Ascension Day

30

Sirens filling the night. But this time Jac knew with certainty they were coming for him, not someone else or a nearby fire.

He’d been about to jump straight down from the side of the flat roof when he saw the two police cars only twenty yards to his left by the entrance. One with a patrolman inside, the other unmanned. Jac ran to the right to slip down the end of the flat roof, out of sight of the cars, when a flashlight beam from his room swung across and settled on him, and the shout came, ‘Hey… hey! Stop!’

Jac looked up only briefly before taking the last two strides to the side to scramble down.

The shot came as he’d got half his body over, kicking up the roof asphalt two feet away, a fleck of it flying up and hitting him on one cheek — Jac jolting back for an instant as he thought he might have been hit. And with that jolt, the last strength went from his arms, and he fell down the remaining five feet.

Jac half-rolled to break his fall, scrambling into a run before he’d fully straightened. He headed further to the right away from the police cars, across twelve yards of motel car-park — another shout from the police behind, only half registering above his ragged breathing and the blood-rush like heavy surf through his head — then he was into the road, turning right again, putting more distance between himself and the police cars.

More motels. Small apartment blocks interspersed. Further ahead, wooden-boarded houses and bungalows, some with front verandas.

Jac heard the siren winding up as he was only eighty yards along, then the second siren a few breathless strides later. He glanced desperately over one shoulder as the first car swung onto the road, roof light spinning.

Jac became frantic. The street was too open, wide, himself too visible as he ran along. The police car would see him the instant its headlamps hit him.

And he became aware only then of the cool dampness on one cheek, wiping at the blood there with the back of one hand as his eyes darted wildly for options. The sirens were deafening, smashing the night-time stillness of the street.

A turning on the left twenty-five yards ahead. Would he reach it in time before the squad car caught up? Probably, but it would clearly see him take it, would swing into the turn and catch up with him not long past it.

As Jac came alongside the first bungalows, a curtain was pulled back to see what all the commotion was. Jac’s eyes honed in on a gap between the houses. No gate. The police car had already covered half the distance towards him. No time to dwell on it, no other immediate options. Jac cut across their front yard, heading for the gap.

Old bicycle, dustbins. Some planks that Jac almost stumbled over. A couple of large bushes that Jac sped past, branches whipping back against him — and then he was in a more open lawn area, a fence twenty feet away: six-feet high. Siren closer now, almost alongside. He picked up his stumbling pace and leapt at the fence hard, levering up and scrambling down the other side.

A dog barking almost immediately his feet landed the other side. Low and throaty, menacing. A big dog. Jac’s heart froze, fearing it was there with him in the yard — but then, with another volley of barks, its front paws hit the fence a yard to his side with a bang. Jac jumped back a step, reflex response, relief quickly overlaying the shock as he ran on.

Sirens paused in the same spot now, taking stock of where he’d gone, a faint flicker of a searchlight spilling over the fence he’d just jumped.

Jac picked up pace. A clearer lawn area, he’d covered most of it by the time he heard the sirens moving on again, starting to circle round the block. A side gate, but only waist high. Jac leapt it easily. But as he burst into the front yard, breath heaving, a couple of black teenagers stood by an old Trans Am in the driveway, surprise freezing them for a second as Jac, six yards to their side, sped past, the shout of ‘Hey, man!’ from one of them carrying surprise as much as indignation: wasn’t often you saw a white man running from the police in this neighbourhood.

Jac headed deeper into the street away from the sirens, some sort of plan finally forming in his mind. He glanced anxiously over one shoulder, looking to see when the police cars would reach the turning, though he could have told simply by listening: the tone of the sirens suddenly became starker, clearer as they pulled alongside the opening, flashlight sweeping from a side window.

Jac knew that they’d pick him out easily — he was less than fifty yards into the road — but he kept running in the same straight line.

Jac heard the tyre-screech as they swung into the road, the stronger revving of engines. But still Jac kept on straight, knowing that soon they’d catch up with him — legs pounding flat out, until… until… with one last frantic glance over his shoulder, Jac saw they were already twenty yards into the road. Past the point of no return.

Jac cut off sharply at a tangent again, towards another bungalow on the far side, smiling to himself as he heard the squad cars brake sharply, tyres squealing as they negotiated rapid three-point-turns.

But Jac didn’t run through to the back yard of the bungalow this time, he crouched down by its side gate out of sight, listening to the sirens receding — his frantic heartbeat counting off the seconds until it was safe for him to emerge again. In that instant Jac noticed an Hispanic-looking man eyeing him with concern from a neighbouring window, then suddenly shifting from it, as if about to come out.

Jac eased up — the police car tail lights were just turning off — then ran out again, legs pumping wildly. It was vital he gained as much distance as possible before they realized he wasn’t in the next street. Already seventy yards into the road, hopefully at least a hundred before they caught on and turned back.

Jac listened to the sirens. Still seemed to be the same distance away in the next road. A light rain hit Jac’s face then, and he tilted his head, welcoming it. Felt it cooling his blood-boiled head, felt some of it touch his dry lips.

Some brighter lights Jac could make out now just beyond the end of the road, misty and blurred with the rain. Jac squinted, the lights finally falling into focus: the Toni Morrison Interchange, where Carrollton Avenue and Interstate 10 met, a tangled web of highways and overpasses. And, where the first highway crossed, a barrier that Jac could see at the end of his road where it formed a T. If he could make it to the barrier, the squad car wouldn’t be able to follow him.

Jac looked towards the end of the road. Eighty or so yards. Touch and go whether he’d make it to the end by then? Jac’s legs felt weak, his chest cramped and aching. He wasn’t going to be able to keep up the same pace much longer.

Sudden change in the tone of the sirens. It sounded like they were turning, starting to head his way. Jac pumped harder, pushing himself. The sirens drifted away for a second as they headed back up to the top of the adjacent road, then turned, starting to move closer again.

Jac pushed every muscle to the limit, felt them screaming for release. Sixty… fifty-five yards from the end by the time he heard the sirens spilling out openly as they came alongside the road. Jac glanced back to make sure, saw the spinning glare.

But they seemed to hang there for a second, as if unsure whether he was in the road, and Jac kept tight in by the front fences so that he wasn’t too obvious as the flashlight swayed from side to side, probing. The flashlight finally picked him up, and they turned into the road — but by then he’d gained another dozen yards or so.

Jac pushed even harder, but the more he demanded from every muscle and sinew, the more they seemed to ache and shudder, beg for meltdown into welcome release. It felt like he’d hardly be able to make it ten yards, let alone forty… thirty-five… thirty…

The sirens pressing in closer, filling the air. Jac glanced back as the first set of headlamps reached him: sixty-five, seventy yards behind. Still almost twenty yards to the barrier.

Oh God. God. The sirens deafening, seeming to fill every space in Jac’s head as the squad cars bore down, as if they were about to run him over as the barrier loomed ahead.

But they had to slow down, the front car screeching broadside as Jac reached the barrier and leapt it.

‘Stop…. Stop!’

A frozen second as Jac glanced back from the few yards of waste ground before the highway edge, already checking for gaps in the traffic to dart across. Car door swung wide, a patrolman tensed in aiming stance, his figure part-silhouette in the spinning glare of the roof lights.

Yet Jac saw hesitation too in the patrolman’s eyes, worried that any stray shot would hit the traffic passing behind; and as Jac saw a small gap in the traffic, he turned and ran through the first clear lane, brief pause for a four-wheeler passing in the far lane, then on, jumping the central barrier — Jac only half paying attention to another shout of ‘Stop!’ More desperate now, but less audible with the traffic noise in between.

And so Jac was startled, falling back a step, when a shot sounded — only realizing that it was a warning shot as he looked back and saw the patrolman lowering his gun from the air to point straight at him.

A moment’s nervous Mexican standoff, Jac praying that he wouldn’t risk a shot with the traffic passing in between — though maybe he would if there was a long, clear break — but then a large truck flashed between them, breaking the spell.

Jac darted into the next lane, letting one car pass, but then had to pause for a second, feigning like a matador as the next car approached faster than he’d timed, another car alongside in the fast lane swinging wide of Jac at the last second, blaring its horn.

Jac scurried across the last lane and leapt the side barrier. Rows of concrete and steel stanchions ahead, supporting the motorway above. Heavier shadows between them.

Jac weaved between the stanchions, trying to make best use of the shadows to lose himself as quickly as possible from view, glancing in between at the patrolmen across the highway: the one who’d fired was peering hard, trying to follow where he’d gone, his partner now on the radio, the second car pulling away, possibly to swing onto the highway further along.

Jac hoped by then he’d be long gone. Another busy four-laner thirty yards away, a ramp to one side swinging up to one of the highways above, another ramp on the far side of the stanchions. A choice of escape routes for once.

But in that moment, above the dull drone and swish of traffic from above, Jac thought he could hear other sirens: three or four, maybe more. He looked around frantically, caught a glimpse of two squad cars in the distance on the highway he’d just crossed, heading fast his way. But the directions of the sirens on the tangle of roads above were harder to place.

Jac ran for the closest ramp; he needed to get out of sight quickly from the highway behind.

More sirens. It sounded as if half the city’s police were hunting him down. Jac had given up on judging direction; they seemed to swirl and echo from all around as he started up the ramp.

Another sound also reached him then, a shudder running through him as he paused mid-step to make sure: the rapid thud-thud of a helicopter winging through the night sky. Jac looked up, but couldn’t see its lights yet; whether because of the clouds, the partial cover of the overhead highway, or it was still too far away, he wasn’t sure.

But he knew with certainty that it would be upon him any second. Jac’s eyes darted desperately: if he continued up the ramp, he’d be more visible from above, but if he headed back down, the two police cars bearing down on the highway behind would see him.

Sweat beads massed on his forehead, mixing with the raindrops, chest heaving as he gasped like a dying frog into the night air. He felt completely worn, exhausted, the sirens echoing and spinning in his head making him feel dizzy, unsteady; his legs trembling so hard that they felt about to buckle at any second. It would have been so easy, welcome surrender, just to lift his hands to the helicopter searchlight or first police car to arrive — he couldn’t go on much further in any case — but instead, as the lights of a car heading up the ramp hit him, he lifted one hand to that, trying to flag it down. It went past.

Sirens moving closer, one on the highway above now sounding no more than fifty yards away. Jac flagged more frantically. A camper van and a car not far behind went past too, the car beeping as Jac took a step in front of it.

Jac could now see the helicopter searchlight as it broke through the clouds: about sixty yards to his right, moving methodically forward with tight sweeps. And the closest siren above now sounded only twenty yards away.

It started raining more heavily then, and Jac mouthed one last silent prayer into the sodden, misty night air as the scream of the sirens and the thud-thud of the helicopter closed in all around him, becoming all-consuming. And as the next two cars on the ramp also swept past him without stopping — the beam of the helicopter searchlight now circling in to within thirty yards — Jac felt any remaining hope slip away.