Plans for winter camp

     She tossed a pebble into the creek. It ran slow this time of year, summer's near end. She felt the crisp cold of a breeze waft up from above the canyon below. It hit her left cheek like a reminder to seek out a winter cave.
     "I don't have enough stores of food yet."
     She spoke to the scrub jay peering at her from a gooseberry bush. "Where do you winter up, Jay? Wish I were you, feathers an' all. Fly south. No worries of where your food is comin' from. No deadlines. No fear of cold or death. Just instinct right?"
     The jay cast her a skewed glance, cocked its head again and flitted off. She remembered seeing a dead jay in her backyard at home. She wondered if it had fallen from disease or just age. There had been no marking of injury on it. No evidence of its mortal enemy, the domestic cat as having mortally wounded it. All its feathers were intact. She had left it there to slowly decompose. Her dogs had left it undisturbed.
     She wished she would have been left undisturbed, unmolested by her stepfather - but no, she had been too much of a temptation for his roving eyes, his lustful hands to grope and torment her adolescent innocence. Her life in hell at the claws of a sex fiend. This is why she fled. She escaped. She was off the grid. Found herself on the the threshold of winter's portal. No where to go but up. Far up the spine of the Sierra Nevada. No stores of food.
     "Wish I could fly away. Oh God, I wish I could just find someplace to stay. Worse case scenario, I'm gonna hole up in some cave. I know a couple of 'em. Snow hares. Snares. Wood. Flint and rock. My gun. Yeah, I'll be alright. Okay, get a grip. Let's go. Time to fly away."
     She recalled with a frigid shudder, the previous night's attack by some creature. It was halfway between a spirit and real flesh and stinky flesh. It was evil, to be sure. It smelled like lust. Like her stepfather. But this one was hairy like a bear. And heavy. It's red eyes she'd stared into and never forget. She felt for her small bible at her backpack's side pouch. Yes, it was still there. The complete King James's version in the tiniest of print. Font 6, old and new testaments. It was her comfort. Her salvation. Her sword against evil.
     She remembered the bright entity, the angel that had thwarted the demon, Moth Man, or Slender Man, whatever, off of her that night. She trusted in this same messenger of God to keep her safe. Because she was determined. She wasn't going back to civilization. She would stay in the wilds forever.
      "I'd rather die of starvation or freeze to death than go back, Lord. I trust that you will care for me and provide, be my guide and lead me . . . yes, though I walk through the valley of shadow of death, I will fear no evil."
      She rose up, dusted herself and headed in a southwesterly direction. There was a cave about 4 miles distant that she would winter in.
      She was unaware that two male hikers who'd heard her last night's screams were tracking her.