Twilight by William Gay

Tyler came for him he just feinted left and slammed Tyler in the side of the head with his fist. Tyler staggered and swung the toolbelt hard but Sutter caught it onehanded and jerked and when Tyler came stumbling into range Sutter drove a fist into Tyler’s abdomen and the boy’s breath exploded outward in a harsh whoosh and he sat down hard and rolled over. By the time he got upSutter was sitting on the couch with the rifle across his lap. Now get out the memory box and let’s look at them old family pictures, he said.
    I don’t have them, Tyler said. Someone’s keeping them for me.
    Sure they are. You just handed them over for somebody to keep a few days. You think I just fell off the haywagon? Shit, Tyler, you can do better than that.
    I went to the law with them. Sheriff Odel’s got them. I told them the whole thing, and they’re going to be looking for you. You better not touch my sister again.
    Fact is, I know you went to the law. But you went with some cock-and-bull story about me and your sister. Odel done talked to me about it. We had a laugh and a little drink, and heleft thinking you was either a troublemaker or kind of light in the head. A blackmailer runnin to the law is one of the stupider things I ever heard of.
    There is just no way you can get away with this.
    Watch me. We’re in the process of me getting away with it right now.
    Tyler was silent a time. He glanced at his sister. Don’t tell him, she said, but she wouldn’t meet his eyes.
    They’re in the truck, Tyler said at length.
    Sutter rose from the couch. We’ll see if they are, he said. You go first. Little Sister stays with me. I’ve got a knife on her, and you try anything even approachin what you done awhile ago, she gets another slit cut in a place where she’s got no use for one.
    The truck sat facing the house. Tyler was wishing he’d left it pointed outward bound. A cool wind was looping up through the pines. They sighed softly. A three-quarter moon the colorof bone hung suspended over them, and the truck gleamed dully.
    Where in the truck?
    They’re taped under the dash. If you want them, you’ll have to get them out.
    Not in a million fuckin years.
    Tyler opened the truck door and lay back across the seat. Hands behind his head and fumbling under the dashboard. A myriad of wires here. He felt the tobacco can ducttaped behind the radio.
    Hell, it’s gone, he said.
    Involuntarily Sutter leant forward as if he’d look too. Tyler kicked him in the chest as hard as he could with both booted feet and before Sutter struck the ground he was immediately scrambling to get under the steering wheel. He was alreadycranking the truck when Sutter dropped the rifle and went stumbling backward and fell. Get the hell in here, Tyler was yelling. Move it.
    She jumped in and sat holding the door handle. When the engine caught Tyler popped the clutch and spun it backward in the gravel not knowing or caring where Sutter was or even if he was under the wheels. He slammed the shift lever into low and went sidewise out of the driveway with the rear wheels fishtailing onto the road. Shut the door, he said, but she just sat there. She seemed not to know where she was. She was very pale. He glanced back once, but he didn’t see Sutter, which was just as well, for there was an explosion behind them, and both windshields erupted in flying pellets of safety glass. What the hell do we do now? he asked aloud, but he was already doing all there was to do. Get down, he told her. Shut that door and lay down in the seat. She slidobediently down in the seat but left the door flopping and when Tyler reached an arm across her to close it they were already going too fast for the curve.
    He was trying to correct the skid the truck was in but the rear tires were already schoolhopping along on the packed chert when there was a dull boom and a tire went and the truck spun with the windshield opening an elongated frieze of fleeing trees and inexplicably the house itself