Free The Indestructible Man by William Jablonsky Page A

little pieces and stomp all over them. But before he can get his hands free we’re on him, each of us lying across an arm or leg. His scary wide eyes glare at us as he curses and calls us “fuckers” through the gag. He tries to say something else, but we can’t understand and we aren’t about to take the gag off so the devil can charm us.
     
    “That’s it, boys,” Brother Stewart says. “Hold him tight. Old bastard almost got free before.” He rips off more strips of bed sheet and ties Joe’s wrists down tighter. “We can’t have him running around loose. Somebody’s liable to get hurt.”
     
    After a few minutes Joe stops fighting and we get off him. Brother Stewart pours the last few drops of holy water on Joe’s forehead. This time Joe just lies there, not even struggling, his eyes watering and looking up at the headboard.
     
      Brother Stewart leans over Joe again and starts to say the Lord’s Prayer, but after the first few words the old Nova’s horn cuts him off. He looks up, irritated. “ Dammit ,” he says. “I thought I told Minnie to get going. Keep him still till I come back.” He heads out the door; Joe cranes his neck to watch him go and spits curses through the gag. He thrashes his arms again, and one of the ties around his left wrist comes loose and falls to the floor.
     
    Sam stumbles over the dirty clothes to the bedside table to get it. “Wait a minute,” he says as he bends down. “What’s this?” He comes up holding Minnie’s jewelry box, empty except for a string of purple beads hanging out.
     
    From the driveway outside we hear footsteps; then a car door slamming, and the old Nova spinning its tires in the gravel. I open the blinds but all I can see is a cloud of dust where the car had been. Sam and Charlie push me aside to look. “That son of a bitch,” Sam says. He hands me the ax handle we’d brought in case we had to get rough. “Stay with him a minute,” he says, and he and Charlie and Byron go outside to look.
     
    Joe lets out a howl that makes me want to hide under the bed and starts pulling at his bonds with ungodly strength, so hard that the ties dig into the wooden bedpost, and into his arms too, leaving dark red tracks in his skin. He gives one last, hard jerk and the ties finally snap. Then he rips the gag off his mouth, and I know I have to do something, so I run to the bed, try to grab his wrists and pin him down.
     
    “Jimmy,” he says, wheezing and panting. “It’s me!”
     
    I turn my head away and try not to listen.
     
    “Jimmy! I’m no demon. And Brother Stewart’s no preacher. Him and Minnie—”
     
    “No—shut up,” I say, wishing my hands were free so I could plug my ears. “Don’t you talk to me.”
     
    “ Dammit , are you that stupid?” Joe wrenches his arms free and grabs me by the shoulders. I try to keep him down, but on my best day I’m nowhere near as strong as him, with or without the devil. We wrestle until he flips me off the side of the bed, and I land hard on the floor. He unties his feet and starts limping toward the door, still slow from being tied up so long. I crawl after him and hold onto his ankles until he falls to the floor. He kicks at my head two or three times, hard enough to make me see stars, but I grab him round the legs so he can’t crawl away without dragging me.
     
    “I ain’t letting you out this door,” I say.
     
    Joe turns over in my arms, reaches up, and takes my head in his hands—not hard, just enough to hold me still, but he could twist it right off if he wanted to. “Listen to me,” he says, slow and quiet. “There’s no devil in me. Brother Stewart’s been playing games with you, and he just ran off with Minnie and all our valuables. This is me talking. If you let me up now, I can still catch ’ em .”
     
    I look into his eyes and for a minute it seems like he’s telling the truth, and I start to loosen my grip on him.
     
    “That’s it,” he says. “Just let me go