Chapter 7

Now that I knew the gravity of the situation, it became a lot more important in my mind to have us disappear, permanently. Running from a potential jail sentence might be a game. A dangerous game, to be sure, but still a game. Running from a death sentence is an entirely different manner.

I took stock of our finances and transportation options. One of our options was our next door neighbor in the temporary RV park where everyone waited for their maintenance appointments. Some came as much as two months before their appointment, just to enjoy the camaraderie of the group. A lot of these folks had sold their homes to be able to enjoy the nomadic lifestyle. They also traded the tedious and expensive continuous maintenance of a fixed base for a once a year tuneup at the RV factory. It was much less stressful that way. They also escaped the ever-rising wave of real estate taxation.

Most of the RVs in the park were followed by a towed vehicle of some sort. Our neighbor, Jake Jones, had a nice little 4x4 Jeep attached to his.

“Jake, I have a deal for you. Come on over. I’ll explain over a beer.”

Now, Jake was never one to turn down a free beer, so he jumped right on that.

“Whazzup, dude?”, he asked, after his fifth or sixth beer. It took that many to get his brain purged of the latest stories about hunting, fishing and football. Thankfully, I managed to get his attention pointed back to my problem before he got into his church and family stories.

“Jake, I’ve got a huge problem and don’t know what to do about it. Nancy tells me that she needs to go visit her mother down south of here a bit, but I don’t want to lose my place in line for maintenance. Do you know of anybody that’s headed in that direction when they leave here and is going to be heading out in the next day or so?”

“Sure. Old man Smith and his wife are heading out for Tallahassee tomorrow. I’m sure they would give her a lift.”

“That’s great! I’ll go talk to them. Here, take the rest of the six pack with you.”

“Don’t mind if I do.”

I went to confirm things with the Smiths, then went inside to coordinate with the girls. “Mr. Smith says you can ride with him, Darling. They are headed for Tallahassee. The first time they stop for fuel, I want you to call me. I will tell you to tell them that I will be coming to get you because of a family emergency and they should leave you there.”

“What about me, Grandpa?”

“We will get you a ride in another direction so that we don’t leave here together. The black hats will be looking for one man and two women, so we need to split up here and regroup somewhere else.”

“Ok. I hope we aren’t apart too long. I only feel safe with you, Gramps.”

“Love you, too, Little Bit. Don’t worry, we will get through this together. First we need to break up the pattern they are seeking, to give us time to make more long range plans.”

I managed to get my granddaughter headed toward Birmingham with a nice older couple who thought she was headed back to college.

I visited Jake again, with another 12-pack. “Jake, old buddy.”

“Well, I know you want something because I see you got beer, but it didn’t cost me nothing but a hangover last time. Come on in. What can I do you for?”

“That’s about it”, I said with a grin. “I need you to take advantage of me.”

“Hey, now, I ain’t into nothing like that. Besides yore women just left. Can’t you get by a day or two with just the Widder and her daughters?”

“Relax, man. It ain’t nothing like that. What I need is a four wheel drive to go somewhere and I don’t have time to go shopping. What say I swap you that Audi I’m towing for your little Jeep?”

“Shit! I love that Audi, but I’m kinda broke right now and couldn’t give you no boot. Don’t that Audi have four wheel drive?”

“That’s all right. I don’t need nothing to boot, but I do need a 4x4 to get to my daddy’s house up in the hills. Now I see that I should have bought the Quattro option on that Audi, but I didn’t think about it at the time. I’m talking about a straight swap. Can you do it?”

“Hell yes! Are you shore you want to do that?”

“I don’t want to, but I don’t see no other choice. I’m ready to swap titles if you are.”

As I drove away, I hollered at him, “Just tell the folks here we will be back as quick as we can, but I don’t know when it will be.”

“All right. You drive real careful. Thanks for this here Audi.”

“Yeah. It breaks my heart, but I gotta do it.” I left him grinning like a jackass eating saw briars, as we say around here.

I was going to have to find some way to change direction without giving away expensive vehicles every time or even the good nest egg we had would evaporate too soon. This problem would not go away. Not soon, not ever. We had to find a certain method of disappearing and stick with it.

In America, it is not possible to function without a vehicle unless you live in a big city. Owning a vehicle puts cross hairs on your back that are dreadfully easy to find. Big city living puts other cross hairs on your back. It is rarely possible to rent without a credit check. Boom! Cross hairs!

Moving about the country or about the world puts other cross hairs on your back. Fake IDs could possibly reduce the problem, but my resources did not run to fake ID providers. Let’s see, now. Google, please tell me where I can find a fake ID provider. Cookies? What cookies? Next thing I knew, Google would sell my ID to ten sites offering fake IDs, all run by an agency which shall not be named.

With enough money and time, we could have plastic surgery in Mexico and sneak back across the Rio Grande. Then we could have new IDs, free hospitalization and voter registration in five precincts before you could blink an eye. But who am I kidding? We could never hope to pass.

The first order of business was to find some place to lie low for two or three months, until our trail grew cold enough to at least reduce the level of manpower allocated to tracking us.

I called Daphne, as we had arranged, and gave her new directions. She was glad I had called because the Smiths were getting worried about me. They had refused to leave her alone and were waiting there for me to come. Shit! Trust nice people to fuck things up when you’re trying to break the law. I told her to go on to their destination with them and I would pick her up there.

Hopefully, Emily had made it to her rendezvous point without incident. I didn’t try to call because who knew whether the black hats had tapped my phone? It was time to ditch it.

After disabling my phone, I found a Dollar General that had a good selection of camouflage cloth. I bought a bolt of it and some scissors, then found a side road that petered out into a logging track that disappeared into the piney woods. Once I was out of sight, I made a simple cover that wouldn’t pass scrutiny, but would avoid catching attention and drove further into the woods.