A Walk in the Woods

purposes of hilarity, and I supposed this was one of those moments. I was about to fly for
cover, and even Katz was halfway to his feet, when it stopped just before us, with a rock
and another cloud of dust, and a youthful female head popped out the passenger side
window.
"Yew boys wunna rod?" she called.
"Yes, ma'am, we sure do," we said, putting on our best behavior.
We hastened to the car with our packs and bowed down at the window to find a very
handsome, very happy, very drunk young couple, who didn't look to be more than
eighteen or nineteen years old. The woman was carefully topping up two plastic cups
from a three-quarters empty bottle of Wild Turkey. "Hi!" she said. "Hop in."
We hesitated. The car was packed nearly solid with stuff-- suitcases, boxes, assorted
black plastic bags, hangerloads of clothes. It was a small car to begin with and there was
barely room for them.
"Darren, why'nt you make some room for these gentlemen," the young woman ordered
and then added for us: "This yere's Darren."
Darren got out, grinned a hello, opened the trunk, and stared blankly at it while the
perception slowly spread through his brain that it was also packed solid. He was so drunk
that I thought for a moment he might fall asleep on his feet, but he snapped to and found
some rope and quite deftly tied our packs on the roof. Then, ignoring the vigorous advice
and instructions of his partner, he tossed stuff around in the back until he had somehow
created a small cavity into which Katz and I climbed, puffing out apologies and
expressions of the sincerest gratitude.
Her name was Donna, and they were on their way to some desperate-sounding
community--Turkey Balls Falls or Coon Slick or someplace--another fifty miles up the road,
but they were pleased to drop us in Hiawassee, if they didn't kill us all first. Darren drove
at 127 miles an hour with one finger on the wheel, his head bouncing to the rhythm of
some internal song, while Donna twirled in her seat to talk to us. She was stunningly
pretty, entrancingly pretty.
"Y'all have to excuse us. We're celebrating." She held up her plastic cup as if in toast.
"What're you celebrating?" asked Katz.
"We're gittin married tomorrah," she announced proudly.
"No kidding," said Katz. "Congratulations."
"Yup. Darren yere's gonna make a honest woman outta me." She tousled his hair, then
impulsively lunged over and gave the side of his head a kiss, which became lingering,
then probing, then frankly lascivious, and concluded, as a kind of bonus, by shooting her
hand into a surprising place--or at least so we surmised because Darren abruptly banged
his head on the ceiling and took us on a brief but exciting detour into a lane of oncoming
traffic. Then she turned to us with a dreamy, unabashed leer, as if to say, "Who's next?"
It looked, we reflected later, as if Darren might have his hands full, though we additionally
concluded that it would probably be worth it.
"Hey, have a drink," she offered suddenly, seizing the bottle round the neck and
looking for spare cups on the floor.
"Oh, no thanks," Katz said, but looked tempted.
"G'won" she encouraged.
Katz held up a palm. "I'm reformed."