Chapter 9

Unconventional Grandparent Skills

There are few things harder than abandonment. For Young Ned, being left at boarding school for the majority of his childhood left him with deep, residual issues he really needed to talk to someone about. Until the girl named Chuck came back into his life, he had nobody there to talk to, entirely alone in the world. He blamed this isolation primarily on his absentee father, and he blamed it on himself, because if he had figured out the rules of his gift earlier, his mother might still have been alive. Chuck's father would still have been dead, mind you, but he'd have had a relatively normal childhood. Of course, he would never have been able to touch his mother again. Ever. Not even a goodnight kiss.

But alas, events elapsed that could not be undone with a single touch, and Ned's father left him at boarding school. If there is one thing out there that is harder than abandonment, it's a reunion, after years apart without a single word, to discover his father hiding in the cellar of a New York antiques store, a stranger who is shorter than remembered, whose face is lined and hair, grey.

Which goes some way to explain why the Piemaker was, currently, at this precise moment in time, hiding in an alleyway trying to catch his breath. Just when he thought he would be okay, Doctor Henry Morgan came around the corner, a rueful smile on his ageless face.

Meanwhile indoors, Emerson Cod's disappearance had been noted, and a girl named Chuck was trying - failing - to contact him on his cell, apparently forgetting movie theatres' strict policy against phones of any kind (especially the Police Public Call variety, nasty things, they get everywhere you know. Literally). Detective Jo Martinez was attempting to console Abraham Morgan, at which point Chuck revealed the apology/bereavement/? pie, a peach cobbler they all agreed it was an appropriate time to eat.

And the two catalysts of this mystery sat down awkwardly next to one another.

Where to begin? 'I'm sorry, but I was unaware of your existence until 58 minutes, twelve seconds ago so this is awkward' didn't really cut the mustard. 'I'm your grandfather by adoption but I don't even look old enough to be your father' was even worse, if that was possible. For a moment Henry thought of what he could possibly say, all eloquence erased, uncertain what his next move was. The vehemence with which Ned had rejected Abe's apology hung heavy between them, Henry well aware that he was going to be perceived as being on Abraham's side. There - a beginning. An opening statement.

"Just so you know, I'm strongly opposed to Abraham's actions. He didn't even tell me you existed, let alone your twin brothers, until earlier today. I'm not sure he was even planning to tell me until I mentioned you resurrecting me...thank you for that, by the way, entirely superfluous, but a nice gesture nonetheless."

"You're welcome," Ned intoned, his countenance expressionless and tired. "Though technically, I killed you again too,"

"Details...anyway, about Abe. There is no justification for that sort of behaviour, but there are reasons," at this, Ned snorted incredulously. "What sort of upbringing do you imagine he had? A 200 year old father - yes, that's how old I am, 235 now, 165 when we - Abigail and I, first adopted Abraham."

"He's not your biological son?" Ned seemed confused. "I thought maybe, well, your thing caused me to, you know, touch dead things. That. That would have made sense."

"There is a genetic link to our family trees somewhere, way back," Henry admitted. "But no, I'm not. Abe's biological parents died in the Holocaust. Auschwitz." A sharp intake of breath from Ned, embarrassment sending his face bright red.

"I didn't know - I'm part Jewish? Chuck's Jewis-" he began, then cut off. "I'm sorry."

"He never knew them," Henry sighed. "I was the only father he ever had and I love him so much," he found his voice shaking, emotion rocking him to his very core. Memories of his argument with Abe earlier floated through his head unbidden, raw: those vicious words stabbing at his heart 'they aren't even yours'. Looking at Ned, he felt the same deep seam of affection running like a rivet through his very being. This young man was his grandson, and he loved him. Simple as.

"What happened to her?" asked Ned cautiously. "Did she-"

"She disappeared." That was all he was willing to say, and sudden understanding crossed Ned's face. "I – well, I adored Abigail, and her departure tore me apart. It was hard for Abe. It always was. My secret, you understand. We could never stay anywhere long unless the neighbours noticed. I've watched him grow up, grow old," the word stuck in his throat "One day I know I'll lose him. I won't have aged a day in 200 and God knows how many years – preferably many, many more – but his life will be over like that."

Silence. Ned stared at the floor. "I'm not ready to forgive him. He left me at boarding school without a word, where I was completely alone. He abandoned the twins at a fair! I went into baking because it was the only time I was ever happy."

Henry nodded "I understand. For what it's worth, you need to know something, something important: as Abe's son, you're family. If you can't talk to him, talk to me. You're my grandson, after all, bizarre as that may sound. You're important to me. I have time to make up for, and after Abe's gone-"

After Abe's gone I'll have no-one.Wait, no. That wasn't quite true. There was Jo. Jo who, in her own feisty way, deeply admired him, and he returned that feeling. More than admiration, perhaps. He wished so badly he could tell her about his condition, but he remembered the times it had gone wrong. Remembered his first wife. And he didn't want to lose Jo. That was inevitable, in time. Abigail, Abe, Jo, Ned, even Lucas, one day they'd all be gone and it would be Henry and Adam, alone in the world, the last representatives of a species long gone. Or maybe there would be others, crawling out of the woodwork, a new race, a new evolution of humanity. Funny, that, because Henry remembered when Charles Darwin first published On the Origin of Species. He remembered…

Another long pause passed between the two and Henry looked up at his grandson - yes, he looked up because now Ned was standing and by God that was a long way up, even when Henry raised himself to his feet too. He didn't get that from Abe. Now the eyebrows, on the other hand, I can see…

"I accidentally killed my mother when I was nine. Also Chuck's father," Ned suddenly blurted. "I ruined my life, I ruined her life, I ruined everything. I guess I know what it's like for a gift to turn out to be a curse. But now it's more like a gift again except...well, I can never be with Chuck. She was dead. I brought her back."

"For longer than a minute? You said-"

"Someone else had to die, yeah. And I brought her father back later, she tricked me into leaving him alive and so I accidentally killed another person...but anyway, Chuck and I can never touch. Or she dies," Ned shifted from foot to foot. "So that's me."

"I have an immortal psychopath following me around and occasionally slitting my throat for me so Jo doesn't find out about my gif- curs- condition."

"One time I got trapped in a trophy room full of dead animals."

"The NYPD keeps arresting me for public indecency after I return from the dead."

"Um...I found a dead body floating in a vat of taffy?"

"Is that a story I want to hear or not?" Ned shook his head vigorously. "I was incarcerated in Bedlam by my wife who believed I'd gone mad when I told her I was immortal."

"I lost my best friend when I brought some dead leaves back to life."

And so it continued in that vein, the two swapping stories about their life, the topic of Abe put well away for some other time. At some point, of course, it would have to be raised, but right now, there were better things to talk about.

Such as:

"I once died in a train crash by getting impaled by a pole."

"I was hired to solve a death I'd caused only to later find a dead body in the freezer framing me for murder."

"I was accused of crashing the train I'd died in because I was obviously not dead and apparently that's suspicious now."

"I once was hanging off a cliff about to die when somebody saved me and I have no idea who it was so I can't even thank them..."

As to who saved the Piemaker that fateful night, one would have to look to Abraham for the answers.

And as to who murdered Doctor Henry Morgan, one would have to dig deep, because as any connoisseur of mysteries knows - the secrets are at the bottom (or somewhere midway through chapter twenty. Either or).

So grandfather and grandson walked back around the corner to the antique store, preparing themselves for the inevitable conversation that was to come. At which point a gunshot rang out, turning Doctor Henry Morgan into a rather attractive corpse.

Hearing the gunshot, Detective Jo Martinez ran outside, closely followed by a girl named Chuck and Ned's father, Abraham, the latter of whom immediately ran over to check on his son only to find his father had both died and disappeared in the time it took for him to get outside.

Meanwhile, Jo Martinez wanted to know where Henry was and there was no answer.

Meanwhile, Henry Morgan, swimming to the shore in a state of undress, would find himself arrested again, on the immediate other side of the city, impossible for him to have got there in so short a time.

Meanwhile, somebody lowered their gun and frowned. This was not going as planned. Very few dead guys did that - vanished. So what, exactly, was going on?

At least this clears the name of one suspect - for, the murderer of Henry Morgan was not aware he was immortal. What of Adam then? For once, it seems he is innocent. Of course, only this once. Soon he would be back to his usual hijinks - for now. Anyway, like any devoted stalker, fellow immortal Adam whose age has passed into myth, he took intense interest in anything that happened to the object of his curiosity. If someone killed Henry Morgan once, that could be ascribed to bad luck, but twice was too much like a coincidence for Adam's taste. What if the murderer had been successful? Nobody killed Henry except Adam, that was how he wanted it to go. That was his design. No, he needed to have a talk with this wannabe assassin.

And talks with Adam often ended up on the end of a blade.

Henry never needed to know until after the matter was resolved.

Wouldn't he be grateful to his guardian angel? Wouldn't he be pleased? Maybe he'd even help Adam with the sticky situation both of them were in. Maybe he'd be able to find a way out of their condition.

He was, after all, a doctor.