Picacho Del Diablo, Mexico
You wake up.
It’s before dawn and the air is frigid and every inch of your body hurts.
But you wake up anyway.
You get out of bed. Shoes on. You run a ten-mile trail throughout the mountains. The cold makes your lungs scream, but the altitude no longer affects you the way it once did.
When your legs refuse to go any farther, return to the cabin.
Get the gun.
Creep into the woods. Find animal tracks. Follow them.
A doe and her two fawns, camped in the underbrush. The mother and one of her children get away.
The other is not so lucky.
Bring the carcass back to the cabin. Sharpen the knife.
Skin the deer, dress it, hang it to dry.
Go down to the ravine to rinse the blood and sweat from your body.
Morning light now illuminates the mountains.
At the riverside, you shadow box and lift boulders. No weights to be found out here. The rocks serve that purpose.
Pick up the heaviest one you can find. Carry it up the hill. Again. Again.
Your muscles cry out for rest. For a moment’s respite.
No.
Another rep. Another.
Sun is high overhead now.
Then—target practice. Lying in the dirt. Plinking the rock targets a hundred yards away, two hundred yards away, three hundred yards away.
Don’t miss. Don’t you dare fucking miss, you son of a bitch.
You don’t.
Sun beginning to set. You run again until you can’t anymore.
You return to the cabin.
You drink whiskey until you black out.
And when the morning comes, you do it all over again.