Acrasia

Chris sat there was at least an hour, yanking dead grass out of the ground and dropping it back into its dirt grave. He wondered if it would’ve been a good idea to just leave. Rae took care of Kid anyway, and they both could probably have used a couple fewer bullets in their life. On the other hand, what would they do if someone caught them? Neither of them had the training Chris did, and if he didn’t have such good reflexes he would’ve been killed on the spot. He sat there until he stared nodding off, listening to the chatter in the van.

He couldn’t tell what they were saying, but Kid was loud. His voice would rise higher and higher until he was practically yelling and Rae would shush him. Eventually, they went silent. Chris assumed they had fallen asleep until a blanket was thrown over his head. He pulled it off to find Kid looking down at him, a half-grin on his face. Kid sat down cross-legged across from Chris, silently yanking grass out of the ground with him for a minute or two.

“So, what was the fight about?” he finally asked, breaking the silence.

“There was no fight,” Chris sighed. “Just… problems. It’s complicated.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard it all before,” Kid shook his head and smiled. “Well if it makes you feel any better, I don’t have much luck with girls either.”

“Yeah?” Chris muttered, looking up. “And what relationship issues have you suffered in your sixteen years of existence?”

“First of all,” Kid started, “I’ll be seventeen on the fifth. That’s, like, in a couple weeks. Second of all, I’m not even a virgin! I swear on my life, I lost it to this sophomore at—“

“It’s fine,” Chris cut him off quickly, “Need to know basis.”

“Anyway,” Kid continued, “I was dating this girl not too long before I got snatched. She was really pretty and all, but no one really thought so. In fact, no one actually talked to her but me, because we were partners for an English project. From there we kind of just hit it off really well. We dated for five months.”

“But you were flirting with fake girls on the computer?” Chris raised an eyebrow.

“No, see, that all happened after we broke up,” Kid’s smile faded. “We got in this really dumb fight, then I said some stuff I didn’t really mean. I said she was ‘better off a loner’. Gosh, that really was a slap in the face for her. She wouldn’t talk to me, and she wouldn’t even look at me in class. Then all of this happened, and I don’t know what’s going through her mind. I honestly wonder if she’s ever worried about me.”

For a moment, Chris felt a twinge of sympathy for Kid. He always assumed teenagers didn’t understand anything, because for the most part they didn’t. However, Kid seemed genuinely upset. A couple days in the world alone can really get a person thinking. Chris was about to reassure Kid that it was okay when he heard a shout from behind him.

“That’s the van! That’s the van!”

Kid turned completely pale.

“It’s them,” he whispered.

Chris nodded, realizing that the Kid’s pedophile kidnapper had finally caught up to them. He snuck up around the van, bumping into Rae on accident. She had heard the yelling too, and had instinctively gotten out. She handed something cold to Chris, and he looked down to see that it was the handgun she had hidden from Kid. He looked at her with a confused expression. Was he supposed to shoot them? He waved Kid over, who ran and hid behind the van with them.

“Where are they?” a different voice asked. There were two of them.

Chris bit his lip. He knew that there were less than five seconds until they were spotted, and quickly thought of something. As soon as the two men turned the corner and saw them, Chris trained the gun towards them. One of them was short and bald, thirty-something years old. The other was closer to his forties, with a beard and the appearance of an alcoholic that spent his entire day ogling pornography. They were both dressed in ratty old clothes. The bearded man put his hands up, but the shorter one just shook his head.

“What are you gonna do, shoot us?” he yelled.

“No,” Chris said, laying on a thick New Yorker accent, grabbing Kid, and holding him in front like a human shield. “I’ll shoot the little turd. Come any closer and I’ll blow his brains out.”

He put the gun to his temple, despite the gasp from Kid and the soft whimper from Rae. Chris knew that Rae was aware he would never actually hurt Kid, but with knowledge that he had lied many times before, he wouldn’t have been surprised if she was terrified anyway. The bearded man grabbed the shorter man’s arm, pulling him a step back.

“He can’t kill the boy,” he snapped. “We need him. He knows too much.”

“What are you, his parents?” Chris loosened his grip slightly on Kid as he felt scratching on his arm. “Just give me the code book and I’ll give him right back.”

“Passcode?” the bearded man frowned. “What passcode?”

“Oh, so you’re not his dad?” Chris put on a fake expression of surprise. “Well that’s a game changer. Only one of us can take the kid, and I’ve got people all over the country.”

“We’ll call the cops on you!” the short man yelled.

“You’re bluffing,” Chris smirked. “You’d never do anything with the cops, because you’re afraid of them.”

The short man looked to the bearded man, and they exchanged looks of distress. They honestly believed that Chris had kidnapped Kid from another pair of kidnappers, and they couldn’t call the police when they were criminals themselves.

“We’ve got your code book,” the short man finally lied. “It’s up in the car. You give us the kid, we’ll give you the book.”

“You give me the book, I’ll give you the kid,” Chris pointed the gun back at the man, who jumped slightly and nervously looked at the bearded man. They nodded to each other, then looked back at Chris.

“Stay here, we’ll get you the book,” he started backing away. “Stay here.”

Chris nodded, waiting until they both ran off before letting go of Kid. He backed up into Rae’s open arms, and they both looked at Chris in shock.

“They’re going to get guns. We need to get the hell out of here and go somewhere where we’d blend in with the crowd. Get anything important that you can carry with you, we’re ditching the van,” Chris ordered.

Rae nodded, opening the van doors and grabbing the jackets and leftover money. Chris grabbed her hand and she took Kid’s, and he led them running down the road at full speed. They didn’t stop until they hit a small town about a mile away, with little life. Chris dragged an exhausted Rae and Kid all the way to a small building with a faded sign that said “Marymount’s Family-Owned Inn”.

“We don’t have enough money for an inn,” Rae frowned. “And this town is so close by, they’ll find us!”

“Don’t talk so loudly,” Chris hushed her, “This is the closest town we can run to. We’ll have a cover story, and they won’t expect us to be so close anyway. With so many witnesses, they can’t do anything. Now stop panting and follow my lead.”

He opened the door to the inn, looking around the place. An older woman sat at the front desk, talking quietly to a younger woman who looked like her daughter. Chris put on a fake smile, approaching the desk and pretending like nothing had ever happened.

“Hi,” he said, getting their attention.

“Well, hello!” the older woman greeted him brightly. “Welcome! My, you look like you’ve been through hell!”

“Yeah, we’ve been traveling for a very long time,” Chris nodded and spoke loudly, putting on a perfect act of someone he obviously wasn’t. “My name is Gary, this is my sister, Lucille, and my younger brother, Ben. We’ve been taking a road trip to Georgia to visit our sick grandmother, but we got pulled over on the way. Turns out, they weren’t even police officers! They took our car and everything we had, and we’ve walked miles to finally find this heavenly establishment you’ve set up here. It was the doing of the Lord, I’m positive!”

“Oh my goodness,” the older woman bought his story, putting a hand over her chest. “You poor things! Please, please take a room! No pay necessary! Our home is always open to those who need it to be! And be sure to be awake up and early, we have a free continental breakfast every morning!”

The woman took Rae and Kid’s hand, leading them up the stairs while chattering about how tired they must be. Rae glanced over her shoulder, and Chris gave her a reassuring smile. He put his hands in his pockets, and then looked to the younger girl who still sat behind the desk. She twirled her light blonde hair around her finger, looking Chris up and down.

“So, the girl is your sister, right?” she said quietly.

“Uh, yeah,” Chris awkwardly muttered.

“I hope you have a great stay,” she giggled, giving him a wink. “If you need anything, my name is Dianne. And Gary, sweetheart, I mean anything.”

“Yeah, thanks,” Chris said quickly, hurrying up the stairs and finding Rae and Kid in the room on the very end.

They were both passed out on the bed, sound asleep. Chris had made them run pretty far, and they must’ve fallen asleep as soon as they hit the mattress. None of them had slept on a real mattress in ages.