A Kingdom of Our Own

Chapter Eighteen - Route 97

Three long days of endless walking passed by, with nothing notable or out of the ordinary occurring – and then on the evening of the fifth day since their departure, they arrived at a small goods yard.

“This is as far as the tracks will take us. We’ll have to go through the woods from here until we reach Route 97.” Dalton explained tiredly.

“Why can’t we just carry on following them?” Harry asked.

“Because if we carry on this way, we’ll end up in Seattle and that ain’t nowhere near where my Godfather lives.”

They walked quickly over the brown, rusted tracks, headed towards a poorly maintained forest path. To get there, the boys had to weave through a maze of parked train cars and on one turn passed a massive coal cart that had been tipped on its side, which for a moment Harry bent down to examine. There were no trains in sight, but then again that wasn’t much of a surprise given that only two or three ran a day.

As soon as they were clear of the railroad and had entered the shade of the woods, Harry reached into his backpack and pulled out the map book. After a brief examination, he exclaimed, almost excitedly, “Hey, look how far we’ve gone.”

Dalton continued to walk silently, lost in his thoughts, forcing Harry to press in a slightly louder tone:

“Dalton? Dalton, do you hear me?” he said, rubbing his friend’s shoulder.

“What?” Dalton asked with a sudden snap, as if Harry was beginning to get on his nerves.

“I’m just saying,” Harry replied, his voice reduced to a whisper. “How far we’ve gone. About one more day and we’ll be there.”

Dalton didn’t comment on what had been said and a short period of silent walking followed, until Harry’s worries got the better of him and forced him to talk.

“Are you getting tired of me Dalton?” he asked without looking at him.

“Of course not. Are you tired of me?”

“No, Dalton. Right now, you’re my only friend in the whole world. I just hope I’m not bugging you.”

They made their way through the trees, their backpacks weighing down on their shoulders more than ever. The fading sunlight filtered through the leaves and cast down on the ground in a spotlight of glimmering gold. Their sneakers cracked over twigs and dead leaves.

A soft “tweet, tweet” made Dalton raise his gaze. A robin flew over his head and landed on a low-lying tree branch to his side. Then, quicker than in a blink of an eye, it was airborne again and had disappeared from view. Dalton’s focus switched back to the path ahead and he immediately noticed that they’d reached a crossroad. There were two options. Left or Right.

Harry immediately pointed decisively to the left with a long stick he’d picked up along the trail, as if he knew for sure that this was the right direction to take. Dalton meanwhile was a little more cautious in regards to how he’d reached this verdict and asked uncertainly, “Are you sure it’s that way?”

“I’m not stupid,” he scowled, taking a stride to the left.

He did stop and pause for a second though when a loud roaring sound broke out somewhere behind them. Both Harry and Dalton quickly turned to face the path leading off to the right as they listened to the unmistakable noise of a truck’s engine – and a moment later it was just about visible through the trees, shooting past with a trail of dust behind it.

Dalton glanced across at Harry as if to say “I told you so,” but Harry simply shrugged in response as if it was no biggy and began walking the other way towards the road, once again taking the lead.