Rant by Alfie Crow

about eight hours.
    Can I trust him? No. Do I have a choice? No. This will have to be handled very carefully. If I let him get the upper hand then I will have lost my one chance at getting out of this. Plus I certainly don’t fancy applying his haemorrhoid cream myself.
    And after all, he hasn’t given me any trouble since yesterday.
    â€˜What about our mutual friend, there?’ I ask.
    â€˜He’s probably better off handcuffed, and I imagine we can’t really let him go just at the minute since he probably knows too much, thanks to you and your big mouth.’
    I start to argue, but realise he’s quite right. As usual.
    â€˜Should we off him, then?’ I ask, in my best menacing goon voice, which comes out sounding a bit like Sue off Sooty and Sweep . I really need some sleep.
    Two pairs of eyes stare at me like the loser I am.
    â€˜Only joshing,’ I say, pathetically.
    â€˜C’mon, Mike.’ He sighs. Holds out his wrists. ‘At this moment we need each other. I’m not about to do anything stupid while you’re holding a gun on me.’
    Oh yes, the gun. I pull out the gun (carefully) from my trousers and hold it on him whilst I undo the knot at his wrists, watching him closely all the time. Watching his every move.
    Paying particular attention as he removes the gun from my hands, nuts me in the face, and then swiftly kicks me in the testicles so hard I swear long-dead distant relatives back in Northumberland must have winced.
    I lie down quickly, squeaking like a guinea pig on heat with a mouthful of cotton wool (never heard one? You don’t know what you’re missing).
    Captain America scowls at me.
    â€˜You brought that on yourself,’ he rasps, then reaches into the front seat and takes out the water bottle. ‘I’m in charge now, so let’s get a few things straight.’
    He takes a huge swig from the bottle, a huge gulp of Backseat Boy’s wee, and then spits it out in a rather impressive arc across the street.
    God help me, I laugh. I know it’s wrong and childish and pathetic but I laugh. I laugh and I laugh and I laugh until he kicks me in the testicles again. And then I laugh no more.
    Tuesday May 4 th . Lunchtime-ish.
    So I was running, running, running because, let’s face it there’s not really much else to do on a Tuesday afternoon when you’ve just accidentally, um, defrauded…misappropriated funds from…okay, robbed a bank and you are carrying several thousand pounds of hit money apparently from some Mexican terrorist group and you have a particularly vicious-looking handgun tucked into your underpants (have I mentioned how much that chafes when you run?) and you know your wife is going to give you such a hard time when you try to explain that either you or she may well end up shooting you, just to make the point that you appreciate, that you understand fully, that what has happened, what you have done, is very, very, very naughty indeed.
    After a bit of running (seven minutes tops, maybe a bit less – must start exercising again), I decided that I needed to sit somewhere quiet, turn my lungs the right way out and think things through a little. One of my big problems, according to Anna, is that I spend too much time thinking and talking and not enough doing.
    Well. I certainly seemed to be addressing that imbalance at the moment. Or does it not count if you’re having things forcibly done to you?
    (Actually, the word Anna uses most often isn’t talking but ranting . You’re having a rant. You are doing a Rant. I’m being Mr Rant – see how clever my stage name is? These things don’t just happen at random, you know.)
    I realised I was standing next to the Sensory Awakening Garden for the Visually Impaired that the council put in last year, and it looked quiet and secluded enough to hide a desperate fugitive. In I went.
    Nice. I don’t know why the place wasn’t stacked