So You Used to Be Human - Book 3 (Original Version)

Chapter 27: Save Our Souls

"Nervous?" I asked.

"Fuck yeah. You?"

"Terrified," I said, and I wasn't lying.

I did the only thing I could at the moment. I stepped forward and knocked on the aluminum door.

RAP, RAP, RAP of my fist on flimsy aluminum echoed through the trailer park and I winced at the sound which was too loud for my own tastes. Maybe it was louder to us because we were so amped up, but it felt like we were waking up the whole goddamn park. I waited anxiously, expecting all of the lights in the trailers to come on, and for someone else to yell, and then the first gun would appear as the inhabitants came streaming out to protect the closest that any of them would ever come to touching a god.

None of that happened.

Just silence, the kind of silence you get at 3:22AM when everybody is asleep and not interested in anything you're doing unless you're trying to break into their own trailers or set them on fore or something.

There was a grunt from inside Jesus' trailer and then a click as the door opened. Jesus stuck his head out of the door and he had clearly been sleeping.

"What? You wanna buy some weed?"

I looked smugly at Jaime and she just glared at me to go through with it. Obviously this was some kind of ritual and I had failed it last time. I had worked that one out as was determined to get it right, otherwise I might be losing my liver very shortly.

I triumphantly held up a folded $100 taken from the center console of the King's car. "How much will this get me?"

Jesus snatched the money and examined the bill as if checking for a counterfeit. Satisfied, he palmed the bill and with a "Wait here," he pulled the door shut. The light came on inside and I heard him rustling about inside.

I could also distinctly hear the "What the fuck" look that Jaime was giving me at the moment. That was how strong the look was. This was the kind of look you do not ever meet and instead look anywhere else but directly into it even on pain of death. Meeting that gaze would only ensure your eternal suffering.

Stupid me: of course I looked. I glanced over at her as the rage built up on her face, and I knew she was assuming the worst about this whole situation.

When Jesus opened the door and threw a bag of weed at me, the bag I almost dropped, Jaime was ready to explode.

"It's primo grade-a khush. I grow it myself, so it's organic. Go on, give it a smell man, just inhale deep." I found myself raising the bag and inhaling deep. Damn that was some good shit. No matter how much Jaime glared at me, it wasn't going to change the fact that it was some primo grade-A shit.

Jaime snatched the bag from my face and threw it back to Jesus.

"Are you Jesus?" Jaime demanded.

"That's what they call me around here. I've got lots of names though. You can call me Freddy if you want. Why don't you chill out baby? Relax. It's all good out here in the wood."

Jaime folded her arms.

"No."

"I'm sorry, what? What do you mean 'no'?" It was like Jesus hadn't ever heard the word in a very long time.

"No," Jaime repeated and dug her heels in. "It's what people say instead of 'fuck you'. So let me say it again: No."

Jesus looked from Jaime back to my surprised face and started laughing as if this was the funniest thing in the world. I chuckled along with him, wondering just what was so goddamn funny, but damn his laugh was infectious.