Free Monstrous Affections by David Nickle

get caught!”
    “You shut up!” said Shelly. It was a struggle to keep her voice from
quavering — Blaine was thirteen, three years older than her, and he
was starting to get his man-arm. He’d hit her harder than he knew,
maybe, and her ribs ached from it.
    “Quiet, both of you.” Their dad crouched beside them, behind the
highway sign that announced a new Petro-Canada service centre
was coming here by October. His arms were crossed on the washbasin he’d brought with them. The trowel dangling in his hand cut
through the air to emphasize what he said. “This is just what I was
talking about back at the house. This is why we’re here tonight. Time
to stop all the fighting.”
    “Whatever,” said Blaine. “This won’t land you back in jail, will it?”
    “This,” said Dad, “will keep all of us from jail, for the rest of our
lives.”
    “Then why are you stealing tar, not paying for it down at the
hardware?”
    “Got to be filched,” said Dad. “That’s part of the magic.”
    “Whatever.” Blaine rolled his eyes.
    It was pretty clear that Blaine didn’t buy any of this — and Shelly
knew she should probably defer to her brother’s judgement. After all,
the last time their dad had been home for any length of time, Shelly
was just five years old; Blaine, at eight, had known their father that
much longer — lived through five more years of Dad’s promises and
schemes, aftermaths of his barroom fights and late-night visits from
angry OPP patrolmen; Lord knew how many three-day benders with
his former buddy Mark Hollins; and maybe one or two more solemn
pledges to improve himself, and turn all their lives around.
    Maybe Mom was right, and Dad was just full of shit.
    Dad started down from the sign, and into the midst of the
construction site. The workers had laid foundations for the garage
in a huge cinderblock rectangle; there were more bricks stacked over
by the trees, along with some lumber, and there was a yellow digging
machine that Dad figured was to hollow out a place for the big tanks
underneath the pumps.
    But Dad didn’t care about the digging machine, or where the
tanks would go or anything else. He was after the tar pot, which had
been left simmering through the night. Dad figured they had about
half an hour from the time the work crew left, to the time the night
watchman arrived — and that would be plenty of time to do what
they needed to do.
    Dad set the basin down beside the tar pot, making the bent-up
twigs and wire rattle.
    “Get the turpentine ready,” he said. “Blaine, you listening?”
    “I’m listening.” Blaine reached into his pack, and pulled out the
shoebox-sized tin of turpentine they’d brought along. “It’s here,” he
said.
    “All right.” Dad set the trowel down a moment and rubbed his
hands together. He reached into the breast pocket of his jean jacket,
and pulled out a little brown plastic bottle Shelly recognized as one
of Mom’s old painkiller prescriptions. He pushed on the safety lid,
twisted it open, and held it over the pot. After a couple of seconds,
something thick and white like condensed milk dripped out, made a
long, snotty line between bottle and pot. Dad held it there until the
last was poured out, then threw the empty bottle behind him.
    “Shelly,” he said, “hand me the skeleton.”
    “Don’t call it that,” said Shelly quietly.
    “That’s what it is,” said Dad, sounding puzzled. “But I won’t call it
that. Just give it to me careful.”
    Shelly reached down and lifted the thing from the basin. It wasn’t
more than two feet long — bigger than a newborn, to be sure; but not
so big she should be scared of it. She shouldn’t be scared; but when
a still-green twig bent like an arm flopped against Shelly’s knee as
she lifted it, she nearly dropped the thing. Dad was right — this was a
skeleton, and it was crazy to call it anything else. When she handed
the skeleton off to Dad, she was trembling.
    “I hate this,” she