“Man, you really do need a vacation.”

The man at the grocery store sputtered this to me as I mopped at my sweating brow, waiting in the long line that weaved toward the back. I gave him a grimace, trying to stand on my tippy-toes to see the front.

“Seems like everyone’s trying to get out of town for Labor Day,” I sighed, playing with my coiffed blond hair. “I don’t blame them. But damn, I should have gotten here earlier; when I planned to. Things never really go as planned, though, do they?”

“Sure don’t,” he grunted.

The man I was speaking to—just one of those “friends” you pick up in line everywhere, who shares your qualms with the world—gave me a soft punch on the shoulder. He was carrying a twelve-pack of domestic beer, and his belly bulged out over his jeans. He had the aura of a previous frat boy, reliving the glory days. I could tell by the way he swept his eyes from my shoulders, down the crest of my breasts, and toward the cinch of my waist, that he wanted our conversation to move forward.

But I felt drained, washed out. I’d been on a dozen or more dates over the previous summer, without a single “win,” and I yearned to be free of the San Francisco streets. I yearned to flee the tech people, who earned high salaries and seemed to eliminate anything interesting or gritty or personable about the city. The reasons my mother and father had been drawn here in the first place. The reasons I had stayed, after finishing law school.

But it seemed that those reasons were seeping away, making me a stranger in my own land.

“Where you off to, anyway?” he asked.

“The Mendocino National Forest,” I told him, knowing this was a place someone like him wouldn’t follow me.

He gave a snicker, one that read unkind if I listened to it the wrong way.

“Why the hell would you go all the way out there? We’re renting a boat, my buddies and me. Why don’t you come with us? We’ve got loads of beer and food and afterwards, we’ll have a bonfire on the beach. Classic San Francisco late-summer evening.”

“I don’t want San Francisco right now,” I said, adjusting the parcels in my grocery basket. “I want to be as far away from this place as possible. I haven’t had a vacation in years.”

The man’s eyebrows rose high on his face. “But don’t you have unlimited time off? Damn, I don’t know anyone without that. We’re always coming and going as we please in the tech industry. You don’t work in it, I take it?”

“Defense attorney,” I said. I kept myself low, centered. I wasn’t in the courtroom. I didn’t have to defend myself against anyone like him. Against anyone at all, actually. Not now that I was on vacation for one entire week.

“Sounds rough.”

How was it possible that the line hadn’t moved along at all?

Again, I rose up on my tip toes, and I sensed the man’s eyes on my ass. My hands shifted, feeling the weight of the things I’d packed for the trip away: a water bottle, some snacks for the drive, and a small bar of chocolate. I felt anxious, itchy.

With a thrust forward, I dropped my basket near a stack of the others, and began to dart toward the door. I was no longer hungry. With my hands drawing into fists, I felt volatile and alive—straining against the vibrant city around me.

“Hey! You want me to hold your place in line?” the man called from far away, his voice growing whiny in my ear. “Or…?”

But already, the grocery store doors had pulled apart, revealing the grey and foggy parking lot. My little Chevy Cavalier, red and dented, awaited. I tossed myself into the front seat and inserted the key, bringing up the map to the forest on my phone. The blue line that led me there looked winding and strange, so unlike the simple dart to and from work I’d been taking for the past three years.

“Mendocino National Forest,” I whispered. “Here I come.”

I blasted from the little grocery store in the Mission District, easing down Valencia Street. Around me, Mission District hipsters celebrated Labor Day weekend. They held frozen margaritas and large burritos, twirling their mustaches and ogling one another.

I had been one of them for years, picking up on their culture the minute I darted from my office. I’d dated countless of them: men who told me the bands to listen to, the brands to buy to “do my part for the environment,” and even the houses to live in, based on my “personality” and “needs.” As if they could ever really know.

No. The fact was, I had always yearned to be out of the city. To walk through the forests and inhale the gorgeous, clean mountain air. I was a life-long city dweller, but I held something else within me. A desire to flee to the mountains. I had the idea that I could really think there, perhaps for the first time.

In some ways, I imagined I would make a different career move up there. That I would see all the holes in my current life and decide to mop it up, start clean. Maybe I could become an artist, like my father had been. Maybe I could go back to school.

Not that I didn’t love making a difference, as my mother often put it. “These people; they need you.”

But it had been a long time since I’d been able to separate myself completely from my work.

In any case, I wasn’t sure what the forest would bring me. But I was certain it would be more than I’d gleaned from the last several years. The constant 9 to 5, the constant humdrum, the men who never cut it or loved me enough or cared about anything besides my looks.

Once I darted out of the city and onto the highway, I exhaled deeply, feeling relieved. Already, the monkey on my back was falling away.

I turned up the radio and began to hum along, though feeling almost frightened to sing. Somehow, I hadn’t been alone with my thoughts in a long time, and I was certain someone could hear in.

As I drove, my phone buzzed twice—both with work-related emails. Slightly panicked, I shot my phone toward the backseat, knowing that they’d have to do the work without me for the seven days ahead. I had to pay attention to what my doctor had said, nearly a year before. “A vacation is your greatest medicine right now, Serena. Seems you’re working yourself to death. More meditation, maybe. More peacefulness. Otherwise, you’re going to age, prematurely. Already, I can see pre-wrinkles on your face.”

What the hell were pre-wrinkles, anyway? I had wanted to ask him, but instead I shuddered, knowing that my heart, mind and body were fighting back against my unrewarding schedule. I had to find peace.

The first sign for Mendocino National Forest blipped past me. I shifted my shoulders, leaning forward slightly. The cars had begun to filter off, proving that anyone who had left San Francisco for the holiday weekend hadn’t driven quite this far away. I was beyond them.

At the base of the mountain, a small town had sprung up: just a small grocery store, seemingly tacked together with a few spare logs and a painted sign, a gas station, a mechanic’s shop, and a church, a block up. The church was a bit crooked, with a cross that had been tacked to the outside. A sign out front read, “For He Is Risen”. An Easter sign, despite the September date. It felt very much that the world didn’t pay attention to the clock out that far. That the world had a different set of rules.

Checking the address a final time, I leaned on the gas pedal and revved the little car up the base of the mountain, toward the entrance of the National Park. After paying a small fee to a man wearing a brown National Park Service hat, I cranked toward the halfway point of the mountain, where the driveway eased off toward a quaint, rustic cabin. Removing the keys, I ducked out from the driver’s seat and edged toward the cabin, which was situated at the side of a crystalline lake. The water glowed with the mid-afternoon sun, showing the perfect fluff of the clouds above them.

Placing my hands on my hips, I felt my heart grow light, amazed. This world was not my world. Nothing about it was recognizable. And yet, I could already feel my breath coming and going with ease.

Closing my eyes, I snuck my foot from my wedged heel and eased my toe into the thin bit of water beneath me. It was icy, cool. A shiver rushed up my spine.

After a moment, I turned back toward the cabin. The front porch faced the water and was lined with cobwebs, each of them waving along with the wind. Ducking beneath one that crept from one post to the next, I maneuvered toward the door and walked through it, knowing that the key would be on the kitchen table. These had been my instructions. I could lock it when I pleased—but there was no need to lock the door when no one was around. The place had nothing but a table, two chairs, and a bed. I’d even had to bring my own sheets.

Scanning the cupboards, I realized my stomach had cramped with hunger. Rubbing at my stomach, I reasoned that I wouldn’t be able to get in a comfortable evening hike if I didn’t even have something to eat.

I bounced back through the front door, darting toward my car. In my head, I began to calculate an appropriate grocery list for the week ahead. Eggs. Bread. Cheese. Maybe a bit of chocolate. Certainly some wine. I’d spend the week drinking and reading and even writing, maybe. I’d spend the week doing precisely what I liked, just alone.

As I marched from the porch, I spotted a serene moored boat, bobbing in the distance. The top was a bright red, but foggy looking as evening crept across the lake. I was disappointed I couldn’t yet relax, or dive into this world. But I resolved myself to drive quickly and not make a single detour.

What else could I get up to around there, anyway?