Page 62 of Falling Slowly
“Why do you carry that? Do you smoke?”
“Are you looking to bum a cigarette?”
“No. I just never thought of you as a smoker.”
“I’m not. I took this from Trevor last time he decided to quit.”
“And then he bought a new one the next day?”
“Probably.”
Trevor announcing he was going to quit smoking was a running office joke.
“Are you one of his accountability buddies?” I asked, desperate to think about something safe and familiar, like the burly Scottish copywriter who smoked like a chimney.
“I think he needs someone like you. Someone who can kill with one look.”
I tried to relax my face. I might have been shooting some fairly sharp eye-daggers at him. But only because the alternative was full-blown panic city.
“Let’s walk up a bit and I’ll use my seventh sense to detect the perfect campsite.” Charlie gestured at the path.
“Seventh?”
“I’m already using my sixth sense to monitor your emotional state in the dark.”
“Oh, really? What is my emotional state?” I crossed my arms, fighting the chill that crept in through the sleeves.
“Hangry.”
I nodded. “I’m also terrified and freezing.”
“I was going to say!”
“Your sixth sense is really slow.”
I whipped around and started powering up the path, as fast as I could in the faint glow of Charlie’s phone light. I could only make out the rough direction of the path. The darkness had already swallowed the details, including the rocks and roots I kept stumbling over. Still, it felt good to move. Do something. The plan wasn’t great, but at least there was a plan. We wouldn’t die here tonight. I’d decided that much, even if I berated myself for being stupid enough to follow him off the path to see the elk. Why? If I was that desperate to stare at animals, I could always save up to visit the zoo and see the fat gorilla touching himself in the corner.
The path twisted left and right, leading us up the hill. Finally, we came to a small clearing. Charlie took my hand and led me off the path. I heard the sound of water before we found the small stream. “Perfect! In the morning, we follow this down the hill,” he said. “That’s the best way to get back to civilization.”
“How do you know that?”
“It’s something my grandfather used to say. If you get lost in the mountains, find a stream and follow it down. Settlements are built around water sources.”
It made sense, but first we had to survive the night.
“So, what does your seventh sense say?” I asked, letting him lead me across the high grass.
I should have pulled my hand away, but I couldn’t. It was the only part of my body not shivering and terrified.
“I can sense a great camping spot right about… here.” He stopped abruptly and I bumped into his side, grabbing his arm for balance.
“Here? Why?”
He lifted his useless phone flashlight. “There’s a big rock that way. It offers us some protection. And trees on the other side.”
“I can’t see anything,” I insisted, but after a little while, I noticed the shape of a larger rock. Either that or a black hole that was going to swallow us.
Charlie pulled me closer until we stood by the shape. Definitely a rock.
