PillowThief

Fri, 10 Nov 2006 13:07:10 GMT

“Attention students and staff, please excuse the interruption, it has come to my attention that several members of our student body have come down with what appears to be THE EBOLA VIRUS(?). Because of the nature of this illness certain precautions need to be taken to ensure the safety of both the rest of the students and staff, as well as the community at large. In order to limit the exposure to this illness the state has deemed it necessary to keep the entire population of the school, both resident and non-resident students, as well as the staff, under quarantine for a period of time to be determined appropriate, starting immediately. Due to this action, this year’s spring break activities have been canceled indefinitely. If you begin to show symptoms of this illness please see Nurse Hathaway immediately. Thank you for your cooperation in this matter, you may now return to your lessons.”

"This is so lame," Sarah complained, as she flopped on her stomach across her boyfriend, Kyle's, bed.
Sarah and her best friend, Gwen, had descended upon Kyle’s room to discuss the announcement the Vice Principal had dropped like a bomb over the P.A. system during their first period class.
"Just because some morons from 4 H or Future Freaks of America or whatever it is came down with a stupid little cough they have to go and cancel spring break for everyone."
"Don't forget the best part of this whole thing,” Kyle’s roommate, Tyler, said with a sardonic smirk. “The part where we are trapped in the school under quarantine like prisoners. I swear this place gets more like a jail everyday."
Kyle snorted. “No kidding.” He paused for a moment, thinking things over in his mind. "We should just leave," Kyle said as he crossed his arms over the back of his backwards-facing desk chair. "We should just pack up and go on spring break anyway. We aren't sick and we don't know any of the people who are, so why should we be punished because of them?”
“We shouldn’t,” agreed Gwen, “but by now I’m sure they have already called our parents to let them know about the lockdown. You know your folks won’t go against what the school says just to take us to the beach.”
“So. We can drive; we’ll take my car.” Excited by his idea, Kyle got up and began pacing the small room. “It’ll only take, what, a day or two to get to California? Tomorrow is Friday. If we leave at night, after classes, they won’t even notice we are gone until Wednesday at the earliest. That’s five days. We will be long gone by then.”
“What makes you think they won’t notice us having gone missing for five days?” Gwen questioned logically.
“They aren’t going to take head counts over the weekend, the teachers and staff are just as bummed about this as we are. They are going to be off doing their own thing. If they actually have classes or something on Monday people will just assume that we are sick or that we ditched; no big deal. They won’t start to wonder if we were the next victim of this virus thing until Wednesday. They won’t want to think about us until then.”
Gwen just shrugged, she couldn’t argue with his logic.
“So genius,” Tyler challenged a few moments later, “where are we staying?”
Before Kyle had to admit that his brilliant escape plan was only half formed, Sarah came to his rescue. “My Aunt and Uncle have a house in Malibu, and they are conveniently in the Bahamas until June,” she offered.
“Awesome, the place sounds perfect.” Tyler grinned. “So we’re really going to do this?” He looked around the room for confirmation and was met with shrugs and nods. “Wicked! California here we come!”

The next morning the five excited teenagers could barely sit still through their classes. Instead of reading Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, they made mental lists of the things they forgot to pack. In their World History class they daydreamed about surfing the waves or tanning in the sun when they should have been focusing on the Industrial Revolution in Europe . In Biology, instead of learning about how genetics effect plant color, they watched the minutes tick by on the clock, praying they would go faster, instead of learning about how genetics in plants effect their flower petal color. Twice over the course of the day, they were almost caught by a teacher passing incriminating notes, and at lunch, Kyle’s brother, Luke, eyed them suspiciously, like he knew they were up to something.
Finally, the blessed clock struck three signaling the end of the school day. Kyle, Sarah, Tyler and Gwen packed their books away in their backpacks and were the first ones to flee out the classroom door. The group made arrangements to meet next to the low stone wall in front of the library at midnight. The library closed at ten o’clock so two hours later the place should be deserted. It also happened to be situated as the midpoint between the girls’ and boys’ dormitories and the parking lot. Until then, the teens each went their separate ways in order to get some last minute packing and planning done.

Kyle and Tyler were already waiting when Gwen and Sarah arrived several hours later. They were sitting on top of the wall with their stuff cluttered all around them and by the looks of it, they had been there a little while.
“Jeeze, you guys, what took you so long?”
“Your girlfriend,” Gwen answered Kyle with a playful smirk in Sarah’s direction. “She couldn’t get her bag to close and we had to go back to the room four times to get something she left behind and just couldn’t possibly live without.”
Kyle rolled his eyes, “Yep, that sounds about right.” He glanced at her two piece, matching, designer Louis Vuitton luggage set, they were bulging and looked like they weighed over fifty pounds a piece. She better not expect me to carry those for her, he thought to himself, because there is no way. Shaking his head he gathered his stuff and motioned for the others to do the same.
“I staked everything out earlier,” Kyle said as he led everyone through the poorly lit darkness toward the car. “There is one guard stationed between the parking lot and the road out of here. If we get past him then we should be home free.” He turned around to look at the others in the group, the tail of the surfboard under his right arm nearly taking out Sarah in the process. “Gwen, I was thinking that you and Ty should be in
charge of distracting the guard. Do anything in your power to get him to look the other way when I am moving the car-”
“So basically he’s telling you to flash the guy.”
“Shut it Ty Ty, no one asked you.” Gwen glared menacingly at him before turning her attention back to Kyle and his plan.
“As I was saying, once I get the car onto the road, you guys can sneak through the woods and meet us right before the fork. No one is patrolling the woods, so you shouldn’t have a problem with getting through.”
When they were about four spaces away from Kyle’s parking spot, Tyler noticed a dark figure leaning up against Kyle’s brand new, jet black, Toyota 4 Runner. Who would be lurking out in the parking lot at this hour? Was it possible someone knew about their plan? Were going to try to stop them from leaving?
“Dude,” Tyler whispered into Kyle’s ear, “who’s that?”
Kyle glared menacingly at the figure, “My brother.”
As he got closer to his car, Kyle’s glower intensified, his elder brother however, remained un-phased. “What the hell are you doing, Luke?”
“Coming with you.”
“Like hell you are.”
“Let me put it to you this way, little bro, either I’m coming with you, or you aren’t going at all. I’m not just going to silently sit here under military lockdown if I know you guys are at the beach having the time of your lives. If I have to rot here, you have to rot here.”
“How do you know we are going to the beach?” He folded his arms across his chest and looked smug.
Luke laughed, “You are carrying a surf board under your arm, moron. So what will it be?”
Kyle sighed, he could see he was losing control of the situation rapidly. He glanced briefly at the others to make sure there would not be any protests, and then shrugged, defeated. “Fine, whatever, get in.” He gestured grandly to the car and clicked the keyless entry button to unlock the doors. Tyler opened the back hatch and started loading in the suitcases and duffle bags. It took some doing. enough stuff for five people to take over a week long vacation took up quite a bit of space; more than the back area had to offer. In the end it took all five of them leaning against the door to get it to close. With that done, Luke and Kyle strapped the surf boards to the roof rack. They were ready to go, all that was left was deciding seating arrangements.
“Well, I’m driving obviously,” Kyle stated. “It’s my car.”
“I should get to ride next to him,” Sarah stated imperiously, “he’s my boyfriend.”
Tyler disagreed. “No, you should sit in the back. There is no way you’re going to be able to navigate. You can’t even read a map.”
“You could do that just fine from the back seat.”
“Not squished between Gwen and Luke. With two guys in the back seat there wont be any elbow room.”
“That’s not my problem.”
“It is if you want to actually get to California.”
“Guys, cut it out,” Gwen said. “It doesn’t matter all that much. We can always switch it up down the road a ways. Lets just get going, before someone notices us standing here.”
The rest of the group nodded in agreement and Sarah, Kyle and Luke climbed in the car. Sarah took the opportunity that Tyler’s previously assigned guard distraction job offered her and snagged the front. He scowled at her, but said nothing about it.
“We’ll walk a little ways to make sure no one is hanging around nearby,” Tyler said, “and then I’ll give you a signal if you are in the clear to start the car. You’d better wait until you get to the main road though, before you turn on the headlights. Those new blue ones you installed are really bright.”
Gwen and Tyler walked back the way they came, half way to the library they gave Kyle the all clear signal and watched him pull his car out of the parking space, and then jogged toward the security guard stationed where the large parking lot, met small road that traveled around the school. They stopped to catch their breath and compose themselves about 100 feet from the guard just out of his sight.
“What are we going to tell him?” Gwen whispered.
“Just follow my lead” Tyler started to walk confidently in the guards direction. After a few steps he stopped and grabbed Gwen’s hand, interlocking their fingers. “You should probably pretend to like me as well.” He gave her a smirk and kept walking. As soon as they got within the guard’s line of sight the smirk morphed into a look of grave concern.
“Oh good,” he said, “I’ve been looking all over for one of you guys. We were walking past the music department on the other side of campus and I think someone is trying to break in. They were trying to jimmy the lock on the door with a coat hanger and carrying a baseball bat. I think he or she might be trying to steal the new audio equipment.”
The guard pulled a walkie-talkie from a clip on his belt. “Johnson, we have a possible forced entry in progress in the music department. I’m going over there to check it out. Would you cover me?”
The voice on the other end crackled, “Affirmative. I’ll meet you there.”
Turning back to Gwen and Tyler the guard said, “Thanks for the heads up. You two should get back to your dorms now. Its almost past the twelve-thirty curfew.”
“Yes, sir,” Gwen acknowledged with false sincerity. They waited until the guard was out of sight before they busted up laughing and slapped each other high five.
“We should get going,” Tyler said, starting toward the path that led to the forest. “We don’t want to get left behind.”
Gwen looked suddenly apprehensive. “Right, about that. Do we have to go through the woods? Couldn’t we just go down the main road like they did? No one is watching, we just made sure of that.”
“No, we talked about this remember? As soon as those guards realize no one is trying to break into the music room they are going to come back here looking for us. We don’t want them to spot us walking down the street. Besides, Kyle and them aren’t waiting for us at the end of the street, they are waiting for us further up the main road at the end of the woods. Its faster this way.” Tyler chuckled, “You aren’t scared about going in there are you?”
“No, of course not. I mean, what could possibly be in there. Nothing.”
“Who are you trying to convince there, Gwenny, you or me?”
“Shut up. Lets just get this over with.”
It was pitch black inside the forest, and the moonless night did nothing to help that fact. The only illumination came from a small Maglight flashlight on the end of Tyler’s key ring. But between the huge, intimidating shadows that it cast and the glowing, yellow eyes that seemed to be following them everywhere, it did nothing to soothe Gwen’s rapidly beating heart. A large owl swooped down from a tall tree, its screeching cry echoing in her ears. All pretense of composure gone, Gwen screamed.
“Shh!” Tyler said, laughing. “We aren’t that far away from the school. Someone will hear you.”
Gwen blushed, embarrassed by her reaction. She prided herself on generally being the level headed one. “Sorry. It just startled me, that’s all.”
“Uh huh, “ Tyler played along with a smile. “I can hold your hand if you’re scared. I won’t let anything big and scary get you.”
“Oh shut up. Let’s just hurry up and get out of here.” Gwen picked up the pace and arrived at the far side of the woods a good 15 steps ahead of Tyler. She climbed into the car without a word and waited for him to catch up. As soon as Tyler burst through the door however, she knew she was never going to live this down.
“Guess who’s afwaid of the dark? Wittle Gwenny.”
Gwen’s face flushed red to match her auburn hair as she glared at Tyler. The others sniggered.
Kyle glanced in his rearview mirror at Tyler as he hit the gas and peeled out up the main road leading away from the school. “Ok, where to now?”
“The bank up the street, we’re going to need to fund this whole vanishing act.”
Before Kyle could even pull into the dark bank parking lot, Tyler was giving out instructions again. “Pull out only as much money as you think you can get away with without either your parents noticing the money is gone, or the bank notifying them that it has been withdrawn. Don’t get excited and pull out several grand just because its there. Be conservative. We don’t want them to realize we are gone any earlier than necessary.”
Heads nodded all around the car and Tyler continued, “Don’t worry about us not having enough money to get home, we can always use my credit cards on the way back.”
“Don’t you think your folks will freeze your credit cards as punishment once they realize we are gone?” Gwen looked at him with her eyebrow raised.
The car stopped and Tyler climbed out of the car as he replied, “Nah, they will want us to keep using them so that they can track us. That’s why we’ve got to do everything in cash on the way down there. Going home it won’t matter. If they find us, who cares? We were coming home anyway. Even once they realize I’m not using them they will keep them active in hopes that I get desperate.”
“Apparently you’ve done this a time or two.”
Tyler just grinned at her and stepped up to the ATM. Reaching into his wallet he took out his card and inserted it into the machine. He punched in the code and despite his confidence a moment before, prayed to himself that it would actually work. The machine spat out his money and a receipt that he crumpled into a ball and tossed basket-ball style into a trash can, and then stepped aside so that Sarah could take her turn.
“Sorry guys,” Tyler said apologetically as he slid the card and money into his wallet. “I only got fifty. Although to be honest, I suppose I’m lucky I could get any at all. Since I pulled that last stunt, even though I still have access to my American Express, my parents have been awfully stingy with my access to their bank account.”
“That’s alright Ty, we’ve all got you covered,” Sarah said, tucking her money into her designer Gucci handbag. “I pulled out four hundred, that should be enough to cover the hotel rooms as long as someone else can spring for room service.”
Kyle was not about to be outdone by his girlfriend. He whipped out his own ATM card and punched in the appropriate numbers to withdraw five hundred dollars. Luke, who had been peering over his brother’s shoulder gaped at him.
“Dude, you’re going to give me half of that.”
“Why should I? Get your own.” Kyle went to pocket the money, but Luke grabbed his arm.
“Because I need some money too, and Mom and Dad will notice for sure if an entire grand goes missing.”
Kyle huffed, clearly unhappy, but he handed a wad of twenties to his brother. Luke made a show of counting it to make sure his portion was all there before stuffing it into his pocket. Gwen slipped the two-hundred fifty dollar result of her ATM visit into her purse and the group got back in the car. “Twelve hundred dollars,” Gwen totaled the sum of everyone’s cash in her head. “That should be more than plenty.”

***

“Ok, Tyler, now where do I go?” Once again, Kyle peeled out of the parking lot, slamming the other passengers back in their seats.
“ I dunno, I’ve never even been to California. What do the directions say? Hand them back here and I’ll check.”
“I thought you had them.”
“Nope. What did you do with them after you printed them out?”
“I didn’t print the directions, I thought you did.”
“Oh great,” Sarah interjected, sounding a little hysterical. “No one remembered to printed out the directions. Now what are we going to do?”
Luke didn’t sound worried, “Don’t worry about it. You still have the directions to your Aunt and Uncle’s place right?”
“Yeah,” She said slowly, “ but those only tell me how to get from the freeway to their place. They wont do us any good from here.
“That’s ok, you’ve go the important part. Don’t lose it. Interstate 5 should take us all the way to California. Once we get closer we can get directions to the freeway on your instructions.”
“Ok then smartass,” Kyle said, paying more attention to watching his brother in the rearview mirror then watching the road, “how do I get us to I-5?”
“Well first, you watch the road before you kill us all, then you tell Sarah where to find the map so that I can read it and tell you.”
“Right” Kyle said, a little sheepish. “ So we need a 7-Eleven. I don’t have a map either. And shut up about my driving, no one asked you.”
Sarah bat her eyelashes at Kyle and gave him her best puppy dog eyes, “And a Starbucks too. Please?”
“Fine,” he agreed giving her an indulgent smile, “and a Starbucks too.”
Forty-five minutes later they were finally speeding down Interstate 5 south toward California. The group was amazed at the number of cars on the road at this time of the night, but they were glad for the company. At least with so many other people around they didn’t stick out. The less they stuck out, the less likely it would be that someone would notice that they weren’t where they were supposed to be.
Kyle reasoned that the faster they got to an area of the state where people didn’t know about the quarantine, the better. So they planned to drive through the night; put as many miles as possible between them and the school where people knew them, before stopping. Sarah plugged her iPod adaptor into the cigarette lighter and set the device on random play. She cranked up the volume and the group rocked along to the songs that blared out of the speakers. The loud music was designed to keep them awake, but one by one, they started to drift off. The girls were first, Sarah leaning her chair back and slightly crushing Luke’s knees, and Gwen resting her head on Tyler’s shoulder. It was just too easy for Luke to rest his head on Gwen’s shoulder, she was not wake to complain. Finally as the early morning rays began to penetrate the sky, Tyler too nodded off, his cheek pressed up against the window that he had been staring out for hours.
Tyler’s nap didn’t last long, the thud, thud, thud, of Kyle driving over the lane reflectors woke him up. “I think its time we pull over. That’s the third time you’ve run those things over. You’re falling asleep at the wheel.”
“Am not. I’m driving by Braille. I was trying to wake you guys up, you wusses fell asleep on me.
“It’s ok man, its just about morning. You’ve been awake a long time. I’m sure we’ve gone far enough for tonight.”
“Two hundred forty miles give or take,” Gwen’s voice was groggy with sleep. “If you’ve been going the same speed you were before I went to sleep, and if we only stopped that once.”
Kyle hit the trip odometer on the dash and confirmed her assessment. “How do you do that?”
Gwen shrugged, “Just talented I guess.”
Tyler pulled the map out from the pocket in the back of Kyle’s seat. He opened it up and hummed a little to himself with his tongue sticking out of this mouth while he tried to trace their route so far. “If I’m looking at this right, we should be coming up on Eugene in about 10 miles. I’m sure we’ll have no problem finding a hotel to stay in there.”
Sarah fumbled around in her purse before pulling out her bright pink cell phone. “I’ll get us directions to the hotel.” She had just dialed the number and was about to press send when Gwen stopped her.
“Wait, you can’t use your phone. Its just like a credit card, it can be tracked. You will have to use a pay phone somewhere, or a phone book.”
Sarah closed her phone and put it back in her purse, “Oh yeah, I forgot about that.”
Kyle got off the freeway at the next exit and began a hunt for a pay phone. Nearly four blocks later, they finally found a working one outside a Chevron gas station. While Kyle got the car refilled with gas, Luke and Sarah went to the phone to get directions to a hotel. Picking up the receiver, Sarah inserted a few coins into the slot and dialed the number for information.
“The listing for the Hyatt Hotel in Eugene, Oregon, please,” Sarah requested of the operator using her most self-important voice.
On the other end of the phone the nearly monotone voice of the operator informed her there was no listing for a Hyatt in Eugene, and inquired if she had another request.
“I’ll settle for the Hilton then I suppose,” Sarah said, deflated.
“Would you like me to connect you for an additional charge?”
Sarah indicated that yes she would and deposited the additional money into the slot and waited for the front desk at the Hilton to answer their phone.
“The Hilton Hotel, how may I be of service to you?”
“Hello,” Sarah said, her self-important voice returning. “I am calling to inquire about whether you have a room available at your establishment.”
“For what date?”
“Today.”
“Let me check.” The operator’s computer keys clicked rapidly in the background. “Yes, ma’am. There are several rooms available for check-in today at 3 pm.”
“3 pm? Is there a way I could check in any earlier. In about a half an hour? There would be some extra money in it for you if I could.”
“No ma’am there’s not. Check-in is strictly after three. There is no way a room could be made ready for you any earlier than that.”
Sarah placed her hand over the receiver and whispered to Luke, “ The Hilton says there is no way they could have a room ready any earlier than three o’clock. Is that ok?”
Luke shook his head, “No, we’ll find something else. Kyle wont wait that long here just doing nothing and he cant make it any farther behind the wheel.”
“Ma’am?” the voice on the other end practically shouted into the phone. “Ma’am, are you there? Would you like me to book that room for you?”
Sarah took her hand off of the mouthpiece and returned the other end to her ear. “No, that’s alright. I really needed something much sooner than what you can offer. I will have to take my business else where. Thank you for your time.” With that she replaced the receiver back on the hook. “Now what? Do I call somewhere else?”
“No, they’re all looking antsy over there. We’ll just drive around and find something.”
After directions from the eager to please man behind the counter in the mini-mart, the five young teens climbed back into the car. His directions took ten minutes to figure out, but eventually they arrived in front of the local Best Western. Sarah and Luke walked up to the doors and went inside to talk to the clerk.
The hotel was nice enough, Gwen mused to herself. Although, it was entirely outside- no hallways- so she wondered if it wouldn’t be more accurately labeled a motel. Still, it was clean, the lobby was large and sported several plush chairs, and the marquee outside advertised free HBO in every room. She’d never actually stayed in a hotel of this caliber before, but there was a first time for everything. They needed a place to stay, and they were not in any position to be picky. The minute Sarah and Luke closed the door to the lobby, however, she knew they wouldn’t be staying here.
“They refused to rent us a room, can you believe it?” Sarah was fuming. “Apparently you have to be 18 to rent a room here. I even offered to give her a large tip and a quality recommendation to my father’s people. This is outrageous.”
“Its fine, there’s another place across the street.”
“That one?” Sarah squeeked? “Tyler, have you even looked at it? You can’t expect us to stay there. We could catch a disease or something. We could be robbed.”
“I highly doubt that your chances of getting robbed there are any higher than they are here, directly across the street. Let’s just go check it out. Its only for one night and I’m exhausted.”
Reluctantly Kyle drove them across the street. Sarah stayed in the car and looked on apprehensively while Tyler went with Luke to inquire about a room. She made Kyle click the doors locked after the boys left, just to be on the safe side. This place looked horrible, it was the definition of seedy. The lobby was barely more than a closet, the exterior badly in need of re-painting, and there were several light bulbs burned out in the neon marquee. There was not a soul else in the place except them and the greasy, overweight clerk wedged behind the counter. The place was covered in filth, the pool had been drained, some time ago by the look of it, and now had a several inch deep lining of dead leaves and stagnant water.
The health department really should look into this place, Sarah thought, they would probably shut it down. All this grime makes my skin crawl, I feel like its sticking to me even in the car. I need a shower. Oh but eew, probably not in that place. The water is probably gross.
Tyler and Luke exited the lobby with grim expressions and Sarah’s heart nearly stopped. If they could not even stay in a place like this, where could they stay. What were they going to do now, go home?
“Bad news?” Kyle asked as they climbed into the car.
“Well that all depends on what you consider bad news.” Tyler tried to break it to them gently, “ We got the room, but its going to cost us three hundred dollars. And there is only one. Its around back, if you want to drive around there.”
The room wasn’t as bad as Sarah had expected it to be, but it still wasn’t great. The stale smell of old cigarette smoke billowed out at her the second she opened the door. The room had one queen sized bed with a threadbare comforter and four wooden chairs arranged around a small table. The room was freezing, who ever had stayed in here last had left the air conditioning running at full blast. Looking on the bright side, at least the black out curtain worked. They would be able to pull it shut and it would seem dark as night even though officially the middle of the day.
“Who’s sleeping where?” Luke wanted to know. “I’m exhausted, time to hit the sack.”
Kyle glared at his brother. “Well you’re on the floor for sure, since no one actually invited you along on this trip. You just kind of invited yourself.”
“Fine by me.”
“Let one of the girls take the bed,” Tyler said, rolling up a bath towel to use as a make shift pillow. “I’m fine on the floor.”
“Sounds good to me.” Sarah said coming out of the bathroom with short cotton shorts and a tiny tank top. Kyle gaped at her. He’d never seen her in pajamas before. All of the guys had chosen to just sleep in what they had on. They would all shower and change clothes in the morning. He had just assumed that the girls would do the same.
Gwen opted to just slip under the covers of the bed and shimmy out of hear jeans. Once situated she held up the opposite corner of the sheet so that Sarah could climb in.
“The bed’s plenty big enough, there’s no reason we cant share.”
Sarah slid into bed and switched off the light which sat on the bedside table. After a moment she turned it back on. “What time do you guys want to wake up? Do you think this alarm clock even works?”
“ Set it for noon,” Kyle mumbled, already half asleep. “ I want to get back on the road. The rest of you can sleep in the car if you want.”
Sarah fiddled with the alarm clock until she was reasonably sure that it was set for noon, she hoped it worked. After a moment’s thought, she picked up the phone and dialed the number for the man at the front desk.
“Hi, this is room 317. I was wondering if you would be able to give us a call at twelve o’clock to wake us up?”
“Yeah, sure, whatever you say.” The man’s voice made Sarah shiver. She hung up the phone and turned out the light once more, satisfied with her work.

***

It took a few minute after he woke up for Kyle to remember where he was and why. He yawned and stretched, and then rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he sat up. Glancing at the clock he read the time as three o’clock. Three o’clock? Three o’clock! “Aww damn, you guys, wake up. Its three o’clock. We’ve got to get going. We overslept.”
The others grumbled at him and Tyler even threw his towel pillow at him, but eventually they all awoke. As soon as the full reality of the situation set in panic descended on the small hotel room.
“How could we have slept so long Sarah?” Kyle said, accusingly. “I thought you said you set the alarm.”
“I did, remember? I even called that horrid guy at the front desk to call and wake us up just incase the alarm didn’t work.”
“ Hmm…right.”
“Lets just get going,” Gwen said as she grabbed a handful of her clothes and headed for the shower, “that guy gives me the creeps.”
It took a an entire hour for all of them to take their turn in the showers and to get dressed and ready to leave. They jammed their stuff back into the car and then Tyler and Kyle headed to the lobby to pay off their bill.
“We’d like to check out,” Tyler said, sliding their room keys across the counter. “I believe we agreed on three hundred?” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He drew out the three hundred dollars that he had gotten from Sarah earlier and laid it on the table.
“I’ve upped my price. If you kids expect room service and wake up calls its gonna cost extra. Say, five hundred extra.”
Kyle gaped. “Eight hundred dollars?! You didn’t even give us the effin’ wake up call.”
The greasy man grinned malevolently at them. “That ain’t my job. But that is my price, so you kids can either take it, or I can call the cops and tell them I got a bunch o’ no good runaways harassing my establishment.”
“No, no, we’ll take it.” Kyle too pulled out his wallet and dropped the required amount of money on the counter. He was glad he had taken it back from Luke this morning when he was in the shower.
The clerk scooped up the money and made a big show of counting. When he was done he smiled at the boys with a big toothy grin. “Thanks boys, pleasure doing business with you. Come back again soon.”
Tyler and Kyle ignored the man’s obvious glee and strode back to the car with matching grimaces. “You’re stupid wake up call cost us five hundred dollars, Sarah,” Kyle said as he flung open the car door.
“He would have come up with a reason to charge us that anyway,” Gwen reasoned, sliding over to make room for Tyler to climb into the back seat. “Don’t blame her. He was looking to make a quick buck and we just happened to make very easy targets. We’ll just have to find somewhere that will let us pay in advance next time. Now lets get out of there before that sleaze ball starts charging us rent on this parking space.”
“Can we grab some food before we get back on the road?” Tyler asked, leaning across Gwen so that he could poke his head into the front seat. “I’m starved.”
Kyle checked his watch, “Yeah, we can drive through somewhere. What do you guys want?”
“ Drive through? As in fast food? Eew. I cant eat that.”
Kyle rolled his eyes at her, “ Well its your only option, Sarah, so its either that or starve. One small order of fries isn’t going to kill you. ”
She pouted, “Fine.”
“Good. It looks like our options are Taco Bell, Burger King, and McDonalds, what will it be?”
“Burger King”
“Burger King”
“Burger King, I guess”
“ Luke?”
“Whatever you guys decide, I don’t care.”
Kyle was confused, his brother was never this agreeable about fast food. He hated Burger King. He looked in the rearview mirror, but he couldn’t see Luke very well where he was sitting. “Burger King it is then.”
Kyle drove the group up the street into the drive through of the Burger King. Within seconds of pulling up to the menu the speaker crackled to life, “Welcome to Burger King, what can I get you today?”
Kyle leaned out the window and shouted into the speaker what the rest of the car told him they wanted. “Um, I’d like a triple Whopper with cheese, two regular whoppers, one with no pickles and the other with cheese and no onions, one original chicken sandwich, four large orders of fries, two large cokes, one medium Dr. Pepper and a water.” Kyle leaned his head back into the car. “You’re sure you don’t want anything Luke?”
“No, I’m alright.”
“Get him a sprite,” Gwen spoke up, looking at Luke concerned.
Kyle leaned out the window again, “And a large Sprite.”
The speaker emitted static for a moment before the garbled, slightly metallic voice returned once more. “Ya want fries with that?”
Kyle was confused. “ Yeah, I just ordered four large orders.”
“Oh, right. Yeah, um, I’ll have your total at the window.”
Kyle pulled the car forward to the window and was greeted by the forty something cashier who sported big hair, long, claw-like, red finger nails and way too much make up.
“That’ll be twenty three, ninety three, Hun.”
Kyle reached behind him and Gwen handed him some of the money in her purse. He handed it to the cashier and waited for his change.
“Six oh seven is your change dear,” She handed him a wad of ones, “and here’s your food.”
Kyle passed the two large bags she handed him to Sarah to divvy up and handed the sodas directly to their owners.
“Have a nice day, and we hope to see you here again real soon.”
“Yeah, uh huh, you too.” Kyle rolled up his window and pulled away from the driveway. They munched on their food as they drove further down the interstate.
“ So how much money do we have left,” Tyler said, swallowing his last bite of cheese burger, “minus what we just spent and the eight hundred dollars the hotel fiasco cost us?”
Everyone reached into their wallets and handed their remaining money to Gwen who totaled it up. Luke did not even react when he reached into his wallet and found nothing, he just leaned against the back seat and closed his eyes.
“Just over three hundred dollars,” Gwen announced when she had finished
counting. “Three hundred, thirty four dollars and forty seven cents to be exact.”
“That doesn’t sound like very much,” Sarah commented turning almost completely around in her chair so as to be able to see behind her.
Gwen agreed. “ No, it isn’t.” She calculated a few more variables up in her head. “It should be enough to make it the rest of the way though, if we are careful. We just have to only spend money when it is absolutely necessary.”
“Your aunt and uncle keep their place stocked with food right Sarah, even if they aren’t there?” Tyler asked, catching on to Gwen’s train of thought.
“Yeah, except for milk and stuff that would spoil.”
Tyler smiled, “Good, then we really won’t need to spend any money while we are there. We can just bum stuff off them. I’m sure my folks will send them a check for what we used when we get back to school.”
“I doubt you’d even need to bother.’

It was several hours later when Kyle called for the attention of the rest of the group. “Hey guys, wake up, we are getting ready to pass into California.”
“Its just a stupid sign Kyle, its not like it’s a big deal.” Tyler was usually grouchy when he woke up. Especially when he was awakened before he had had enough sleep.
“ I know. I just thought you guys might want to see it.”
“ I’ve already seen it, like I said, its no big deal.”
“ Well fine then, go back to effin’ sleep. You guys all left me as the last one awake again and I thought it would be a good reason to wake you up. Excuse me for wanting a little company.”
Tyler closed his eyes and leaned his head back, but he couldn’t help sniping at Kyle just a little more. “If you want someone else to drive Kyle, just say so. I’m sure Luke or Gwen would me more than happy to take a turn. Your driving sucks anyway.”
“Just shut up and go back to sleep Tyler, you’re starting to sound like Luke.” Kyle huffed, peeved at the treatment he got from his best friend. Speaking of his brother, Kyle hadn’t heard a peep out of him in a while. A long while. He craned his neck to catch a glimpse of him in the rear view mirror but saw the horrific sight of swirling red and blue lights instead.
“ Shit! Just what we need.” Kyle slowed down as the siren behind him started to wail. He pulled off onto the shoulder of the road and left his hands on the steering wheel. He’d been pulled over several times before. He knew the drill. The officer was grey, balding, and several sizes too large for his uniform. Apparently they didn’t see too much action in this little nothing town.
As the officer approached Kyle rolled down his window and put on his best ‘I’m a good boy’ smile. “Good evening officer, what can I do for you?”
“ Your license, registration and proof of insurance please.”
“Sure.” Kyle reached into his back pocket for the license in his wallet, and then leaned over a wide eyed Sarah to pull the registration and insurance card out of the glove compartment. “Here you go.”
The officer waddled off to back to his patrol car to input Kyle’s information into the system and Kyle started to sweat. “What if one of our parents turned us in already?” he whispered to the others. “What if the cops have my car flagged as the get away car or something?”
Before the others had the chance to offer their ‘what-if’ opinions, the police officer returned. “From Washington State, huh?” the officer said conversationally, handing Kyle back his information. “What are you kids doing all the way down here in my neck of the woods?”
“Spring break,” Kyle said nervously, “we are actually headed to the beach.
Tyler rolled down his window, hoping to speed the old codger along. The longer he dawdled, the higher the chance something would go awry. “Did we do something wrong?” he asked, plastering on the same innocent smile Kyle sported.
“Not intentionally I’m sure. You have a tail light out, that’s illegal, especially in the dark, like its getting to be. Now, normally that would come with a fine, but since you kids aren’t from around here I’m gonna give you a break. Just promise me you’ll take it down to Earl’s and get it fixed quick like and I’ll let you go.”
“That is very kind of you sir, thank you.” Tyler replied politely.
“ We’ll get it fixed right away,” added Kyle, relieved that they were getting off so easily.
“ See that you do. I wouldn’t want to see you kids and your pretty little girlfriends getting’ hurt. Some of these roads can be pretty dangerous without proper lights.”
“Thank you again officer,” with that, Kyle began to roll up his window hoping that the cop would get the hint, and that he would not be offended.
When the cop waddled back to his car and left Kyle breathed a sigh of relief “That was so close. If our parents had informed the cops that we were using my car to ditch boarding school we would have been so busted.”
“So does this mean that no one knows we are gone yet?” Sarah asked, joining the conversation again now that the officer was gone.
Tyler shrugged, “ I would assume so, since they ran Kyle’s plates, registration, license and everything, but you never know with parents. They never do what you would expect.”
Kyle exited the freeway at the next available opportunity onto what appeared to be the main drag in the small town. “Let me know if you guys see anything resembling a mechanic’s shop or an auto parts store. Lord knows there’s probably only one here.”
As it turned out, there were two, a Kragen Auto Parts store and Earl’s Garage. Earl’s was a tiny, redneck looking place, covered in dirt and grease, and it was packed. Six or seven cars in various states of repair took up nearly every square inch of parking space in the small lot. Kyle opted for the Kragen.
“How hard could it be to change my own tail light? I’ve changed a light bulb plenty of times, it can’t be much different.”
The entire group used the stop as an excuse to get out of the car and stretch their legs. They wandered the isles of the store looking for the part they needed. Row upon row of automobile paraphernalia that, for the most part, they could not make heads or tails of.
“Maybe we should just ask someone for some help,” Sarah suggested. She picked up a tropical passion scented air freshener and gave it a sniff.
“ We’ll find it,” Tyler assured her, examining a box of spark plugs closely.
It was difficult to tell by the face Sarah made whether she doubted his claim or if she thought tropical passion was a foul smelling fragrance. She placed the air freshener back on the shelf and dutifully followed behind the others as they continued to hunt through the store.

Sun, 05 Nov 2006 19:57:55 GMT

Sat, 04 Nov 2006 15:52:48 GMT

Fri, 03 Nov 2006 01:27:43 GMT