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Falynn
PLAYLIST: ? TOMORROW - JORJA SMITH ?
A month and a half later…
The buzzer goes off,making me jump. I grab my baseball bat and creep to the door, my footsteps soft and soundless. Rising on tiptoe just as carefully, I peer through the peephole. Murphy pockets the pounds I’ve left for him under my mat and hangs around for the signal. From my end, I knock twice.
His drab gray eyes flick up to the peephole before he gives a nod and takes off. My groceries wait for me on the doormat. I let another couple minutes pass and then wrench open the door to grab my things as quickly as possible. Only after I’ve double- and triple-checked each lock is twisted and latched back in place do I carry my tote bags into the tiny pocket that’s my kitchen.
It’s not much—the entire flat is smaller than even my old crappy apartment in Las Vegas—but it’smine. Rented and paid for under an alias. My landlord is the kind who prefers to avoid a paper trail. He charges a standard fee that covers rent and basic utilities like water and electricity. Fine by me. The less trace of my whereabouts, the better.
There’s a reason I don’t talk to anyone, and there’s a reason I haven’t left my flat in damn near three weeks. I’ve made it this far. It’s way too risky to get cocky now.
Murphy kind of happened by accident. Three weeks ago when I was cautiously sneaking to the local market, I came across him standing outside, selling trinkets. He’s sixteen and a school dropout, making ends meet by doing odd jobs around the village. My offer for him to make a weekly trip to pick up my groceries and deliver them is the steadiest work he’s ever had.
You’d think it’d get boring hanging around in a flat barely bigger than a closet for days on end. You’d be wrong.
I can’t be bored when every waking moment of my existence is spent analyzing and thinking about what’s going on. If I hear an odd noise, it becomes the only thing I can think about for hours. If I sneak a peek outside the corner of my curtain window and see a suspicious stranger in the narrow side street below, it’s what I obsess over for the rest of the day or night.
When you’re hiding, trying to disappear completely from real life, your downtime isn’t really downtime. There are no moments of peace or relaxation. Sleep comes in short blocks of time. Emergency escape plans are formulated and then reformulated. Nothing’s ever a guarantee, certainly not tomorrow.
I can’t stay here forever. A month is already bordering on too long. I’ll have to leave again, and soon. I’ve mapped out a couple of options. None of them a sure thing just yet.
The nights are the hardest. Long stretches of time where everything is darker and quieter than usual. Since I’m sleeping in no more than two- or three-hour increments now, I have no choice but to hang around in silence and listen for any potential threats.
Coffee helps. So does tea. Both keep me alert, if a little more fidgety and anxious. At any moment I might have to drop everything and run for my life.
When I first escaped through the door Carlotta left open for me, I followed her instructions. I escaped through the eastern perimeter leading to a cobblestone street deep in Estoril. I hailed a taxi, but I didn’t go straight to the airport. Instead, I checked into a hotel on the other side of the small city with my real name. I wanted Giovanni and his men to know I was there. I left my fingerprints everywhere. Even flirted with the desk clerk and bellboy so they’d remember me later when questioned.
Then I trashed the place. I made it look like a struggle had taken place. I screamed and pounded on the door. Broke a mirror and cut open my hand again, squeezing droplets of blood on the bedsheet and the floor. I left behind some of the few belongings I’d brought with me when escaping his compound, like my phone. Just so he could think I’d been taken against my will.
I didn’t like faking my own kidnapping. Giovanni would flip out. The possibility I was in real danger would cause him a lot of distress, but it was a necessary evil. I had to use it as a distraction to buy myself more time to properly get away.
My last act before ditching the hotel room behind was to chop off my hair. I hacked off enough inches to cut it down to a bob and then flushed that down the toilet. Shorter hair would make any disguises I might have needed to wear easier.
From there, I was off. I snuck out of the hotel using one of the side exits. I bought a bus ticket with the local currency and rode it several villages and small cities over. By the time I reached Spain, I figured I’d bought myself a full day. In the next twenty-four hours, Giovanni and his men would figure out the trashed hotel room was a fake out. I hadn’t been kidnapped.
More diversions were needed.
I flew into Munich, Germany, using my real passport. I rented a car and then drove into Switzerland and eventually France. Along the way, I left nuggets for Giovanni and his men to find—small things that would seem like mistakes on my part, like visiting an internet cafe and signing into my email or online accounts from various, trackable locations, and checking into another hotel room with one of my credit cards. I had more exchanges with locals, hoping they’d remember me, and be able to point him in the wrong direction when asked (unknowing on their part the info they gave was incorrect). I left my first rental car in Zurich and didn’t rent another one ’til Bordeaux. That one I ditched at the airport.
I wasn’t boarding a flight, though of course they’d think I’d have. Why else would I drive a rental to a local airport?
It was a long week of planting clues at different locations, purposely leaving false leads so I could then disappear completely.
Once I’d left enough conflicting bits and pieces and had bought myself enough time—or so I hoped—I rode a ferry into the UK. I found the smallest, most obscure British village and the most unscrupulous landlord willing to rent to me off-the-record.
My plan won’t work forever. Eventually, I’m certain he’ll find me. Giovanni won’t give up. He’ll search for years if he has to, tearing the world apart country by country. But, in the meantime, the quiet and solitude of my tiny flat is worth it.
The sense offreedomis worth it, even if every moment of it is steeped in paranoia.
Since I’ve flushed the meds down the toilet and stopped taking them, the fogginess in my mind has cleared up.
No meds, no schedule, no staff watching my every move, reporting my behavior to my husband has helped me feel like me again. Me on the run, me tense and paranoid, but like myself.
I want to survive.
The longer I manage, the more hope grows. Maybe I just might. Maybe I’ll beat the odds.
