Godless by Pete Hautman

Fairview, more than twenty miles away.
    â€œI love it up here,” Henry says. He is lying on his back, spread-eagled on the sloping steel, his head six feet from the hatch. Another few feet and he’d slide right off into space.
    â€œWhy do you suppose they have this hatch padlocked?” I ask. “They afraid somebody’s gonna steal the water?”
    â€œI think they’re more worried about terrorists.”
    â€œYeah, right. Terrorists in St. Andrew Valley.”
    â€œYou never know,” Henry says. “Hey, you know what would be funny? Get a few gallons of red food coloring and dump it in the water. Everybody would turn on their faucets and it’d be like blood coming out.”
    â€œYou’d need a lot of food coloring. There’s a million gallons of water in there.”
    â€œOr you could dump soap in it.”
    â€œWhy would you do that?”
    â€œI don’t know. It’d be funny. People foaming at the mouth.”
    â€œYou’ve got a weird sense of humor, Henry.”
    â€œI’ve heard that.”
    After a few minutes I start to relax. I loosen my death grip on the post and stand up. My stomach is floating and I have an empty spot under my heart. That means I’m afraid. But I also have a turbine whining in my skull, and a shuddery feeling high in my chest—feelings of power and excitement.
    â€œI feel like Moses,” I say. “Moses on the mountain. You know what we need? Some commandments.”
    â€œI got enough trouble dealing with the first ten,” Henry says.
    â€œOurs will be easier. Like, Thou shalt not pollute the water supply,’ or, ‘Thou shalt not eat asparagus.’”
    â€œYou don’t like asparagus?”
    â€œNot much.”
    â€œI don’t mind it. I like how it makes my pee smell. Hey, if the water tower is god, what’s the devil?”
    â€œI don’t think the Chutengodians have a devil.”
    â€œYou gotta have a devil. You can’t have a religion without a devil.”
    â€œSure you can. Buddhists don’t have a devil.”
    â€œI still think you need a devil. Hey, y’know what’d be cool? Come up here in a thunderstorm.”
    â€œYou’d get fried,” I say.
    â€œYou think so?”
    â€œThis is the tallest structure in St. Andrew Valley. I bet it gets hit by lightning all the time.”
    â€œOh. Well, it would be fun while it lasted.”
    â€œHey, you know what we should do?” I say. “Get everybody up here. All the Chutengodians. In fact, wegotta do it. Next Tuesday, the Sabbath, we all climb up for Midnight Mass.”
    Henry tips his head back and looks at me. “This is my territory.”
    â€œIt would just be for an hour or so. Tell you what. You can be the High Priest.”
    Henry thinks about that.
    â€œWhat does the High Priest have to do?”

 
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    O NE DAY THE O CEAN NOTICED THAT THE H UMANS WERE PASSING BY ITS EFFIGIES WITH HARDLY AN UPWARD GLANCE, AND DRINKING FREELY WITHOUT THANKS OR ACKNOWLEDGMENT .
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11
 
    â€œJason! Jason, wake up!”
    â€œI’m up. I’m awake. What’s the matter?”
    â€œAre you feeling all right?”
    â€œI’m fine, Mom. Jeez.” I pull the covers up over my head.
    â€œIt’s almost eleven!” She tugs on the bedspread. “You can’t sleep the whole day away.”
    â€œWhy not?” Actually, I probably
could
sleep all day.
    A few hours ago, Henry Stagg and I watched the sun rise over St. Andrew Valley from the top of the Ten-legged One. The town was still in shadow when the sun’s first rays lit up our faces. We sat in devout silence as sunlight touched the silver tank, lighting it inch by inch, from the top down. Talk about being close to God.
    â€œIt’s not natural to sleep fourteen hours a day.”
    I lower the covers and look up at her. “I haven’t been sleeping that long. I was up most of the