Alas, I don’t have my guitar, and I don’t even have cell signal so I can’t send Kristen a wake-up message. Still, the fantasy helps release some of my anger. I’m feeling slightly better when people begin emerging from the tents.
Breakfast consists of coffee and Pop-Tarts, surely the finest any hikers could hope for. I eat two of them and hope the sugar and caffeine will propel me up the mountain.
Our plan is to pack up the campsite and drive to the first trailhead. Zach and Lisa will drop everyone off, then drive to another trailhead. They’ll leave Lisa’s car there and drive back in Zach’s. That way we climb Mount Pierce, cross the ridge, and go down Eisenhower. Then they’ll play musical cars again.
We make good time packing, but the trailheads are farther apart than anyone realized, and we don’t get started until after eight. The sun fights to peek through the heavy cloud cover, but the humidity’s only getting worse. Even though it’s not warm, I sweat through my T-shirt and am regularly ambushed by mosquitoes and black flies.
Despite these irritations, I attempt to enjoy the scenery and the sweet, woodsy smell of the forest, but being so close to Jared and Zach makes my emotions whirl again. Luckily, everyone is out of breath and no one is doing too much talking.
About an hour in, we encounter our first hiker. An old man with long, gray hair emerges through the trees. He carries a walking stick made out of an actual, well, stick, and has two dogs with him. He makes me think of Gandalf in hiking shorts.
“You kids heading up, are yeh?” He has a thick Maine accent. “You’d better hurry. Storm’s coming, and you don’t want to be caught on that ridge then.”
“It’s not supposed to rain,” Hannah says. “I checked the weather before we left yesterday.”
The old man scoffs. “My knee’s more reliable than those false prophets, and it’s been saying ‘storm’ to me since dawn.”
We all glance upward. A sliver of blue hovers above the tree canopy.
“Doesn’t look too bad,” Mike says. “But we’ll keep it in mind.”
“Ah, yeah. Well, you know what they say about New England weather—if you don’t like it, wait five minutes. Up here, you don’t got to wait that long. You be careful, kids.”
He continues down the path, and I wonder how early he had to be up to have already made it to the top of the mountain. At this rate, I feel like we’ll never make it. We’re so deep in the forest that at times I lose sight of the sky through the tree cover, and civilization seems as far away as the moon.
We continue, and all I hear is the sound of our boots crunching on the path, heavy breathing, and the occasional sneeze from Mike, whose allergies interrupt the silence like gunshots. We’re robots, pressing on. Zach tries to take my hand once, but it’s too difficult to hike that way, and I’m grateful when he drops it a minute later.
I stop bothering to check the time, and I’m glad I don’t have the map because I don’t want to know our progress, or lack thereof. Tantalizing glimpses of the ridge and the rest of the Presidential Range occasionally reveal themselves, but when we finally do reach the top, it’s almost anticlimactic. I can’t be bothered to look around because all I want to do is rest and eat. Even that’s difficult because the wind on the summit is wild. Despite my jacket, it blasts its way through to my skin. I scarf down an energy bar, thankful the bandanna prevents hair from blowing into my mouth. A couple feet away, Jared’s taken his boots off and is massaging his feet.
“Dude, you needed to break them in,” Mike’s saying.
“I didn’t have time. I bought them for this trip.”
The irony doesn’t escape me, and I turn away from them to soak in a view of the valley.
Hannah wanders over to me, her face breaking into a sly grin. “So you and Zach were gone for a while. Have fun?”
Actually? I’m not sure about that. But it’s not as though I can say it. “Yeah.”
“How much fun?”
“Probably not as much as you.”
Her face falls. “Don’t be too sure about that.”
“Oh?”
“It’s not anything bad, really. You missed it since you were off with Zach, but Jared was acting all kinds of weird last night. Distant or distracted, and then he got moody, too. Things were pretty dull after you left. He went to bed early.” She stuffs her hands in her pockets, clearly annoyed.
“I thought I saw you guys talking when I got back.” She’d been up talking to someone. Even in the dark and with Zach distracting me, I could discern her pink fleece.
“That was Mike. He was being fun, at least.”
“Oh. Well, sorry.” Am I? I don’t think so, but I wish I was. For Hannah’s sake as well as my own.
Hannah sighs. “Maybe camping isn’t the best time. Sleeping bags and bugs and dirt. I’ll corner him when we get back. But now—” she holds up her phone “—group pic!”
We turn toward the others, and my eyes are instantly drawn upward. The sun’s burned off the morning gloom, but evil, black clouds are drifting ever closer, bubbling and churning like steam. It’s as though my mood’s physically manifested in the sky. The clouds block the sun, draping the mountain range in shadow. A flock of black birds circle beneath them. The silence erupts with their cawing.
The whole scene reminds me of something out of a movie. This is what the world looks like right before the apocalypse arrives. It’s both creepy and gorgeous. What I’m pretty sure it’s not, though, is safe for hiking along the ridge.
“That is so cool,” Hannah says, snapping a photo.
I cross the rock to where the others are pointing and talking. “Guess the old guy was right.”
“Looks like it’s over Eisenhower,” Lisa says. “Should we turn back?”
“What? No!” Hannah catches up to us. “It’s not raining. It’s only some clouds.”
I zip my jacket higher. “Only some rain clouds. And the guy was right—we do not want to be on the ridge if it starts raining. Especially if it starts to storm.”
“It could be nothing,” Jared says. “It’ll probably break up. The sky’s clear around it.”
I’m not so sure of that. Mount Washington is covered in clouds, which supposedly is normal, but more clouds appear to be forming between it and Eisenhower.
“No clue,” Mike says when Lisa asks his opinion.
Hannah groans. “It’s not supposed to rain today.”
Lisa and Zach hem and haw. It’s clear that everyone wants to keep going forward. I’m the lone voice of reason.
“Fine.” I raise my hands in defeat because no one is listening to me. “I hope the old guy isn’t right.”
Hannah throws an arm around my shoulders. “Love you, cuz, but I can’t believe you’d rather trust some strange, old dude’s knee over your own eyes.”
I thought I was trusting my own eyes, but I let it go and take off with the others once Hannah’s gotten her fill of photos.
We haven’t walked for too long when a strong gust of wind whips debris in our faces. Leaves rush about my ankles, and dirt and pebbles scatter down the trail. We’ve dropped in elevation so the wind should be less intense, and yet it doesn’t seem any less so. My stomach twists.
Above, the sky darkens, but if anyone else notices, they keep quiet. There’s an odd stillness all around, a silence as though the mountain’s retreating inward. The background drone of chirping and buzzing insects has vanished, yet in the unusually filtered sunlight, the scrubby leaves burst with green. Everything appears sharper and more focused. The knots in my stomach climb my spine in a series of tingles. The air feels lighter, less humid.
CCR’s “Bad Moon Rising” plays in my head, and a drop of water lands on me as we approach a section of open ledges. I’m sure they provide an awe-inspiring view. I’m also sure they’re a good reminder of how easy it is to
go sliding off the mountain.
I stop, wiping the raindrop away. “Um, guys? I got rained on.”
“It’s just spitting,” Hannah says. “No big deal.”
In answer, the sky crackles with thunder. The black birds we saw earlier scream. Another couple drops of water hit me. No big deal, my ass.
Lisa pulls out her map, and Mike and Zach have to grab the corners because the wind tries to blow it out of her hands. “I think we’re about here,” she says, pointing. “There are shelters here and here.”
“Too far,” Mike says. “We need to get off the ridge and get below the tree line.”
Thunder rumbles again. Wind snatches the map from Mike’s hands, and only Zach holds on to it. My bandanna smacks me in the face.
I can’t help myself; I sing a few bars of the song in my head aloud. Jared gives me a dirty look.
“Turn back.” With Zach’s help, Lisa refolds the map. “We can bypass the summit and get back on the trail.”
The rain intensifies then, as though determined that we shouldn’t get off the ridge unscathed. I pull the windbreaker’s hood over my head, but that only makes it harder to see, and that’s a bad idea.
Zach wraps an arm around me. “Should have listened to Claire, people. Good call.”
I smile weakly. Vindication’s nice and all, but I’m too anxious to get off the ridge to take any satisfaction from it.
The first flash of lightning streaks across the sky as we turn around. We’re perfect targets in an electrical storm, and my heart beats faster. Although I’m dying to pick up the pace, the rain’s turning everything slippery. A false step could be worse than slow progress. Then, with the next crack of thunder, the sky opens all at once. Rain clobbers us in downpour so thick it’s like we’re swimming. Someone screams. I can’t see a thing except Lisa’s yellow jacket in front of me. Leaves attack me and cling to my face. My feet slide on the water-logged path. My boots are helpless against the deluge, and rain squishes between my toes.
We press on, minutes passing like hours. The only good thing about this is my adrenaline suppresses all the muscle aches and sleepiness of earlier.
Finally, the sky lightens but the rain doesn’t ease up. We’re back at the tree line, and their skinny trunks block some of the wind’s fierceness. Thunder continues to rumble in the background, but I breathe a little easier, literally and figuratively. I stop to rest and unpeel my soaking wet clothes from my arms and legs.
Hannah shrieks with laughter and dashes by. Faltering to a stop at the head of the line, she lets out a whoop. “Now that was an adventure.”
“We’re not off the mountain yet,” I tell her. It’s so noisy that I have to yell to be heard. “By the way, I was right.”
She tosses her head back as she laughs again. Rain streams down her face. “Yeah, but if we’d listened to you, we’d have missed all the excitement. Now think of the story we’ll have to tell.”
“The story of how we almost died in the mountains during a thunderstorm? That’s what gets you nominated for the Darwin Awards. Not the sort of thing I want to brag about, personally.”
Hannah sticks her tongue out at me.
She skips ahead down the path, and I can almost see what’s going to happen before it does. You know how time warps right before something bad occurs, leaving you with an icky feeling of premonition? It’s like that.
One second Hannah is moving way too fast over the slippery rock.
The next second she’s gone.
A scream sticks to my throat, the words “Hannah, slow down!” dying there, useless.
Hannah shrieks, only this time it’s not a playful sound. I freeze, stunned for a second. Then my paralysis breaks, and I charge down the trail with the others, fighting off panic.
“Hannah!” Lisa sounds on the edge of hysterics. “Oh, my God. Hannah!” She’s also running too fast, and she slips in the mud. Mike catches her.
We find Hannah lying on her side. She’s fallen only twenty feet or so, but it’s a steep twenty feet over tree roots and rocks, and she’s not moving.
Out of breath and shaking, I hover to the side as Lisa and Mike kneel next to her. Her eyes are open and she’s wincing, so some of my tension dissipates. It can’t be as bad as I feared.
“Are you okay?” Lisa asks. Her voice quivers.
Hannah nods, then shakes her head. I think she says something but it’s too soft to hear.
Lisa and Mike throw questions her way and debate what to do, but they’re not actually doing anything useful, and Zach and Jared are just standing there with expressions of horror. I don’t know what to do either, but something has to be better than nothing.
“Move,” I say to Lisa. “Hannah, can you flex your leg?” She’s curled up on her side, probably the same way she landed.
She whimpers as she does it, but she unbends her knees.
“Okay, good. Can you roll over?”
Hannah nods again. She bites her lip and slowly eases over onto her left side.
Mud covers every inch of her. Beneath it, a layer of blood coats her leg. Nothing looks horribly mangled or anything, but the blood must be coming from somewhere.
“Where does it hurt the most?”
“My ankle,” she says, her voice no louder than a whisper.
“Can you move it?”
Hannah lets out a cry.
I take that to mean she tried and figure she’s not walking on it. I wet my lips. Funny how they can feel so dry when rain is running down my face. “Mike and Jared, get over here. You’re the tallest, and you’ll have the easiest time carrying her. Help her up. Come on.”
They both blink at me as if dazed then slowly move.
The rain lightens some more, and sun pushes its way through the gloom. I glance down the trail, debating. It’s fairly well marked, and we need to hurry. “Lisa, Zach, go on ahead. Get Lisa’s car and meet us back at the trailhead. This is going to take a while with Hannah.”
Lisa nods. “Right, yeah. Good idea.”
Between Jared and Mike acting as Hannah’s crutches, and me scouting ahead to warn them of slippery spots or simply to remove branches that fell in the middle of the trail, we make it down the mountain safely. Lisa and Zach pull into the lot around the same time that we arrive.
Everyone’s wits are returning, which is a relief. I don’t like being in charge, especially when I’m making things up as I go.
Jared and Mike get Hannah into the SUV, and Lisa helps pull off Hannah’s boot amidst much cursing. Hannah’s ankle is swollen and purple.
“Ice packs?” I ask. They’ve been sitting in the cooler since yesterday, but there’s a chance they’ll at least be cold.
They are, barely. So we get Hannah’s foot elevated, and stop by this general-store—like place to buy real ice for her. As soon as we’re back to getting cell phone service, I call my aunt and uncle and tell them what happened.
My adrenaline’s worn off by the time we get home, and I’m tired, starving, and thirsty. My aunt and uncle are waiting to take Hannah to a doctor when we arrive. Hannah hops into their car, moaning about going out in public while stinking and covered in mud.
The rest of us stand around in the driveway. I don’t know about the others, but I’m deflated and want to crash. Preferably in the shower.
But first we need to unload the cars, and make sure Mike doesn’t drive off with the wrong gear. Yawning, I set Hannah’s and my packs down on the porch without looking and drop one on someone’s hand.
“Sorry,” I say, glancing up.
It’s Jared, and all he does is remove his hand. He doesn’t even acknowledge my presence. His face is strained.
I wait for the pain that ripples through me to pass before going back for another load. His rudeness can be explained easily—he’s worried about H
annah. It’s understandable. But it picks at that scab on my heart.
I’m thrilled when the guys drive away. While Lisa raids the fridge to make us a very late lunch, I ignore my rumbling stomach and lose myself in the shower. It’s okay now, I promise myself. It’s over. Hannah will be fine because no one dies of a broken ankle. And for the next two weeks, I can avoid all contact with Jared.
When I shut off the hot water and emerge, I’m scrubbed pink on the outside, but my insides feel as dark and foul as ever.
Chapter Thirteen
It’s been two days since I’ve heard from or seen Jared. Although he’s been by the house to check on Hannah, he’s timed his visits so I’m at work. I doubt he’s done it for my sake, but I’m thankful nonetheless.
But the best news of all? My bandmates pulled through for me. While at work, I got a text from Nate that he, Erica, and Alex have all arrived in Eliot Beach. That’s why they’ve been vague in their responses. They wanted to surprise me. I don’t know how they expect we’ll be able to practice this way, but seeing them and talking things through will be awesome.
I hurry home and discover Hannah lying on the sofa. Her ankle rests on the arm and her laptop sits on her stomach. It’s the same position I saw her in last night before I went to bed.
“Chocolate?” she asks, holding out a box of truffles. The table is covered in boxes of candy: chocolates, jellybeans, mints, and more.
“Sure. Thanks.” I grab a dark chocolate truffle. “When did this arrive?”
“This afternoon. Mike and Jared brought it. Isn’t it sweet?” She’s updating her Facebook page and not looking at me.
“Too sweet for you.” Lisa clomps down the stairs and grabs a mint. She purses her lips like she wants to say something else, then storms away, shaking her head.
“What’s her problem?” I ask Hannah.
Hannah shrugs. “Got me. She’s been pissy all day. I think she wanted to go somewhere with Mike, but the rest of us wanted to stay here and watch a movie. So of course she’s taking it out on me as if it’s all my fault.”
Another Little Piece of My Heart Page 13
