Waterproof
She went shopping for what she thought of as ‘gear’. Her London wardrobe, the clothes she wore in company, the opaque tights, the long black coat, the midi-dresses and knitwear in grey and black and blue-black, were a kind of adult school uniform and would not do for the high fells. Instead she would need nylon and fleece and ‘technical garments’, whatever was needed to feel comfortable, warm and dry, to feel, in short, that she was still indoors.
In the shop, the clothes rails glowed with reds and yellows, purples and oranges. Marnie preferred camouflage and bought a green cagoule composed entirely of pockets and zips, a pair of waterproof trousers that rolled into a ball the size of an apple. She bought socks of an unimaginable complexity, based on a design by NASA, and a red woolly beanie because wasn’t 95 per cent of body heat lost through the head? She bought thermals in case of snow, sunblock in case of sun, she bought maps and a clear waterproof pouch for the maps, and a rucksack with a pocket for the map pouch plus the capacity to carry forty litres of clothing, though she struggled to imagine what forty litres of clothing would look like. Hydration was key and so she bought a rubbery bladder with a tube attached, grisly and sinister, like something you’d find hanging by a hospital bed.
She’d need a compass, because what if she wandered off in the fog or was ostracised by the group? As a kid, she’d always assumed that a compass somehow pointed where you needed to go but life was more complicated than that. A high-tech slice of plastic, marked with impenetrable scales and signs, it seemed inconceivable that this device could help her find her way, but imagine the embarrassment of being rescued without one. Carrying a compass on a walk was a way of saying, ‘Look, I’m trying, all right? I’m doing my best.’
She bought new boots. Ideally a shop like this would be staffed by weathered, bear-like rangers in checked shirts, but the boy in charge of boots was a pale, intense zealot who insisted that it was all about the boots, the wrong boots would break you, never skimp on boots, so that selecting the correct boots seemed as momentous as buying a horse. Too small would mean blisters but too big would mean blisters, plus impacted toenails, corns and keloids, and with this in mind, he led her to a small fake bridge paved with varnished cobblestones to replicate the experience of country walking. The pretend bridge was patently ridiculous.
‘You seriously want me to walk over this?’
‘If you could.’
‘Is there a shop troll? You know, fol-de-rol?’ The assistant stared at her with such ferocity that she had no choice but to trot back and forth, clip-clopping across the puny bridge in a variety of boots, frowning in concentration, head cocked as if talking to her feet telepathically, until she wanted to throw herself off it. She settled on a ruinously expensive pair in glossy brown leather, something to spray them with and wax to rub them down. ‘You must wear them now,’ ordered the assistant, ‘wear them in’, so she packed her flats into the rucksack and hiked back down Charing Cross Road. The money she’d spent had left her with a sick feeling and she struggled to justify the expense to critics who didn’t exist.
Back at home, she put everything on and looked in the mirror, the labels dangling like baubles, the room seeming to shrink as she bulked up. The green cagoule with the red beanie made her look like a stuffed olive, and the noise alone would send her mad, the roar of nylon against Gore-Tex. Was she imagining it, or were the boots too tight? In profile, if she held on to the straps of the rucksack, the low-slung bulk made her look like a tyrannosaurus. From the front, she was self-conscious about the way the straps framed her breasts, pushing them forwards in a single solid unit, like the nose of a submarine. Should she pack something elegant for the evenings, devote one or two of her forty litres to a nice dress? Would there be parties? Should she get her legs waxed? She felt sweat trickle down her back.
Four single people, a married couple, a teenager. It was like a murder-mystery, though she hoped it wouldn’t come to that.