Chapter 1

The doorbell rang insistently, rousing Larry from his game of Minecraft, to go to the front door. He noticed that it was September 12, 2024 at 11:46PM, late for someone to call on them. He had a sudden feeling of foreboding that almost took him to his knees. Recovering, he managed to open the door, his foreboding was confirmed when the person standing at the door was a Jackson County Deputy Sheriff’s officer. He asked to come into the house, Larry let him in, knowing that the officer was delivering bad news and that he, Larry, would need to sit down, they went to the living room.

Sergeant Nathen Graves hated delivering the news he was responsible for delivering to this young boy. He had made similar deliveries of this nature to far too many people in the twenty five years he had been a Deputy Sheriff, it never got easier...

“Son, May I call you Larry?” At the boy’s nod he continued, “Larry there is no easy way to tell you what I need to tell you! Please grab hold of yourself and try to find the inner strength, or faith in God, this is going to hurt and change your life irrevocably! Your parents were killed by a drunk driver approximately forty seven minutes ago. They were both killed instantly when the SUV the drunk driver was driving ran a red light and plowed into the side of your parents car at a very high rate of speed”

This was worse than Larry had first imagined, he sat stunned as the realization washed over and through him. Tears came to his eyes as he recalled how much they loved each other, and had been looking forward to a night in downtown Kansas City at the top restaurant, Anthony’s on Grand, followed by dancing at Missie B’s. It had been a treat that they had saved for months to be able to afford. As teachers they couldn’t do something like this very often. Now they are gone!

Sergeant Graves gave the boy a few minutes to grasp the terrible news. He had more bad news to impart to the sixteen year old boy. As a minor he would be remanded to Child Protective Services and placed in a foster home. Had he been just a few months older at seventeen he would have avoided this outcome. He felt it was his duty to explain what was going to happen to him.

“Larry, the age of consent in Missouri is seventeen, as you are still several months away from that age, you will be treated as a minor. That means on Monday, Child Protective Services will collect you and will place you in a foster home. This will be an adult married couple who will be paid to watch out for your best interests until you reach seventeen. There are very good and qualified people out there, so don’t be afraid of the changes you are about to be forced to endure.”

Larry felt the news of foster care as a terrible blow, almost as devastating as that of his parents death. He had heard stories of how terrible some of the foster care “Parents” were. His Mom and Dad had raised him to be independent and he was perfectly capable of taking care of himself. He knew that his parents had saved over twenty thousand dollars toward his college fund. They had almost five thousand in the bank, in a savings account where they had been saving toward buying a new car. What’s more, he knew where the debit card for that account was. His parents had bought him a really good used Harley Davidson 2020 XL 1200R Sportster Roadster motorcycle for his sixteenth birthday, it had a detachable rear seat and a backrest.

He sat there making plans, he had been working at his Dad’s lifelong friend’s print shop on weekends and holidays as well as over the summer. He had been able to save over three thousand dollars towards college. His bank was a Wells Fargo branch that had over eight thousand other branches scattered around the United States.

The officer had asked a question, he waited patiently as Larry, who had obviously been thinking and not listening to him became refocused. When he could see the boy was paying attention to him again he repeated the question,

“Do you have someone you can call to come be with you tonight and the rest of the weekend?”

“Yes, sir! My dad’s friend and my boss, Dale Robertson!”

“Let’s call him Larry, put him on speaker and I can help you explain what I need him to do.”

Larry hit the speed dial number and a few sleepy voice answered the call,

“Hello, Larry, what’s wrong? Why are you calling so late?”

“Dale, it’s Mom and Dad, they were both killed tonight...” At that point Larry lost it, he had done extremely well to that point. But saying it made it real!

“Dale, I’m Sergeant Graves of the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department, I just informed Larry that both of his parents were killed in an automobile accident tonight, a drunk driver broadsided them. They were both killed instantly. Can you come over and stay with Larry tonight, he’s a great kid, but you never know what might happen in these circumstances.”

“My wife and I will be there in twenty minutes!”

“There’s no need to rush over, I’ll stay with Larry until you get here. Don’t get yourselves killed thinking you have a time limit to meet.”

“Thank you Sergeant, you read my mind. I’ll obey the traffic laws!”

“That’s all I can ask of you, Dale! I’ll see you in a little bit.”

Thirty minutes later Dale and his wife Glenda, came through the front door. Glenda rushed to Larry and cradled him in her arms, smushing him into her small titties and comforting him and cooing in his ear that everything was going to be alright.

Dale went to the Sergeant and began talking to him, they knew each other on a professional basis. Dale had gotten in trouble with the law fifteen years before. He had been dealing drugs and running with a bad crowd. He had been arrested but James, Larry’s dad, had bailed him out and had been instrumental in getting the Judge to give him twenty years of probation rather than five years in a State Penitentiary. Dale had five more years to serve on his probation. He had turned his life around, met Glenda, started his printing business, all because of the unwavering support of his friend, literally since they had shared a crib, James Langhurst. Sergeant Graves had been his arresting officer. They quickly caught up and shared anecdotes about James. They both had a lot of respect for the man. When the stories dried up, Sergeant Graves excused himself and left.

Larry didn’t know about everything his dad had done for Dale, he didn’t know that his dad owned twenty percent of the printing business. His dad never took the twenty percent of the company that he was due. He didn’t know that Dale had faithfully deposited the money due James, in an account, calling it a “Rainy Day Fund”. It now held just over one hundred thousand dollars, all of which now belonged to Larry.

Sergeant Graves left and Dale looked at Larry, so young, an only child, now facing a life alone. That’s not right, he wasn’t alone, he was without parents, but Dale was his Godparent, he couldn’t be his Foster Care person because he was still serving his probation. But he could still be there for him and try to help him adjust to his new life. That life and advice had to start now!

“Larry, since you’re only sixteen you would have to be in CPS’s Foster care system for the next five months. My advice to you is to not be here Monday when they come to get you!”

Larry looked at Dale in shock and blurted out, “Why?”

“You are self reliant now, you have access to a lot of money and you have your bike! Getting Foster parents is like Forrest Gump said, “It’s like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re going to get!” You could get very lucky and get a couple that truly will have your best interest at heart. Or more likely, you will get a couple that already has two or three foster kids they look after and they are glad to get you for the extra money your presence will make them. They won’t care about you or the other two kids! And if they find out that you have money of your own, they will find ways in which to get it! So my advice is to leave town before Monday and stay gone for the next five Months. Once you turn seventeen CPS can no longer touch you, you come home and can live here and go to school. In the afternoon and on weekends you can work for me at the print shop. Right now you have a total of $109,543.00 in your partnership account, and $20,543.00 in your College fund account.”

“What partnership account?”

“Your Dad gave me $5,500 to start my printing shop. It was twenty percent of the amount that I needed to be able to start up the business. The bank required that much to get a loan for the rest of the amount. I set up an account for your Dad when he refused to accept any money back from me! He said that his contribution had been a gift and he didn’t want to be a partner. But I did it anyway! You are now that partner, so that money belongs to you. I hope you use it for college, but leaving for five months won’t use up much of it.”

“Where should I go?”

“Anywhere out of the state of Missouri, go somewhere you would like to go. You like to backpack, go hide out in the mountains for a few months. Law enforcement would have forgotten about you by then. You need to be careful not to be caught, they will issue a bulletin to law enforcement to detain you and it could extend to other states, so take precautions. Your Sportster isn’t a touring bike but it shouldn’t be too bad on a long trip. I’ll put money in your bank account so you can use your debit card for purchases. Call me if or when you need more.”

“I still have paper plates on my bike, will that cause a problem?”

“Great question, and I’m not sure! There’s no glaring permanent tag declaring you are from Missouri, but they might stop all bikes with a temporary tag. I would steal a tag from a junkyard in another state from a bike like yours. And change your appearance as much as you can. If you get stopped they will send you back here. Best not to give them a reason to stop you! And take your battery out when you aren’t using your phone, so they can’t track you.”

“Thanks, Dale, Glenda, I really appreciate everything. I’ll try and check in with you as often as possible. I’ll be leaving early Sunday morning. I hate that I’m going to miss their funeral, but I’ll visit them when I come home.”

They hugged and said their goodbyes. Dale gave Larry five thousand dollars in cash, to help him survive the coming months. He had retrieved the cash from the office safe on the way over to the house knowing what he was going to have Larry do.

Larry spent all day Saturday packing and repacking his backpack. He bought freeze dried foods and batteries for his flashlight. He cleaned his Remington Model 700 rifle, breaking it down so it could be stored inside the frame of his backpack. Two boxes of 308 caliber ammunition and a box of 45 caliber for his Dad’s 1911. He bought a second ceramic filter for his MSR filtration pump that would attach directly to his Camelback bag. He packed two bottles of fuel for his camp stove. Satisfied that he had everything that he would need he strapped the backpack onto the backrest of his motorcycle.he added his sleeping bag and Thermarest pad in waterproof compression bags to the very back. He covered everything with an extra large duffel bag and securely fastened it down.

He slept fitfully, tossing and turning, never reaching REM sleep. Finally he gave up, he got up and took a shower, then fixed bacon and eggs for breakfast. At 4:00AM he climbed on his bike and rolled it out of the garage, he climbed aboard the bike and rolled down the driveway and down the street. He was almost half a mile from his house when he started the bike and took off to the west, eventually hitting I-70 and crossing into Kansas. A few miles later he took the ramp onto I-35 south, keeping to the speed limits posted he pulled into Oklahoma City just after nine thirty that morning.

Larry, using Google, looked up the nearest junkyard to his position. He followed the directions given to him and found a huge junkyard, even though it was Sunday they were open. The man behind the counter directed him to the motorcycle section, he also confirmed that the bigger five gallon tank from a touring bike could be made to fit on his bike, but he didn’t recommend doing it. “By the time you ride one hundred and fifty miles, you’re gonna want to get off that bike!” That had made a lot of sense to Larry but he wanted to look anyway.

Larry rode back to the motorcycle section and parked. Looking through the rows of crumpled bikes he found to be depressing, some had obviously cost the rider his life. But he did find a relatively new Kansas plate that wouldn’t expire for another eight months. He used his tool kit and a small Crescent wrench to remove it and stowed it under his seat along with the tool kit.

The guy at the front stopped him before Larry could leave.

“Son, I watched you take that license plate, who are you running from? The police?”

Larry told him the story of his parents dying and that CPS was coming for him. The man understood why he was running but he was running a business,

“I have to charge you for the plate. One hundred ought to cover it! But please understand that if the cops ask me about it, I’m going to tell them that you stole it!”

Larry paid the man and apologized for trying to steal it. The man wished him luck and waved him on his way.

Larry knew he was safe until sometime Monday morning, remembering what Dale had said about changing his appearance he Googled the bus station and followed the directions into downtown OKC.

Larry parked his bike and walked into the station, as he approached the door a policeman handed him a leaflet, it was about a fourteen year old girl who had run away from home. Her name was Wendy Johnson, she’s tall at 5’10”, thin build, with black hair and dark brown eyes. She is a mix of Asian and Black. It also described the clothing she was wearing. She was very pretty, Larry thought. She would be perfect for what he had planned. The authorities were going to be looking for a single rider on a motorcycle. If there were two people...

A bus was arriving from the town she lived in, Ardmore, Oklahoma. That was why the cops were present, Larry stationed himself close to where the bus was unloading, so did a cop. He saw her as she left the window seat where she had been sitting and retrieved her bag from the overhead storage. She was slowly working her way toward the door and toward the cop standing just outside it. He needed a diversion, an older woman carrying some packages was approaching the cop, Larry knocked into her just as the girl appeared in the doorway of the bus. The ladies packages went flying into the cop. The policeman had to reach out to catch the woman and then help with her packages.

Larry begged forgiveness then yelled “Mindy, I’m here to pick you up, your mother sent me!” As he waved to her and slyly pointed at the cop.

Windy looked at him and where he had pointed and nodded, not sure if this tall kid was safe but getting caught and sent home wasn’t an option either. She quickly decided that Larry was the better chance for freedom and she rushed to him and gave him a big hug. He covered her with his jacket he had brought from his bike. By the time the policeman had finished dealing with the lady and looked at the couple, her back was to him and the clothing described accurately in the leaflet was covered by his jacket. He had heard her called “Mindy” so he thought that she wasn’t the girl he was looking for. He turned and flashed his badge at the driver and entered the bus and searched for the girl. Not finding her he figured that either she never got on the bus and had taken one to somewhere else, or she had left the bus at a small town between here and there.

Windy was trying to get Larry to slow down and talk to her, she wanted to make sure he wasn’t a serial killer or a guy who gathers runaway girls for a whorehouse or something. Larry just wanted to get away from the place, he didn’t want to get caught either. So he was tugging her along by her arm. Finally he realized that she was about to make a scene that would draw security and the other law enforcement officers to them if he didn’t stop and do something. So he stopped and kissed her. A full blown tongue swapping kiss that took the girl’s breath away and that shocked her into compliance. Hugging her he explained who he was and why he had saved her. He whispered in her ear that they needed to get out of here and that he would explain what was going on a little later. And that she could trust him. She quieted down and went along with him. She balked at getting on the bike, but once again he reassured her that he was safe, that he wouldn’t harm her and that they could help each other. She had never ridden on a motorcycle before and gripped him as if he was the last pillar of the earth and she was afraid of dropping into the abyss.

They rode to a motorcycle shop a few miles away. She gradually relaxed as she noticed how carefully he negotiated the city streets. Soon she even started to enjoy the freedom she felt, the same freedom that all bike riders feel free of a helmet, hair blowing in the wind, sunshine shining in their face, freedom. They stopped at the shop and the guy told her to come in with him. This more than anything else helped her realize that the guy wasn’t out to harm or rape her. She joined him in the shop as he walked over to a helmet display.