Altar Read Online Free PDF Page B

their arms thrown out toward their screaming parents, flailing to swim to the edges of the pool.
    How are they moving like that? she thought. A few adults were running and then — at that moment — instinct took over, and she darted toward her son, not noticing when she knocked down another woman who was kneeling and tugging at her hair, not hearing the new screams, the screams of terror that were replacing the sounds of life like a spreading fungus, like the way the clouds had stretched across the once-sapphire sky, a gray-fisted storm consuming the sun.
     
     
     
    Gary turned toward the water, saw only twisted shapes of peach and brown stuck within a smeared pallet of blue. The world was blurred with his tears.
     
     
     
    Tyler was spinning now, dizzily so, along with eight or nine other kids. A couple of them, he noticed as he spiraled around, were laughing. He tried to turn his body away from the whirlpool as the water drained, but was suddenly jerked backward, as if a giant invisible hand had grabbed him around the mid-section and tugged.
    His body twisted and he was underwater. He clamped his mouth shut, saving breath. There was a chaos of limbs and bodies. He noticed with no sense of wonder or shame that one boy’s suit had come off, the bright yellow cloth sucked down into the hole like the last inch of spaghetti when you sucked it into your mouth, something he used to do as a game when his parents took him to the Olive Garden on the occasional Saturday night.
    The swirling current held him tight as he circled and he couldn’t breathe but was holding his breath okay, for now. He saw the water wasn’t all that blue anymore, not by the hole, not by the funnel. It was dirtier, like parts of what was below were mixing with the water. He saw a large boy, likely trying to impress his friends, actually swim toward the hole. He was within a foot when he went head-first into it as if yanked on a rope. The suction was tremendous but it abated as the boy’s large body got wedged in the gash, his legs kicking, his torso beyond sight. Blood spat upward from the jagged edges of the hole, mixing with water and dirt as the boy thrashed wildly, as if he were being eaten alive by something down below.
    Tyler, feeling the pull of the current lessening, ripped off one of the blue wings keeping him afloat, then the other. He let them go, watched them swirl away, then kicked as hard as he could for the surface.
    He broke free and the world exploded into his senses. Rain poured from the dark sky and it seemed the air itself was screaming, the cries of kids and parents reaching a crescendo of terror. As he gulped in oxygen he saw kneeling bodies lining the pool, arms reaching inward. One lifeguard dove into the water, began swimming toward them.
    Tyler began kicking for the edge, hoping the body of the boy jammed into the crevice would hold a few moments longer.
     
     
     
    Gary heard laughter behind him. He turned and saw Ted and the fat kid leaving the locker room. They were alone. Ted was tying the string of his suit, a giant smile on his face. Both of them walked to the edge of the pool and looked in. Ted, not realizing who Gary was in relation to the violence of what he had just done, nodded toward him.
    “The fuck’s going on?” Ted said.
    Gary looked at the swirling water, then at the two kids. The big fat kid with the cow eyes looked nervous now as he stared at the siphoning water. No, he looks scared, Gary thought. Scared enough to shit himself.
    “Not sure, you should check it out,” he replied evenly, raising his voice over the screaming of children and the parents ringing the pool, some of whom had dove in, frantic to reach their own. “Unless you’re scared,” he said.
    Ted looked stunned for a moment, then laughed loudly. But the big dumb kid backed away, his eyes never leaving the dark funnel of water in the middle of the pool. Without a word, he turned and walked. After a few steps, he was