A Walk in the Woods

continue to do on future days, over the same sorts of hills, along the same wandering
track, through the same endless woods. The trees were so thick that we hardly ever got
views, and when we did get views it was of infinite hills covered in more trees. I was
discouraged to note that I was grubby again already and barking for white bread. And
then of course there was the constant, prattling, awesomely brainless presence of Mary
Ellen.
"When's your birthday?" she said to me.
"December 8."
"That's Virgo."
"No, actually it's Sagittarius."
"Whatever." And then abruptly: "Jeez, you guys stink."
"Well, uh, we've been walking."
"Me, I don't sweat. Never have. Don't dream either."
"Everybody dreams," Katz said.
"Well, I don't."
"Except people of extremely low intelligence. It's a scientific fact."
Mary Ellen regarded him expressionlessly for a moment, then said abruptly, to neither
of us in particular: "Do you ever have that dream where you're like at school and you look
down and like you haven't got any clothes on?" She shuddered. "I hate that one."
"I thought you didn't dream," said Katz.
She stared at him for a very long moment, as if trying to remember where she had
encountered him before. "And falling," she went on, unperturbed. "I hate that one, too.
Like when you fall into a hole and just fall and fall." She gave a brief shiver and then
noisily unblocked her ears.
Katz watched her with idle interest. "I know a guy who did that once," he said, "and
one of his eyes popped out."
She looked at him doubtfully.
"It rolled right across the living room floor and his dog ate it. Isn't that right, Bryson?"
I nodded.
"You're making that up."
"I'm not. It rolled right across the floor and before anybody could do anything, the dog
gobbled it down in one bite."
I confirmed it for her with another nod.
She considered this for a minute. "So what'd your friend do about his eye hole? Did he
have to get a glass eye or something?"
"Well, he wanted to, but his family was kind of poor, you know, so what he did was he
got a Ping-Pong ball and painted an eye on it and he used that."
"Ugh," said Mary Ellen softly.
"So I wouldn't go blowing out your ear holes any more."
She considered again. "Yeah, maybe you're right," she said at length, and blew out her
ear holes.
In our few private moments, when Mary Ellen went off to tinkle in distant shrubs, Katz
and I had formed a secret pact that we would hike fourteen miles on the morrow to a
place called Dicks Creek Gap, where there was a highway to the town of Hiawassee,
eleven miles to the north. We would hike to the gap if it killed us, and then try to