The Trail

by Meika Hashimoto

  Jake looks up from his comic book. “Oh, that? It’s a booby trap. Have you ever heard of a night raid?”

  I shake my head.

  “Night-raiding is a time-honored tradition of sneaking into another hut in the dead of dark and stealing as many special objects as we can without getting caught. If you take a look at the hut dining rooms, you’ll see objects that the crews have collected over the years and hung up for decoration. Road signs, mostly. Some of the objects are more coveted than others and are often booby-trapped to make them more difficult to steal.”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, back in the 1950s and 1960s the prize item was a human skull that had been smuggled out of an abandoned logging camp. In 1969, a Cessna plane crashed on Mount Washington and its front propeller made it into the huts, though it disappeared a few years back.”

  Jake scratches his chin. “There’s a stuffed pink boa constrictor named Vicky. A megaphone taken from Rutgers University.” He nods at the cup. “Take a peek at where that fishing line goes and tell me what you see.”

  I hop out of the hammock to inspect the cup. The fishing line is almost invisible, but I trace it out the window and down to the handle of a weathered rowing oar hanging on the dining room wall. “An oar?”

  “Yep. That oar is one of the special items. It was used in the Olympic Games in the 1970s. Right now it’s the most valuable raid item in the huts. If someone tries to take it down, they’ll trigger the fishing line to tip over the cup, spilling the spoons and waking us up. There is also a row of spoons hidden behind the oar, so even if the fishing line is cut, there would still be a ruckus if the oar is moved.” Jake grins. “Every once in a while a guest gets hit with a falling spoon, but they’re generally good-natured about it when we explain its purpose.”

  Jake returns to his comic book, and I go back to the hammock. I pull a blanket over myself and fall asleep to the smells of baking bread and cooling brownies.

  “POWER RAAAAAAIIIIID!!!”

  I awaken to the sound of spoons clattering and voices shouting in the dining room. Jake is halfway out the door and pounding down the stairs before I tumble out of the hammock. The cup is no longer there. I rush to the window—it has been yanked down and lies broken amid the tossed spoons on the dining room floor.

  A girl with brown hair pulled into a tight ponytail is holding the paddle of the oar while a guy with spiky blue hair and a tie-dyed T-shirt is using a Swiss Army knife to slice the fishing line off the handle. Another guy, with dreadlocks, has climbed on top of one of the benches and is busily removing a No Parking sign from the wall.

  My heart jumps into my throat. I want to run down there and tackle the raiding crew, but the guys pulling down the oar look big. And determined. I feel helpless. I’d be easy for them to squash like a bug if I tried to fight them.

  Jake comes into view, a howling tornado of protest. He grabs the middle of the oar and leaps onto a dining room table, wrapping his body into a human knot around the wooden shaft. “You’re not getting the oar, Pete,” he yells.

  “Hi, Jake!” the blue-haired guy says cheerfully. “I do believe I am getting the oar. Hannah, check and see if anyone’s upstairs. We need to make sure that Jake’s the only one around.”

  The girl with the ponytail nods. Panicked, I duck down from the window and crawl under the bunk bed as I hear footsteps climb the stairs. I scrunch up and try to make myself as still and silent as possible.

  Two neon-yellow sneakers appear in the doorway. I can see flecks of mud and dirt on the shoelaces as they wind up to make little bows below a pair of gray wool socks. The sneakers step into the room and approach the bunk bed. They are so close. I swear the girl can feel my heart thumping like a jackrabbit’s against the wooden floor.

  “Pete, there’s no one up here!” Hannah calls down from the window.

  The neon sneakers take one more turn around the room before they finally leave, and I remember to breathe again. I wriggle out from under the bed and take a quick look through the crew window.

  “George, get the duct tape!” Pete barks to the dreadlocked guy, who is trying unsuccessfully to peel Jake off the oar. George grabs a roll of tape and tosses it to Hannah before joining Pete.

  Together the two burly guys pry Jake off the oar—first his fingers, then his arms, then his legs and reluctant feet. Hannah is waiting with duct tape. They hold him down while she winds the tape around his hands and his ankles until he is completely immobile. With a flourish, Pete rips off one last piece of tape and seals it across Jake’s mouth.

  Once Jake is taped up, Pete, Hannah, and George go to town on the dining room, unscrewing bolts and pulling out nails to free all the decorations until the walls are bare. They pile up the signs they have taken and tie them to wooden packboards they have brought with them before carrying them to the front porch.

  Pete picks up the oar and lashes it to his packboard using a length of twine. He takes his time, looping and knotting the twine tightly to make it extra secure. He gives the oar a loud kiss and carries it reverentially to the porch. When he returns, he smacks his lips together. “Snack time, anyone?”

  Pete and the other two raiding crew members disappear below me, into the kitchen. I hear them shuffling about, raiding more than just signs and the oar.

  Jake has been placed on top of a dining room table. He looks up and sees me. His head tilts a little and his eyes fixate on the front porch for a moment, then jump back over to me.

  I know what he wants me to do. It scares me. I can handle the woods. I don’t know if I can handle people. Especially confident, ridiculously in-shape college kids who would kill me if they caught me.

  C’mon, Toe. Don’t be a chicken. It’s Lucas. In my head again.

  I take a deep breath and look around the crew room. On the table next to the radio, a pair of pink scissors is jammed into a widemouthed mason jar along with black permanent markers and pens. I pick up the scissors. My hands are shaking so hard that I nearly jab myself as I tuck them in my pocket.

  There is a door in the crew room that leads to a metal catwalk over the backyard. I open it quietly and tiptoe across it. The kitchen windows are open and directly below me. I can hear Pete laughing as he crunches on something. I reach the end of the catwalk and make a wide counterclockwise circle to the front of the hut.

  Ducking below the dining room windows, I drop to my hands and knees to crawl over to the packboards on one of the porches. Both porch doors have been propped wide open, and I can see Jake slumped on the front dining room table. He slides his eyes over to me, and I give him a quick nod.

  As quietly as I can, I begin cutting the twine pinning the oar to Pete’s packboard. My hands wobble like crazy. Pete tied some good knots, and it takes several tries before they give way to the multipurpose shears.

  “Yo, Jake, want some crackers?” The voice sounds like it’s right next to me.

  I look up. George is standing in front of Jake holding a box of Triscuits. He only has to swing his head left to see me through the doorway, a twelve-year-old nothing of a kid, crouched above the most precious raid item in the entire huts system.

  George rips off the duct tape keeping Jake silent. He pulls out a cracker and makes dive-bombing sounds as he swoops it toward Jake’s mouth. The cracker starts curving left.

  “Hey, man, can you stir the soup and take out the bread?” Jake asks.

  “Yeah, no problem.” The cracker flies back to center and is fed to Jake. George throws a handful of Triscuits down the hatch, then heads back to the kitchen, munching.

  I slide my hands around the center of the oar and hoist it up. The paddle end is heavier than I realize, and it rises two inches before gravity takes over and it thunks gently onto the floorboards.

  I wince. One of the raid crew must have heard me. I wait a few agonizing seconds, but no one comes out to inspect the noise. I breathe in quiet shallow gulps as I shift my grip and swing the oar sideways. Waddling under the weight, I move off the porch.r />
  There is a short bark. Moose runs over to me, his tail wagging. He has woken from his nap at exactly the wrong moment.

  “Shh.” I bend down to quiet him, nearly ramming the oar into the ground. I swing it up at the last second and motion for Moose to follow me down the trail. When we get about twenty yards away from the hut I hear someone shouting. We’ve been found out.

  I crash off the trail and into the woods. I nearly eat dirt when the oar dips down and rams into the ground. I sprawl forward and just barely catch myself on Moose’s skinny back. He whines and holds still while I get my feet back under me.

  I yank the oar level again and keep going, trying to keep all eight feet of it from wobbling out of balance again. It seems to bang on every bush and tree that I pass, but it doesn’t hit the ground again.

  A hundred yards later, I stop, panting hard. I prop the oar against a maple tree and quiet my breath. I wait for the sounds of pursuit, but none come. I sit on a rock with Moose by my side and we wait.

  After an hour, I am convinced that I’ve waited long enough. I carry the oar back until I can see the trail, then stash it behind an old rotting log.

  When I get back to the hut, the signs on the front porch are gone. I tell Moose to stay outside and head in. Jake is in the kitchen, digging a spoon into a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey ice cream. When he sees me, he grins. “You got the oar?”

  I nod.

  Jake laughs. “The crew from Greenleaf are mighty mad. They couldn’t figure out where it went. I think I’ve convinced them that Zealand has a ghost thief.”

  Ghost thief. I could get used to the name. Sounds wily.

  Jake goes to the freezer and removes a second pint. It’s Phish Food. Chocolate ice cream with chocolate fish swimming in marshmallows swirls. My favorite.

  Jake hands me the pint and a spoon. “For you.”

  “Where’d you get it?”

  “Whether or not a raid is successful, it is tradition for raiding crew members to offer tokens of consolation to the crew that gets raided. In this case, we are the lucky winners of two pints of Ben and Jerry’s.”

  “So that was a power raid,” I say as Jake and I gobble and slurp down our pints.

  “Yup,” Jake says, licking his spoon. “It’s more risky than a night raid. If any of my crew had stayed around, we could have shut them down.” He pats me on the back. “But they weren’t. And we still have the oar. I’m glad you were here, Tony.”

  After we finish the ice cream, I show Jake where I hid the oar, and we spend the afternoon rigging it to the wall. When we are done, it is the only decoration in the dining room. But it is enough. As I stare at one of the silver spoons peeking out from the oar’s paddle, a flicker of pride shoots through me. I did it. I helped Jake out and didn’t screw everything up. I can protect things.

  It feels like my bad luck is turning. I think of Andy’s marble, safely tucked away in my pack. Once again, it seems to be working.

  AS EVENING COMES, Jake invites me to grab a spare bunk and spend the night. I look around the hut. It is nearly six o’clock, and most of the guests spending the night have already arrived. There are at least two dozen people milling around the dining room. It’s too dangerous. Too many people.

  Then again, my goal for the day, Ethan Pond Shelter, is still five miles away. I don’t want to be stuck making camp after dark again. I’ve already learned that lesson. “Do you know any place nearby where I could camp?” I ask Jake.

  Jake nods. “There’s a stealth site just down the trail. Once you come to an intersection and take a right, start looking on your right. You’ll see it in a few hundred feet.”

  “Thanks. I think I’ll set up there for the night,” I tell him. “Too many people snore in the bunk rooms.” I don’t want to tell him the real reason I’ve been avoiding the huts at night.

  Before I leave, Jake gives me an extra loaf of bread for the road. “Be careful,” he warns me. “It’s gonna be a scorcher of a day tomorrow.”

  Moose is waiting for me on the steps outside of the hut. I tear off a few hunks of bread and toss them to him. “C’mon, boy,” I say. “Let’s get going.”

  We head down a short, steep rocky section that ends abruptly in smooth, flat ground. I take a right at the intersection and start hunting for the stealth site like Jake told me to. Even though he told me it was easy to find, it takes a few back-and-forths before I spot the narrow bushwhack trail leading down to it.

  I set down my pack and fire up my stove, cooking up two boxes of Annie’s mac and cheese. As I spoon out half on the ground for Moose to eat, it occurs to me that I should be getting him some proper dog food. And a dog bowl. And maybe a leash for when we have to cross real roads. To keep him safe.

  It’ll add a couple of pounds to my pack. And it’ll cost more than I budgeted for. I think about the shrinking roll of bills in my backpack. I would have to be very careful to have enough to buy food for me plus Moose.

  I look over at Moose, where he is lapping up his dinner in fast, hungry gulps. He looks up with his scruffy face and gives me a huge doggy smile, and I know he’s worth it.

  As soon as he has gobbled up every bite of his dinner, Moose trots over to where I’m sitting with my pot of macaroni. He noses his way in between my legs. I lift up my pot and look down at him. He woofs and wags his tail. I shake my head. “No, you can’t have my dinner,” I scold him.

  Moose raises his eyebrows and gives me the most pathetic sad little puppy eyes look. It completely destroys me. “Oh, you are good,” I grumble. I reach into my pack and pull out the rest of the bread. I decide to eat fast, so by the time Moose is done with his dinner, my plate is empty and I’m not tempted to give him more macaroni.

  As I gobble down the rest of my dinner, I pull out my map. It’s thirteen miles to Mizpah Spring Hut, the next hut down the trail. There’s a tentsite nearby, where I figure I can stay for my next night.

  Thirteen miles. I smile to myself. When I first started out, I was barely making ten miles a day. I thought it would be a miracle if I could hold the pace. Now, after nearly a week on the trail, and especially after the mileage I pulled yesterday, I know I can make it.

  I lick the last bit of mac and cheese off my spoon and stand up. There is a small stream nearby, and I walk down to it to clean my cookware. As I’m finishing up, I hear barking from the campsite.

  Moose. He’s in danger.

  I grab my stuff and run back to the site in time to see Moose circling a great big bearded man wearing a dirty rust-colored backpack.

  I’m about to scream at the man, to tell him to get away from my dog, when the man stoops down to Moose and holds his hand out.

  “Here, boy,” he says. His voice is deep and calm.

  My stomach flips back right side up as I see him reach over and gently scratch behind Moose’s ears. “Hi,” I say hesitantly.

  The man looks up. “This your puppy?”

  I nod. “Moose, settle.”

  Moose trots over to me. I reach down and scratch his belly. “Be good.”

  The man straightens. “Mind if I camp here with you tonight? I’m thru-hiking and didn’t want to stay at the hut, so they told me to come this way.”

  “Not at all.” A jolt of excitement jumps through me. I’ve never met a bona fide thru-hiker before. “I’m Toby.” My real name slips out before I can catch it.

  The man nods. “Name’s Wingin’ It.”

  “Wingin’ It?”

  “It’s my trail name. When I’m in town I like to order buckets of chicken wings and chow down.” He shrugs. “I also don’t plan much.” He sets down his pack. “Hate to be rude, but I gotta get something to eat before my gut digests itself.”

  Wingin’ It gets to work on his dinner while I pitch my tent, driving the stakes into the rocky ground. After I set down my sleeping pad and fluff up my bag, I jam all my food into my bear bag and go to find a place to sling it up. As I walk by Wingin’ It, he is just settling into his dinner, a massive helpin
g of ramen noodles. I spot four empty noodle packages curled up in a plastic trash bag.

  Wingin’ It is on the ground leaning back against a fallen log. “Sit down and have a chat,” he tells me.

  If I had been Lucas, I would have already been bugging Wingin’ It with a million questions. What’s the whole trail like? What was your favorite part? Did you ever almost give up, and if so, where and why?

  But I’m not Lucas. I’m me. The kid standing behind the kid asking the questions.

  I hesitate. I’m about to tell Wingin’ It that I’m just going to hang up my bear bag and go to bed, but then Moose trots over to the thru-hiker and casually plops down next to him. He gives Wingin’ It his devastating puppy eyes look.

  Wingin’ It picks out one long string of ramen and dangles it in front of Moose. Moose catches it on his nose and licks it up.

  I sigh. If Moose is going to be social, then so am I. I settle against the fallen log and stare as Wingin’ It wolfs down the steaming noodles. He eats faster than Moose. When he’s finished with the ramen, he slurps down the soup and belches. “That was good.” He sighs. “When you’re hiking miles upon miles every day, there’s just no way that you can keep up with feeding yourself. You’re ravenous all the time.”

  “What’s the hungriest you have felt?” I ask.

  Wingin’ It gives me a long, contemplative stare. “Now that’s a story,” he says slowly. “I’ll tell you for some dessert.”

  I dig through my bear bag and pull out two Snickers bars. Wingin’ It solemnly accepts them. He peels open the wrapper on one of them, bites down, and chews appreciatively. When he has licked the chocolate off his fingers, he is ready to begin.

  “SOME WEEKS AGO I was on this one stretch down in Vermont. It’s a piece of trail where you’ll cross a couple of country roads, but you won’t see a single gas station or convenience store the whole way. It’s about three days of travel before you can even think about a resupply.

  “I was traveling with another thru-hiker, named Arsenic. I had met him in Connecticut, shortly after passing the New York state line. We hiked at the same pace, so we more or less found ourselves camping together for about two weeks before we got to those three days in Vermont.