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She’d somehow used her walking stick to pin Bey’s shoulders to the mountain, and he’d managed to grab two fistfuls of her long brown hair, and the tangle amounted to what would be considered a stalemate in Ultimate Fighting. I would later learn through tiresome post-fight analysis (because if anything is in surplus on a long AT hike, it’s the time you have for conversation) that Bey had caught a short burst of energy and tried to pass Asher on the trail, and Asher had somehow whacked Bey’s leg with her stick, and Bey had tried to take Asher’s stick before they both fell to the ground. We’d escape my apartment after dinner each evening and walk to a city park near downtown Tampa to lie in the grass and read, a round-trip journey of a few miles. In a moment of contrition, I promised that if they made it to Newfound Gap, 67 miles from Hot Springs, we’d try to catch a ride into Gatlinburg to resupply, and we’d spend a night in a hotel.