'The Hike' - Chapter Twenty-Two - Cringe

Chapter 22: Night 11: The two beers and the whole lazy vibe after Kozia Stena pushed me back into the attic once more. The trauma from almost falling to my death after Echo Hut was almost gone. I started feeling sleepy. I went and took a quick shower—you can’t waste any water up here—and then up the ladder, back into my kingdom, where my body collapsed into oblivion in a second. Day 12: I woke up to someone hammering on the bathroom door, repeatedly. The sound went through my head like a hammer pounding a pumpkin. I felt the anger bubbling up inside me. The poor woman who passed by when I stuck my head out of the attic to see who dared disturb my dream took the full blast. I channeled it into a vomit of complaint. She nearly jumped out of her skin. The angry, high-pitched voice came from above, and when she looked up, all she saw was a floating head screaming at her. She quickly realized what I was yapping about—and disappeared. Later, the hut owner told me it was the wind slamming the...