Mindy Mejia - Leave No Trace

‘Here!’ The yell made me jerk and the flashlight beam disappeared as quickly as it had come, but the door didn’t open. Footsteps ran across the corridor, in the opposite direction of Lucas’s room.

‘How the hell could he have gotten out?’

‘Crazy people, man. They do crazy shit.’

‘He must have gone this way. Come on.’

They hurried back to the emergency exit and into the stairwell. As soon as the door slammed shut, I sprang up and ran to the window, opening the casement and cranking it up as high as it would go. There was enough room to fit through and barely reach the bars.

‘The bed.’

Lucas and I dragged it under the window and I jumped on top, retrieving the hacksaw from the bag and starting to saw the middle bar, putting every ounce of muscle into my dad’s diamond tipped blade. Before I’d finished four strokes, Lucas’s arms appeared on either side of me and he gripped the handle, adding his strength to mine. I felt him brace his feet wide as he leaned against me for support.

‘Is this… going… to work?’ he asked in my ear as we frantically sawed through the bar.

‘Diamond… beats… rebar.’ I puffed as we broke through the other side. I repositioned the saw at the top of the bar – a harder angle because of the window – but we barely got halfway through before more footsteps thundered through the stairwell.

‘Shhh.’ I stilled our arms and we waited, catching our breath while more guards burst into the ward and examined the spray paint damage not thirty feet away from us. All they had to do was shine a flashlight into this room and it would be over. Hear a noise. Take ten steps this way and send up an alarm that would condemn Lucas to this cell and send me to jail. I felt Lucas’s heart race against my back as we stood, frozen.

Just as one of them started to come closer, they got a call over the radio. It was too muffled to hear, but they immediately headed back into the stairwell and the ward was quiet again. Lucas and I whipped back to the window and sawed as hard and as fast as we could. We hadn’t taken more than a few strokes when a light hit the side of my mask.

‘Hey!’ A guard – who must have stayed behind when the rest of them left – pointed a flashlight through the door. He tried the knob, but I’d shut it fully, engaging the lock again.

‘Central station, I’ve got an escape attempt in ward four. I repeat, ward four, room six. Need immediate backup both inside and out.’ His shouted instructions grew disjointed as he ran down the corridor toward the main desk, probably to unlock some emergency keys.

There wasn’t time to saw through the whole thing. I tossed the blade and pushed the partially detached bar as hard as I could to one side. The metal screeched as it slowly opened a hole large enough to squeeze through. The guard returned, still yelling for backup as he stuffed key after key in the lock.

I shrugged off the backpack and shoved it through the opening, hearing it drop on the ground below. Then I turned to Lucas.

‘You first.’

His glance shot to the door. ‘Maya—’

‘Go! Now! There’s a rope on the fence straight ahead through the trees.’ I braced my stance and lifted his leg.

He started to climb up, pulling himself to the ledge. ‘But, Maya—’

‘Watch your landing.’

I pushed him forward until he fell, vanishing from the window so suddenly and completely that for a second I couldn’t move. He was out. I had gotten him out.

The doorknob turned and footsteps rushed into the room. I pivoted on top of the bed and kicked instinctually, catching the guard straight in the throat. He stumbled and I grabbed one of the window bars, hiking myself up and through as a flood of victory, of total confidence, coursed through my body. I had almost cleared the sawed-off bar – could see Lucas’s shadow hunched below, waiting for me – when two hands grabbed my boot and pulled me sharply back and down.

I screamed as the jagged stump of rebar tore through my jacket and gouged deep.

‘Where do you think you’re going, you—’

He didn’t get any farther before my other foot smashed into his face, sending him toppling off the bed, into the desk, and landing hard on the floor. Ignoring the pain, I pulled myself through the opening and dangled from the ledge before dropping to the ground. At least this time I didn’t sprain my ankle. I didn’t see any flashlights in the grounds yet, but voices shouted near the front of the building. Lucas’s hand reached through the darkness, finding mine. He pulled me up and we moved as fast as we could toward the rows of evergreens. His gait was unsure and I began slowing as pain wrapped my middle in a wicked vise grip, hobbling me. Suddenly a light illuminated us from behind and I looked back to see it was coming from Lucas’s window. The same guard I’d just kicked in the face yelled, ‘Over here! Into the woods!’

More lights bounced around the side of the building, followed by three guards sprinting toward us as the flashlight beam stayed trained on our backs. We disappeared into the trees fifty yards ahead of them and darted through the rows, running on pure adrenaline, breath pumping and feet driving hard into the shadows.

‘There,’ I whispered, stumbling out of the far side of the woods at the exact spot where the rope was tied to the fence. ‘You first. Don’t argue.’

He hoisted himself easily. He was becoming more lucid by the second, temporarily winning the drug war I’d waged in his veins. He dropped lightly to the ground on the other side, wearing the backpack. I grabbed the highest knot I could reach and tried to lift myself up, which made pain shriek through my body and tore a groan from my throat.

‘What is it? What’s wrong?’

He reached through the fence, searching for the wound.

‘Don’t touch it. Give me a boost.’

I’d barely said the words before his hands swept down and I stepped into them automatically, feeling the wind rush by my mask as he pushed me up into the night. I grabbed the rope and pulled, gritting my teeth. Lucas guided me from below and I climbed to the top, wobbling precariously over the spikes as the guards broke through the trees.

‘Jump!’ Lucas shouted and I did, without any thought for the fall or the consequences of the ground rushing up to meet me.

Lucas caught me, taking my weight easily, and carried me as he jogged across the street. The guards’ shouts faded as they retreated back toward the main entrance to pursue either by foot or car, not even bothering to attempt climbing the fence. They were calling the cops if they hadn’t already.

‘Turn here. Half a block. Down the alley.’

He followed my panting instructions as I reached behind him and pulled the car keys out of the backpack.

‘Here. Stop.’

He dropped me by the Chevy and opened the door.

‘You’re hurt. I’ll drive.’

‘Nice try.’

I pushed him through the driver’s seat and fell onto it, slammed the door closed behind us, and turned the car on, throwing it into gear and shooting out of the alley with the lights off. I took us two blocks down and swerved into another alley, working our way north in that zigzag pattern as police sirens blared in the distance. Pulling the ski mask off, I sucked in a deep breath of air and flicked the headlights on, slowing to a sedate twenty miles an hour as we pulled out in a completely different neighborhood and headed toward the University campus. We crested the hill past Amity Creek and Hawk Ridge, and we kept going until we were driving due north on a single country highway where the houses spread further and further apart.

The clock on the dash inched toward midnight and the more the woods took over the skyline, the more I accelerated, speeding away from the city. In Duluth the street kids would be roaming the shipping yards looking for the next unlocked door, Jasper would be pacing the perimeter of the house, growling as the wind beat against the windows, and the bars would be in full swing, ejecting the belligerent too-drunks into the chaos of downtown. I could hear the bustle and traffic, smell the water as it lapped against the shore, see the glow of red and yellow on the neon peninsula that jutted into the lake, the world I was leaving and might not see again. After another ten minutes the homes began receding further into the forest, distant lights shrouded in branches, and Lucas finally turned to face the front of the car. He’d spent the entire drive crouched against his seat watching our tail for anyone in pursuit, but now he reached out and touched the dash.