Unauthorized Vacation: Change in Plans!

Spratt was directed to the space on the floor between the second bed and the exterior wall and told to get ready for bed.  A couple of pillows were thrown down for him and Hector pulled the table and chairs away from the wall and filled the space between the second bed and the hotel dresser to create a make-shift ‘blockade’ between Spratt’s sleeping area and the rest of the room; doing so formed a miniature ‘cell’ for Spratt and delineated an area that he was not allowed to leave during the night.  Spratt quickly digested his surroundings and knew that attempting to go through the hotel door during the night would be impossible as he would have to crawl over the table and chairs and make it past two armed police officers before reaching the door.  He wasn’t very concerned about the door though because his ‘walled off’ area included the only window in the room and they were on the first floor.  He concentrated on the window while preparing to go to ‘sleep’.

Obviously drunk at this point, the Sergeant and Hector took turns using the bathroom and telling jokes to each other and the Sergeant leaned back on his bed to make a last minute phone call to his wife while Hector went back to the bathroom.  Spratt started untying his boots while considering his options.  “The window is going to be the only way out”, thought Spratt who remembered in detail the opening mechanism from earlier in the day (the curtains were now closed and so he had to go on memory alone).  It was the type of window that slides from side to side instead of up and down but a lot of hotels have a ‘stop’ on those windows so that they don’t fully open (to prevent accidental falls or suicides).  Sometimes they don’t put those ‘stops’ on first floor windows…Spratt couldn’t remember whether this had one or not.  It was a crucial point because it would mean the difference between quietly opening the window enough to sneak out of it or having to break the glass and jump through it which would certainly awaken the cops.  One way might mean a good head start and the other may mean barely getting away and/or getting shot at in the process (at this point, Spratt KNEW that he would get away…they were too drunk to catch him but he still wanted to do it while attracting the least amount of attention).  Regardless of the type of lock, though; Spratt knew one thing: he WAS going out that window one way or another.  Spratt berated himself mentally for not remembering about the ‘stop’ but his train of thought was interrupted when Hector came out of the bathroom and started screaming at him.

Stumbling his way across the room, Hector was yelling, “Don’t take your clothes off!!  You are going to sleep fully clothed!”  Spratt was startled at the outburst and wondered if something were about to happen.  He quickly glanced at the Sergeant who appeared to have nodded off.  Hector was apparently in charge now.  Spratt began buttoning his shirt back up when Hector yelled, “Put your jacket on too!  I’m not going to wake up in the middle of the night to give you a blanket if you get cold!”  Spratt was still a bit confused but quickly thought, “Good.  Then I won’t even have to get dressed when I decide to go!”  He couldn’t believe his luck because he had already considered the risk of waking them while putting his clothes on (a few rustles in a quiet hotel room are surprisingly loud when you are doing something covert!).  “And put your boots back on too!” Hector ordered, “I don’t want you complaining about cold feet tonight; I need my sleep!”  The only thing Spratt could think about while he was getting fully dressed was, “Holy Fuck!  They are making this easy as shit for me!”  Spratt got fully dressed.

The Sergeant was snoring by now so he was obviously asleep when Hector told Spratt that he was going to have to handcuff him and put the shackles on before he went to sleep.  This put a huge damper on Spratt’s plan and he immediately started considering how he might overcome the added obstacle of being restrained for the night.  “I hope they don’t chain me to a piece of furniture or anything” thought Spratt.  Hector started emptying the contents of his pockets onto the dresser top and told Spratt to lay face down and stick one of his legs in the air so that he could put the shackles on Spratt’s ankle.  Before getting on the floor, Spratt paid close attention to the exact position on the dresser that Hector put his handcuff keys.  He thought that he may be able to get to them during the night but then considered that it might be a futile attempt since chains make noise and climbing over the make-shift barricade of table and chairs to get to the dresser would certainly make enough noise to wake them up.  He resigned himself to the fact that he would have to go out the window all ‘chained up’ and worry about taking them off later.  The main goal, he kept reminding himself, is to get away; anything else would have to be dealt with later.

Spratt had been through the drill of being shackled many times before.  In a standing position, the cops will have you face a wall and lean against it while bending one of your legs back to knee level so they don’t have to lean down too far to put the shackle on.  Once it is on that leg, they will tell you to put it down and lift the other one up.  Click, click on the second leg and you are then reasonably hobbled.  In a lying position, it is basically the same except you are horizontal instead of vertical.  Spratt got down in the prone position and lifted his right leg up so that Hector could put the shackle on.  He hated being in this position because he could only see the wall to his left and the bed to his right.  Hector turned off the light in the room leaving only a sliver from the half-closed bathroom door; enough light to see by but not enough to read a book with…kind of like a very strong night light.  Spratt couldn’t see where Hector was in the room; he could only hear him gathering up the chains and then the rustle of the bedclothes.  He knew that Hector would either have to come across the bed or move the table to get to where Spratt was laying so the noise from the bed confirmed the route that Hector was going to take.

Hector mumbled something to Spratt about maintaining the position that he was in and that he would be restraining him in a second or two.  Spratt started to reply that Hector should hurry up but Hector told him to be quiet…”I’ll do this when I’m ready!  Not when you tell me to!”  This position was very uncomfortable for Spratt; his leg had already been in the air for several minutes and felt like the blood was draining out of his foot making it a little numb.  Added to that uneasy feeling was an uncomfortable feeling due to not being able to see anything except a wall, the floor, and the bottom of the bed; he was sort of disoriented and didn’t know exactly where Hector was (he assumed Hector was on the bed because he had heard the movements but wasn’t sure if he was still there or had gone back to the bathroom.  He could still hear the Sergeant snoring so he knew where that one was at least.  Spratt was growing concerned because he was in the perfect position for a surprise attack and he remembered how mad the cops were at the airport and all of the threats they had made.  He wondered if Hector might be drunk enough to carry out some of them.  Where was Hector?

Spratt wanted to say something but kept quiet for fear of angering Hector but he certainly wasn’t pleased with his current predicament and couldn’t continue with his plans to go out the window until he knew exactly how Hector was going to restrain him.  Spratt wondered if he could convince Hector to just put the shackles on and leave his hands free or if Hector would insist on restraining him completely; he even considered that Hector might ‘hog-tie’ him which would leave him completely immobile.  His right foot became too numb due to the lack of circulation and he lowered it to get the blood flowing again but immediately raised his left foot so Hector would have something to attach a shackle to.  Hector either didn’t notice the movement or just didn’t care which foot was raised because he said nothing to Spratt.

“Damn!  Why is this guy taking so long!” thought Spratt as his left foot started to get numb.  He started to lower that foot when the Sergeant’s snoring started taking on a different rhythm and caught his attention.  He listened for a few moments with his foot still in the air…something about the snoring seemed very strange.  Spratt listened for a while when he realized…HOLY SHIT!!!  Spratt couldn’t believe it!  The Sergeant’s rhythm hadn’t changed at all; it was exactly the same…the difference in what he heard was the additional rhythm of Hector’s snoring!

Spratt’s mind began racing!  “It can’t be!” his mind screamed.  “Surely both of these fuckers aren’t asleep!”  “Could it be?”  “It can’t be!  Can it?”  “Maybe they are ‘passed out’!  They were pretty drunk!”  “No!  It must be a trick!”  “Hector must be testing me to see if I will try to leave!  Don’t fall for it!”  Spratt lowered his left leg but didn’t move another muscle as he tried to determine if both cops were really asleep or if he was being set up.  The breathing patterns fell into a predictable cycle and the snoring seemed genuine but, still, Spratt wasn’t sure.  He lifted his head up slowly…ever so slowly so as to not make any noise at all.  It seemed like an eternity until he was finally able to get his eyes over the bed enough to focus on Hector’s position.  Finally, he saw Hector.  There he was, lying in the bed, facing away from Spratt with the shackles next to his body.  Fucking incredible!

Spratt was positive that both cops were now asleep but laid back down to think about what he should do.  He knew that he was going to leave but wondered if the window was still the best option.  “Can I get all the way to the door without waking them?”   He tried to weigh the options.  The window was a guaranteed exit; if he tried to make it to the door, they might wake up and catch him.  On the other hand, he had heard the amount of noise the door makes but they hadn’t opened the window and it might be very loud; besides, it may not even open wide enough for him to crawl out of.  He didn’t know what to do but decided to lay there long enough for both cops to reach a deep sleep before doing anything.

Spratt began thinking about what might happen if he were able to pull this off.  Would he be able to get away with it or get caught shortly thereafter?  “If I get caught, it will be by the Georgia police and, surely, they will hold me on the warrant I have here and prevent me from being transferred to Puerto Rico” he thought…”or will they?”  “What if they decide that I was already in the custody of Puerto Rico and give me back to them?”  “Whose custody am I actually in?”  “Would they keep me in Georgia?  Send me back to Idaho?  Or, would they put me on a plane to Puerto Rico where I am guaranteed an ass-whooping just for trying to escape?”  “What if I can get away without making any noise?  What would I do?  I don’t have any money.  Where would I go?”

Spratt had to pee!  He couldn’t risk going to the bathroom and waking them up!  If they woke up while he was using the bathroom they probably wouldn’t do anything to him but it would remind them that they needed to shackle him and he couldn’t risk that…he was almost a free man now.  He couldn’t hold it for much longer though…”Damned Coronas!” thought Spratt.  Spratt scooted up next to the bed as quietly as he could and unzipped his pants very carefully.  He lifted the bedspread and began peeing underneath the bed onto the carpet in back and forth motions so as to not ‘puddle’ the urine and make the least amount of noise as possible.  Soon, any area that he could reach was saturated and, no matter where he pointed his penis, it started to sound like rushing water.  Hector moved on the bed and Spratt cut the stream immediately.  “Fuck!” screamed Spratt inside his head, “Please don’t wake up!”

Spratt slowly moved back away from the bed and returned to planning his next move.  He decided to go out the door.  It was the most brazen move but he remembered exactly where the Sergeant and Hector had placed their wallets and, if he was quiet enough, he might make it out of there with some money in his pockets…at least he was dressed and, if he could get past the table barrier then it wouldn’t even matter if they woke up…he could bolt for the door and run out of the hotel.  He tried to think of every eventuality but the door seemed the best way to go; he just needed to make sure they were in a very deep sleep before trying it.

Spratt woke up with a jerking motion.  His mind screamed, “Holy Shit!  How long have I been asleep?!?  What fucking time is it?”  He could still hear the two cops snoring and was pretty sure they were asleep but what fucking time was it?  He slowly, carefully lifted his head above the bed to see the clock radio…3:30am!  He had been asleep for over an hour!  While chastising himself for falling asleep “How the fuck could I make a mistake like that?!?” he was also glad that it wasn’t later in the morning when they may be more prone to wakening.  He knew that, if he was going to leave, he had to do it at this very moment; no more procrastinating.

Spratt got on his hands and knees and began crawling towards the table and chair ‘barrier’.  He quickly decided that climbing over it was the riskiest move since there was the chance of it not holding his weight and breaking which would wake everybody up.  He noticed that there might be enough room for him to crawl under the table and through the legs of the chairs so that was the route that he decided on.  “How much noise can this fucking carpet make?” thought Spratt as every time he placed his hand on it and moved his knees up it seemed to make an earth-shattering rustle.  Finally he got to the table and went underneath with no problem; the chairs were a different story though.  He slowly crawled under one chair when the button of his jacket clanked on one of the legs!  He waited an interminable amount of time before deciding that the cops hadn’t heard the noise and started crawling under the next chair.  He finally snaked his way under the other chair and started to stand up very carefully.  His back wasn’t completely clear of the chair and he bumped into the bottom side of it causing the chair to tip into the first one causing the loudest fucking noise that Spratt had ever heard and, worse, causing Hector to move on the bed!  Spratt froze in place.