2019-07-10 - Through the Woods

Up in the one of the Bayside towers, Unit 503, Sutton sits on her couch drinking a glass of wine. To either side of her are laundry baskets full of freshly washed and folded clothes. Productivity and wine. Not a great sign in the land of Sutton.

She looks across the room, at the jacket hanging on the rack, one left by a recent visitor who hauled ass so fast he left it behind. After a sip of wine, her second glass, she rises from the couch and heads across the room, leaving her wine behind. She unhooks the jacket and reaches into the inside pocket, pulling out a motel key and a blank pad of paper. She puts those back.

She shoves a hand into the side pocket, then turns, and takes that with her back to the couch, where she sits and begins removing items one by one.

Sutton pulls a handful of things from one of the jacket pockets, a bunch of shiny nickles (24), and some jolly ranchers (6) still in their wrappers, a mouse trap, and a chocolate bar. She makes a little pile on top of the coffee table.

Two chocolate bars, a silver chain without a pendant attached, though there's a jump ring for one, an old five pound note, two orange and yellow train tickets (English), a receipt entirely in Korean, some crumbs, and a bit of orange peel. Sutton dumps them on the table, brushing her hand off on her knee. "Little slobby, but I've seen worse." She considers the pile, fingers the chain, then takes one of the chocolate bars and stands, leaving the coat folded across the table's edge.

Sutton leans against the coat after she's hung it, pulling it tight against the hook of the rack. She sighs, then releases both hands, tipping back. "This is getting old."

Sutton rubs her forehead, reaches for her North Face jacket, the one she wears hiking, and says softly, to herself, "I know." She pulls it on and pulls open the door, letting it swing closed behind her as she makes her way down along the hall toward the elevator.

Sometime later, after she's walked the entire distance to the trailhead on the Outskirts of Gray Harbor, which is not the shortest of walks in itself, it's gotten significantly dimmer. A smarter person would turn around immediately and head back along the road, careful of oncoming traffic. She's just angry enough to cross the road, cross the clearing, and head into the trails, to walk off some of the anger, hurt, and general pissiness before returning the handful of miles back into town, and the Bayside Apartments on the overlook.

"You are not afraid of random wolf attacks in the fucking woods. You're an adult with mace. Get over it."

As pep talks go, this one is wine-fueled and less than stellar. She tromps into the woods and makes her way along the only trail she's been on once before. She makes her way over and deep along one bend in the path, over a footbridge that crosses a little creek which widens into what might be more accurately called a stream. She moves along it, up a hill, sliding in the mud, dropping to knee at least once, which will bruise, and makes her way along past a fallen stump big enough to stop and have lunch on, for instance.

She keeps going until she comes to a second small clearing with a large fallen log, and finds a place to finally stop after another slip, this time hard enough to land in some mud and knock some sense into her.

Ten minutes into her think, Sutton mutters, "This is the best fucking idea I've had this month." And so she does what any self-respecting city employee with a free moment would do — pulls out her phone to play Candy Crush for a while.

One level advanced and all her lives later, which really doesn't take that long considering the chocolate fountains were invented by Satan, she looks up and takes stock of her situation. Still pissed at Carver, now just pissed off and alone in the woods at night, potentially with wolves. And a newly minted minor phobia of same. Too many goddamn fairy tales as a kid.

And this weird town. It seemed like a good idea at the time she... doesn't remember choosing it, but that she received and accepted a job offer from it. The Firehouse here anyway.

Sutton opens her recent texts and comes up with a sad few names aside from some half-assed flirting with several cops and at least one of the ladder guys. Also: 

Carver (NOPE)
Waffles (Moretti — NOPE)
Tacos (Ruiz — drunkenly entered into phone, doesn't respond well to winemergencies)
and a couple of old friends from Seattle wanting to get in touch again and do lunch sometime soon (NOPE)

Her thumb hovers over Moretti's name, but that would just lead to regret and more regret, and possibly another hangover or four.

"Goddamn it."

She makes the most awkward of choices, some twenty minutes later, and composes a text.

🌮 : What do you do when your friend starts lying to you?