Chapter Text
Back Home
The car came to a sudden stop; I wasn’t waiting for us to arrive to our destination so soon. I felt my old insecurities blending together while I waited for the chauffer to open the door for me, as was proper protocol, it was nerve wracking. Perhaps a few years ago I would have taken all of this for granted. The chauffer opened the door and stepped aside so I could exit, I absentmindedly thanked him and I could feel myself returning to a world I had long forgotten, but apparently had no trouble returning to, I didn’t even know the chauffer’s name.
The first step is always the hardest, but it has to be taken anyway. This was the path that was going to take me to my brother, and while I may have learned to despise the shallowness of the privileged, him I miss. I cringed just by looking at the perfectly groomed clothes of the people around me, compared to my well-worn suit. The image they posed was so daunting, it made me want to return to Vienna and hide in the humble life I had managed to build for myself. But alas, it was not to be.
So instead of turning back, I made my way past the grand staircase of the Ritz, pondering how I ended up here when I begged my brother for weeks on end, not to throw such an extravagant event on my behalf. The salon was even grander and at the centre of it all was my brother. He hadn´t changed a thing from the last time I saw him all those years ago waiting for me to board a plane that would take me far. Sure, he looked more mature and probably went through a girlfriend or two or twenty. At the same time, he looked preoccupied, as if the weight of the world rested on his shoulders alone, and the way he gazed around the room could only be considered paranoid with that crazy gleam in his eye. It was probably because of the curse of being dad’s offspring.
But all of that seemed to drain away the moment he locked gazes with me from across the salon. For a moment it was like he became the little boy I used to hide with in our father´s study, the one that made up mysteries to keep us entertained during those long nights alone spent in hotel rooms in some unknown corner of the world.
It is an old cliché, the story of the poor single mom going against adversity to raise her children, while the dead-beat dad bangs a younger trollop and drinks away the little family’s shoestring budget. Our case was slightly different. There was never a mother in the picture, sometimes I wonder if she ever existed. Our father tried, I’m certain he did, we just never measured up to his precious company. I don’t think me or my brother, knew how much we meant to him until he was bedridden, and he entrusted the future of his life’s work to my now doomed brother.
Still distraught by the walk down memory lane, I began walking towards my brother, when I noticed he was in the company of a beautiful young woman. By her flaming red hair, I instantly knew she was Scarlett, my brother’s girlfriend in passing, though I suspect she would take longer to go away. She was using a diamond-encrusted necklace, Will’s common way of apologizing for being such a jerk.
All I knew of Scarlett, aside from her femme fatale appearance was that she was the Chair in Office at the prestigious law firm my uncle Cornelius built. As far as I knew that is how they met, one day Will went to the office trying to mend his broken relationship with our uncle who once again refused to meet him. So instead of a healed familiar relationship, Will left the office with a new girl on his arm. I don’t think Cornelius ever found out, he hated my brother enough by the time I left London.
Before I could even open my mouth to greet him, my brother was already engulfing me in his arms. It was comforting to know that despite the coldness that constantly surrounds him he could find a little bit of warmth within him. It was even more comforting to realize that warmth was aimed at me.
Conversations that were long overdue in the sterile room of the airport were just scratched when the vapid guests of my welcoming party crammed me and managed to separate me from my brother, the only person I returned to this wretched place for. Even with the not so gentle thought running through my mind I have poise, so outing on a smile I let the vultures ensnare me with their questions and fake curiosity. The party ran its course.
It took me a while but I was finally able to make my way out of the throng and into one of the adjacent hallways. I heard loud familiar voices that were trying to be quiet, so I obviously followed the sounds to a small room. Whoever was in there, left the door ajar so I could peek inside and watch the scene unfold. The flickering light of the chimney was he only source of illumination, and it was just enough so I could make out the silhouettes of my brother, arguing with dear uncle Cornelius.
Curiosity piqued, I drew closer to the door but made so much noise that both figures stilled and stopped their heated argument to run to my hiding place. Not wanting to be caught, I hightailed it out of there and into the crowd of the main salon. I tiptoed along the sides of the room hoping to avoid detection. I breathed a sigh of relief when I exited to the furthest balcony only to see another sight I did not expect.
Scarlett was there, along with a man about Will’s age, who looked vaguely familiar. He chuckled at something Scarlett said while she leaned to him flirtatiously. Nothing happened though because Will decided to interrupt the moment when he entered the balcony and flew into a jealous rage. My brother whispered something in the redhead’s ear that caused her to slap him with enough force to tumble him down.
Before anyone could storm off, I decided to leave. Taking one last look at the people, I saw their three faces starring back at me. But what drew my attention was not the devastated expression of my brother, but the factions of the stranger beside him. It was then very clear why I knew him. If I recall correctly his name was Andrew Marshall, some kid who used to go to our same school but who disappeared before we even finished elementary school.
I tried to make a swift exit but my brother caught up with me at the stairs before I could make it to my car.
- “Elroy I have to tell you something very important. Please, I know this night was a disaster and not what you wanted when you just came back, but could you meet me tomorrow at my place. Just before nightfall.”
And in true Tucker fashion, he turned and left without waiting for my response, assuming I would do his bidding.
The car ride to the apartment was silent, I kept dozing off soothed by the to and fro of the car. Arriving to the posh building I couldn’t help but miss the simple abode I left back in Vienna. The contrast was staggering. Entering the loft only enhanced my depression by looking around all the unpacked boxes that littered the place. Fortunately, the mattress had arrived to the master bedroom and I had a somewhat comfortable place to sleep. Laying down on the bare bed my last thought before succumbing to exhaustion was not without sarcasm. Home Sweet Home.
The sun was setting; I could see it disappear behind the tall buildings of the city from the rolled down window of my car. Soon the whole city would be immersed in shadow and I was still just sitting in my car waiting for the courage that had deserted me to come back again. Sighing I decided that courage I was waiting for was refusing to make an appearance. Finally, with one last sigh I opened the door and exited my car.
My first impression of my brother`s house was that it had not changed in the years that had passed since I last visited. Perhaps it had a darker aura but that was to be expected since my brother was no longer the happy young man he was when he first moved in. It makes sense that some of the dark secrets he had taken to keep lately also reflected on his house.
But I was stalling. I probably looked like a fool standing in front of his door with my arm ready to knock but not quite daring to. After yesterday’s events I didn’t know if I was upset with my brother, but he did say he had something important to tell and I couldn’t bear to let him down.
I knocked on the door. Once, twice by the sixth time I was confused. Why would he have me come all the way to his home just for him to be absent? I remembered there was a spare key hidden under the porch light, so I let myself in.
The inside of the house wasn’t any less gloomy than the outside, if anything it was more sombre despite the large windows letting in the last slivers of light. Everything was silent as I made my way through the house waiting for the inevitable creaking of the wood that seems to be ever-present in this type of atmospheres. Thankfully the creaking never came and the silence remained unbroken.
I barely dared to breathe in the oppressing stillness of my brother’s home. I chose to ignore the feeling telling me my brother was not here, and instead I decided to make myself at home and check the house I used to intimately know before he came home.
The bottom floor was empty, not just of people but devoid of any signs of life, it was as cold as the winters we spent in Scotland with father. The coldest winters I remember ever having. The next floor was a little more vivacious. Perhaps it was not colourful or garish, but the presence of my brother was obvious with its worn-out books, medicines in the cabinet, the unkempt bed I could glimpse from the hall and the pictures adorning all the walls. Because of the mess, I could tell the maid hadn’t come by today. My brother was always one for those luxuries.
At the end of the hall, was an elegant wooden door that guarded the entrance to what was once my father’s studio, the same studio that now belonged to my brother. I was a bit apprehensive to cross this threshold. This was a place that protected all my father’s most well kept secrets and his deepest intimacies. I assume it was also full of my brother’s undisclosed thoughts. Thoughts I wasn’t sure he wanted me to know.
I shook off my hesitance, and opened the door. What met my eyes was not a sight I could ever forget. It will haunt my every waking moment as well as well as turn my dreams to never ending nightmares.
The studio was as I always remembered. The same dry earth tones, the same ochre furniture, and the leather smell of the sofa. Even the pictures where the same. The only addition to the picture that could have been painted ten years ago, was sitting in my father’s swivel chair.
The lifeless body of my brother was leaning on the desk, pale against the dark colour of the blood pooling under William’s head. The image was grotesque in its composition, straight out of a gothic horror. The blood, the gun, the pasty tone of my sibling’s skin. There was even a hole that pierced through his head where I could peek a little of his well-cultured brain.
The panic came a second later. Throat constricting to the point I cold hardly breath, tears were leaking out of my eyes in a way they haven’t done in the past ten years. My first instinct was to run as far as I could from this image, to pretend this could never be my reality, that my brother was not laying dead in his study. But my rational side took over and I went to the body to check for a pulse.
Not finding any sign of movement inside my brother’s veins brought the reality I was trying to deny crashing down on me. He was really dead. The man that used to laugh, and pretended he never cried, the one that did his best to make our father proud and tried to shield me from not having a mother. That wonderful admirable man was gone.