Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 6

minutes and I'll figure it out." Air looked extremely skeptical but went over the other side of the desk and started working on something else.
    About twenty-five minutes later I had read through all the spreadsheets he had in the document and found where his mistake was. He had duplicated a couple of boxes during data entry. After I had shown Air the mistake and asked for the receipts and files I would need to fix it, he just stared at me with a look of wonder on his face.
    "What are you doing here in Albuquerque?" I was a little shocked by his seeming non sequitur and I felt myself wall up. I scrambled for something to say and came up with, "Just needed a change of scenery."
    Air looked at me speculatively, "You runnin' from something, kid?"
    My jaw clamped closed and I turned away. Yeah, I'm great at being on the lam.
    "Hey, Jason. It's fine. I've got my own mileage. You ever want to talk about it I got good ears. Otherwise, it's none of my business. What I was going to say was, if you want to take care of the books a few hours every day you can have the room as long as you need it. I'll even throw in lunch."
    I took a deep breath and decided to trust Air, if only a little bit. "And you wouldn't put my name down or anything?"
    "Nope."
    "Okay. You've got a deal."
    Over the next month or so we settled into a pattern. I woke up and spent the morning working for Air, then we ate lunch together and I spent the afternoon wandering the city or in my room. Eventually, I confided in Air and we decided to send one of the USB drives to the FBI anonymously. He took it with him on his weekly trip to Socorro to visit Luann's grave and mailed it from there.
    Two weeks after Air had mailed the USB drive we still hadn't heard from either the FBI or the Irish Mob so I started to relax, to feel safe again. Then "they" popped into my life again with another one of their pearls of wisdom: it always comes when you least expect it.
    When Air heard I'd never seen a hot air balloon in person he forbade me to come into the office and shooed me off to the Balloon Fiesta to "experience" it as he put it. The first day was fine, fun even. But as I stood in the predawn light watching the ballooners of the Dawn Patrol spread out their massive envelopes and slowly fill them with fire heated air on the second day, I felt an uneasy prickle on my spine. Like someone was watching me. I spun in a circle scanning the gathering crowd for any face I recognized or that seemed out of place. There was no one.
    It was only a matter of time before they caught up to me, though.
    ****
     
    Present
    Tommy's lilt was still relatively far away, so I decided to try to make a break for it. I just had to figure out which direction I wanted to go. Albuquerque during Balloon week was insane– like Mardi Gras on laughing gas, Air had told me. It would be easy to hide in the crowd, but how would I get away? Once I left the Fiesta grounds, my leg would slow me down.
    I peeked my head around the corner of the building I was still hiding behind and saw that the path opened up in about 200 yards to large field where the balloons took off. Just inside the field I saw a man with a balloon that looked about halfway full. He was alone, trying to get his balloon off the ground. You needed at least two people to get one of those monsters in the air.
    I didn't know enough about hot air balloons to know how long it took for one to fill up completely but it looked to be rising pretty quickly. I gauged my timing for when Tommy was turned in the other direction and slipped into the crowd. I made sure to walk at the same pace as everyone else and had attached myself at the side of a group of college age guys who were about my same height.
    As I reached the edge of the field, Tommy must have discovered my temporary hiding spot and the bloody footprints leading away because I heard him shout to his fellow goons to follow him. The closer I got to the one guy with his two person balloon I could see a bad day, between pissed off and heartbroken, written all over his face. As I approached, he stared down at my leg, and as soon as I was close enough I grabbed the edge of the basket for support.
    "Need some help?" He laughed, then looked behind at the trail of bloody footprints I'd left. "Whoever you're running from, you just led them here, bud."
    I turned around briefly and stared at the footprints, a burst of hopelessness shooting through me. Then I turned back and looked up at him. He