Cashmere & Cunningham – Into the Wild (-ish)

With the sand running out on the timer of my last summer in that sweet liberty before adulthood, we wasted no time. A day later I drove over to pick up Evie for our adventure — five full days of “camping,” which sounded much more romantic and manageable in theory than I expected it to be in practice.

She had me come up for breakfast at her place, and to show me all the snacks she cooked, baked, and prepared as if we were deploying with infantry. Her tiny kitchen smelled like cinnamon, roasted nuts, and something lemony she insisted was “essential morale food.” Every counter was covered: granola bars, muffins, trail mix, sandwiches wrapped in wax paper, some sort of salads and heartier fare, and a suspiciously large container labeled Emergency Brownies. I felt like it would take a month to get through all this.

It was fun. I couldn’t stop staring at her. This girl just always looked somehow different and awesome. I’d seen her in regular clothes, various uniforms, a bikini, my mom’s upscale dresses — and now she was in cute shorts (did I really just think that?), a slim‑fit tank, an open zipper hoodie, and a large backpack on the floor that looked like it weighed more than she did.

When we went downstairs and she saw the car, it surprised her.

Not my BMW convertible.

My mom’s Range Rover Autobiography, gleaming like a polished obsidian brick in the morning sun.

“Oh no, now you’re not Beamer‑Boy anymore,” she said, bone‑dry.

“It’s my mom’s. Just borrowed it.”

She exhaled dramatically, pressing her hands to her chest. “Thank God. Because if you’re not Beamer‑Boy, I can’t go with you. I only trust him.”

“Yeah, still me. Just uni-break‑camping‑edition,” I deadpanned.

Up And Away

We had fun driving the many hours north. The farther we got from the city, the more the world changed — the air grew cooler, the trees taller, the roads narrower. The forest thickened into towering trunks and deep green canopies that filtered the sunlight into soft gold. Ferns carpeted the ground. The smell of pine and damp earth seeped through the vents.

I pointed out restaurants on the GPS. She made me pull over at a rest stop and we ate what she brought.

Wanna guess how many times I’d done that in my life? Yep.

We got lost twice — once because I trusted the GPS too much, and once because she trusted a hand‑painted wooden sign that absolutely lied to us — until we finally found the cabin.

Wow. That looked… rugged.

The clearing was quiet except for the distant rush of a creek. The cabin sat under a canopy of old trees, their branches swaying gently in the breeze. The wood was weathered, the roof slightly uneven, and the porch creaked when the wind hit it. Moss clung to the stones around the foundation. Birds called from somewhere high above, and the air smelled like pine needles, damp soil, and something faintly smoky.

I cursed myself for agreeing to this.

Clearly, that thought was written on my face because Evie grabbed her things, ready to jump out of the passenger seat, then looked at me and burst into laughter.

“What?” I asked, confused why I suddenly seemed so funny.

“Just think — it could have been worse. This was gonna be a tent.”

She got out, and I couldn’t argue with that logic.

We walked in, and I almost hit the floor next to my backpack, which I had aimlessly tossed inside, when I realized how rustic this was.

“I can see daylight through the walls!” I blurted out.

“It’s a log cabin. They’re never fully sealed. But smell.” She inhaled deeply, eyes closing. “I love this smell. Smells like… like…”

I inhaled too. Earth. Wood. Sap. A hint of smoke. And something else.

“Rotten manure.”

Evie’s head snapped toward me, eyes flying open.

“Nathaniel… something something Cunningham! How dare you!?”

“Seriously, you don’t remember my middle name is Cameron? Get out of here, woman. That is beyond weak.”

She gave me a look, then shrugged.

“Seriously, why is your middle name Cameron? I mean, why use your mom’s maiden name? How unimaginative can you be? Not hatin’ here, just… wondering. I mean, imagine my parents had named me Evangeline Snodgrass Hollis.”

I froze.

Snodgrass.

The name hit me like a rogue pinecone. I actually felt my soul leave my body, hover above us, shake its head, and return.

“Snodgrass?” I croaked, now roaring with laughter. “Evie… that sounds like you were born in a barn behind a Dollar General.”

She threw her hands up. “EXACTLY! My name is already long enough — add Snodgrass and suddenly I sound like a Victorian orphan who churns butter for a living.”

I wheezed. Actually wheezed. The cabin echoed with it.

She jabbed a finger at me. “See? SEE? This is why my parents didn’t give me a middle name. They knew whatever they picked would ruin my entire life.”

“Evie Snodgrass Hollis,” I repeated, tasting the chaos of it.

She groaned. “Stop saying it! It sounds like I should be wearing overalls and carrying a chicken.”

I lost it again.

Outside, a bird startled out of a tree. Inside, Evie shoved me lightly, cheeks pink from laughing.

“Snodgrass,” I whispered, because I am a menace.

She tackled me.

We fell onto the couch together, still bouncing when she told me, “Shut up… Cameron.”

Okay, for a moment I froze, bracing. If you remember, when I first met Elodie, the girl who single‑handedly ruined my life for almost two years, I introduced myself as Cameron — in case she was a gold‑digger. So glad that instinct was wrong. Ha. Pardon the sarcasm. Let that be a reminder that sometimes initial gut feelings are dead‑on. I should have trusted mine.

So I thought a girl I liked calling me by my middle name would set me off again.

I waited and… nothing happened. Just a joke. Just a clapback.

Was I cured?

“You okay, Nate?” she asked, rolling onto her stomach next to me, our faces close.

I looked at her, grinning. “Yeah. I’m okay. I’m better than okay.”

I rolled off the couch and held out my hand.

“Come on, Smorgasbord, let’s get camping.”

“It’s Snodgrass. I have Nordic background on my mom’s side, duh. Hence the blond hair and blue eyes.”

“Okay, Smorgasboard.”

I pulled her up, our faces close again as I grinned down at her.

“Let’s go make this the next best day of our lives. Come on, girl — show me what to do here. I wanna camp the shit out of this week.”

Camping The Sh*t Out Of It

Yeah, that we attempted.

Before you get too excited, it wasn’t that bad — and surprisingly, I wasn’t that bad at it.
Well. Mostly.

The forest around our cabin was alive in that way only deep woods can be — tall trunks rising like cathedral pillars, their bark dark and ridged, the canopy so thick it turned the sunlight into shifting gold. Every breeze sent a ripple through the leaves overhead, a soft whispering that sounded like the trees gossiping about us. The air was cool and damp, carrying the smell of pine needles, moss, river water, and that faint sweetness of decaying leaves that somehow wasn’t gross, just… forest-y.

Birds called from somewhere high above — sharp chirps, low coos, the occasional distant hawk screech that made me flinch like someone had fired a gun. A woodpecker hammered away at a tree nearby, each tap echoing like nature’s construction crew. And every now and then a twig snapped in the underbrush, making me jump like a man who had never once been outside a metropolitan area.

Which, to be fair, was mostly accurate.

I mean, yes — technically, I’d been “outdoors” before. A handful of times Mom dragged us to Jackson Kershaw’s horse ranch in Chestnut Ridge. Her ex. And by “dragged,” I mean she bribed us the way only mothers can — promises of plenty laced with guilt trips. He had no love for any of us and the feeling was mutual, somehow my sisters managed to find ways to dodge it and I was the poor fool getting dragged with still. Jackson usually barely acknowledged me, same with son Beau, who technically would be my older half-brother, same mother, but we didn’t know each other and neither ever had any interest to change that. So, he was about as much as a brother to me as anyone here reading it. Male or female.

Jackson is rugged in the way only real cowboys are — sun‑baked skin, boots older than I am, a twang nobody outside Chestnut Ridge can understand. Mom somehow speaks it fluently. Even Dad, who is a polyglot by nature, can decipher it. I cannot. To me it sounds like someone gargling gravel while giving directions.

His ranch is all heat, dust, hay, manure, and animals that stare directly into your soul. Those aren’t normal horses. I grew up around horses — glossy and well‑behaved and trained by professionals. Jackson’s horses are built different. Dusty and rugged, they look at you like they’re deciding whether you’re worth the effort of kicking or belong just ignored in general. Jackson said it’s because those are working horses, not pets. Well … aren’t all horses technically ‘pets’ unless you plan on eating them?

I hated it there every time.

Every visit was a highlight reel of me sneezing, sweating, stepping in something unspeakable, and trying not to get either kicked by a horse or knocked out by Jackson. Yeah, that happened — accidentally, but still. He meant to hit my dad, which was… not better. That was the other thing I hated. Jackson was a brute with a vendetta against Dad. When my grandparents were still alive we used to visit in San Sequoia a lot, they’d invite Jackson and Beau

So yes, I had technically been outside a metro area before — but only under duress, and never voluntarily.

This time, though… This time I was here on purpose. With Evie. Which made everything feel different.

Even the bugs.

Even the dirt.

Even the cabin that looked like it had been built by a pioneer with commitment issues.

I inhaled the forest air again — pine, damp soil, river water, and something faintly smoky — and squared my shoulders like a man preparing for battle.

We were going to camp the sh*t out of this week.

Or at least… I’d give it my best shot.

But not today. We arrived late afternoon, too late to attempt any activities without getting caught in the dark, so we took it easy and just set up and settled in. Time enough to start leaning into the full outdoorsman (and -woman) experience tomorrow.

The Great Panic

The first night in the cabin was supposed to be peaceful — rustic, cozy, the kind of thing people post on social media with captions like forest retreat and unplugged bliss. Instead, it sounded like the forest was staging a coordinated attack.

It started with a thud.

Not a normal thud. Not a “branch fell” thud. A roof thud — the kind that sounds like a giant monster from outer space landed on it, and you suddenly remember you are not, in fact, at the Four Seasons.

I froze in my bed, staring at the ceiling, holding my breath, listening.

Then came the scrape.

A long, slow, deliberate scrape across the wood siding — the kind of noise that says: I am outside your cabin and I have plans. The kind that end badly for you.

I sat up, heart pounding, listening to the forest rustle and rumble outside like it was waiting for me to make a mistake. Something screeched — a sound so unholy it could only mean someone had opened a portal to another dimension.

I laid back down and pulled the blanket up to my eyes. Breathing shallow, just in case whatever that was could hear it.

Then my door burst open.

No knock. No warning. Just a shapeless creature barreling into my room like a panicked bear or a giant potato with legs.

I screamed.
It screamed.
We screamed at each other until we realized we were screaming at each other.

“EVIE — WTF?!” I yelled, my heart pounding outside my chest.

“NATE!” she gasped, already halfway into my bed. “Something is out there! I heard … stuff!”

“I know!”

She was shaking — genuinely shaking — wrapped in her blanket like a terrified burrito. And because I am a gentleman (and also terrified), I lifted my blanket so she could dive fully underneath.

We huddled together like two woodland creatures who had absolutely no business being in the woods. Both blankets pulled up to our eyeballs.

“What did you hear?” I whispered.

“Loud thud.”

“Roof?”

“Yeah.”

I swallowed. “Same. What the hell can fall on our roof in the middle of the night? It sounded heavy, too.”

“Yeah. And then a scrape.”

“Evie, scrapes are bad.”

“I KNOW.”

We lay there, listening. The forest creaked. Something rustled. Something thumped again — closer this time. We clung to each other, shaking, not even trying to hide it. Too busy not peeing our pants.

“Nate,” she whispered, voice trembling, “if you don’t make it, I’ll tell your parents you died heroically.”

“Thanks. Appreciate it.”

“I’m not telling them you died doing something stupid. Even though statistically, that’s more correct. And more on brand.”

“Thank you?”

She exhaled shakily. “If I die… well… there’s no one left to tell. Just tell my story and make it good. And you can have all my stuff. Everything in my beautiful new apartment.”

I blinked. “Evie… what am I supposed to do with an apartment full of pink IKEA decor and TikTok skincare?”

She side‑eyed me from under the blanket. “Cherish it. Remember me by it. And not to be rude or anything, but your face could use a little moisturizer. Just saying.”

Another thud. We both flinched so hard the mattress squeaked as we almost piled onto one another in the most contorted way imaginable.

“Okay,” she whispered, “what if it’s a bear? What do we do if it comes inside?”

“It’s not a bear. There are no bears here. Are there?”

“There are bears here.”

“We’re screwed—”

“NATE.”

We stayed like that — two grown adults hiding under a blanket like children during a thunderstorm — convinced the forest was plotting our demise. Every sound became a threat. Every creak became a monster. Every rustle became a cryptid with a vendetta.

Eventually, the noises faded, leaving only the usual creaking of old wood. The fear softened. Our breathing synced. Her head rested against my shoulder. My arm wrapped around her without thinking, hers around me. We whispered nonsense to stay awake — dramatic last‑will statements, complaints about the cabin, theories about the roof creature.

Eventually, exhaustion won.

We fell asleep intertwined like old roots — limbs tangled, blankets twisted, her hair against my cheek, my hand somewhere it definitely hadn’t started.

Morning Humiliation

We woke up alive.

Alive… and mortified.

Evie blinked at me. I blinked at her. We both realized the position we were in — the kind of position that would start all sorts of rumors.

She scrambled back so fast she nearly fell off the bed. I sat up so fast I just about pulled a muscle. We both had a very unhealthy shade of pink for complexion.

“Okay,” she said, clearing her throat, “so… we survived.”

“Barely.”

“And we… uh… slept.”

“Yup.”

A beat.

Then we both burst out laughing — the kind of laughter that comes from fear, relief, and the realization that you accidentally cuddled your best friend all night in the most XXX-rated way because you thought a raccoon (that’s our story and we do not want to hear differently, it was a racoon, okay!?) was a demon.

It became the first joke of the trip. And the first moment that felt like something was shifting.

Fish Ahoy

Shockingly, I made a decent figure fishing — even caught something edible of respectable proportions — but getting it off the hook was another story. I had never touched a fish in my life. Not once. Not even at the grocery store. I always pointed at the fillets behind glass like a civilized person. My only prior interactions with fish were watching them swim in tanks or seeing them arrive already cooked on a plate.

The moment my fingers brushed the cold, slick scales, my spine tried to evacuate my body. The fish wriggled, the line jerked, and I made a noise I’m pretty sure only bats can hear. According to my unhelpful wilderness guide, Evie “Smorgasbord” Hollis, I pulled “the funniest face she had ever seen,” which incapacitated her for the entire half‑hour hike back to the cabin.

The forest didn’t help. Every sound was magnified — the splash of water, the creak of branches overhead, the distant rush of the creek. The air smelled like damp earth and pine needles, and the sunlight flickered through the leaves like nature itself was laughing at me.

I’d read that loud noises repel wildlife. I can confirm that. With Evie snorting and wheezing beside me, we didn’t see anything larger than a butterfly.

Fish prep was… not my thing. The moment we opened the belly and discovered live worms wriggling around, both of us gagged so hard we nearly folded in half. Acting on pure instinct, I grabbed the entire mess and flung it into the forest like a cursed artifact. It hit a tree with a wet splut and slid down in a way I will remember until the day I die.

Evie stared at me, wide‑eyed, looking like she had just witnessed a war crime.

“Our food…” she whispered.

A large crow swooped in, grabbed the fish — worms included — and flew off triumphantly.

We ended up eating what Evie had packed.

The Great Foraging Fiasco

We went mushroom foraging — which sounded wholesome and rustic until we actually did it.

We found a lot. Too many. Suspiciously many. Especially of the rare ones.

Hm.

But once we sat down to prep them, our confidence evaporated. Every mushroom looked like every other mushroom. Every “safe” one looked like a “deadly” one. Every “deadly” one looked like a “maybe okay if boiled.”

After ten minutes of comparing our loot to Google images, we realized we were one misstep away from starring in a cautionary wilderness news report. Involuntarily. After they found our bodies at some point.

When Evie went to grab a knife to cut into one and compare the underside to photos, I grabbed the cutting board and tossed it out the window.

She reappeared beside me — holding half a mushroom like she was presenting evidence in a murder trial.

“Nate,” she said, incredulous, “why …. you …. you can’t just—”

I snatched the half‑mushroom out of her hand and yeeted it out the window too.

She stared at me like I’d just committed a felony.

Outside, the same crow from the day before swooped down, inspected the new offering, then hopped onto a branch to complain loudly at us — a full, offended monologue. Evidently it wasn’t a fan of dubious mushrooms either.

“Our dinner…” Evie said, incredulous.

“Seriously?” I turned to her. “You were going to chance food poisoning in the middle of nowhere, with the closest sign of civilization further away than I care to acknowledge?”

She opened her mouth, closed it, then nodded. “Okay… fair.”

We ended up eating what she had packed.

Hunters Like (Not) Us

We even found a leaflet at a tiny tourist center about beginner hunting. Since we clearly weren’t fishermen or gatherers, we decided to try that — with borrowed bows and arrows after a brief introductory training. Sounded cool in theory.

They recommended rabbits.

Well… that, too, sounded easy in theory, based off the stick‑figure drawings they used in their booklets. Guess what? In real life, rabbits are not black‑and‑white stick figures. They were adorable. Soft. Round. Precious. Both of us choked instantly.

We still tried to impress ourselves and each other a few times, but neither of us could shoot with any seriousness.

Until Evie tripped over a root and crashed into me. I had the bow drawn. The arrow flew.

There was a moment of collective gasp, fading into held breath. Then silence.

Then the alarm.

“You hit someone’s car!”

“I know!”

“Does that alarm sound like your mom’s car?!”

“I don’t know!”

We waited a while that seemed safe, then snuck back to the parking lot like fugitives.

Both exhaled.

“Not your mom’s car.”

“Thank God. I was about to dictate my last will and testament.”

Evie hesitated. “Nate… not to sound like a weirdo, but I’m glad we missed. I don’t think I want to kill something to eat it.”

“We killed the fish.”

“Yeah, but that wasn’t cute with long ears and a wibbly little nose. They sit there and you just want to go pick one up and snuggle it. How often have you thought that about a fish? Any fish.”

“Fair.”

We decided to move the car to a safer spot — the riverbank looked unstable, and evidently untrained people ran around there with bows and arrows, and the darkness here was pitch‑black.

Evie guided me out and in until the tire hit a bump and a loud, bloodcurdling screech followed.

She glared at me in the mirror.

“What was that?” I gestured.

She shrugged, still staring.

“Well, go look.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Evie!”

“Uh‑uh.”

I rolled my eyes and got out. We walked around the car and—

“OH NO.”

“Oh shit.”

I had run over a rabbit. Yup.

I will spare you the lengthy debate about what to do next.
We eventually decided to honor it by… using it. I mean, it seemed like the sensible thing to do, since it was already dead. Trying not to look at it too closely we wrapped a plastic bag my mom kept in the car to collect trash in around it and carried it home. Once we passed other hunters, they saw the rabbit outline in the almost transparent plastic bag and congratulated us on our successful hunt.

Yeah.

Once it was in the cabin kitchen, we both stared at it. It was… badly mangled. I mean, the SUV is very massive and a little rabbit is … not. You do the math.

We took turns throwing up into the sink until I opened the window and tossed it out.

Evie joined me as we watched the crow — now accompanied by two friends — descend for the feast.

“Don’t say it,” I pleaded.

“Wasn’t gonna… I kinda got used to you throwing our dinner out the window.”

I glared at her, incredulous “Seriously? You were gonna eat that?!”

“Absolutely not!”

We ended up eating what she had packed.

Mission Abort

Late afternoon found us curled up on the deck again, wrapped in blankets like two retirees who’d given up on life and embraced early-onset cardigan culture. The forest hummed around us — crickets chirping, the creek whispering somewhere beyond the trees, leaves rustling overhead like nature was flipping through a very judgmental scrapbook. The air was cool and smelled like pine, damp earth, and the faint hint of whatever tragedy we’d cooked (or failed to cook) earlier that day. Fireflies blinked lazily in the clearing, drifting around us like tiny lanterns that had no idea how incompetent we were.

“Hey Nate?”

“Hm.”

“Can I trust you with a deep, dark secret you have to promise never to tell anyone for as long as you live?”

“Okay.”

“I hate camping.”

A beat.

We both exploded — the kind of laughter that steals oxygen and dignity at the same time. We laughed so hard we nearly rolled off the deck and into the underbrush, which honestly would’ve been on-brand for us.

Once we recovered, we started packing up while continuously listing all the creature comforts we missed: TV, proper toilets, showers without insects in them, real food, coffee that didn’t taste like boiled despair. Evie admitted that nostalgic childhood memories hit different when you’re not the kid — when you’re the one expected to lead the wilderness expedition instead of being carried through it by two competent parents.

We didn’t camp the sh*t out of anything. We didn’t become rugged wilderness experts. We didn’t catch dinner, or forage dinner, or hunt dinner. We didn’t even manage to not run over dinner.

But somehow, it still became one of the best weeks of my life.

Not because of the cabin. Not because of the forest. Not because of the adventure.

Because of her.

Because of the way she laughed when I panicked over a fish. Because of the way she leaned into me when we walked through the woods. Because of the way she whispered “Snodgrass” like a secret code word. (Seriously though — what kind of name is that?) Because of the way she looked at me on the deck at night, wrapped in a blanket, fireflies blinking around us like tiny floating spotlights.

Because of the way everything felt easier when she was next to me.

We aborted the camping mission early — no shame, full relief — raided the first gas station we found and ate candy until we felt sick. Then we grabbed pizza near her apartment and spent the night binge‑watching comedies, wrapped in blankets that didn’t smell like damp pine needles or existential regret.

And somewhere between the gummy bears, the pizza slices, and the sitcom laugh tracks, I realized something:

We didn’t camp the sh*t out of anything. But we absolutely lived the sh*t out of that week. Together. Without even noticing.

And maybe that was the real adventure.

Later, sprawled on her couch in a way that was far too close for friendship and not quite anything else, I turned my head toward her. She turned hers toward me. Our eyes met. We smiled — the same smile, at the same time, like we’d rehearsed it.

I gave a small wink. She nudged me with her shoulder. I wrapped my arm around her. She leaned in — easy, natural — like this was simply how we fit.

The movie played — some forgettable comedy with a plot thinner than the cabin mattress — but it didn’t matter. It wasn’t the point. The point was the quiet, the closeness, the way our laughter blended, the way the room felt different with her in it.

It didn’t need a name. It didn’t need a definition. It didn’t need a label.

It just… was.

We just…

We were.