Godless Read Online Free PDF Page A

to me. “My dad would totally freak. Count me in, Kahuna.”
    Just then, Shin lets out a startled squawk. An exceptionally large water drop has hit him square on the forehead. But it’s not just water. He sits up and wipes it away and stares at the glop dripping from his fingers. It looks like snot, or slime. My first thought is that a bird crapped on him, but then we hear laughter from above. We all look up and see a grinning red face hanging over the edge of the lower catwalk, 120 feet above us.
    â€œGotcha!” shouts the face.
    It’s Henry Stagg.

 
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    F OR THREE BILLION YEARS THE O CEAN WATCHED, CONTENT, AS THE WORLD EVOLVED . I T WATCHED THE RISE AND FALL OF THE DINOSAURS, THE RISE OF THE MAMMALIANS, THE CETACEANS’ RETURN TO THE SEA, THE MIGRATION OF THE CONTINENTS .
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6
 
    Father Haynes, a thousand years old at least, is standing in the pulpit delivering one of his famous sermons on selflessness. His voice rises and falls like the sound of a crop duster passing back and forth over a field, spraying us with words. I’ve endured this sermon before. It goes on for nearly half an hour, but the message is simple: Give more money to the church.
    I could use some money, too, for necessities such as game discs and french fries and size-thirteen Nikes. Maybe I should collect dues from the congregation of the Church of the Ten-legged God.
    I look to my left, at my father. His lips and jaw are set in a determinedly attentive mask, but his eyes are drooping. I’m not the only one who’s heard this sermon before. I lean forward and look past him at my mother, hands folded neatly in her lap, a worried smile on her pink-lipsticked lips. Probably thinking about all the germs floating around the church. Influenza, hanta virus, ebola, bubonic plague …
    Do they really think that attending mass will make them better, or happier, or save them from an eternity of hellfire? Maybe they do. But there are something like ten thousand religions in the world. What makes them think that they happen to have been born into the right one? I have asked this question several times. So far, I haven’t heard a good answer. Better to start your own religion, I think. That way you get to be your own pope.
    I’m well on my way. I have a god, I have sacraments, and I have two converts—plus myself. But the Church of the Ten-legged God (CTG for short) still needs one more thing: a set of rules, or commandments. I wonder what sort of commandments the Ten-legged One might hand down. I’ll have to make some up.
    Father Haynes has shifted gears and is now talking about respect for the sanctity of the church. I think he’s upset because a few weeks ago he found some chewing gum stuck to the bottom of one of the pews. I wonder how he would feel about spit, and I think about Henry Stagg.
    Nobody likes being spat on. As Shin disgustedly wiped his face clean with his shirttail, Henry descended the spiral staircase. Watching him trot confidently down the perforated metal steps, I couldn’t help imagining thatthe Ten-legged One was sending an emissary down to speak with us, like God sending Jesus to Earth, only he turns out to be Adolf Hitler. When Henry ran out of staircase, still fifteen feet above us, he sat down on the bottom landing and dangled his cowboy boots over our heads.
    â€œWhat are you guys doing?” he asked.
    I was not about to tell Henry that we were there to worship the water tower.
    â€œHow’d you get up there?” I asked.
    â€œI flew,” Henry said.
    â€œYeah, right.”
    Henry shrugged. I looked around. No ladders, no ropes. No way he could have jumped high enough to reach that bottom rung.
    Shin said, “You’re not supposed to be up there.”
    Henry laughed.
    â€œHow are you gonna get down?” Dan asked.
    â€œWhy would I want to get down?”
    â€œYou have to come down
sometime
.”
    â€œI don’t … uh-oh. The