When the bag was all but bursting, I tossed it out my window.
I turned back, looking around my room like I had never seen it before. Like I hadn't slept in it every night of my God damn life.
With that, I waited until two in the morning and I crept out, music still on, but lower. My parents would allow for noise so long as they could sleep through it. I jumped down out my window and made my way to the truck, tossing my bag into the back and making my way toward the barn, so paranoid that a God damn moth flying into me had my heart flying into my throat.
See, there was one advantage to the paranoid, survivalist freaks I grew up around. We had supplies. We had supplies for any possible situation. EMP? We had dozens of Faraday cages. Grid went down? We had solar. There was firewood for long, cold winters. There were medical kits. There were wilderness survival kits in bugout bags in case we needed to get out of Dodge.
And, of course, there was enough old Army rations and canned foods and dehydrated mason jars full of 'just add water' meals the women had made fresh from our gardens in the summer.
I grabbed a box, throwing in the foods I knew would be more useful to me- the ones with beans and meats, the ones that would keep my weight on even if they were all I ate. I wasn't worried about fruits and vegetables; I was worried about calories. I grabbed a wilderness survival bag, a tent, a couple extra knives, and two extra blankets.
That was all I could carry and I wasn't going to risk a second trip.
I ran to the car and shoved all the shit inside, making my way out of the drive and down most of the side street with the lights cut so no one could see me if they looked out a window.
Waiting for six AM was the longest span of time in my entire life. Fact of the matter was, I knew I had to wait until Martina arrived. If I called the cops and they showed up and Martina saw them, she would turn around and leave. They could never pin it on her.
So I waited. And at five to six, knowing Martina was always on time, I stopped at the only pay phone in the town, situated inside the mud room of a diner, and I called the cops. When I hung up with them, I called the daycare center.
With that, I ran to the truck and I got the fuck out of that town so fast I was shocked I didn't get pulled over ten times as I crossed out of the state.
I pulled off in another small town the next day, using some of my precious money for gas and realizing that that would be my biggest obstacle. I had enough food to get me through. I had clothes. Hell, I even had a bar of soap I could use to clean the fucking clothes and myself. But I didn't have enough money to keep paying for gas and the eventual repairs on the car. I needed, whenever I stopped, to find odd jobs.
I was big for my age. I could easily pass as nineteen or twenty. People looking for lawn mowers or foremen looking for day laborers wouldn't think twice about hiring me. And, after all the years at the farm learning to build houses, I knew enough to convince them to choose me over whoever else might be standing at the train station that morning.
So that was what I did. Across eight states over the course of a year. I slept in the shell of the truck whenever I could in the summer. When the cops got nosy, I took to the woods with a tent. In the winter, well, I still slept in the shell. I lined the walls, ceiling, and floors in heatsheets to lock in my body temperature. I loaded up on layers. And I prayed I didn't lose any toes or fingers to frostbite.
I didn't.
By the time I hit Jersey, I had enough cash socked away to be able to afford weekly accommodations at a motel. From there, with my first real shower in a year, I hit the streets and looked for work. I was tired of moving. I was way too happy with the feel of a real mattress underneath me at night instead of thin blankets. I liked having air conditioning so I didn't sweat to fucking death. And I really fucking enjoyed having TV and proper bathrooms, and women.
Within an afternoon, I found myself contracted to a local building company, doing whatever jobs they needed an extra experienced hand with.
It wasn't a glamorous life. But it wasn't filthy and hate-filled either.