Field-Tripped

by Nicole Archer

  Then I notice the trek pole again. I pick it up and lower it over the edge. With the space blanket, scarf, and pole, it’ll reach the dog. “It might work if I had something to anchor us.”

  “You,” she says. “You hold the pole and I’ll get him. I weigh less. It should be me. Then he won’t get scared. I’ll put your backpack on and we can tie the scarf to that and the other end to the lanyard on your pole. I’ll slide down and cover him with the blanket. Then I’ll push him up, while you pull.”

  “And what about you? How are you going to get back up?”

  “I’m an excellent climber, better than you.”

  With a harsh look, I tell her I’m in no mood for her risky, competitive behavior.

  “I’ll tie the space blanket around me like a harness and attach the scarf, and that way, if I slip on the way down, you’ve got me.”

  “I don’t like this.”

  But apparently, I don’t have a say in the matter, since she’s already wrapping the space blanket around her waist like a diaper.

  I won’t bore you with the events that transpired next, like my arms almost snapping in half, or her almost falling off the edge, or the struggle her dog gave us, or the bald spots I gave him by yanking him up by his fur, or the seventeen tries it took her to get back up—suffice it to say, we’re all together now, on the upper ledge, safe.

  Safe, as in we have a little more time before we either starve or freeze to death.

  As if the universe read my mind, snow blows down from the sky in wild, windy swirls.

  We waste no time building a shelter. The crevasse between the adjacent cliff is big enough for the four of us to cram inside. We can’t lie down in it, and the razor-sharp rocks underneath are no substitute for a bed, but it’s better than dying from exposure or frostbite.

  Using the broken snowshoe, we pile crusty snow in a wall around the entrance for insulation, and then we drape the space blanket across the opening and tie it down with the tent cords, buried in the snow.

  We cut open the backpack and spread it and the rain poncho on the ground, then haul in what little supplies we have.

  I then perform the death-defying act of gathering fuel. I pitch the rock, with the scarf attached, over the tree about fifty times before it actually works. Then I hang off it until the branches break off and we manage to gather seven twigs and one limb, that won’t last more than an hour.

  I would have given up the second time, but Charlie kept egging me on with her terrible rendition of “Eye of the Tiger,” in which she substituted the real lyrics with her made-up ones.

  “Rising up, slipping on sleet. Eli’s fine, and takes chances. Missed the distance, now he’s back on his feet. Just a man and his will to surviiiiive. So many times it happens too fast. You trade your scarf in for glory! Don’t lose your grip on the dreams of our past. Eli must fight just to keep us alive. And the last known survivor throws his scarf in the night. And I’m watching him faaaaall with the eye of the tiger. Dun! Dun, duh, dun, duh, dun duh!”

  Grinning and shaking my head, I start singing along with her.

  This is the Charlie I remember—the fighter, the comedian, the enchantress—the woman who makes surviving an avalanche fun.

  When the chore is done, it’s just after noon, and we find ourselves with nothing to do. So we stand at the edge, and gaze down at the barrenness below.

  “It’s so pretty up here,” she says.

  “That it is.”

  Another long moment passes. “If we get out of here, what’s the first thing you want to do?”

  “We are getting out of here.” I can barely believe the optimism that just came out of my mouth. “And the first thing I’m gonna do is make love with you.”

  She gives me a shy smile. “Really?”

  “Yep.”

  She stuffs her hand in my pocket. “I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather be trapped on a mountain with than you.”

  “I take it you’re not pissed at me anymore.”

  “Hmm?”

  “About Sabrina. Last night. I kicked her out after you left, in case you were wondering.”

  “Poor girl. Even a blind man could see you’re not into her.”

  I draw back a little and lift a brow. “You knew?”

  Her gaze turns back to the mountaintops. “Every time she looks at you, you’re looking at me.”

  I squeeze her closer. “If you weren’t upset, then what was up with silent treatment? You must have been mad about something.”

  “I’m not mad. I’m sad.” She pauses before clarifying. “I don’t know what to do with you or us or this.” She ducks out from under my hold and faces me. Her mouth opens and closes. Then she takes a deep breath and starts again.

  A shudder rolls over me. We are about to have “the talk.” The talk we’ve been, or rather I’ve been avoiding. The “what happened” talk. The “what now” talk. The talk where I’m forced to come clean.

  The first thing she says is “I’m sorry for cheating on you.” Her pitch grows higher, and the words come out faster. “I thought you left me. You didn’t tell me where you were going or when you’d be back. I had no one to turn to. That night, I drank a fifth of vodka.”

  I shield my eyes. I can’t watch her do this—the guilt, the pain.

  “I don’t remember anything about that guy,” she says. “I don’t remember his name. Or what he looked like. I don’t remember anything. He was just a substitute. A plug filling a black void.”

  I lower my hand and brave a glance. Her lips are trembling and her lashes are wet.

  Suddenly, I feel every bruise and scrap from the fall. “It doesn’t matter now,” I say. “It’s over.”

  “But it’s not! Here we are!” She points at her chest. “This isn’t just sex for me. I have feelings for you. Scary feelings. And you’re just standing there, looking annoyed, not talking to me, being a fucking man.”

  “I didn’t leave you,” I say quietly.

  She jumps to her feet and screams, “You did! Twice!”

  My blood shoots up to my head and pounds against my temples. “I was devastated, Charlie. I lost them, too. And my goddamned career. I needed time to process everything. So I handled it poorly. I was twenty-one years old. And then you slept with that guy. You knew about my mom cheating on my dad. How did you think I was going to react? Did you think I was going to stick around for more fun times?”

  Her expression calcifies into stone. “I needed you.”

  “I needed you!”

  Tears gurgle up in her voice. “I’m sorry. I was just as young and dumb as you. But you still left. And you didn’t tell me you were coming back.”

  “I left because I killed your family.” I slam my eyes shut and listen for her response.

  All I hear is my own heartbeat.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  Charlie Dates An Amputee

  December 2005

  SOMETHING TERRIBLE HAPPENED. Elliott hurt his knee, and now he can’t go to the Olympics.

  I’m really worried about him. He’s been so depressed. I don’t know what to do. He won’t talk to me. I keep telling him he has his whole life ahead of him. The doctor told us he would be fine in a year.

  I talked to Weiner about it, and he told me to leave him alone, let him recover on his own time. I begged him to come over and cheer him up, but he said that would be weird since he hasn’t come clean about our relationship.

  Weiner’s pissed Elliott won’t stop lying about us. There’s no doubt that Loser loves me, but sometimes, I wonder.

  But then I remember I haven’t opened a car door in his presence since I was ten. And he likes my crazy made-up songs and weird sense of humor. Most of all, he loves me.

  I can wait. He’ll get better.

  I have faith in that Loser. He’s the strongest man I know.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  Charlie Clings

  Eli’s Mixtape: Hippie Sabotage, “Your Soul”

  “I KILLED YOUR FAMILY.”


  One by one, snowflakes land on my face and melt. I shiver and wait for him to explain.

  When he finally speaks, his voice is so soft and strangled it crashes against me. “Patrick found out about us. Right before the accident, he sent me a text. He was with your mom and dad, said they were all coming to beat my ass.”

  He pauses and runs his hand through his frozen hair. “Well, actually, he said, ‘I’m coming to beat your assets,’ but I knew what he meant.” He violently rubs his forehead. “Rage driving. They wrecked because of me. I killed them.”

  I stare at him without blinking. Does he seriously think he caused their accident?

  He bounces from foot to foot, scratching his face, rolling his shoulders.

  I’m grateful for our imprisonment on top of this godforsaken rock. Otherwise, he’d run away.

  Survivor’s guilt.

  That’s what my therapist called it.

  “You believe you’re the one who should have died in that wreck.” She’d stated this as though it were fact.

  “That’s ridiculous,” I told her. “It was an accident.”

  “Let’s talk about your self-destructive behavior.” She’d listed the examples. “The drunk driving. The sex with strangers. The extreme sports. The reckless stunts. When you’re not working yourself to death, you’re trying to kill yourself.” She had paused and noted my expression. “Why are you smiling? Is this funny to you?”

  I feel my lips. They’re dry and leathery and curved up. A storm of laughter is brewing in my belly. It’s so wrong. I bite my smile off and snort.

  “Are you laughing?” he asks.

  It’s like my head blows off, and my emotions erupt. I collapse on my back and howl. My laughter echoes over the valley. “You fucking idiot!”

  And then I cry and wail and moan. It’s the first time I’ve cried about this. And it hurts. Oh God, it hurts. My dog frantically licks my hand.

  All of a sudden, the tears dry up. I focus on him.

  He’s pale, like he’s going to vomit. And he’s frozen in place like a statue.

  “You left me, when I needed you the most, because you thought you killed my family?”

  Not a peep comes out of him.

  I shout at him. “They knew! They always knew. They were just waiting for you to grow a spine and stop sneaking around. Patrick found your stupid engagement ring. They were coming over to celebrate. Don’t you remember the pictures of the accident? There were broken champagne bottles all over the highway.”

  “They knew?”

  “Yes! How could they not? My God, Elliott, we fell in love in elementary school. You can’t hide that.”

  Three more times he repeats the words, as if trying to firmly cement them in his mind. And then he fists his hair and tips back his head and roars. “THEY FUCKING KNEW!”

  He turns to me, eyes wild with terror. “I’ve been living a lie for ten years. What the fuck is wrong with me?” His body seems to give out, and he sinks to his knees in the snow.

  “And you,” he says after a long, tortured moment. “You knew I was going to propose?”

  “Patrick always had such a big mouth. He never could keep a secret.”

  “That son of a bitch.” He gapes at me.

  I reach for his arm and keep my hand there for a moment. “I blamed myself, too.” The past tense is right, because as of this moment, it ends. The guilt. I have no use for it anymore. I forgive myself. I forgive him. I forgive my brother for driving my parents into a semi. And I forgive them for leaving me.

  I do this silently, almost as a prayer. I release my pain and give it to the mountains. Take it away!

  Then I crawl over and lay on top of him. My dogs lay on top of him too.

  He grunts. “Are you guys trying to smother me?”

  I kiss him softly, delicately, and he hugs me tightly.

  “I feel like I should take you to dinner or something,” he says. “Like out on a date. Make up for lost time. Start over and get back to where we were.”

  “Pizza sounds so good right now.”

  “I know. I’m starving.”

  I lay my head on his chest and let the rise and fall of his breathing soothe me. “Think we can? Start over?” I ask.

  “Do you?”

  “I don’t want to lose you.”

  He removes his glove and slides his hand under my jacket. His fingers curl around my breasts. He needs skin-to-skin contact.

  So do I.

  “You never told me what you’d do,” he asks, “when we get off this cliff.”

  “Make love with you, of course.”

  He grabs my bottom and kisses me. “Good girl.” Then he rolls me off and sits up. “What else would you do? Besides hump me?”

  I sit back on my hands. “I’d go to Machu Picchu and scatter my family’s ashes.”

  “You still have them?”

  “Yeah.”

  His lips pull back. “That’s kind of gross.”

  “I know. I haven’t been ready. It’s hard to explain.”

  “Why Machu Picchu?”

  “Remember my dad was big into astronomy? He always wanted to take us there. Apparently, there’s some sort of magic stone that does something special during the equinox. We could never get our schedules to work out, so he kept putting it off.”

  “How come you haven’t gone?”

  I let out a big breath. “I don’t know. Guess I haven’t wanted to let them go.”

  He winds my pigtail around his finger. “I miss them, too. I miss your mom a lot. I could always talk to her about anything.”

  His words pluck a tight string around my heart. “She loved you, too.” I change the subject. “What about your family? Have you seen them, yet?”

  He frowns. “They don’t know I’m here.”

  “Are you going there for Christmas?”

  “Hadn’t planned on it.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t really get along with them. It’s been weird between us for a long time.”

  I stare at him.

  “Why’re you looking at me like that?”

  “Elliott Andrew St. James, your parents are alive and well, and you don’t want to see them because of their sex life? What I wouldn’t give to argue with my mother again.” I’m aware this is a total guilt-trip, but he doesn’t seem to get the life-is-too-short bit.

  He digs out my red hat and pulls it over his head. “Maybe I’ll stop by for Christmas. Surprise them.”

  “So you don’t have any plans for the holidays?”

  “No.”

  “Me, neither. I never do. I hate the holidays.”

  “I’m don’t really enjoy them myself.”

  What I’m about to offer next feels like the biggest risk I’ve ever taken in my life. “Want to spend them with me? We can ‘not enjoy’ them together.”

  He smiles. “I’d like that.”

  We hold hands and gaze at the wilderness for a moment. “We have to get out of here.”

  “I know,” he says. “Let’s hang tight for a bit until they figure out we’re gone.”

  “The weather’s getting worse. I’m worried about my dogs up there.”

  “They’ll be fine.”

  “Maybe I should throw a beef jerky up there?”

  “You and those dogs.” He stands and offers me a hand. “Come on. Let’s get in the shelter.”

  THIRTY-NINE

  Eli Saves A Dog

  Survival Tip: If you decide that rescue is unlikely, leave clear signs behind so searchers have an indication of your route.

  Eli’s Mixtape: Portugal. The Man, “Don’t Look Back in Anger”

  THE REST OF THE AFTERNOON, we fill each other in on the last ten years of our lives. I tell her about my music career and about my former rock star roommate, Elias.

  “That guy is totally my celebrity crush. What’s he like?”

  “Quiet. Considerate. Funny. In love. He’s got a girlfriend. She’s cool. Makes him happy.”

  �
��I read about her. Wasn’t she a drug addict?”

  “Yeah, she’s clean now though.”

  She asks what I do in my spare time.

  I tell her a few things. And that’s it—the story of Eli St. James. No crazy adventures. No real legacy. No struggles. What happened to me? How did I get so boring?

  From what it sounds like, her life hasn’t been all that different from mine. Other than the extreme sports, all she does is work.

  The sun disappears early and leaves us shivering in the shelter. I’m snuggled around Charlie, and she’s curled around her dogs.

  The space blanket flaps and snaps in the wind. I fight the urge to fire up a tinder ball. The package says it’ll burn up to four hours, but it’s going to get a lot colder later on.

  She sneaks her dogs a piece of a jerky, when she thinks I’m not looking.

  “I saw that.”

  “They’re hungry.”

  “We might have to eat them.” I wish I were kidding.

  She smacks my leg. “Bite your tongue.”

  I scratch her big mutt’s ears. “Better fatten you up, boy.”

  “You know what’s crazy?” she says. “I’m having fun. It reminds me of when we used to go camping.”

  “It is kind of fun. In a really fucked-up way.”

  Later, we doze off. The dogs wake us up in the dark, barking like maniacs. I grab the flashlight and peel back the blanket.

  A family of bighorn sheep stares at us. Then they dart down the mountainside.

  “Holy shit!” I jump out of the shelter and watch them. “We should have lassoed them with your scarf and rode them down to the bottom.”

  She bursts out laughing.

  I do too.

  All of a sudden, I hear something. “Shh! Listen.” The sound of snowmobiles nears.

  We jump up and down and scream for help.

  The engines cut off. “Charlotte? Bearded Clam? You down there?”

  “Burt! Down here!” Charlie cries.

  “Thank God. You hurt?”

  “No! We’re okay.”