Death Watch by Ari Berk Page B

it’s not like he needs any more money, Amos! Property, investments, not to mention whatever was left of his wife’s estate! Nothing left to you, and you say ‘fine’ and just walk away?”
    “Not my decision. My brother’s been caring for him and has made the house his own, has lived there with his wife while his son’s been at boarding school. My brother also has money of his own. He’s always been good with it, antiques and investments, I assume. I’ve hardly spoken with either of them in a long while,and I suspect my dad and my brother simply came to an understanding that didn’t include me. Besides, there were some things on which my father and I did not see eye to eye, as you know very well.”
    Dolores ignored the end of his sentence, but hissed, “An understanding?”
    “Yes. An understanding.” And that was all his father would say on the matter. When they got home, Silas’s mom went right into the house and slammed the door, leaving Silas and his dad still standing on the porch, so his dad put him back in the car and took him out for dinner.
    On the way, Silas asked his dad, “Will I see them now? Ghosts?”
    “No. Probably not,” his dad told him matter-of-factly, but then added more earnestly, “Maybe.” Amos paused a little longer, then said, “You saw my father because he wanted to see you. He wanted to say good-bye to you, Little Bird.”
    That made perfect sense to Silas. It seemed simple and sensible and right. Why wouldn’t his grandfather want to see him and say good-bye? Of course he would.
    Looking back, Silas thought that maybe his dad had thought about that moment coming and had planned to answer his son’s questions with only just enough information, to answer what Silas asked about and nothing more. Not to make a big deal about it. This kind of stuff upset his mom, so his dad was always quiet about it with him. Quiet and careful.
    When they got to the restaurant, Silas had asked his dad if he could give the hostess another name, a made-up name.
    “Why?” Amos asked him, amused.
    “It’ll be fun to be someone else. Let’s be other people tonight!” Silas remembered saying that because the thought of him and his dad playing a trick on the world excited him.
    So Silas told the hostess their last name was “Bedlam” because he had read it in a song in one of his father’s books, and because he had heard his dad use it a few times when talking to his mom. A few minutes later, the hostess called out, “Bedlam! Party of two! Bedlam, party of two,” and Silas nearly squealed, he was so pleased with himself. All through dinner, he pretended he was someone else, that he and his dad were other people, from some other place where there were people named Bedlam, and the spell was only broken when they got back into the same old car to go home. Still, Silas felt better and asked no more questions about ghosts.
    When they got back, perhaps emboldened by his alternate identity, Silas couldn’t help but say something to his mother about what she’d done to him. He told her in a tone perhaps too much like his father that there was “no reason to hit people just because a ghost wanted to say good-bye to them.” His mom really starting yelling then.
    “Damn it, Amos.
Damn it
!” And from that day forward, his father hardly ever went upstairs except to visit Silas in his room.
    After the funeral and the fight, Amos showed Silas the watch, maybe just to distract him, maybe because he knew Silas would come to see it eventually.
    “Does it really tell time?” Silas remembered asking his father. “It looks very old.”
    “It is rather old,” his dad told him, “but it’s not for telling the time. Not really.” And then Amos would say no more about it except that one day, he might show it to Silas again and talk a little more about it then.
    But that day hadn’t come, and now Silas sat alone with his father’s strange silver watch in his hand.

     
    It was about three hours later