Read The Terror of Living for Free Online

utility knife that was slightly longer. He was aware at all times that pigs were not as delicate as the human body, but they came close, and they were good practice for the real thing.
        With care, he opened the bag and found the button clasp for each of the knives. Afterward, he cleaned the sinew from the hacksaw, then began to prepare the table once again.
        
        
        HUNT PACED THE LIVING ROOM, LOOKING OUT THROUGH the big framed window onto his lawn, where he could see the pines farther out. He still wore his boots, double-laced around his ankles. They had almost drowned him. But then, he thought, so had the river.
        He'd never made good money. There was always the hope, but it had never come, not in the past twenty years. It was always one job away, always just beyond his reach. And though he thought often about it, money was not his main concern. His life had been scarred by one remarkable event, remarkable not in a way that he was proud of, but rather in a way he could, even after all the time that had passed, only half believe-that he had shot a man once in a bait shop, for a sum as small as forty dollars, killed him with a spray of buckshot.
        He'd done time for that, ten years. Every bit of it he'd wished he could take back. From the time he'd got out, twenty years ago, to the present day, pacing his living room, thinking how life had led him here to this moment, his mind going a million different places, time and time again coming back to the same conclusion-that it was his fault life hadn't turned out different.
        He walked circles, keeping his eyes on the gravel drive and beyond, past the trees to the black asphalt of the road. His wife, Nora, came to the living room door to look him over. She was a tall, thin thing with overdrawn eyes and hair curled out like cotton candy. Hunt knew that their life with horses had changed her, five foot six with thin, muscular legs and strong, callused hands. He could see their life together in her face, just as he could see his own in the mirror, both of them lean in the cheekbones, their bodies defined by straight edges and bone-sharp points extending from their elbows down to their knees. Hard work had stripped the beauty from her too soon, but then, looking at her now, there was a different sort of beauty after all these years. He loved her, and when she just stood there looking at him, he smiled, walked the five or so steps from where he had been standing near the window, and gave her a playful kiss beneath her chin. "Don't worry," he said, his voice as rough as river rapids. "We'll get this all straightened out with Eddie." She gave him a doubtful look, like he was a misbehaving child who kept making promises he couldn't keep.
        "I worry," she said, "but it's what I do and you can't help that."
        "No," he said. "Though I wish I could."
        Nora stood looking at him a moment longer. Maybe just to look him over. Maybe just to know if everything would be okay. She had felt his clothes when he came in, worn and crusted with dirt, so stiff and starched with mud, Hunt knew they felt as if they'd been washed in a bog, then hung from tree limbs to dry. He'd smelled it all the way home, jeans and shirt smoky with the odor of the forest, lichen and moss and something else, something he knew she hadn't smelled in years, something that he could see troubled her but that Hunt knew was fear.
        His eyes gave the place a quick once-over while she tried to settle him. "I'm going to trust you," she said. "I'm going to trust you and I don't want you to tell me different."
        "Don't worry," he said again. "Eddie's going to come by and we're going to work this out."
        Nora stared at him a second longer. He could see she was unsure of herself, had no idea what to do or how to react. He'd never been the kind to stare out the window before. Always sure of himself, always in control. "I'll put some coffee on," she