“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve seen people rave about wild swimming, and Chloe was going on about the river the other day, and it looked so refreshing this morning, and I wanted to try it. Just take a few steps in, even if part of me was convinced there was a river monster waiting to drag me into the depths.”
With how close he was beside me, I felt rather than saw Jack shrug his shoulders. “Well then, it sounds to me like you did what you set out to do, because you definitely took more than a few steps into that water.”
“Oh,” I said, surprised to realise that he was right. I might have run from the river like a baby, but I’d technically exceeded my initial expectations.
“I take it you’ve never done it before then?”
I shook my head, and my wet curls brushed over my shoulders, sending a fresh chill through me. “I’m not the most adventurous person, to put it lightly.”
Jack smirked, and I rolled my eyes, but I also chuckled.
“Not what I meant.”
He shrugged. “I know. But still, what makes you say that?”
“I mean, I’ve never even been out of the country.”
“I have,” he said. “It’s overrated.”
I laughed. “The whole world is overrated?”
“Okay,” he said, “not whatImeant. But we do live in one of the best places in the world for adventures.”
“Such as?”
“Well, swimming,” Jack said, gesturing at the river. “And hiking?—”
“Your favourite,” I said, remembering last night.
Jack nodded. “Well, my favourite would technically be camping. And then there’s kayaking, climbing…”
“Okay,” I said, “I get it. You’re Mister Outdoors.”
“I mean, it’s notthathard to get into. Maybe don’t jump straight in with climbing, but you literally just have to start walking and you’ll hit a hill you can walk up. Get some XP so you can level up to the next thing.”
“Sorry,” I said, “get somewhatnow?”
“XP,” he said, then paused, as if I would know what he was on about. “Experience points?” I shook my head. “They’re a gaming thing. You get enough XP, you level up.”
“We don’t use that in Fatima’s game,” I said.
“No, we use milestones. But they’re pretty common in D&D, and in video games and stuff. You get it from combats, loot, important interactions, all that. As you level up, the gaps between levels gets bigger, so you keep having to do new things to keep levelling up. So maybe now you’re going for a swim, and next time you go for a hike, and the time after that you stay out camping…”
“So, baby steps?”
“Yeah, I guess,” he said, frowning, “but that’s a way less interesting way to say it, you’ve gotta admit.”
I nodded. “Interesting. And how does one get this XP in real life?”
Jack waved his arms around him, nearly hitting me in the head in the process. “Pick a direction, and I’ll tell you something you can do. It’s all around you.”
I looked around as if a quest marker were going to appear somewhere. But I knew he was right – I’d been telling myself for years that I should take more advantage of where I lived. The town we lived in was nestled in the Wye Valley, spanning part of the southern border between West England and East Wales, with some of the most beautiful scenery Britain had to offer. I just … hadn’t actually seen much of it. Cara and I had always talked about doing more, but none of it had ever come to fruition.
“Okay, that way,” I said, pointing off to my right, down the river. Jack thought for a moment, squinting his eyes as if he really could see the quest marker I’d been imagining.
“Well, that’s towards Abergavenny,” he said. “You’d have to go over the Black Mountains, part of the Brecon Beacons, which are my favourite. I’m going there next weekend, actually.”
“Ooh, fancy,” I said. “So I guess you’ve managed to dissociate hiking from your ex?”
