The morning began in motion. rswfire pointed the RV toward Port Orford with a list of chores waiting at the other end of the drive, and before the town came into view he turned the camera on and named the thing that had been sitting under everything for the last couple of days: his core muscles were still sore. Not pain, he said — tender. He could not account for it. He had not, by his own reckoning, done anything to earn it. He had thought they were getting better. Whether this was a sign he had pushed too hard or simply the ordinary shape of healing, he stated plainly that he genuinely did not know, and he let the not-knowing stand rather than closing it into a plan. What he did name was the boundary he was holding: no excursions, no hikes down to the beach, no Cape Sebastian trails, no playing with the ocean, no Mount Doom. He would still walk out to the cape edges. That was the line — his need for movement negotiated against his core muscles' need for healing, two systems both load-bearing, neither one yielding. AI had told him to give it another month, probably all of January. January was also when he would be cleaning cabins and doing physical work on the campground. He said he hoped he would not make anything worse.
The fuel stop came and went, and then across the street sat the propane depot — the perfect place for it, he said, and he still had not done it. Not since the mountain in Nevada. He had talked to the man that day: open seven to three, every day until New Year's, which was exactly when he was leaving. The obstacle was not the hours. The obstacle was the approach — the tank sat on the right side of the RV, and he stated he did not yet consider himself the best driver at that. Early morning, seven o'clock, fewer eyes. He said it out loud to the camera as a commitment: he had to get propane before he reached the campground, where he would be stationary for up to three months. This is me saying I'm going to do it. Let's hope I do.
Then the grocery store, and the part of the morning he came back to the camera specifically to tell. There was a woman at the checkout he had known across visits. Weeks earlier, when he had almost nothing and was being careful in the aisles, he had mentioned that care to her, and she had walked to the back of the store and returned with a coupon so he could take three dollars off toilet paper. On this day the exchange ran longer. He had a cart full of things he had not usually bought — he was trying to eat healthier, working from suggestions the AI had given him — and he held up a jar and asked her whether the tomatoes inside were sundried. She left her post and took him to another aisle. He had only been curious; she went anyway. Back at the counter, they kept talking. He told her about Mount Doom, about injuring his core there, about renaming Port Orford as Orford Shire because the two go together. He said he was not telling the story well. She began telling him about herself instead: she was taking a software engineering class. He is a programmer. He offered to help if she ever needed it. She kept describing the joy of finally solving a problem in code, and he said he recognized that feeling immediately, and they connected there, at a checkout counter, over the same specific pleasure.
He framed what happened as mutual, not received. He helped her feel seen. She helped him feel seen — she does every time, he said, down to the three-dollar coupon. There is connection everywhere if you allow yourself to be open to it. She opened up to him because he opened up to her. He was still saying it when the road ahead stopped him. Something was blocking the way — storm damage, a big deal — and he had to go around. Three storms in a row now. We're good, he said, and took the detour.
Cape Blanco State Park received him back on what he called a wonderful morning in a wonderful life. The water had risen around the site. The little patch beside the RV had been a moat the night before; he had lifted his power cord as a precaution and then spent the storm hours playing a game built around Drummer from The Expanse, a character he named the coolest ever made. Inside the camper he laid the haul out for the camera. A couple hundred dollars, and he said it was expensive — the dollar store first, always, everything as cheap as you can get it, and only what remained bought at the grocery store where it costs a fortune. Toilet paper. Paper plates he had been avoiding because of the price. Nuts and trail mixes for snacks he could carry. Cleaning supplies, because he was leaving in two days. Spinach, bananas, peanut butter for his first smoothie. Baby carrots, olives, pickles, the sundried tomatoes, bread, bagels, hamburger meat. Hummus and feta he could not fully account for — the AI had told him to get them, maybe for bagels — after he had asked it to take his bagels-in-the-morning, hamburgers-at-night baseline and expand it a little. He planned to make energy bars with the peanut butter. It would carry him to the new year.
The shower bag was packed and ready and the shower was the next thing on the list. The ocean was not. He said he did not know if he could go look at it that day, that he could not believe how badly his core muscles felt, that they simply did not feel good and he should probably let them rest and do something on his computer instead. Two days out from departure, a three-month stationary post ahead, propane still unbought, water still standing around the site. He wished everyone a good day.