Chapter 8

Running from you, this running man
Getting away, travel any way I can
Don’t need you no more, I’m over and done
Not my problem no more, not my woman
Time Out (B. Lake) 2017

ZERO HOUR +27

I rushed towards the entrance, and then changed to a sort of crouching sidle as I tried to disguise myself amongst a group of travellers from a large camper van. They looked at me as if I’d pissed on their state flag, and pointedly moved away from me. But by that time, I was into the long, wide hall, with its hedgerows of shop fronts. Trying to rack my brains to try and remember what the body beneath that face had been wearing when he walked past me, threatened to give me a headache. I knew that it hadn’t been the black jacket and trousers I’d seen in the video, but my memory kept morphing him back into wearing those, which made it as unreliable as a market trader fronting a display of suspiciously unidentifiable DVD players.

I spotted the signs for the toilets, and did my sidling move once more, which quite honestly would have given me free passage to the disabled loos if anyone had cared enough to notice. They were down a passage that echoed to the feet of its patrons, and smelled of pine and bleach.

I crept into the men’s bathroom, peering under the stall doors to try and see if Summer was there, then berated myself for being an idiot. The ladies lavatory was a lot more difficult. When I entered, there were several women at the hand basins, washing their hands or checking their make-up in the mirrors. All eyes swung towards me.

“Left luggage check. Left luggage check,” I chanted repeatedly, shielding my eyes more to hide my face than their private bits. One of the stall doors opened unexpectedly, a woman still determinedly yanking leggings up over a little girl’s plump legs, the girl’s feet leaving the ground completely at the zenith of each tug. The woman looked at me suspiciously.

“Don’t leave unattended luggage,” I said. “Report anything suspicious.”

The woman’s eyes grew wide and she hustled the girl out quickly. Once again, I checked under the stall doors, but unless Summer had found a pair of old flats, some tatty flip-flops, brand new Nikes or some sparkling red dance shoes, she wasn’t in the bathroom.

My heart was beating like Taylor Hawkins was having a hissy fit. Where the hell was she? Where was Murdoch? Why was I still in the women’s bathroom?

I stepped out into the passage and almost collided with a door as it swung open in front of me. Purple hair swirled and I grabbed Summer’s arm. She squeaked in surprise.

“He’s here,” I whispered, swinging her in close so I could put my mouth to her ear. “Murdoch. He was the one checking up at the hotel. I saw him walking into this place.”

Her eyes opened so wide the whites of her eyes were clear around the pupils. I felt her start to shake.

“We need to go!” I whispered and she nodded.

Trying to watch every person in the centre at the same time, I drew her out into the main hall, the scent of coffee, fried food and Mexican spices strong once again. We moved steadily towards the exit, until I looked into a book shop, and saw Murdoch’s reflection in the shop window. He was following behind us, his perfectly ordinary features half hidden behind the ubiquitous cap that seemed to cover the top half of his head.

I felt a snowy avalanche stream down my whole body, as if I’d done an impromptu ice bucket challenge. Then I realised he was looking around and not concentrating on us. With Summer’s arm held tight against me, I drew her to one side, trying to seem casual – just two ordinary people going about their daily lives – nothing to see here!

When we were out of the main traffic flow, she just couldn’t resist. She looked over her shoulder and froze. She’d seen him. Panic distorted her features and her mouth opened to scream, to shout, to cry ... I didn’t know which. It didn’t matter – I couldn’t let her draw attention to us.

I span her around to face me and kissed her, my hands pressed to her cheeks to hide her face, and trying not to knock the ever-present cap from her head. What is it about caps that excite Americans so?

Summer’s eyes opened even wider, and for a long moment she was as stiff as a sheet left out on a washing line during mid-winter, and then she softened into my arms. Her eyes were locked on mine, although mine were darting everywhere, trying to spot Murdoch within a sudden surge in the pedestrian traffic. I saw his back for a moment as he passed us, then he disappeared behind a pair of bloated shoppers dressed in shorts and loose tee shirts who were big enough to remind me of myself when I was fifteen. When he reappeared from behind them, he was striding out through the exit.

The ice over my body released its hold and I sagged with relief, and realised suddenly that I was no longer kissing Summer – she was kissing me.

Her mouth tasted faintly of cherries and honey, and her breath was sweet with a passing scent of autumnal air. Her lips were soft; so soft they felt almost insubstantial, and I couldn’t help pressing mine more firmly against them. I felt her teeth slowly close on my lower lip to nibble for a moment, and then my tongue was pressing between them to seek out hers. I was no more in control of my actions than the pilot of an airbus after the wings had fallen off.

We kissed for an instant that lasted a lifetime. No more, no less.

My heart pounded and melted into a small blob within my chest. The knight cheered loudly in my head, knowing he’d won the internal battle. I would no longer be able to walk away from her, away from this situation, and go back to my normal life – such as it was. I was hers to do with as she wished; to love and cherish, to ignore and leave, or to betray and ruin – it was all in her hands.

There was a series of giggles and laughter, a hiss of disgust, a snort of acknowledgement, and I realised the passing parade were very aware of our actions, and felt themselves completely at liberty to comment on our embrace.

She drew back, and I recognised on her face the slightly stunned look that mine had to be wearing. We both knew that something had changed forever. Our lives had suddenly been diverted onto a new track – destination unknown.

All my fears suddenly rushed back in. This was a girl from a different country – a different continent – whom I had known for just a day. She was damaged, sought by the authorities, and she knew my intimate weaknesses. She was danger personified. Walk away, Will Robinson! Danger! Danger!

And yet all I wanted was to be near her. Well, not actually all ... My heart knew it was desperate for her to feel the same way about me; my body craved her slightest touch; and Mr. Happy had reappeared to post a claim on what he wanted as well.

I hadn’t felt like this since the first days with Phoebe.

No – that was wrong! What I had felt then was the faintest echo of this; like the grumble of a distant thunder storm compared to the noise and violence of that storm letting loose right above me, with lightning turning nearby trees into badly shaped matchsticks.

Our eyes were locked together.

“We need to go,” I mumbled, not making any move whatsoever.

“Yes,” she agreed, seemingly equally paralysed.

“Get a room,” said a passerby, sounding disgruntled and more than a little jealous.

It broke us out of the immobility spell that those sudden surges of emotion had cast over us. I took her hand and we crept to the exit, peered out for several minutes, and then dashed for the car, running stooped over like a pair of really old pensioners who had been given a hefty dose of cocaine with their creamed corn and vitamins.

Within minutes we were exiting the services and getting back on the highway, me cursing at myself for not following the earlier plan and using the back roads. I handed her the phone.

“Find us a route to Nashville that keeps us off the highways,” I said.

She fiddled with the phone with an expertise that made mine look like that of a caveman finding a Rubik’s cube – probably able to solve it, but just as likely to break it in the process. My skill with programming hadn’t migrated to using a phone, as those teenage years largely spent in my room, with no friends, meant no need for social media. Besides, I was always at my computer, so why bother with a small screen. To be honest, I would have been quite happy with a flip-phone, but Lappies had felt that would put out the wrong message to potential clients. In the end he’d presented me with an Android phone as a gift. I’d taken it apart to examine the workings, put it back together, and discovered that the phone and I were members of a mutual hate society. I detested trying to type anything on those idiot keys. In return it hated me enough to make sure everything I typed came out wrong.

“We’re coming up to an intersection, so take the next left,” she said after a long while. We had passed several others already, but I trusted her to find us the shortest indirect route.

Half of my attention was on the mirror, searching for any sign that we were being followed. Summer directed me to the north with her hand, and then screamed as I turned and automatically swung onto the left side of the road, facing oncoming traffic. I yanked the wheel over, thankful I hadn’t been able to hear the abuse the people in the hooting cars were bellowing at me and my heart rate began to settle down.

“Sorry,” I said. “My attention slipped for a moment.”

She squeezed my hand. The back of my shirt felt damp, and when I put my hand back to feel, I realised I was sweating up a storm. The air con was doing its job, but my body was responding to the tension.

This part of Missouri was a little hillier and a whole lot more arboreal than Kansas, which was nice. It was even a little like England, if you discounted the heat and the foreign trees everywhere. We were in the Mark Twain National Forest, apparently, which sounded more impressive than it looked. It seemed a little sparse to be a forest, and if Robin Hood had tried hiding out there, he would have been found on day one in my estimation. Maybe we were still in the undergrowth and it would build up to a proper forest as we went on.