The young man, maybe thirty years old, sat
by the brook and took his shoes off. He rapidly put his feet on the water and
trembled a bit before the cold water relaxed his pain. He had been walking for
at least two days without stopping and his feet really needed a rest. He had
blisters and burns so the last stretch of his walk had been especially painful.
But he finally got to the brook the map indicated and he knew he was going to
be all right, at least for the time being.
Rains had come and go the past few days. It
never really stayed but, when it did, it appeared to wash down every single
part of the forest. He was afraid that rain may come back and wash down the
river the few things he still had but he had to stop and he would have to take
care of things when they happened and not before. So in a matter of minutes he
had taken the tent out of his backpack and had started the installation. At one
point, he had to take his feet out of the water, which he didn’t like so he
tried to put up the tent fast. When the night came, he ate some bread and fruit
he had kept from other days and decided to lay down for a bit at the edge of
the water; his feet again soaking there.
He put a sweater beneath his head and started
looking at the stars. It was amazing how amazing the sky looked out there, in
the wild. Back in any town or big city, the sky was normally dead, only a
couple of stars visible. But there, it was like looking at a huge picture of
the universe. Actually, that was exactly what it was. He remembered reading how
all we see in the sky happened a long time ago and he started wondering how
many intelligent beings were looking at the sky thinking exactly the same he
was pondering on.
The man fell asleep right there, feet on the
water. He didn’t woke up during the night, only turned over, adjusting his
pillow. Although the weather had not being very good, it was still spring and
sunny days were not unheard of in this region of the world. The wilderness was
a beautiful place to be during spring because everything came alive: the
animals, the flowers and even humans could feel that surge of life coming out
of them. When the man woke up, he felt the smell of the flowers growing by the
water. He stood up and realized his body ached a bit but not much more than when
he slept inside the tent, in a sleeping bag. He tried to stand up but his feet
hurt a lot and the roots and stones by the edge of the water didn’t really
help.
It was hard, but he managed to take off all
of his clothes, leave them on a small pile by the tent and then walk straight
to the brook, that had become wider during the night. The water reached his
ankles when standing up but that was good enough for taking a proper bath,
which he hadn’t done in a long time. He scrubbed his skin with his fingers and
nails and did the same all over. He got his hair wet too and tried doing funny
hairstyles until he realized they only worked when bathing with shampoo, which
he obviously wouldn’t use in this pristine environment.
When he was almost ready, scrubbing his neck,
he suddenly felt something strange. He felt someone was near. He looked around
but didn’t see any anyone, not human or animal. He continued with his bath but
then he heard the grass and turned around fast, as a fox ran away from him. The
man smiled, amused by the curiosity of the creature. He stood up, in pain, and
walk clumsily to his tent were he had a towel to get dry. Then, again, he saw
the red fox getting near through tall grass that grew where the forest begin
again. His dried fast and kneeled in order to get his camera. When he did, the
fox was out of the grass, looking straight at him. The man took a couple of
pictures but the animal was scared by the sound of the shutter.
He stayed naked for a while, as he decided the
day was warm enough not to wear clothes and no one was going to be there anyway
to look at him. As he was not fit for a long walk, he tried to come up with
something to do while his feet got a little bit better. He his feet on the
water again and took pictures of everything that was around him. Birds were
starting to sing, feeling the gentler weather of the day. Some butterflies also
flew over the stream and some squirrels, but nothing as big as the fox that
apparently was now far from there.
When putting away the camera, the hiker
realized he food only for a couple of days: two slices of bread, some berries,
and honey he had gotten from a fallen hive and the last piece of a rabbit. He
decided to cook that, as it was about to get bad. He lit up the small burner
and cooked the meat. He hoped no big animals were nearby, because the smell was
pretty strong for such a small piece of meat. He ate it with a slice of bread
and a few sips of water from the stream. He washed the pan on which he had
cooked the meat and decided it was best if he moved his camping site, in order
to prevent the arrival of a bear or a wolf.
A few minutes after, he had his backpack on
and had started walking along the stream. He was still naked, which felt oddly
liberating. He didn’t see the point in wearing clothes in such a remote area
and, after all, bonding with nature was better if you tried to be just as
nature. He kept walking for more than an hour until he realized the more he
walked, the more trees started to appear on either side of the stream, which
seemed to have decreased in size, more like the brook he had seen the day
before. Rain mustn’t have been strong so the river had no way of staying large.
He walked some more until he reached a nice patch of mossy grass. He set up
camp there and decided to lie down, his feet hurting a lot again.
Maybe it was because of the pain or because he
had gotten tired from the walk, but he felt asleep again, just after putting up
his tent. The weird thing this time was that he overslept and woke up at night.
He had n way of knowing the time but he knew it was very late as even the only
sound came from the water of the stream. He didn’t stood up when waking up, he
just lay there and thought about a dream he had often: it was a bout him
feeling stressed, in fear, unable to breath. When having that nightmare, he
often heard many voices, some known, some others not. Because of that dream, he
had sweated as he slept and know his body felt deprived of energy.
Trying to forget what he had seen and heard,
he stood up and ate some of the berries he had in his backpack. He then walked
to the edge of the water and put his feet on it. He ate every single berry
trying to think about his past, about the people he had left behind and the
thoughts that still hurt him. He didn’t really wanted to think about it but the
nightmare had put everything back on his mind. He had travelled from a very far
place to this forest in order to find peace and calm but that seemed to be
almost impossible. It was just like everything he had attempted to leave behind
had found its way there and now it was acting up again.
The last berry on his hand fell to the ground
and rolled over a bit farther. He tried to get it but then a small animal came
out of the bushed and bit the fruit first. Then two more animals just like the first
one but smaller, came out of the bushes too. It was a family of hedgehogs. Each
one bit a small piece of the berry and finished it in a glimpse. They all
looked at the man and he attempted to touch them but the remembered their
spines. He then looked around for more berries and realized a nearby tree had
small apricot-like fruits on it. He stood up slowly, walking with care, and
grabbed four of the fruits from the tree. He put them in front of the hedgehogs
and waited.
He waited until the small creatures started
biting the fruit and eating. They filled up on just two of them and smelled the
man, apparently thanking him for the food. They turned around and disappeared
by the bushes, probably to get some sleep. This event had taken the man out of
his mind and reminded him he had to sleep again in order to restart his walk
the next day. His feet still hurt but he couldn’t afford to stop his journey
because of it. This time, he did go inside of them and the sleeping bag.
He didn’t sleep a lot and woke up very early.
He put everything on the backpack fast; put on some shorts and started walking
through the forest once again. Later that day, he arrived at one of several
posts in the forest, where a park ranger told him people had been looking for
him, fearing he was lost or worse. He thank the man for his worries and decided
to tell him that, sometimes, he just needed some time by himself to keep on
breathing correctly.
