Southern Gothic Read Online Free Page B

money and some false sense of security really worth selling your soul to the Hulls?”
    “Honey, that’s going a bit far. Maybe you’re not seeing this clearly because it involves the Hulls.”
    “I’m prejudiced, now? Is that it?”
    “That’s not what I said.”
    Sandra stomped down the small aisle leading to the bedroom at the front of the trailer. She whirled around, her eyes blazing, her face tight, and she shook her fist. “Because you are clearly too much of an idiot to know when to support your wife, I’ll make this plain and simple. Don’t talk to me again tonight. You sleep out there. I’d make the point really clear if I had a fucking door to slam shut.” Instead, she threw the sliding curtain closed. Seconds later, classic rock blared from the bedside radio.
    Max smacked his forehead and plopped onto the couch. “Stupid, stupid.” he said. “What the heck were you thinking?”
    He knew the answer to that. One glance at his surroundings gave him the answer. They were in trouble, soon they would be forced to live off credit cards, and once that debt began, they’d never dig out of it. Like a snake coiling before it struck, the money problems readied for a devastating blow. It didn’t matter that he had a college degree, that he had been employed by a public school, or that he had managed to keep them afloat for several years. Nobody would hire him for a decent job — not if they looked closely into his history. Too many job changes. Too many gaps of unemployment. Bosses won’t care that he had made a stab at self-employment. If anything, they’ll take that as a sign of his desire to always be looking for better pastures. The best he could hope for was to flip burgers.
    Sandra would eventually get a full-time job — unless she was right and the Hulls were stopping that from happening. In which case, things were even worse than he wanted to admit. But wasn’t the real problem her inability to admit the situation? He had no love for the idea of working with any Hull, but reality appeared to be pushing them towards that cliff.
    And it was a cliff. A sheer drop into a dark abyss that he had climbed out of before and knew each time became more difficult. And each time he resurfaced, life became a little harder, a little worse.
    But if he didn’t help Cecily Hull, what would be left for them? Being poor. Except they had been poor before, and back then, when one of the Hulls tried to buy them off, they easily refused. They had also been forced into working for the Hulls later — which proved to be no big deal until the day they came calling about a witch coven. That was when the long climb out of the darkness began.
    “We made it, though,” he whispered. Looking around him, Max wondered if it had been worthwhile. Being poor was one thing. Being poor with no real possibility to get out — that was poverty. That was unacceptable.
     
     
    A few hours later, Max startled awake to the cold of a ghost drifting into the room. He had no memory of falling asleep. No sound came from the bedroom. He had no memory of Sandra shutting off the music.
    His disorientation might have continued, but Drummond floated a few feet away, and upon seeing Max awake, Drummond said, “Finally. I was getting bored waiting for you.”
    Max felt a crick in his neck and rubbed it while sitting up. “What do you want? I’ve had a crappy night.”
    “No kidding. What stupid thing did you say to get thrown out of the bedroom?”
    “Cecily Hull came by. Offered to hire us to help her destroy Tucker. Sandra threw her out.”
    Drummond shook his head. “And you thought it might not be such a bad idea.”
    “It would solve a lot of our current problems. But I don’t really want to do it any more than Sandra. Only difference is that, from a practical standpoint, I don’t see a better alternative.”
    “Well, on this one, I’m taking both sides.”
    “You can’t really do that.”
    “Sure I can. For one, I agree with your