Becoming Odyssa - Jennifer Pharr Davis [84]
There was a trio of voices: one happy female soprano, one angry male baritone, and another female who just sounded belligerent. The entourage sat on the pavilion steps, lit a joint, and started passing it around. At first, they were oblivious to our presence, and neither Raptor nor I moved a muscle. But when they spotted our sleeping bags, the hazing began.
“Damn thru-hikers coming to town,” the man said, raising his voice.
“Stinkin’ hippies!” shouted the woman, followed by an unsettling laugh from the other female.
Then they started whispering, and actually succeeded in not letting us hear what they were saying—except the woman who couldn’t control her laughter.
“He he, yeah, we should do it. Ha ha ha.”
Then there was silence.
The three of them stood up and stumbled away, the woman’s laughter occasionally flaring up in the distance.
I heard a noise coming from Raptor’s end of the shelter.
“Psst. Raptor, are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m just getting my pocketknife out of my pack.”
“Do you think they’re coming back?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
I lay awake, listening for any unusual noises. The wind was blowing hard, which made it difficult to hear anything else, until the thunder started. It grew louder and was followed by heavy rain and bright lightning. I was thankful for the storm. I hoped that if the Port Clinton residents had made any plans to come back to the pavilion, the weather would deter them.
The rain lasted a long, long time. The downpour washed away some of my fear, and before the end of the storm, I was asleep.
I awoke later that night to a noise in the distance. At first I thought it was more thunder, but as it grew louder, it seemed more like a churning sound. It grew louder and louder, and then I could feel the floorboards of the pavilion begin to vibrate through my sleeping pad.
I was anxious and frustrated because I couldn’t figure out what was happening. I slept so heavily on the trail that waking up in the middle of the night always left me disoriented. It seemed that if I couldn’t figure out what was coming toward me, it would consume me. Then I heard the whistle—a train.
I hadn’t seen the railroad tracks when we set up in the pavilion, but they must have been close, because even though I covered my ears to muffle the sound, I could still hear rocks from the tracks hitting the side of the building.
After the roaring freight train passed, I didn’t go back to sleep. I just lay on my back with my eyes open, waiting for the sky to lighten.
As soon as the dawn greeted the darkness, I packed up and walked over to Raptor. He was still asleep, with his pocketknife clutched in his hand.
“Hey, Raptor,” I whispered.
He awoke immediately, his eyes wide open, as if he had tried to be vigilant even in his sleep.
“Hey, I just wanted to let you know I’m leaving. I wanna get out of this town.”
“I’m right behind you,” he said.
I wanted to leave Port Clinton as quickly as possible. Originally, I had planned to take a rest day to care for my feet, but now I just wanted to get back on the trail. However, I knew I couldn’t leave without new socks.
It amazed me that socks were such an important piece of equipment. I had experienced enough discomfort by now to know that it wasn’t my shoes causing the pain, it was my socks—or, really, the combination of my socks and the weather. The wicking socks I bought in Roanoke were great, but switching back to a synthetic pair made me miserable. And whether it was from rain, sweat, morning dew, or a river crossing, it seemed that my synthetic socks were always wet. Wet feet in wet socks led to stinky, bleeding, crumbly white feet with polka dots. The rocky terrain in Pennsylvania just exacerbated the situation.
I knew I wouldn’t find socks for sale, let alone wicking socks, in Port Clinton. I had asked at the restaurant the night before, and a man sitting at the bar told me there was an outdoor store ten miles down the road. I needed