by Nina Revoyr
Suddenly Gwen heard a whooshing sound and locked eyes with a fish, level with her in midair, ten feet away. It was caught in the talons of a huge rust-winged hawk, whose right foot was clamped around the fish below its head, the left above its tail, the bird’s wings beating the air as it moved quickly skyward. The fish’s mouth was working and it must have been in shock, removed so suddenly from its watery home that it didn’t even struggle. Then they were gone and the great bird turned upriver, its large, solid body now dwarfing its prey, the wings moving with efficiency and power. As it flew, water streamed off the fish in a diffuse, falling spray. Rays of light hit the droplets as they fell, and the whole effect was like a million fireflies, or shimmery fireworks floating softly toward the river.
“Holy shit,” Todd said.
“That was something,” Tracy said, grinning.
“That poor fish didn’t know what hit him,” Oscar said. “Did you see him? He was looking right at us!”
“That’s life in the wilderness for you,” Tracy remarked. “One minute, you’re just swimming along, minding your own business. The next . . .”
Gwen took a few steps closer to the river. She didn’t want a life lesson right now. She didn’t want the moment to have meaning imposed; it was perfect and complete as it was. In the distance, she could still make out the tiny figure of the bird, the now-thinning trail of spray.
“Let’s keep going,” Tracy said, and so they did.
The trail stayed close to the river now, sometimes just beside it, sometimes winding away past a rock formation or through a stand of woods, never out of hearing distance. After another three miles the trail crossed the river. It was serene here, and there were enough rocks to use as stepping stones. When they reached the other side, they decided to break for lunch. They left their packs beside the trail and scrambled back down to the river’s edge with their lunches. Gwen sat on the sand, and Tracy a little above her on a fallen log. Todd clambered up on a big rock at the edge of the water, and Oscar, after removing his boots and socks, waded out into the river, where he hoisted himself up onto a rock and sat facing upstream. The usual gray boulders were intermixed here with smooth, shiny black rock, whose wavelike curves and circular indentations had been carved by the rushing water. They looked like sculptures, more beautiful than anything conceived by man.
They ate hungrily—cheese sandwiches for Tracy and Gwen, peanut butter and jelly for Oscar and Todd. They shared a couple of Snickers bars for dessert. Then the two men relaxed on their boulders, arms over their faces. Gwen gazed out at the water, which was so clear she could make out brown and gray rocks submerged far out in the river, as if she were looking at them through glass. Finally, nearly hypnotized by the sight of water sliding over rock, she lay back on the ground and closed her eyes. The feel of the sun on her face, drying her sweat, was heavenly; the smell of the pines and the water made her feel cleansed; the steady sound of the river was soothing and she drifted off to sleep.
It felt like ten seconds before someone jiggled her. “Come on, sleepyhead,” she heard, and when she opened her eyes, Tracy was standing over her. “We need to get moving.”
Gwen sat up slowly and saw that the guys were already back up at the trail.
“We refilled the water bottles and treated them—yours too,” Tracy said.
“Thank you. How long have I been asleep?”
“About half an hour.”
When they resumed their hike, Gwen was still half-asleep. The pack seemed heavier now, her hips and shoulders felt bruised, and hot spots were developing on her feet. And she was hungry again too—the sandwich had not been enough. Embarrassed, and feeling like she wasn’t pulling her weight, she asked to stop so she could put some Moleskin on her heels. Everyone waited quietly but she could sense their impatience. She got her shoes back on, ate a bit of beef jerky, and was quickly up again.
They continued for ten, fifteen minutes without much conversation. Then the trail veered sharply away from the river and uphill to the right, and they all stopped to assess their course.
Tracy pointed up the river’s path with her trekking pole. “Looks like the river comes from out of that slot canyon. No way for us to follow it.”
Upriver, forty-foot vertical walls of granite rose on either side of the narrow canyon. Whole sections had broken off in flat irregular shapes like sheets of glass, leaving light-colored scars on the rock beneath. Wherever the river was coming from, it wasn’t anyplace they could safely travel.
“What does it say on your homemade map?” Todd asked.
Tracy swung her pack off her shoulder easily and set it down with one hand. She unzipped the lid and pulled out the map. “Seems right. You can see that the trail heads away from the river.”
“So . . . it looks like we have some switchbacks coming up,” Todd said, looking over her shoulder. “And then there’s an open space here, maybe a meadow?”
“This is a lake,” Tracy said, pointing. “Right here at the end of it.”
“So we’re on the right track?” Gwen asked.
“Seem to be,” said Todd. “But brace yourself. We’re about to go uphill.”
Oscar was sitting on a rock, fiddling with his GPS unit, and now his shoulders slumped. “As opposed to what we’ve been doing for the last four hours?”
“Steeper uphill,” said Tracy.
Gwen just sat where she was, too tired to speak. She could picture her mother shaking her head, hear Chris’s derisive laughter. But what could she do? She couldn’t turn around and walk out. So she reshouldered her pack, more smoothly this time, and resolved to keep on going.
The terrain was steep, but it wasn’t as bad as Gwen feared. The trail was a ramp of earth and leaves, no rock steps. Still, she was glad for the workouts in Tracy’s class, the countless squats and knee drives; without them, her legs—and lungs—would never have been able to handle this load. And it helped that as they switchbacked up the slope, they began to see the wooded valley they’d started from. It was beautiful, and seeing how far they’d come gave Gwen the energy she needed. They heard water again, a stream that was working its way down from another part of the mountain. There was more granite here, massive swirling gentle slopes that flowed downhill in concert with the water. One huge dome was crisscrossed with numberless cracks, like a pot that had been broken into thousands of pieces and carefully glued back together.
Within twenty minutes they’d reached the top of the switchbacks and now they crossed another stream, balancing on a log that had fallen across it.
“Look!” Todd called out excitedly, and Gwen saw the dark, slick backs of fish, the flashes of pink on their bellies as they darted and swam. There were so many she might have reached out and grabbed them with her hands.
“Are they rainbow trout?” Oscar asked.
“No, those are eastern brookies,” Todd said. “Damn, I wish I’d brought my fishing pole.”
They stood admiring the fish for a moment—Gwen had never seen so many in a natural setting, so colorful and alive. They walked on and wound their way through the forest, passing a stand of white-barked trees that Todd identified as aspens, their flat round leaves shimmering and rustling in the breeze like a thousand gentle wind chimes. Then suddenly they were out, in a landscape so different they might have stepped through a wardrobe into Narnia.
They were standing at the edge of a meadow, a mile wide and at least two miles long. The lush green reeds were as high as their waists, and sprinkled through them, at each creek and rivulet, was an explosion of wildflowers—purple and red and yellow and orange, bright blue and scarlet and gold. The river here was wide and meandering, running calmly along the edge of the meadow; several deer were standing a quarter-mile away, drinking peacefully at its banks. The meadow was ringed with taller peaks that still held pockets of snow. Although Gwen could make out the gentle sound of the water, everything else was still; the silence here was even deeper than the silence that morning at camp; it was so full it was a sound in i
tself.
“Wow,” said Tracy. “Wow.” And if even she was impressed, Gwen thought, then this really was something special.
“Have we died?” Todd asked. “Because I think this might be heaven.”
“This is unreal,” Oscar said. “I didn’t even know that a place like this existed.”
“Well, dead or alive, we’re here,” Tracy said. “If our map is accurate, there’s a lake just a bit farther on.”
Here the cover of trees was gone and they were in the open sun; they put on sunglasses and sunscreen and lip balm. The meadow and mountains, the running river, only got more beautiful as they hiked. They were silent except for the occasional word from Todd or Tracy to identify a wildflower: lupine, monkey-flower, Indian paintbrush, mule’s ears, penstemon, mariposa lily. The grandness of it all left Gwen humbled and moved; it was almost too much to take in. After an hour the meadow narrowed and the two ranges came together; the peak straight ahead was the landscape’s gathering point. On each side a stream rippled down a steep mountain wall. And there, surrounded on three sides by mountain, they found the small, pristine lake. The surface glistened in the afternoon sun. The banks in front of them, and to the right, were rocky but approachable; to the left the meadow continued, reaching up to and beyond the lake’s end.
“I think this is home for the night,” said Tracy.
“This is perfect,” Todd replied.
“Let’s put our stuff down and I’ll look around for a place to set up camp.”
Gwen was glad to have a reason to sit; she took off her pack and collapsed. Down the meadow, a deer lingered by the river’s edge, still watching them. Its nose was black and wet, its huge ears swiveling in response to sound. Why didn’t it leave? she wondered. The lake was so still that the reflection of the mountain on its surface looked like an entirely separate mountain. In her exhaustion she half-wondered if she could swim out and step onto it.
Then Tracy was back. “There’s a good spot up there,” she said, pointing behind them and to the right. “Flat, protected by some trees, nice view of the lake. Exactly like it shows on the map.”
“Good. I’m ready to be settled,” Todd said.
Oscar stood up, groaning. “Tell me about it.”
The spot Tracy had found was perfect—clear, and nestled in trees, overlooking the lake. Gwen helped the best she could, unfolding the tent poles until they locked into place, clipping the plastic hooks onto the poles. But mostly she felt like she was getting in the way, so she stepped aside as Tracy attached the rain fly, collected rocks to the fill the gaps in what looked like an old fire pit, and gathered, with Todd’s help, an assortment of branches and sticks for a fire. Tracy was in a short-sleeved shirt now, black, and Gwen saw how the muscles in her arms shifted with her movements. Her calf and thigh muscles were so solid Gwen could see them through her pants. Even at forty, Tracy looked like she could still mix it up with the twenty-five-year-olds in the pro women’s basketball game Gwen had gone to recently with the kids. Tracy’s motions were steady and efficient, strong, and again Gwen thought of wolves. What a well-built creature, she thought, looking at Tracy’s body. Would she ever feel that confident in her own?
Once camp was set up, Oscar and Todd crawled into their tent for a nap. Tracy changed into some flip-flops and even she lay down now, head resting on her pack, cap over her face. But Gwen, after closing her eyes, sat up straight again. Despite her exhaustion, she was too charged up to rest.
She walked down from their campsite and stepped across a small creek, over to the other side of the lake. The lone deer still watched her from the river’s edge. There were a few mosquitoes swirling around her now, but she batted them away. Off trail, the wet earth of the meadow was like tar on her shoes; she stepped quickly so as not to sink in. And what was she trying to get to? She didn’t know. Maybe further into the heart of beauty itself. Finally, more than a hundred feet up the side of the lake, the ground was a little firmer. Here bushes grew in heavy green clumps.
There was a patch of easy shoreline ahead, and Gwen decided to go down to the lake to soak her sore feet. She stepped past some shoulder-high brush, about fifteen feet from the water’s edge. There was a blur of movement—a tiny form, bolting awkwardly away. It was a fawn—smaller than she’d imagined a deer could ever be, barely the size of a spaniel. It moved uncertainly on legs so fresh and untried that these might have been its first steps on earth.
“It’s okay,” she said reassuringly, but the baby was gone, stumbling to the next set of bushes. No wonder the deer had stuck around, she thought. She was afraid we were a danger to her baby.
Gwen was about to continue on when she saw a flash of blond fur—another fawn, curled up in a tight ball with its little bony legs angling outward. Was it dead? No, just lying still, head pulled into its body, ears lying flat against its head. When Gwen saw its dark liquid eyes looking up at her fearfully, she understood it was trying to hide. She stepped up to take a closer look at the little creature, its constellation of white spots, knowing she shouldn’t but unable to help herself. The fawn burrowed its head deeper into itself. “Oh, honey,” she said, “I won’t hurt you.”
Then she backed away enough to give the baby some space, and it sprang up and wobbled off to join its sibling.
“Don’t worry, mama deer,” she called out to the adult. “Your babies are fine.”
She went down to the water, took her shoes off, and stuck her worn feet into the lake, enjoying the shock of the snow-melt cold. She’d hoped to rinse off in the water, but the numbness in her feet convinced her otherwise. Instead, she submerged one leg up beyond her once-injured knee, to discourage inflammation. After her leg and feet got used to the cold, she looked up at the sky. A few afternoon clouds had floated in over the peaks; they almost seemed alive. They moved through, into, and on top of each other, in shades of white and gray. A chain of clouds like five ghosts linked their feathery arms and rose up to take a bow. Then she heard a noise and looked down at a circle expanding in the lake; a fish leapt up to catch a bug, and then another, their bodies clearing the surface and twisting before landing back in their watery homes. Finally, chilled but happy, Gwen put her shoes on and made her way back to camp. Her joy must have been obvious, because as soon as she arrived, Tracy asked, “What just happened? You look like you fell in love.”
“I kind of did,” Gwen admitted. “I just saw a couple of fawns down there. This high.” She lowered her palm to her knee. “Totally covered with spots. Legs so fragile they could hardly walk.”
“Very nice,” said Tracy. “They’re probably just a couple of weeks old.”
“One ran off, and the other was curled up right in front of me. I almost tripped over it. I think that was the mom we saw on the other side of the meadow.”
“Two of them,” Oscar said. He was sitting at the fire ring, rearranging food in his bear canister. “I didn’t know deer had twins.”
“They usually do,” came Todd’s voice from the tent. “Probably to increase the chances that at least one will make it. And they lie still because when they’re babies, they don’t have any scent.”
“How do you know that?” Gwen asked.
“I used to hunt them when I was a kid in Wisconsin.”
This hit Gwen like a punch in the stomach.
“That’s cool,” Tracy said. “Do you still hunt?”
“No,” Todd replied, sounding wistful. “I haven’t gone in years. I’d still be up for it, but I think my kids would disown me. Not to mention my wife.”
“I hunted a bit in Idaho,” Tracy said. “I haven’t in years either, but I do make it to the firing range sometimes.”
“Me too,” said Todd. “To work off stress. My family doesn’t know that, though.” He laughed.
Gwen tried not to hold Todd’s comment against him, or Tracy’s either. And it was easy enough to forget their conversation, since there was still so much to do. She unscrewed the locks on her bear canister and retrieved a packaged dinner, f
ixed up a cheese sandwich for lunch the next day. She took a Ziploc bag and some biodegradable soap, as Tracy had taught her, and went down to the river, where she washed her socks, her underthings, her hiking shirt. She hung her wet clothes on nearby branches, trying not to be self-conscious about them. She went off behind a rock and sponge bathed with a couple of body wipes and a washcloth, forgoing lotion out of worry of bears. There were a few raised bumps on her arms and shoulders from mosquito bites—they had bitten right through her shirt. She put on her warm base layer, top and bottom, and then her hiking pants. She layered on her pink fleece and then her purple down jacket, and pulled on a thin wool cap. She tried not to think about what the cap would do to her hair, or how she must look without makeup.
By the time she got back to their camp, the others had changed clothes too. Tracy was boiling water over the fire. One by one, Tracy poured the water into their food packages, and the hard unrecognizable material transformed into food. They were starving. Gwen’s beef Stroganoff tasted like a school cafeteria meal, better than she’d expected. The others, once the water did its work, had varieties of pasta and rice.
“This is the most satisfying meal I’ve ever had,” Oscar said, and he didn’t sound like he was kidding. They sat on boulders, swatting away the occasional bug, and ate like they hadn’t had a meal in days.
“This will make it better,” Todd said. He pulled out a flask and took a draw, then held it toward Oscar.
“What is it?” Oscar asked.
“Bourbon.”
He let Todd pour him a drink, took a sip, and screwed up his face. Todd poured Tracy a shot and then offered some to Gwen, who waved the flask away.
“Are you sure? It’ll help you sleep,” Todd said.
Gwen laughed, or tried to. “If it was wine, I’d take you up on it. But I don’t think I’m going to need much help.”
“Yeah, what a day, huh?” Oscar said.
