Be Not Far from Me(13)
I give it three days, maybe more, before connections are made and everyone realizes I’m still in the woods.
I look at my foot, turning it different ways in the morning light.
I don’t think I have that much time.
On a good day I can put in eight miles on the trail.
I assume I will not be having a good day, but I do know not having shoes isn’t the setback it seems. More than once I’ve been on trails with people who put a lot of money into serious boots, not realizing that their leg has the job of lifting that extra two pounds on each foot with every step. And that adds up, taking them down by midday and draining them empty by nightfall—if they don’t give up and turn around.
I’ll take my shoes off when I’m hiking if the trail is clear, loving the freedom of dirt in between my toes. So my one good foot being bare isn’t too much of an issue. It’s the other one I need to come up with a solution for.
I tear back into my shirt once it’s dry, biting a tiny, puckered hole with my canines that I widen with my fingertip, then I push my whole finger through. I rip off a section from the bottom as wide as my hand, and loop one end over my right arm and let the other end dangle near my ass. It’s not easy, but I get my bad foot up and hook it through the other end, looking back over my shoulder and inching the makeshift sling down to my ankle.
It’s not bad. My heel is practically touching my butt, and my knee will be screaming in a few hours, but the wound is out of the dirt and I don’t have to waste a bunch of energy holding my leg up.
The next thing I need is a goal. When my familiarity with punching got me kicked off the basketball team and Dad suggested the nonconfrontational sport of cross-country, I was less than enthused. I wanted to be in it, fighting for something, swinging elbows while I grappled for the ball.
My attitude must have been obvious on the first day of practice, ’cause Coach pulled me aside and told me I looked like I wanted to fight somebody. I told him maybe I did, and what the hell kind of competition is there in running?
“Competition?” Coach had asked, pushing his hat back off his forehead. “Okay, tell you what, smart-ass. Give me three miles, then come back and see what kind of fight you got left in you.”
I had shit left, but I took his point. My opponent was myself, the very deep pain that welled within me from mile one the only thing I had to overcome to keep going. I couldn’t run the whole three, puked twice, and got back to Coach with swollen feet and a blister the size of my ass on one heel.
He’d pulled me up off the ground, settled my palms on top of my head so I could take deeper breaths, and said, “Tomorrow, try harder.”
Coach saw me for who I was right from the beginning—someone who wasn’t going to back down from that kind of an insult. So I came back the next day and tried harder, and the next, pushing past pain to the runner’s wall, where the only things that exists are your feet, the ground, and a point in the distance.
Which is exactly what I need right now. A point in the distance.
“Today you’re going to walk two miles in one direction,” I say aloud, making it official. There is no response, not even that one chatty squirrel. Just the wind, taking my words.
I didn’t make a fire last night, but I’ve got to leave something behind so that if anyone is looking for me, they’ll know I was here, and where I went after. I gather enough stones to form an arrow, pointing the direction I’ll be headed once I set out.
The first bit of luck to find me comes in the form of a walking stick I spot nearby, with a notch at just the height for my armpit. It’s not a perfect crutch, but perfection is pretty far from reach, since I haven’t eaten in twenty-four hours and am currently a free bleeder.
I tuck it under my arm, leaning gingerly forward to see if it’ll support my weight. It does, and I take first one hop, then another. I’m hunched like an old woman and swearing like an old man, but I’m moving.
“All right, Ashley Hawkins,” I say, squaring my shoulders as best I can while using a crutch. “Go be a badass.” And with that, I inch forward.
Water will always follow the path of least resistance, something I don’t have the luxury of doing. It will split around rocks, make turns to avoid tree roots, then head back the other way like maybe it left the stove on at home. And while this makes for a lovely postcard, it is a bitch of a thing when you need to head in one direction but stay hydrated at the same time.
Dad has always been proud of the fact that I know which way I’m pointed, no matter where we go. He says people these days are so stupid they couldn’t find north if their nose was magnetized, and from what I’ve seen on the trails, this is somewhat true. My innate sense of direction has always been a point of pride for me, and more than once I’ve had to correct Duke about which path to take in order to reach where we were headed.
Granted, it’s easy to lose your bearings. Most make the excuse it’s because everything looks the same in the woods, but that’s like saying we’re all pink on the inside. If you pay attention, there’s as much difference between one tree and the next as there is in people. I know I won’t end up walking in circles for these reasons—I know which way I’m pointing, and I pay attention to everything I pass.
What can happen though—and will—is that no matter how hard I try to walk in a straight line west—which should be the shortest route out of here—I’m going to pull to the south because I’m leaning that way due to my injury. And it’s impossible to walk in a straight line in the woods anyway, for the same reason blue lines of water on maps are curvy messes.