Gargoyles Read Online Free

complains. Only one window has a screen, and with the wood-stove on he’d wanted to open the door for a cross-draft, but at night apparently the bugs are awful.
    Out the windows, it’s completely dark. Tyler pictures his mother and Kim with insects awful around them. His mother refuses to use repellant. They will have a fire going by now.
Natural light
. Tyler is all they are talking about. They are a mix of afraid and angry and repentant. They know he has no flashlight and beyond their little fire all is dark. His mother, of course, is mostly afraid. How will little Tyler get back from his
little walk
. He remembers her face as she said this, as she said itnot looking at Tyler but at Kim, her face pink with beer and naughty, shitty fun.
    He’s been here in the cabin for at least an hour now. His ribs feel better. The fat one’s salve is amazingly soothing. His “famous elf balm” he called it, and Tyler didn’t want to let him try it on him but he was still afraid of them then. The fat one said it was made of wild beeswax and sap from Douglas fir and chocolate lily, something his sister made and sold.
    â€œSorry,” Tyler asks now. “What are your names again?”
    â€œBab,” says the ponytail one, pointing to his chest. “And that’s Lawrence.”
    â€œIt’s . . .
Bab
?” Tyler asks.
    â€œOne of those jokes that sticks,” Bab explains.
    â€œYou sure you don’t want a ride back?” Lawrence asks, lifting the tea kettle again.
    â€œNot yet. A while maybe.”
    â€œYou don’t think they’re worried?”
    Tyler shrugs and says nothing.
    â€œHow’s the leg now?”
    â€œIt’s okay.” Tyler lifts his right leg for them and twirls the sandaled foot, which hurts to do, maybe enough to make him limp. He doesn’t remember hurting it. Maybe when he jumped the creek. Maybe when the deer fence got him.
    At the marijuana field, after they’d helped him to his feet, their main concerns were, one, that he might come back and steal their plants, or, two, that he’d tell the Vietnamese and they would “Hang our balls from trees,” Bab had joked. Tyler was convincing in his apologies and also in his assurances that he didn’t smoke pot, or know anyone who even knew anyone who was Vietnamese. He was only here camping with his mother. This fact seemed to sum him up for them because both Bab andLawrence quietly exhaled, Ahhh, at ease now. Tyler went on to say that he’d gone walking, got sort of lost, found their place, and was looking for a phone to call his mother’s cell. Both men said Ahhh again, and they didn’t seem angry any more.
    Getting to their cabin, putting a warm beer in his hand, Lawrence had gone for the elf balm and a wash cloth while Bab came up with an idea to keep Tyler quiet about their farm. He had tried, for a minute, to act tough.
    â€œOkay,” he said as Lawrence appeared with damp cloth and the flat tin of salve, “I want to see some I.D.”
    â€œMy I.D.?”
    â€œLet’s see some.”
    Tyler took his wallet out and Bab told Lawrence to get him a pen. Bab found Tyler’s social insurance card and library card and Lawrence handed Bab a pen. Bab sent Lawrence back for some paper.
    â€œOkay,
Tyler
,” Bab said, reading the name, serious. “We know who you are and where you live.” In the background, Lawrence snorted at this. He opened the flat tin of balm, smelled it, poked a gentle finger in, and then rubbed some on his sunburned nose.
    â€œSo if we see any plants missing, we know who. And we know where. Okay?”
    â€œOkay.”
    â€œAnd if, and if the cops come, we’ll know . . .” Bab looked around, stumped, a smile breaking out.
    â€œWe’ll know who to yell at from prison,” Lawrence offered.
    â€œThat’s
right
,” Bab told Tyler, smiling, stab-pointing at his face.
    â€œI’m really not