The Cold Storm

ESCAPE

4 ESCAPE

Montana State Prison

IT WAS LATE at night and snowing at the penitentiary. The quiet demeanor of the indoors wasn’t a testament to what was about to happen on the outside. Most of the inmates were sleeping in their cells, except for one.

James was getting ready to do something that he had meticulously planned for six months. After being locked away for just over ten years, the man was prepared to feel freedom again.

Prison had not been kind to him. He’d been battered, stabbed, and thrown in the hole more times than he cared to count. He was almost left for dead on one occasion if the warden hadn’t found him motionless and bleeding in the shower.

Joining the Aryan Brotherhood seemed like his only way of protection from the other gangs. It’s difficult to defend yourself in prison when you’re all alone. The Aryans ran that place. James’s background certainly wouldn’t serve him well in there. After all, he couldn’t sleep with one eye open.

To everyone’s astonishment, James had the perfect escape plan, thanks to a pretty, blonde, prison employee that he had befriended a year earlier. He promised her a relationship on the outside, in return. Of course, the man had only one concern, busting out of that dreadful place. That night the snowfall was heavy, and he had hoped that it would mask his movements and make him hard to track. That was the plan, anyway.

He was an old, Vietnam Veteran. With long hair, scars all over his body, and tattoos up and down both arms, he was unquestionably a rough site to behold. Most of the wounds he got from Vietnam, some from prison. James had prepared himself mentally for that day. He was ready.

It wasn’t his first time escaping captivity, however. Starving and sick, he had broken out of a North Vietnamese labor camp in 69. Those correctional officers had nothing on the NVA. His main obstacles, getting past the guard towers and over the razor wire fence. He left a balled up pillowcase and bundled up blankets on his bunk in place of his body, hoping that the patrolling guards were none the wiser.

It was the middle of the night. James squeezed his way through a gap in the wall of his cell, which he had worked on for what seemed like forever. It remained hidden behind a poster on his cell wall. Prison noise covered up the sound of cutting and sawing.

Days earlier, he had finally widened the hole enough to allow his slim body to slide through. James’ next move, making his way through a maze of wiring and piping to get to the vent that led to the yard, outside. If anything, the man was resourceful.

With a tool that his new friend smuggled in for him, he jerked the vent from the wall and climbed through. Sliding down the roof of the prison, James shimmied down some piping that led to the ground and shot over to the fence directly in the middle of two guard towers. Launching a blanket over the razor wire fence and climbing over, he sliced part of his right arm in the process.

“Son of a b***h, that f*****g hurts,” he mumbled to himself, as he rolled over and fell to the ground on the other side, applying pressure on his bleeding wound.

Left behind was a b****y piece of his orange, prison jumpsuit. He slipped into the darkness between the searchlights, never looking behind him. His plan seemed to be working, so far. James knew that he had at least a couple of hours before anyone would realize he was gone. So, he wanted to be a long way from that place by the time the alert sounded.

As promised, his so-called girlfriend left him a new set of civilian clothes in a suitcase that she had set in the woods, hidden underneath a tall evergreen tree and blanketed with snow. But, he had no plans to meet up with her. James was a free man now. And he didn’t want to associate with anyone from that prison, ever again. Desiring to get the hell away from there, he immediately changed into his new clothes, tearing a sleeve off of his prison clothes, tying it around his arm, and burying the rest.

A storm was brewing in the distance. James needed to make it as far as he could before dawn. The snow began to fall remarkably hard. He wouldn’t be able to make it very much further in the impending blizzard. So, he found an abandoned building to take shelter in until the storm passed. It was an old, run down, rickety shack in the middle of the woods, barely a roof over it. But, at least it was something.

Wake up would be in approximately one hour. But, for the time being, James was stuck. As soon as the storm passed him by, however, he would be ready to continue his trek. Hiding out in the mountains might have been possible, but park rangers patrol that area pretty routinely.

James could hardly keep his tired eyes open. Slipping in and out of consciousness, six AM came fast, and the sound of the high pitched alarm system reverberated throughout the surrounding hills. Heard for miles around, it served as a warning system to residents. They knew what it meant. It was only a matter of time before everyone around would be alert and on the lookout for him.

Road signs scattered a full perimeter around that place, warning the public not to pick up hitchhikers, and for a good reason. The place was bustling with guards searching every inch of the grounds. One of them found the torn, bright orange bloodied piece of a prison suit whisking in the wind.

“This is where he got out,” the guard confirmed to the others. “Must have torn him up pretty good.”

The sound of chatter and dogs barking seemed to carry with the breeze. James knew he was in a race for time. Pretty soon, roadblocks would be up, and a search party organized to hunt him down. Every vehicle and person would be looked over, and the only way that he would have a chance to remain undetected is by moving through the dense forest, relying only on his wit, and hoping to be long gone by the time the hound dogs picked up his trail.

It was over a decade old now, but James had periodic flashbacks of the event that led him to prison. As he paused for a time to rest, his memory took him back to that moment when he became a criminal in their eyes. It was just another in a series of daydreams that haunted him.

He was defending her, he proclaimed. It was during the spring of 2007. His sister, Jessica, had lousy taste in men. She was a decent looking blonde. But, their rough upbringing didn’t exactly breed self-confidence. With low self-esteem, she would always choose abusive over good-natured.

Jessica’s old man, Terry, was beating her again, as he had done so many times before. James tried desperately to stay calm, pleading for the belligerent man to leave her alone. But, he wouldn’t listen, a fatal mistake. The drunken fool began shoving and striking her. James, furious to the point of boiling over, leaped out of his chair.

“Leave her alone!” He shouted.

Terry, holding Jessica by the hair, released her for a moment, and rushed for James.

“Yeah? What are you going to do about it, punk?” Terry asked him.

“Punk? I’m not the one who can’t hit someone my size, asshole!” James replied as he grabbed Terry by the shirt and slammed him against the wall.

James’ anger got the best of him, and he just snapped. All he could remember was glaring at the man in anger. He must have blacked out shortly after. Bystanders reported that he punched the guy so hard that he must have cracked his skull because Terry went limp and fell, never to get up again.

When James awoke, he was lying on the floor in a jail cell. He had no recollection of the event, but witnesses and the bar owner claimed that James just went crazy and killed the man. Not trusting cops, he took the matter into his own hands.

“He never had a chance,” they said.

Once the trial was over, James had been convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to twenty-five years to life in prison. Everyone called him a lunatic, even his own family. According to them, he was a crazed madman who didn’t deserve ever to see daylight again. It didn’t seem to matter to them that his sister was black from Terry’s fist. An unusual family dynamic, indeed.

All of a sudden, James snapped back to his reality.

“Damn it. I can’t f*****g shake it,” he grumbled to himself. “Got to keep going.”

He rose to his feet to get his bearings. Tired and fuzzy, the man planned to continue. Making his way through the forest, James located a tiny cottage up ahead of him in a clearing, with a dirt bike stationed out front. Slowly progressing toward it, he noticed that there was a light on inside. James noiselessly edged toward the front door and carefully began turning the doorknob.

To his astonishment, the cabin had been left unlocked. He shoved the door open slightly and peered inside. A man was sitting on the couch, and his legs propped, eyes glued to the television. He hadn’t noticed the unsightly figure standing behind him.

James opened the door the rest of the way and stepped casually toward the man.

“Don’t move,” he said in a low, determined tone.

The man glanced back at James, hysterically.

“What the hell?” He questioned. “Who are you? What are you doing in my house?”

Taking another look, the stranger could hardly believe his eyes.

“Wait a minute,” he continued, bouncing out of his chair. “I know who you are. You’re the man who broke out of the prison, aren’t you?”

“Never mind that, friend,” James replied. “I need your bike. I don’t want to hurt you. I need a way out of here.”

The agitated stranger pointed to a set of keys lying on the coffee table.

“Right there,” he said. “Take it and get the hell out of here, please.”

James marched over to the table and took the keys. “Much obliged,” he said to the man, before shifting to leave.

As he approached the door, James glanced back at the stranger one last time.

“Keep your mouth shut mister. I wouldn’t want to have to come back here,” he continued, closing the door behind him.

With one kick of his foot, the bike cranked up, and James rode out like a man on a mission, disappearing into the whiteout.