The long way home

CHAPTER TEN

Gunfire I was in a residential section now, moving past houses and under a canopy of trees. The naked late-autumn branches interlaced above me. Through them, I could see the last light fading from the deepening blue of the sky. Fallen leaves looped up from the gutter into the air as my bike swept past them. With the sirens growing dim as they fell away behind me, it was almost quiet here for a second or two.

I slowed to take another corner. I came down another dark street of houses and turned a corner again and came down another dark street. Here the houses were small and very close together. Narrow two-story clapboards, most of them, with little porches. There was a small lawn out in front of each house, and narrow alleys between them. Most of them had lights on in the windows, sending a yellow glow out into the night.

I saw those lights and for a moment my mind drifted. I thought about the families inside those houses. They'd be sitting down to dinner with one another just now. There'd be the smell of food and the mom would be saying something to the kids like, "So what did you do at school today?" Maybe the dad would say something about what happened at work, or maybe he and the mom would talk about something, just normal stuff…

And they wouldn't know-that's what I was thinking. They wouldn't know how great things were for them. How great it was that they were all there together with plenty of food to eat and a house around them to keep them dry and warm. They wouldn't know how great it was that they were talking to one another, how lucky they were that they could all go to their rooms at the end of the day and sleep in their beds when the day was done. They wouldn't think about the fact that it could disappear, all of it, in the snap of a finger, just like that. They could wake up one morning and it could all be gone just like it was gone for me. They could find themselves out here, in the night, alone, with no food and no bed and no mom or dad or sister or brother and no friends and no one to help them. Then they would miss this dinner they were having now. They would miss it more than they thought they could ever miss anything in their lives…

That's what I was thinking about-when, all at once, every thought I had was blown away and the darkness and quiet all around me were blown away by a fresh howl of sirens and a sudden burst of light. Monstrous white light rushing at me headlong. Blue and red light catching the branches and the trunks of the trees.

A police car had appeared as if from nowhere, right there suddenly on the street in front of me. It was racing toward me, blocking my way, making it impossible for me to pass. I heard another siren scream and looked behind me and there was another one, another cruiser, closing in on me, cutting off my retreat.

The police cars came toward each other with me in the middle. I was blinded by the headlights. I was deafened by the noise. I was caught in the space between, caught on a little stretch of street that was getting smaller and smaller with every instant as the two cruisers rushed together.

In the seconds left to me, my eyes desperately scanned the road. There: a driveway, just to my right, the driveway to the small garage of a small, white clapboard house.

I nearly upended the bike as I turned into the drive at full speed. The sirens shrieked, the lights flashed. Now there was just the garage in front of me, a garage with a car already parked in it; no way out. Again, I looked around wildly. Now I saw the small front yard, the little brick-faced house next door-and a narrow alley between the two houses.

When I slipped out between them, the cops in the two closing cruisers found themselves rushing toward each other, toward a head-on crash. The cars braked and swerved. One bumped up onto the sidewalk, its muffler crunching into the curb as it came to a sharp stop. The other car managed to slow down enough to make the sharp turn and follow me up the driveway. He was right behind me.

I twisted the handlebars. The motorcycle hopped up onto the house's front lawn. The sudden change from pavement to soft earth made the tires go wobbly underneath me, but I couldn't slow down. I raced across the front lawn, heading for the little alley between this house and the house next door.

Behind me, the cruiser that had pulled into the driveway stopped short. I heard its doors fly open. I heard a huge, booming voice-one of the officers speaking over the car's loudspeaker: "Stop right there!"

I drove the motorcycle forward, fast but unsteady on the grass. I tried to hold on to it, tried to get control of it so I could make the turn into the narrow alley.

It was no good. I was losing control.

I hit the brakes, trying to cut my speed before the bike went over. The moment the motorcycle slowed, the soft earth seemed to grip it even harder. I felt the bike begin to slide out from under me.

It all happened with a dreamy slowness at first, and then it happened very fast. The bike tilted and tilted and I felt my body going down and down and I felt my hands losing their grip on the handlebars-and it seemed as if it was taking several hours, as if it might never come to an end.

Then-wham-it ended. I hit the ground and everything sped up again. I flew off the bike. I flew through the air, eerily watching the bike kick up dirt as it twisted away from me. I felt a flashing ache go through me as I hit the soft grass with my shoulder. I rolled, fast, and went on rolling. I didn't know if I was hurt. I didn't know if I'd be able to get up. But I sprang to my feet and, before I knew it, I was running.

That huge voice boomed at me again through the night. "Police! Stop right there!"

Then I was in the alley. Racing as fast as my legs would go. I brushed a garbage can and sent it spinning and clattering out in front of me. I had to leap over it to keep from tripping. I leapt and kept running.

There was a low diamond-link fence up ahead, a gate into the backyard. The breath came out of me in harsh gasps as I pumped my arms, pumped my legs, charging toward it.

Another shout: "Hold it, West! Or I'll shoot."

I was at the fence. I grabbed the top of the gate. I lifted off my feet.

A gunshot. It was like a bomb going off-unbelievably loud. There was a tearing sound. White splinters flew into the air as the bullet ripped into the corner of the house beside me, about an arm's length away.

I felt my stomach turn to water. I was so scared that if I could've stopped right then, I probably would've.

But I was already in the air, already leaping, vaulting, up over the gate, into the dark yard behind it.

I landed on my feet and ran-ran so fast I felt as if I were wearing a rocket pack. A swing set flashed by my shoulder. A sandbox flashed by my feet. A lighted window appeared in front of me. And for a moment, just a moment, I saw them: that family I'd been thinking about. The mom and dad, a son and daughter. They were sitting at a dinner table, eating and talking. I felt something lurch inside me at the sight of them. I wanted to pound on the window. I wanted to plead with them to take me in, to let me sit with them at dinner, let me have a life again away from this fear and loneliness.

But that was just a fantasy.

I saw another alley off to the right. I charged into it, and a second later I came out onto another front yard and veered off across it until I was on the street again.

I didn't slow down for an instant. There was an apartment building in front of me, and that had an alley, too, and I ran into that one, and through another yard and toward another alley.

I must've been going even faster than I thought. The police never caught up with me again. I ran and ran and ran through a broken pattern of yards and streets and alleys.

I ran until I ran out of houses. I ran until I reached the edge of town.

And then I kept running.