Whirlwind Read Online Free

anything get to her, ever. He hated to admit it, but he had lost count of the number of times she had saved his ass just by talking their folks into forgetting they were mad. Running away, running back home, was his kind of no-brain plan, not hers.
    The sun died.
    Night slipped from the cottonwoods.
    A few stray lights from the trailer, from the handful of others on the other lots and the homes on the far side, were caught in fragments in the river, just enough to let him know it was still there.
    Suddenly he didn’t like the idea of being alone. “You’re not going to do it, are you?”
    She giggled. “You nuts? Leave this paradise?” She giggled again. “Sorry, Paulie, but I’ve got two years till graduation. I’m not going to screw it up, no matter what.” She turned her head again; all he saw was her eyes. “But then, I swear to God, I’m going to blow this town so goddamn fast, you won’t even remember what I look like.”
    He grinned. “That won’t be hard.”
    â€œAnd the horse you rode in on, brother.”
    â€œI hate horses, too. Their manure smells like shit.”
    A second passed in silence before they exploded into laughter, covering their mouths, half-closing their eyes, rocking on their buttocks until Patty got the hiccups, and Paulie took great pleasure in thumping her back until she punched his arm away.
    â€œI’m serious,” she insisted, her face flushed. “I’m not kidding.
    â€œYeah, well.” He watched the black water, rubbed a finger under his nose. “So am I.”
    Angry voices rose briefly above the music.
    A door slammed somewhere else, and a pickup’s engine gunned to launch the squealing of tires.
    Off to their left, beyond the last tree, something began to hiss.
    Paulie heard it first and frowned as he looked upriver, trying to see through the dark. “Pat?”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œDo snakes come out at night?”
    â€œWhat are you talking about? What snakes?”
    He reached over and grabbed her arm to hush her up.
    Hissing, slow and steady, almost too soft to hear.
    â€œNo,” she whispered, a slight tremor in her voice. “At least, I don’t think so. It’s too cool, you know? They like it hot, or something.”
    Maybe she was right, but it sure sounded like snakes to him. A whole bunch of them, over there where none of the lights reached, about a hundred feet away.
    Patty touched his hand, to get him to release her and to tell him she heard it, too. Whatever it was.
    They couldn’t see a thing.
    Overhead, the breeze coasted through the leaves, and he looked up sharply, holding his breath until he realized what it was.
    That was another thing he hated about this stupid place: it made too many sounds he couldn’t identify, especially after sunset.
    Every one of them gave him the creeps.
    The hissing moved.
    Except now it sounded like rapid, hoarse whispering, and Paulie shifted up to one knee, straining to make out something, anything, that would give him a clue as to who was out there and what they were doing.
    Patty crawled up behind him, a hand resting on his back. “Let’s get out of here, Paulie, huh?”
    He shook his head obstinately. It was bad enough he was here because his folks had had some shit-for-brains idea about starting over, when they already had a perfectly good business back up North. He definitely wasn’t going to let the buttheads here frighten him off.
    City boy.
    They called him “city boy” at school, their lips curled, their voices sneering, unimpressed by his size or the glares that he gave them.
    Yeah, sure. Like this wasn’t a city, right? Like they didn’t have traffic jams, right? Like people didn’t shoot and stab and stomp each other here like they did in Chicago, right?
    The dark moved.
    The hissing moved.
    â€œPaulie?”
    He swayed to his feet, trying not to make too much noise. His