“That sounds great and all,” I reply. “But perhaps you missed the part where I said I left my journal at home.”
His eyes flash in the glow of the campfire. “Good thing I packed an extra for myself, then.”
Before I know it, he’s disappeared into his tent. When he comes out again, he’s holding a slim cahier notebook.
“Youkeep a journal?” I ask, though perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised.
“Every day for the last nine years,” he says. “Some entries are long, others are just a single line.”
“You must have shelves full of them by now.”
“More like a box under the bed,” he says. “And I burned a couple of them one time. On purpose,” he adds when he sees the look on my face. “Some things you want to remember. And some things…you don’t.”
His words hang between us. He looks up to the night sky, at the impossibly gorgeous display of stars.
“Anyway,” he says after the silence starts to stretch on too long, “if you need a writing prompt, you can start with ‘Why I Should Have Invested in Hiking Boots.’?”
I laugh and give him a light swat on the arm.
“Thank you,” I reply, taking the journal and a blue ballpoint pen I didn’t notice upon first glance. “I’ll start it tonight.”
He’s quiet again, and only now do I realize we’re the only ones still outside of our tents.
“Well,” Thorn says suddenly, sounding more like his serious hiking guide persona and less like the guy who got momentarily distracted bymy shiny vanilla lip gloss earlier, “I’d better let you get started, then. We’ve got another long day tomorrow and you’ll want to get some good sleep.”
The thought of hiking all day tomorrow is too much right now—everything is still aching from today from my head to my toes. My Advil barely made a dent.
“And Sadie?” he says just as I’m about to climb into my tent.
I look up. “Yeah?”
“Enjoy your sleep mask.” He smirks like a guy who’s never evenconsideredusing a sleep mask, let alone tried one.
“Oh, I plan to,” I play along. “You’re going to wish you had one at the crack of dawn.”
He lets me have the last word, then heads over to the campfire, which has dwindled considerably since Matteo last fed it.
“You’re not going to bed?” I ask.
“Just putting out the fire so it won’t go unattended all night,” he says.
“Need any help?”
He shakes his head. “Done it a million times. Thanks, though.”
Inside my tent, I fumble around until I find the small touch lamp in the corner. Light blooms under my fingertips, bright enough to see the entirety of my tiny space and everything in it. I sit cross-legged with the highest part of the tent directly over my head, and open up my brand-new journal.
To my surprise, it’s already been written in.
At first I think Thorn’s made a mistake and given mehisjournal—his own personal one with his own personal thoughts—but I’m too curious to look away, and as it turns out, my name is the first word.
Sadie, he’s written in a neat italic slant,You can do this. —Thorn
CAPTAIN’S LOG // AUGUST THORN
Day 2 • 9:42 p.m. • 73°F • Partly cloudy
TREK NOTES
