The Great Escape

[Arroyos]

THE GREAT ESCAPE

Instead of motorcycles, a linen hamper.
Instead of a barbed wire fence, an open gate.
Instead of Nazi soldiers, a drowsy hospital security guard.
Instead of Steve McQueen, two doddering old men.
And yet, the escape of Slummings and Mayberry from the Camarillo State Hospital had the makings of a Hollywood classic.

But first, before we spring these two old farts, we’ve got to get them on the same program, the same plan—Sean’s plan. The orderly known only as Sean is sprinting down the hospital corridor towards the linen room, with ancient Mayberry shuffling behind. In the linen room, they’ll find Slummings, just like Mayberry thought, hiding behind the mountainous stacks of clean hospital linens.

“What’re you doing here?” Sean asked when he found the Yuma owner. “I told you to meet us in the hallway.”

“Had to hide,” Slummings tried to explain, “they were looking for me. For us.”

“For us?” Mayberry sputtered when he finally arrived in the linen room out of breath.

“That’s what the nice nurse said—what’s her name?”

“Mary?” Mayberry guessed.

“Yeah, her.”

“She told you someone was looking for you two?” Sean asked.

“Yeah. In the hallway, I mean, she told me in the hallway, where you said to wait. Said someone was looking for us and told me to hide in here.”

“She say who was looking?”

Slummings shook his head.

“How would Mary know?” Mayberry wondered.

“If it was someone at the front desk, maybe,” Sean said, trying to figure it out. “But who would … I mean why now?”

“You think someone knows about our plan?” Mayberry asked.

Sean shook his head. “I only told Mary. Good thing too. Which means …”

“Yes?” said Mayberry and Slummings together, like some antiquated Greek chorus.

“We go ahead with the plan.”

“Okay,” Mayberry said.

“What’s the plan?” Slummings asked.

“I told you.”

“I … think I forgot.”

Sean frowned, then explained again. Fire alarm, linen hamper, south gate, taxi waiting.

“You told me that before?” Slummings said.

Sean nodded.

Slummings looked at Mayberry. “He told you that too?”

Mayberry shrugged. “I think so.”

Slummings grinned, “You forgot too!”

“No, I just … maybe I just … well, I’m not quite certain.”

Slummings chortled.

“Doesn’t matter,” Sean interrupted. “Let’s do it. Climb into the linen basket and I’ll wheel you down to the gate.”

“Both of us?” Mayberry and Slummings said. “In the basket?” they chirped like twins in a Shakespeare comedy. “Together?”

Sean nodded and wheeled one of the linen baskets from its storage place at the back of the linen room. He removed a couple handfuls of dirty laundry and offered a hand to help the old men climb in. They were reluctant.

“Won’t the guard just look inside and see us?” Mayberry asked.

“I’ll cover you with towels,” Sean answered.

“Smells funny,” Slummings said.

“Clean towels. In you go.”

And while Peters entertained Vail at the front desk—or Vail confounded Peters—the owner and GM of the Yuma Arroyos were being wheeled out the back of the Camarillo State Hospital toward the infamous portal of Gate 38, where a yellow Prius taxi was waiting.

Imagine the scene, if you will. Orderlies scouring the halls and wards of the hospital for two patients while the men they seek sneak out of the hospital in a linen basket, hidden beneath freshly laundered towels.

Sean pushed the cart down the long ramp leading from the Men’s Ward to the South Gate. The cart rattled and rumbled over the cement ramp, jostling its septugenarian occupants like some twisted Disneyland ride in which passengers are tossed about like dice shaken in a cup, their fates to be determined by a single toss.

The guard at Gate 38 took his eyes off the game he was playing on his iPhone long enough to recognize Sean pushing the laundry cart.

“Peters demote you to laundry duty, man?”

“All the work that’s fit to shit,” Sean said, and the guard laughed before returning to his game.

Beyond the gate, the Prius taxi idled. Sean helped the old men climb out of the basket and into the cab.

“Thanks for waiting,” Mayberry said to the young woman taxi driver as he climbed in the cab. She smiled.

“Leave those in the basket,” Sean said to Slummings, who was clutching an armful of towels.

“But they smell so good,” Slummings said.

“Take one,” Sean said. “One!” he repeated, pulling towels from the reluctant Slummings. “Now get outa here.”

And with that, they were gone. No dramatic motorcycle sprint along the prison fence, no heart-stopping leap over the wire, and no determined frown on the handsome face of a young Steve McQueen. Instead, just the smiling, wrinkled, whiskered faces of two old friends waving from the rear window of a Prius taxi as they pulled away from the hospital.

Sean waved back.

They were gone. They were free. They were on their way back to Yuma. It had been a long time coming.

[Borealis]

I never thought I'd see the day - Welcome back, Bob!!

[Arroyos]

Freedom smells good! Or maybe that’s just the linen towels.