About half an hour later, Webb walked back into The Northern with his backpack on.
Joey gave him a big grin. “Heard about you and Brent Melrose. Heard he lost a fight with his truck.”
Small town. News traveled fast. But really, it was no different than being in a big city where a small group of people all knew each other. If someone got busted or beat up, everyone knew about it right away.
“It was a nice truck,” Webb said. “Now, not so nice.”
“He’s not going to quit,” Joey said.
“I’ll be away,” Webb said. “I’m not worried.”
Webb pointed at all the gear Joey had set aside for him. “Thanks for your help.”
“Sure,” Joey said. “All together, it costs—”
“Sorry,” Webb interrupted him. “First we need to weigh something. You got bathroom scales?”
Joey was obviously puzzled, but he pointed Webb to the household goods aisle.
Webb set a brand-new bathroom scale on the floor and pulled his boots off. “Don’t want to get it dirty,” he told Joey.
In his socks, with his backpack on, Webb stepped on the scale and noted the weight. He’d refilled his pack with rocks after his encounter with Brent.
Then he took the backpack off and weighed himself again. The difference was fifty-four pounds.
“All I’m going to allow myself is fifty-four pounds,” Webb said to Joey. “So if the gear you put together weighs more than that, we need to pull out what’s least important.”
Joey still looked puzzled, so Webb explained. “I spent an hour walking around with rocks in my pack to find out how much I could carry without hurting myself. I don’t want to carry any more than that out there on the trail. I’ll be walking for at least a week, and I’m not into unnecessary pain.”
Joey grinned. “Okay, now I’m impressed. Most people start with too much and either throw it away on the trail or stagger around out there, wrecking their backs and feet. Let’s start filling your backpack and see what will fit.”
“Hang on,” Webb said. He reached into the backpack and lifted out two of the bigger rocks. He hefted them, comparing the weight in his mind to the weight of his guitar. Seemed about the same. Not quite enough.
“Have a bag?” he asked Joey.
“Sure.” Joey didn’t ask why, just watched.
Webb put a few more rocks in the bag and lifted it, closing his eyes and imagining his guitar.
Much closer. He set the bag on scale. The rocks weighed sixteen pounds. He thought he might be off by a few pounds either way, but close enough.
“Thirty-eight pounds,” Webb said. “That’s all I can take. Forgot about my guitar.”
“You’re taking a guitar on the trail?”
“Yeah.” And plenty of guitar strings. Busting a string and not having a replacement would have been disaster. Fortunately, the strings didn’t weigh much.
“Sixteen pounds of gear is a lot to give up for a guitar,” Joey said.
Webb thought about what the guitar represented to him, and what he’d had to do to have the freedom to play it.
“It might be for some people,” he said. “But I’m good with it.”