Gods and Monsters: Unclean Spirits Read Online Free Page A

Nobody saying shit. Tundu occasionally gives Cason a look—an incredulous and expectant whoa-what-the-fuck look—but Cason just tries to keep his eyes forward. He leans forward, plants the heels of his hands on the cab’s dash. As if doing that will steady the world and force it all to make sense.
    Tundu pulls the cab south out of town. Back on the highway, heading toward the turnpike. Finally, Tundu speaks: “Yo. Man. You got a knife sticking out of your back.”
    “Uh-huh,” Cason says.
    “You’re bleeding.”
    “Yeah.”
    “On my seats.”
    A hard swallow. A sniff, a blink. “Sorry.”
    “You need a hospital.”
    “I’m good.”
    That does it. Tundu topples off the ledge, and with him falls any sense of calmness or propriety: “You got a fucking knife! In your fucking back! Hey! Man! Some little kid was hitting you with a frying pan! Some crazy bitch beating you up on the lawn! What the hell, man? What the hell was all that about?”
    “She’s... not a crazy bitch.” Cason’s jaw sets tight. “Something is wrong with her.”
    “Yeah. She’s crazy like a crazy bitch .”
    “I said she’s not a bitch. And she’s not crazy, either. She’s got a, a...” He wants to say, she’s got a spell put on her , but he bites those words in half before they get out of his mouth. “She’s my wife, okay? That was my wife and son.”
    Tundu’s gaze darkens. Eyes narrow to suspicious slits. “What’d you do?”
    “Huh?”
    “To them. What’d you do to them to make them want to kill you like that?”
    “Nothing.”
    “That wasn’t nothing. That was something.”
    How to say this without sounding like a lunatic? “Somebody lied to them. About me. Told them things that make me seem like a different person.” That itself is a lie, but it sounds far more believable than the truth. “I thought... I thought it had been enough time and they’d learned the truth by now or that they were, I dunno, over it. I guess they’re not.”
    The spell should’ve been broken .
    The very thought that this is still happening, that they don’t just want to be away from him but want him actually dead robs his body of strength, his mind of will. He wants to open the door and just roll out onto the highway. Face scraped off. Body dragged under the too-many tires of a tractor-trailer. Cason slumps against the window.
    “That’s... that’s tough, man.” Tundu’s gaze falls back onto the road.
    “It is. And I don’t know what to do about it. Nothing, I guess. Not a damn thing.”
    “Maybe she’ll come around. A few more weeks. Months.”
    “It’s been five years.”
    “Oh.”
    Another span of silence.
    “Where am I taking you?” Tundu says, following signs toward the turnpike.
    “I don’t... I don’t even know.” With E. dead and Alison still treating him like an enemy of the state, where is there to go? “Back to the city. Motel or something. I still got some cash left.”
    “Shit. You can stay with me.”
    “Huh?”
    “No, man, it’s nothing weird—but my one younger brother just moved out, so the couch is open. It’s not too comfortable—I tell you, it’s like sleeping on a bag of rocks, you know? But you can stay for the night.”
    “I don’t want to put you out.”
    Tundu waves it off. “You already put me out. Too late for that.” He offers a smile to show he’s not mad. A big smile. Toothy. A deep basso laugh follows. Cason didn’t think people even laughed like that: HA HA HA HA . “Besides, I make you pay me. I need the money.”
    “Just tonight. Then I’ll be out of your hair.”
    “I don’t got no hair, man.”
    “It’s a saying. An expression.”
    “Right, right.” Tundu nods. “Hey, you still got a knife in your back.”
    “It’s not puncturing anything important. Not too deep. Long as I lean forward in the seat I’m okay. I’ll take it out at your place—you got a shower? Gonna bleed more when I pull it out.”
    “You paying, then it’s cool by me, chief. Cool by