Page 181 of Three Reckless Words

I picked the forest near Solitude because it felt appropriate, the other side that must be a few miles from the cabin.

I couldn’t set off from the property itself. That would have hurt too much.

Instead, I picked a parking lot farther up the road and headed for the trail winding into the woods.

I’ll only spend a night or two here, I decide. Just a nice healing breather, surrounded by pretty trees, then it’s back to real life.

At some point, I’ll call Lyssie to help plot my next move, and try to line up a rental car before I blast off from Kansas City.

It’s funny how walking makes time melt away.

I hike along until my sneakers rub and my legs feel like rubber and my shoulders are killing me from the hefty backpack I brought along. I leave my car behind because I’m sure Dad will have it repossessed soon enough.

It’s only as the sun sets and soaring trees start casting shadows on every good camping spot that I stop and realize I have no earthly clue how to set up this tent.

Or make a fire without a portable burner.

Or do… anything.

Brilliant, Winnie.

In the end, after panicking for a hot minute, I just toss my sleeping bag on a bare spot of ground, tent abandoned, and dig into cold chili from a can.

Yes, it’s as gross as it sounds.

To settle my stomach, I flop back to watch the night sky, so obscured by those big crisscrossing branches overhead that I can only make out the occasional star.

In another life, it might be peaceful, but my legs ache like mad from a few hours of hiking over rugged ground.

My heart lurches at every single noise—and there are a lot of them tonight.

This is a forest, after all. I should’ve realized how spooky andbusyforests get at night. Every second, another bush rustles or some animal calls out.

I have to bite back a scream.

It’s dark and cold and I’m exposed.

I have to do serious convincing to reassure myself there’s not a murdery axeman with a pyramid for a head threatening to kill me, or even a bunch of dumb teenagers with fireworks. No rabid foxes or werewolves around these parts, no sir.

But there could be a bear…

Black bears still roam around some parts of Missouri, and I think they getreallyhungry in late summer before they bulk up for winter hibernation. They’re pretty rare around Kansas City, I think, but sometimes a straggler with a growling belly strays this far north.

Jesus, I don’t know.

I never learned much about bears, and now that I’m here on their turf, it feels like an oversight. Wasn’t there something about standing still if one approaches? Or are you supposed to run? I can’t remember.

God, everything here isso loud.

The many eerie noises aren’t helping me think.

Even if I could sleep, I’d still be pissed at the noise. It’s insects mostly, although sometimes I hear a muffled grunt or a twig snapping from something that totally can’t be a bear.

If I hear an earsplitting howl, I’m out.

So I dig into my sleeping bag, feeling every bump and stone under me.

If I’m honest with myself, the worst part of this whole situation is the fact that I walked away from Archer in the blink of an eye.

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