Strays by Britt Collins

Author:Britt Collins
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Atria Books

Chapter 16

Yosemite: Walk on the Wild Side

In late April, Stinson, Michael and Tabor’s old pal from Portland, arrived in Ventura to pick them up to go back to Portland for the summer. Stinson also brought along a girlfriend from Mississippi, a pretty dark-haired mellow pixie of a girl named Madison who traveled with an acoustic guitar and a caramel pit bull mix named Bobby. Sweet-spirited, the dog got along fine with Tabor right away. Stinson had driven Madison and Bobby all the way from the Deep South.

The day before Stinson and Madison were to arrive, Michael packed up camp and stopped by Linda Tabor’s house in Thousand Oaks to tell her he was leaving. She asked to hold Tabor one last time, and they promised to stay in touch. Then Michael and Tabor walked back to Ventura to wait in their old camp under the acacias.

Michael and his wandering friends would split for months at a time and then reunite in some wild part of California or the gritty backstreets of Portland. Stinson, like Michael, was restless. A wanderer and a slacker, he had spent time in the navy, which made him realize he wasn’t keen on rules and routines. He valued his freedom, even if it meant scraping by. He saw no point in being miserable working long hours to buy things he didn’t need.

When Stinson and Madison arrived at the beach squat, they told Michael that they wanted to squeeze in a side trip to Yosemite before heading north and talked nonstop about how beautiful it was. After that, they wanted to head to Mount Shasta.

“You can show Tabor the world,” Stinson told Michael, though he didn’t need much persuading.

For her part, Tabor was excited to see Stinson again. She had greeted him enthusiastically and kept crawling into his lap over and over again to purr and pull on his beard.

After a couple of days on the beach drinking, listening to some beats, and trading road stories, Michael agreed that he and Tabor might as well get back on the road. He thought since she’d loved their time on the beach, she’d likely enjoy the mountains, too.

They began the long, slow drive up the coast. Their first stop was San Luis Obispo, a romantic old mission town on the Central Coast tucked between the Pacific Ocean and wine country. There they visited a spirit’s cove, and Michael got another ticket for panhandling.

The next morning they set off early and finished the four-hour drive to Yosemite National Park by lunchtime. The May snowmelt had swelled the rivers, and the park was filled with campers. They found a quiet spot surrounded by the granite monoliths and giant trees on the edge of a campground, someplace half-hidden by bushy foliage and scrub but close to the road where they parked. They hoped to avoid run-ins with wildlife like big cats and bears by staying near the road.

With the afternoon sun behind him, Michael tossed off his shoes and rested his back against a rock.

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