THUGLIT Issue Seven Read Free

my foot slide on purpose. It was an accident.
    The vodka lay by her outstretched arm, bottle unbroken. I twisted off the top and guzzled till my throat burned. I had to think, and thinking has never been something I 'm good at. I scanned the horizon, gazing into the vast barren plains, nothing for miles. I drank some more till my belly and head were on fire, and the smoke in my brain started to lift.
    I bound her hands and feet with twine, and hoisted her limp, lifeless body over my shoulder and dropped it into the bed, like an old rug you 'd haul to the dump. Then I drove into the middle of the black desert mesa, bobbing white moon guiding my passage. I grabbed my shovel, and got to work. I dug fast, ferocious. My roughhewn hands cracked and blistered, flaps of skin hanging from my raw, meaty palms. The salt from my sweat stung, and with all that dust in my lungs, I was sucking wind pretty hard, like a big mouth bass flopping on the sandy shore gulping for air. I didn't think about my pretty friend who used to chase critters with me in the reserve any more.
    I needed to get my story straight. I 'd talk to Mike Edsel, explain what Kim had planned. Then he'd help me, he'd be so grateful, of course he would. He could say that no one had seen Kim, that she never came in for her shift. Then tomorrow I'd bring my truck into the garage and get my bumper fixed. Stevie'd back me up. He'd tell 'em I'd come over to help with the roof rats and that we'd been driving to get a box of poison at the all-night Wal-Mart in Pasa Robles when we'd hit a coyote. Everyone knew the coyote problem in the Canyon. The bastards were everywhere.
    The more I dug and drank, the better I began to feel. No one had to know. I killed the bottle and dropped the gate, wrapped my fist around twine like I was pulling a sack of grain to a factory floor. I dragged her through the dust and dirt, thick stream of blood trailing behind, to the edge of the hole I 'd dug big enough for two. I leaned on my shovel, exhausted, but finally feeling hopeful. This could work. Sure, it could.
    Then I heard them. A soft desert breeze rustling the hedge, paws stalking shrub, claws crawling through clay. I whipped around and peered into black, trying to get my bearings, heavy panting trapped between my ears, but I couldn't see anything. The low and steady growl grew louder until I could almost feel their hot breath on my neck.
    They began to appear, one by one, creeping from the darkness, red eyes burning like fiery stars come out of hiding, behind the ridges, between the boulders, a pack of hungry devils, licking its chops, closing in on its prey.

Pegleg
    by Ed Kurtz
     
     
     
     
    Poke was the craziest spook I ever knew, so I told him that. I knew you weren 't supposed to say that when you wasn't black—and I wasn't—but I tried it all the time because I thought it would make me seem tough. I didn't seem so tough after Poke smashed his fist at my mouth and took me off my stool. I thought I got hit by a truck, he hit me so hard. He laughed a little after that, then he grabbed my arm and lifted me up to my feet before socking me a second time, just to make sure I got the picture. I got it.
    " You'll watch your mouth next time," Poke said.
    He said that partly because my mouth was bleeding so bad. He handed me a napkin and pushed my drink over to me. I dabbed the napkin in my whiskey and touched it to my split-open lip. It hurt almost as bad as getting hit in the first place and I howled like a damn dog. I had this mutt when I was a boy and one time he got runned down by a milk van and that dirty little dog just howled like nothing I ever heard, his guts all half-spilled out, 'til he died. It was like that.
    When I was through hollering I said, "Jesus, I didn't mean nothing by it, Poke. You know I'm just a dumb ole redneck."
    Which was true but not why I said it.
    Poke screwed up his face like maybe he wasn't done knocking me around, but instead he said, "Would you keep your