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I was the only one who signed up for that class. Everyone else wanted to take ceramics and something about jewelry. They sent an adult out there with us—whether for the sake of propriety or because the directors were afraid I might have a habit of hitting people with sticks, I don’t know. But our escort usually fell asleep under a tree, sitting so still that at one point we came back from a hike to find a snake sunning in his lap.

For a week I had Davey Beet to myself, and while I know I didn’t do a good job hiding my childish crush, he never acknowledged it, keeping up a steady stream of bird identification, toxic toads, and what mushrooms I’d better never, ever touch unless I wanted them growing out of my spine a week later, a not-too-good smell coming out of my corpse.

He taught me how to track too, then made me turn my back while he walked away, with instructions to yell three times if I got freaked out and thought I was lost. He said he’d come for me if that happened, and there were a few times while I tracked him that I wanted to call out, but pride kept it down. That, and I’d spot the next sign, a step or two ahead. A bent twig, a turned leaf, a muddy slip where he didn’t get traction.

I found him twice, the third time he went down to the creek and circled behind me, pushing me in when I heard his footstep a second too late. I’d shrieked and splashed him, tickled pink that he’d touched me, even if it was just in fun. We waited for the water to settle and then laid on our bellies on the bank, Davey plucking a fish out with his bare hands, easy as pie. (Momma always hated that saying. She said pie is actually pretty hard, especially the crust part.)

Davey knew everything and could do it all, so when I heard his girl split I was half-elated, and half-pissed-off because I knew how it hurt to be left. I wanted to tell him so, but there was no way to do it. I didn’t have his number, because the camp was real strict about interaction between campers and counselors, and he lived two towns over. The local paper ran a story about him doing a leg of the AT on his own, with a big picture of him smiling in a way that didn’t look quite right, no teeth, dimples not popping.

I said I was going to cover two miles today. I bet I didn’t even put in one.

Davey Beet taught me everything I know about survival, and he never came back out of these woods.

So what chance do I have?

Day Three

A possum is never cute. They’re one of the rare animals that even has ugly-ass babies. Dad told me once that possums are loners because they’re smart enough not to live in the same area as another possum so they’re not competing for food, but I think it’s ’cause they can’t stand looking at each other. Regardless, that face doesn’t look good on anything, and it’s even worse when it’s the first thing I see when I wake up.

It doesn’t help that it’s chewing on my foot.

“MOTHERFUCKER!” I yell, grabbing for the first thing my hand comes to, which happens to be a stick. The possum is long gone by the time I pitch it, clocking my foot instead and sending a wave of pain through my body that leaves me sweating in the pale light of early morning.

Shit.

There’s a lot of problems with what just happened. For one thing, a possum bit me. Getting chewed by anything is never good, no matter what did it or where they got you. What bothers me way more is that I didn’t feel it.

I crawl out from my shelter, knees dragging through the ashes of the fire I made the night before. The sun is barely there; mist not yet burned off hangs all around me. Walking is like swimming, my face wet and hair stuck to my neck by the time I get down to the stream.

Something bolts as I slide down the bank, something big enough that brush moves in its wake, and birds break from their slumber. But I don’t see any prints other than deer and raccoon in the soft mud, so I find a good spot to learn bad news.

I set my crutch aside and strip the T-shirt bandage from my foot. The smell gets me first. I’d noticed it yesterday, but it was hard to pinpoint, and in spring all kinds of things are rotting in the woods. Everything that died during the winter waits a few months to rot, and then those of us that made it through get to smell the result. Spring is funny that way, popping with life and color as bulbs come up and trees flower. But underneath it all is a scummy film of death, if you know how to spot it.

I know.

I think maybe deep down I knew it yesterday but didn’t want to think too hard on it. Once, when I went grocery shopping with our first-of-the-month check I grabbed a can of tuna that should’ve never made the shelf. I was pushing my cart, trying to find a way around the old lady on a scooter in front of me because, damn, she was rank.

I drove home with a wrinkled nose and bad words in my mouth because apparently just moving through her stink had been enough for me to carry a whiff around with me. It wasn’t until I was carrying a bag into the trailer that I realized it was my punctured tuna can that smelled the whole time, and that old lady had probably been pushing that electric motor to its limits to try to get away from me.

And now here I am in the woods, thinking something had to go and die where I camped for the night and the whole time it’s my own foot rotting at the end of my leg.

“Dammit,” I say, looking down at what’s left of me.

There are teeth marks in my fourth toe, and my pinkie is almost gone.

“This little piggy cried, ‘wee, wee, wee,’” I say to myself, grimly touching the stump of what used to be my toe.

Possums are industrious scavengers, but they’re also too lazy to kill things themselves. They’d rather snack on someone else’s kill two days after they were done with it than do the job themselves. That’s what the possum thought I was—dead meat, carrion, remains.

And I guess it was half-right.

The crushed part of my foot is a sick shade of gray, something I didn’t notice by firelight. The skin is cold and doesn’t move when I touch it, refusing to make soft ridges and rolls the way Duke’s back always did when I gave him a rub.

My foot is a dead thing. Not bleeding. Unfeeling.

I bend down and sniff, coming back up real quick when I get a nose full of the stink I’m giving off. Between this and still bleeding like a stuck pig I’m going to attract all kinds of things wanting to take a bite.

I pull up my pant leg to see that predators are the least of my worries.