smug expression of a man who had been getting his own way. If he was friends with the Aherns there was also a good chance he was siding with the killer, he may even be the killer. Patrick felt a vein throb in his forehead, his fingernails dug deep into the base of his palm, drawing blood.
He wanted to demand answers, to demand that O’Shaughnessy tell him why he was friends with the Aherns, what he had been telling them, what he had been letting them get away with, what atrocities he had helped them to commit, but by the time he reached him the anger had boiled over and he could barely speak.
He hit him, hard. Adam O’Shaughnessy wasn’t expecting it, no one was. His wife and daughter had been watching from the open door of the caravan, they both uttered startled cries; his young daughter hugged her mother tightly. Patrick didn’t see them, didn’t hear them.
Adam hit the floor, crumpling up on impact, a soft, whining sound emanated from his mouth. He held his hand to his face, looked up with those pleading, desperate eyes; those guilty, evil eyes. Patrick hit him again, straddled him like a jockey on a fallen horse and then pummelled him with a barrage of left and right hooks. He punched until his fists bled and the blood mingled with the rivers running from O'Shaughnessy’s face. He couldn’t feel his hands, couldn’t clearly picture the face he was punching -- distorted by blood, by anguish, by his own pounding fists.
Others came to watch, but none tried to intervene. They all stood and stared, wondering if Patrick had finally caught the killer and deciding that, if he had, he was probably getting what he deserved.
When O’Shaughnessy’s wife couldn’t bear to watch her husband beaten any longer, she threw herself into the melee, received a punch across the temple for her troubles. She stumbled backwards, toppled over, her expression anguished, horrified -- her temple imprinted with the blood smeared stencil of Patrick’s fist.
He stopped, watching her. He pulled back, sucked his fist into his stomach. His eyes deglazed, the anger faded. He stood up, looked down at the whining, hissing mess of blood in front of him. Adam was struggling to breath; his wife was crying; his daughter was screaming.
Patrick woke up to what he had just done. He hesitated, mumbled, stuttered an explanation.
“You bastard!” Patricia screamed at him, firing angry spittle into the air.
“I didn’t--”
“You fucking bastard!” she yelled again, frothing at the mouth.
Patrick composed himself, tried to defend his actions. “You’re friends with the Aherns,” he said, hating himself the moment he spoke. It was no defence of his actions.
Patricia stood on wobbly legs. She threw herself at her husband, ran a finger across his face, tracing a line in the blood. He coughed, spluttered, tried to tell her something but failed, horribly.
“He had this coming,” Aidan said, stepping forward and backing his friend up. “This is not a time to piss off with the Aherns. Evergreen needs to stick together, not run off with our enemies.”
“Andrew Ahern,” Patricia said softly, her words barely audible.
“What?” Patrick asked.
She looked up, gave him a deep and sorrowful look through tear drenched eyes. “It was Andrew Ahern. They’re our friends. Andrew and Linda Ahern. Not the Aherns. Not even travellers. They’re English.”
“But... Willow Park,” Patrick stuttered.
“Willow Walk. Nowhere near, it’s a different fucking county!”
Patrick felt his heart drop, felt a wedge of regret lodge in his throat. He looked down at his hands, cut and disfigured. Two of the knuckles on his right hand had popped out of place; the little balls seemed to be making an escape
towards his wrist. He couldn’t feel the pain before, now they were on fire.
He looked up; past the hysterical woman and her beaten husband; beyond their young daughter who stood, in horror, silently screaming into her hands. The people who had been watching were beginning to drift away, none of them said a word, not even to each other. A few of them gave Patrick blank looks, he saw sympathy there, he knew that they would have done the same thing; that they didn’t think worse of him for what he did. They were angry that the O’Shaughnessy’s were leaving in such hard times, they were jealous and suspicious.
The fact that they didn’t think less of him, only made Patrick feel worse.
“I’m so sorry,” he said genuinely. “I…” he froze when Patricia looked at him again.
“Leave!” she said, trying her best to scream; her lungs and heart failing her. “Just leave us alone.”
12
Edward Byrne was home alone. He lived with his grandmother Martha, a pipe smoking octogenarian who liked to be portrayed as a woman who kept herself to herself but really only remained quiet so she could hear everyone else’s business better. She was at the pub with most of the other locals, another debate on the recent atrocities which she would try to watch and study from afar.
Edward had a lot in common with his grandmother -- which wasn’t unusual as she had raised him for the majority of his life -- he also liked to know what was going on, but he liked to get involved, he liked to be close to the action. When they burned down Murphy's caravan, Martha had watched from the back of the pack, throwing an occasional stone or mumbled word towards the chaos; Edward was in the thick of the action, he’d been the one to fetch the bottle of vodka, the one to start the fire. It wasn’t entirely his idea of course, nor was it his fault, Paul Murphy was going to die that night regardless of what he had done, if anything he saved him from the humiliating death of being dragged out of his home and beaten to death by a hundred angry feet and fists. He deserved to die anyway, he may have not been the killer but he wasn’t one of God’s children.
Edward had stayed home to play on his new games console. He had picked it up for less than a tenner. It was a few years old and was almost definitely stolen, but he didn’t mind. It worked, that was what mattered.
He had amassed a collection of copied disks for the console -- a stack of DVDs with hand written scrawls on the front. Some of them worked, most didn’t. He cycled through them with a lustful hunger, rarely giving each game more than a few minutes. He had wanted a games console for years, had been promised one for his last birthday -- his fourteenth -- only for his grandmother to deny him it in place of a new jacket, but now he was spoilt for choice and quickly tired of it.
The guy who had sold him the console had also sold him a few joints. He decided to spice his playtime up a bit, see if the dope could settle him and force his interest. He opened the front door and sat on the steps to smoke.
His grandmother warned him to stay inside and keep the doors locked, but the killer was only after women, he was a pervert, an insecure little man who liked to pick on defenceless women. If he tried anything with Edward he would kick his arse, teach him a lesson or two about not hitting women.
After a few tokes -- his muscles immediately relaxed, his mind succumbing -- he heard a noise at the back of the caravan. His immediate neighbours were all at the pub, their blackened windows reflecting the light that spilled out from inside the Byrne caravan. He cupped the joint in his palm, wiped the stoned expression from his face and ventured down the stairs and around the back of the caravan.
A football, its stitching worn and coated with a splattering of mud, had wedged itself underneath the caravan. He looked around with a bemused shrug; there was no one else around. The Anderson twins, Terry and Johnny -- two little terrors -- had probably been playing football near the caravan again, scarpering when the ball hit the Byrne home. The last time they’d hit the ball against the bedroom window, nearly giving Edward and his grandmother a heart attack. He’d warned them away but the little shits had defied him.
He stuffed the joint back in his mouth, scooped up the ball in his hands and rolled it around in his palms.
It was a dark and quiet night, the silence palpable. The Anderson’s were unruly children, their parents were too young, too inexperienced and didn’t really give a toss, that was why their kids were the little demons they were, but letting the pair of six year olds out at this time of night, when a serial killer was on the loose, was something else. He sighed to himself, puffing a pillow of smoke out of his nostrils, squinting his eyes as the burning ember at the end of his mouth spat a spot of fire at the bridge of his nose.
He felt sorry for them. He hated them, they were annoying, dirty and would probably grow up to be thugs and bullies, but what chance did they have with parents like that?
He gave a mumbled curse, dropped the ball to his feet and took the joint out of his mouth.
A soft laugh, a rolling whisper on the silent wind, lifted to his ears. The dope was taking effect, exaggerating his paranoia and his sense of the supernatural, the last thing he needed was a creepy laugh in the dead of night. He instantly felt the hairs rise on the back of his arms; felt a chill run through his body.
He kicked the football away, in the general direction of the Anderson caravan. The laugh had come from the other direction, towards his front door, but hopefully the little terrors would follow their football and leave Edward alone.
He crept to the front door, trying to act cool and unflustered in case anyone was watching him.
The laugh sounded again when he climbed the stairs to his front door. It was different, louder, nearer. He ascended with trembling legs, flicking the joint into the night, keen to end his paranoia.
He didn’t see the marks in the grass, the lines of trailing legs and feet leading to his stairs; didn’t see the patches of mud, the spots of blood on the stairs.
He felt a great relief wash over him when he slammed the door, but the noise didn’t stop. Now he could hear it better and he knew it wasn’t a laugh. It had been when he first heard it, but this was like a chuckle, a sinister, evil patter of heavy breaths. They didn’t sound amused, didn’t sound like they were having fun at all.
The sound was coming from his grandmother’s bedroom. His body froze, his heart stopped, kicked and then exploded into a rapid stutter. He clenched and unclenched his fists, turned to the door, thought about opening and running as far and as fast as he could.
He was a fighter though, the only male in his household. The protector, the warrior. He felt a surge of adrenaline, a need to be the hero. He moved forward steadily, paused outside the bedroom door and then rushed forward, throwing it open, lifting his clenched fists in front of him and preparing for battle.
His grandmother was on the bed. She was the one making the sounds, it definitely hadn’t been a laugh. Her eyes bulged out of their sockets, she looked like she was in a state of extreme fear. Her pipe had been stuffed into her mouth, down her throat, the end from which poked out like a second tongue.
The skin around her mouth was cut and bleeding, her thin lips had been reduced to burnt blisters. She was gurgling, trying to splutter a few desperate pleas, but Edward couldn’t decipher them.
The door behind him slammed shut with a windy thump. He turned, startled just as the bat came down, clipping him on the forehead, spinning his world into a chaos of black, red and blue; a cataclysm of nothing, blood and dancing stars.
He hit the floor hard, shook the caravan on landing. He was unable to move, unable to stop his attacker from preparing a second blow. His eyes stared up at the bed as he waited for his end, he watched his grandmother struggling for her finals breaths, kicking her limp, muddied and bloodied feet lazily into the air; her hands, bound behind her back, grasped at nothing. She looked like a beached mermaid, flopping madly on her side and losing life with each passing second.
Then he saw the faces outside. They were faint, with the light on inside the room an
d the world outside black, most of what he saw was a reflection of his own impending doom -- the bat now raised in a fatality position above his head -- but he was sure he made out the horrified expressions of the Anderson twins as they witnessed Edward’s final breath.
13
The Anderson boys were terrified. They barely spoke, just stared off into space as if unable to shift the recollections from their minds. They were too young to have witnessed something so horrific, but they had seen it and they had gotten out alive. They were the only ones who had seen the killer and lived to talk about it; Patrick needed them to talk to him.
“It was very hard for them,” their mother said, as if an explanation was needed. She had her arm hooked over the pair, their eyes were red and sunken, they hadn’t slept and had been crying all night. Their parents hadn’t slept either; mother, hugging them tight and close in case the bogeyman came back; father, sitting on the other end of the sofa looking to exact revenge on whoever had forced his kids to witness suck sickening acts.