Young God: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

thinks.
    “You don’t smell it if you don’t leave,” Angel says.
    “It’s fertilizer,” Coy Hawkins says.
    He looks at her out of the corner of his eye. From the bitch seat Nikki watches the sign for the county shoot by. It looks like a car smashed into it. Her whole body relaxes.
    In town it’s still early. The stoplights are blinking. Coy Hawkins rolls through the group-home light and the other two and then they are back on the highway that cuts up into the north part of the county.
    They start to climb. They start to wind. Nikki tilts her head back on the bench and stares at the pickup ceiling. This ecstasy will never end.
    This highway goes all the way to Virginia.
    The bottom road breaks from tar to gravel with a thump. The road up his hill is so steep it slams her back in her seat. When Coy Hawkins pulls into his yard Nikki looks at the trees. They make a ring around her that is deep, dark green. Above them, to her left, the mountains are huge and blue.
    Coy Hawkins and Angel get out and leave her there. She smells nothing. She thinks it’s going to be okay.

     
    ANGEL OPENS HER MOUTH in an O . Nikki sits beside her, in front of the mirrored closet, watching her. After Angel’s done she looks at Nikki. Nikki shrugs. Angel grabs Nikki’s face.
    The eyeliner is cold and squirmy. Nikki’s scalp prickles and she wishes it would always. When Angel lets go Nikki opens her eyes. Nikki’s mouth twitches up in the mirror.
    “You were so fucked up last night,” Angel says.
    “No, I wasn’t,” Nikki says.
    Angel curls into a ball and mimes shivering all over. She laughs. In the mirror Nikki’s new cat’s eyes twinkle. She feels like shit. She feels like every nutrient in her body has been leached.
    “It was fun,” Nikki says.
    Angel turns lipstick out of a tube. It goes on bright red. Angel sticks a finger in her mouth and drags it out between her teeth. She passes the lipstick to Nikki. She reaches out and shakes Nikki’s knee.
    “You’re so skinny,” Angel says.
    “So are you,” Nikki says.
    Nikki puts a finger in her mouth and pulls it out.
    “Can you give blood?”
    “Do what?”
    “I can’t,” Angel says.
    Nikki’s lips are so red. She pushes them together and parts them again.
    “I never gave blood,” she says.
    “You got to be at least a hundred and ten so you don’t black out.”
    Nikki looks at the two of them. For one thing Angel’s face is not great.
    “I’m like ninety-five,” Angel says.
    Nikki looks at Angel’s hand on her knee.
    “I’m like ninety-one,” Nikki says.
    Angel pushes up the bottom of Nikki’s dress.
    “Are you wearing a bathing suit?”
    “What?” Nikki says.
    One of Angel’s fingers is holding the elastic of the bikini bottom away from Nikki’s skin. Nikki clamps her legs shut.
    Angel smirks. Angel nods at the bed where Coy Hawkins is sleeping. The covers are on the floor. He’s half-wrapped in the fitted sheet.
    “He’s just waiting to see who’s gonna pay the most money for you,” Angel says.
    “What?” Nikki says.
    “It’s called the high bid. Because you’re a virgin.”
    “I ain’t a virgin.”
    Angel puts on Nikki’s white sunglasses.
    “You act like one,” Angel says.
    “I don’t gotta work for him. He’s my daddy,” Nikki says.
    Angel turns to look at Nikki.
    “That don’t matter.”

     
    NIKKI OPENS THE COOLER DOOR. A man opens the door beside her. She closes hers and leans against the glass. She puts a hand on her hip. When the man closes his door she looks at him with cat’s eyes and red lips. She shakes in the gas station’s air conditioning. He swings his beer at her as if he’s about to say something.
    “Stop staring,” Nikki snaps.
    She hurries down the aisle with her pulse pounding. She looks over her shoulder to make sure he’s not following. She grabs a bag of chips.

     
    “CHIP?” Coy Hawkins says.
    “I ain’t a virgin,” Nikki says.
    Coy Hawkins takes his time chewing. He licks his