Part 11 (1/2)

Nervously Peter looked around for Susan. ”What's your mother say?”

”Do not,” said Amy, ”do not tell my mother. It's the alt.i.tude,” she said.

Peter was going to note that they weren't exactly in the Himalayas, but then Amy pointed to the water. ”Look,” she said. ”There are three rivers out there.”

Peter looked at the water. She was right. Next to sh.o.r.e were choppy, dancing waves; then farther out, the midstream core, churning downstream; and finally the eddy beyond, floating upstream in a blanket of bubbles.

”You want some Pepto-Bismol or something?”

”No.”

”Because the guides have all kinds of s.h.i.+t in that first aid box.”

”Jesus!”

”Don't get mad.”

”I'm not mad.”

”You seem mad.”

”Well, I'm not. I'm just wis.h.i.+ng I hadn't said anything to you if you're not going to leave me alone about it.”

”Fine,” he said. ”I'll leave you alone.”

”Thank you.”

Then, just as the mention of lice will cause anyone's scalp to itch, so the mention of a stomachache made Peter feel a little queasy himself. He belched.

”Excuse me,” he said, then belched again. He noticed Amy's wash bag. ”Is that Vera Bradley?”

”How do you know Vera Bradley?”

”My ex-girlfriend liked those.”

Amy picked up the bag and let it dangle from her finger. ”My mother bought it for me. I think they're a total rip-off But it gives her a thrill to see me using it.”

”Hundred bucks for a little purse,” said Peter. ”It used to kill me. But it made her happy.”

”How long were you guys going out?”

”Six years.”

”Who ended it?”

”She did.”

”That sucks.”

”Yup.”

”Aren't you glad we're not with a bunch of Boy Scouts?” she remarked, after a moment.

Peter finished his beer. ”You believed that story?”

”I shouldn't?”

”How do you know when a river guide is lying?”

”How?”

Peter shook his head. ”Whenever he opens his mouth! G.o.d,” he added, ”you are one of the most gullible people I ever met.”

20.

Day Four, Evening Mile 60 While everyone else was eating dinner, and when she was sure the dog wouldn't come over and start sniffing her leg, Ruth settled herself on a log and rolled up her pant leg. She unwound the Ace bandage, then gently peeled off the gauze underneath. What she saw was not encouraging. The wound was still raw and weeping, and the surrounding skin was red and hot to the touch.

Was it time for the Cipro?

In their medical kit, Ruth had packed a five-day course of antibiotics. It was a practice they'd adopted after one particularly painful trip when she got an ear infection on the fifth night, the kind that could have been easily cured with a course of amoxicillin but which, in the absence of antibiotics, had Ruth clutching the side of her head in agony for the next six days and Lloyd worrying about long-term damage to the middle ear. After that, they always brought along a broad-spectrum antibiotic. It was not something they advertised; although he would have made it available if someone really needed it, Lloyd did not want the responsibility of prescribing drugs to strangers while on vacation.

Now, looking at her leg, Ruth knew she had a decision to make. The redness and swelling indicated treatment; on the other hand, there were no red lines shooting up her leg. If they'd brought along two courses of treatment (and why hadn't they? What foolish oversight!), she wouldn't have thought twice. But with just the one round of pills, she was reluctant. This was simply a surface wound, after all, something that should heal, as long as she kept it clean and used plenty of Neosporin.

JT came striding over. ”You should have waited for me,” he scolded. ”Look, the wind's picking up; your cut's going to get full of sand.” He knelt and inspected the wound and frowned. ”I don't like the looks of this. Let me see what Dixie thinks.” He called Dixie, and she came over and knelt and examined Ruth's leg too.

But Dixie didn't want to decide anything until they consulted Lloyd, so they called Lloyd over, and now Ruth cringed, because she was afraid Lloyd would bring out the Cipro, and she really didn't think it needed Cipro, not yet; she had tended how many cuts and sc.r.a.pes and gashes over the years? and she knew what infection looked like, and this was not it. But Lloyd came over, duly called, and he first got confused, and Ruth had to explain to him twice how it had happened (”What dog?”), and then, when he finally grasped that it was not a dog bite bite, he shrugged and told her to stick a couple of Band-Aids on it and stop complaining.

So JT and Dixie washed the wound and applied more ointment and bandaged it up, while Ruth sat feeling helpless, and Lloyd wandered over to Evelyn's campsite and began emptying the contents of Evelyn's day bag, in search of a long list of items he hadn't seen since Lee's Ferry.

Yesterday Jill had told the boys in no uncertain terms that they were to try and use the toilet, but by tonight she found herself caring about it less and less. What could happen, medically speaking? Five days wouldn't kill them. Eight days wouldn't kill them. Thirteen days probably wouldn't kill them, but she doubted it would come to that.

Nor would it hurt Mark to go a day without sit-ups. Mark at forty had done well over two hundred thousand sit-ups: fifty per day, three hundred sixty-five days a year, for at least the fourteen years they had been married. At home he did them in their bedroom, upon rising. Here he did them on the sand, in the darkness, after everyone had gone to bed. Jill was grateful to have married someone who wasn't going to let himself go, but she found herself wondering, as she lay on her sleeping mat listening to Mark's little grunts, if he would really develop a set of the dreaded love handles in fourteen days. And so what if he did? The world wouldn't come to an end, she wanted to tell him. She would still love him.

Ten feet away, Sam began to cough. She recognized the succession of sharp dry hacks. She waited for the aerosol hiss, the quick inhalation of his asthma medicine. Nothing. Sam sat up.

”Where's your inhaler, Sam?” said Mark, between grunts.