So I was Probably A French Fugitive Pt. 2

It’s 4 a.m. and the sun hasn’t even risen yet. I haven’t slept since I formulated “my escape from Paris” plan. Full disclosure, I also haven’t slept because I went to hang out with my Turkish friends one last time at the kebab spot and we ended up in the nightclub until about 20 minutes before this.

I’m full, I’m drunk and I’m covered in dirt because I jumped out of a moving car.

Don’t ask, that’s a whole other story.

I sit up and stare at my three exceptionally bulky bags. I look over at the clock it is now 430 I know the front desk attendant gets in at five. These are the longest 30 minutes of my life.

I don’t understand why I’m so relaxed. Oh wait, I do, it’s called Jack Daniels.

5 o’clock rolls around I walk down to the front desk. I’m the first person Mr. snooty sees which immediately startles him

I explain to him that I’m going to take my bags to Charles de Gaulle airport so they can go to my next destination before me. Quietly, in my head I just singsongy go 🎶you going to jail” over and over again🎶/ I deserve to sit in a French prison.

That’s how bad this plan is

He looked at me for a second and then smiles bringing me over a cart to put my bags on it. He decides to communicate with me via writing and says he will call for a pick up for the bags. Damnit, that didn’t work.

I leave the bags there and go for a walk. He’s not worried because I’m an American in France with nowhere to go. My walk has a purpose. I have to head over to the team's arena to find a printer to print out my boarding pass for Vienna.

New wrinkle though, the arena security though he recognizes me refuses to let me in the building

It is currently 6 am And I realistically have maybe three hours before the hotel and bill are shoved in my face probably by a police officer

I spent the next 20 minutes trying to figure out another way into the arena. One of the smartest things that you can do as a basketball player in any country is to make friends with the janitorial services.

They are the people who will let you in when you want to shoot or work some of your skills or more importantly, for this moment they let you in to break into a computer to use their printer to print out a ticket while they pretend to mop the floor keeping people out

Honestly, it would’ve been a foolproof plan except for the fact that the computers were goddamn ancient.

Like one step over dial-up. Just getting to the print menu took seven minutes. The new money from the new owners did not kick in yet if at all.

Suddenly I hear the discussion in French outside the door. It sounds vaguely aggressive but it’s a female seemingly scolding my janitorial friend. I look for a place to hide but realistically I’m 6’11. If I go under the desk the desk will be off the ground by 6 inches even on my hands and knees

I decidedly froze as the door opens revealing “The Blonde”

“Holy shit!” I’m pretty sure we both said at the same time.

Time stops for about five seconds as I try to recollect the circumstances in which I met this woman. We were at a team party and this random woman that I thought was random now that I think about it, everyone seems to know and love. Not that I can understand them but their interactions with her or that of somebody who as well knows.

I didn’t think anything of it I just assumed she was a popular girl amongst a team that some of the guys might have already banged. It was a nightclub, what can I say.

Come to find out, She works for the team just came back from Holiday in either Spain or Portugal. For those who don’t know, when the Europeans go on holiday they are gone for a month maybe two. I just happen to have been at her favorite nightclub where she surprised everybody by returning home days earlier than expected.

She smiles and is very happy to see me which I can’t lie I’m surprised considering I hid in the bathroom until she left.

Also, her English was much better than I remember.

She asked me what I’m doing and I explain to her what’s going on while she printed out my boarding pass and hand me my wallet that she put on the desk because she assumed she would see me at practice.

She had no idea the team have been sold considering she had not been fired and came into work as if nothing was wrong because too many other people who work here this was sort of old hat

Currently, the team has been bought and sold more than three or four times in the last three or four years.

Any way I look at my wallet and noticed that my €150 in cash is now at €100. I didn’t ask questions because I considered that finder's fee considering I could’ve not gotten the wallet back at all. Funny enough though that €50 finders fee would come back and bite me later on.

Anyway, so I prepare to leave, I kiss her goodbye which then escalates into sex on top of her desk.

TIMEOUT: I didn’t come into my own with women outside of a monogamous relationship until I was about 20 And discovered the state of Florida and spring break as an adult. Which is code for I was a very weak man

TIME IN:At this point I’m just asking to go to jail in a foreign country, there’s no way around it. Also if it hasn’t become abundantly clear this will not be the last time throughout the first half of my career that “ The Blonde “will appear.

So I leave and walk past a smirking janitor who was next to the door and heard the obnoxiously loud sex.

It is what it is.

So I walked back to the hotel realizing that I probably shouldn’t of use those 30 minutes for anything other than implementing my plan and realize I am pressed for time. I grabbed my last book bag I noticed that my bags are still by the desk.

My stomach drops to the goddamn floor as I’ve come to at least my realization that this might have backfired and I am screwed.

I go to Mr.Snooty and he says that the driver never showed up so thinking on my feet I decide to show full concern about the safety of my bags which for some reason worked with him who sympathized with me. So he calls a new driver and suggested I should go with the bags to make sure they get to the destination airplane and then I would come back

After a brief pause, he agrees just as his new driver walks through the door.

There are several things in my life that I will experience after this whole ordeal. Some far worse and far more dangerous than this situation… so I say this next statement as a naïve 23-year-old who had, up to that point had left the country only one time.

In walks the driver who is Chinese but speaking perfect French. My brain cannot compute and all I could do was staring at him which ironically was exactly what he was doing to me.

Mr. Snooty explains to him, I presume, the situation and without hesitation, he agrees. Of course, he does, because he wants to be paid. Also unbeknownst to me, his enthusiasm was high because the Charles de Gaulle airport is pretty far away from my actual hotel. Remember that for later

So Mr. Snooty walks over As I am preparing to broken French again to get everything in order.

Suddenly Mr. snooty out of absolutely nowhere speaks perfect English.

Impeccable English with a British accent.

My mind is blown because he’s been playing me this entire time. He watched me struggle for weeks. I didn’t even have time to react as he explained to me that my driver was going to drive me to Charles de Gaulle, I would carry the bags in and he would wait for me to come back. He would then drive me back to pay the bill.

He asks to hold my license as collateral to make sure I come back. I have to ask him again because I was not necessarily sure I understood him.

Also, I was surprised he asked for my license and not my passport.

I happily gave him the international license I got the year before and my Florida state license with the address that I didn’t even live at anymore. I can only imagine what kind of mail went to that house

Let it be known this will be the first of perhaps 8 licenses I would use to get out of trouble over my 13 years overseas.

I follow the driver, bags in tow out into his exceptional clean car and away we go. The airport was about 50 mins to an hour away and that’s without traffic.

I want to say that ride went smoothly but due to a chain of events leading up to the ride, I had to put together the worst lie I’ve ever told my entire life to keep this plan going.

End of Part 2