All or Nothing Read Free Page B

who’d ordered his imprisonment to change their mind and have him killed. Whoever had put him here, keeping him powerless, was obviously a careful person. Francisco wouldn’t be able to fight back from a comatose state. Francisco wouldn’t object to being stuck in a room without light, food or water if he was unconscious.
    He also knew he was dealing with a coward.
    A shitfaced, snivelling, little cunt of a man.
    Who would find an empty room when he came back to retrieve his ‘trophy’.
    Francisco had lost his shoes and most of his belongings, including his mobile telephone and his iPod, but he had been left with one thing, a solitary item, and it was in his breast pocket.
    Maybe they had overlooked this item , who knows? He thought.
    All he knew was that it was a vital tool.
    His Parker ballpoint pen.
    Being unemployed meant filling out form after form after form. Francisco liked to be presentable for his job hunting and the relevant applications. Smart suit, smart look, smart apparatus. Yes, his pen was his pride and joy at this precise moment in time. At that moment he knew he would never take his preparations for visiting a Job Centre for granted again.
    He looked up at the grimy window above him. It stood at head height, hidden by dirt. A rub of his hand had cleaned the muck from the pane, even so, it shed sparse amounts of light into the room. And doing so had left his hand black with dirt.
    Worth it , he thought.
    The sealant strip of rubber around the glass in the window was now on the floor below. Good old Parker pen. You never know when it might come in handy.
    The pane was loose. Francisco stood and worked the pane free from its frame and placed it on the floor behind him. The cool night air rushed in and filled the room with its pleasant odour.
    Francisco shut his eyes for a moment, revelling in the fresh air and the gradual dissipation of the urine smell. The breeze felt heavenly on his sweaty parched skin, and he opened his mouth to let saliva form so that he didn’t feel so drained and thirsty. He peered out of the window, trying to figure out if he knew his surroundings or not. He saw nothing but moonlight. He tapped his knuckles on the wall surrounding the window and its ledge to test its strength.
    The wall seemed firm and rugged. It would hold his weight. Breathing out, he put his foot on the urinal beside him and hoisted himself up. The opening was about two feet away from him. He would need to grip the wall’s edge and swing himself across to the window ledge without falling to the floor.
    Awkward.
    Francisco gripped hard and swung, but he slipped to the floor in a heap of scrabbling limbs. He'd grazed his forearm on the way down. Landing on his rump with a thud, he rolled over, stood up and jumped up and down in fury.
    Moron , he raged to himself, you've been out cold for too long!
    You need blood in your veins and your arm muscles need to warm up .
    Francisco held onto the bunk and stretched, flexed his arms and legs, and sprinted on the spot. After a few minutes he stopped dead, and looked at the window. Sweat was running down his neck. The room was humid despite the new opening.
    Climbing on the bunk, he bounced a few times to test its strength. It looked dingy but it felt firm. Francisco counted his bounces. On number twelve he leapt as far as his legs would take him, aiming for the open window.
    His body arched forward and his head shot through the gap.
    His breath was smashed out of his lungs when his stomach collided with the ledge, and the weight of his legs started to pull him downwards. But he was halfway out of the room; there was no going back now.
    Francisco's arms were stretched out in front of him. He scrambled for a grip on something, anything, that might hold his weight. Rough concrete scratched at his forearms as he swung them around in vain. Small pebbles and stones shot randomly towards him, so many that he had to turn his head away to avoid them getting in his eyes. Finally,