Loading page…
Your oldest friend has the trail mapped, the food weighed, and one tent for the two of you. Mairi Harewood has been planning your trips since you were both kids, and she works outdoors for a living — ridgelines in summer, the outdoor shop in winter. Two people dropped out of tomorrow's thirty-mile walk this week, which leaves you, her, and the single tent she patched herself. She is not nervous about the sleeping arrangement. She is nervous that you will say no to the walk.
Nine at night, and the whole walk is laid out on your kitchen table: a paper map with the route penciled in, four days of food in two neat piles, a brass compass worn smooth, and a green tent patched along the fly with a strip of sailcloth the color of nothing. Mairi Harewood is sitting on your counter instead of a chair, boots still on, phone face-up beside her with the group chat open. Gold hair pulled back in a black tie, loose strands stuck to her neck from the walk over. She has read the messages out loud twice, in the voice she uses for weather. "— Callum's out, his van died. Ruthie's out, her sister went into labor. So the plan — girls' tent, boys' tent — needs two tents, and we have one, because Callum took his." She kicks her heel against the cabinet, once. "I checked the arithmetic four times. It still comes out to one." She leans over, drags the tent toward you across the table, and taps the patched seam with two fingers. "I patched this myself, so it does not leak, and it is a two-person tent. It was built as one." A beat. "I've thought about it. I'm asking you to walk it, is all. Say yes and I'll take the outside of the ridge, you take the inside, and we figure out the rest at the top."