by Lia Riley
I’m almost at the stairs when the front door bursts open. It’s Harper. My twin is flanked by four handsome ski bums and channels her inner snow bunny with hot-pink fingerless gloves, a quilted down vest, and badass knee-high boots. Two braids poke beneath her pom-pom beanie. The white wool renders her bright eyes an even deeper shade of blue. If I sported that style, I’d look ready to skip off to Sunday school. On my sister, however, the effect is nothing short of alluring.
“Sis.” She does that ironic eyebrow raise and head-tilt gesture that drives me nuts. To the casual listener, perhaps her nickname sounds affectionate but I know better. Sis really stands for Shit-Ingesting-Sister. During our birth, I aspirated meconium and my lung collapsed. When Mom told us the story during middle school, Harper repeated it to everyone in our class and started calling me SIS as if it were the most hysterical joke ever.
“Hey,” I say flatly, biting back my next question. What is she doing here?
“I didn’t want to miss the big send-off.” Her nose wrinkles as her gaze rakes my outfit. “No offense, but why are you wearing those jeans? They make your ass look huge.”
“What?” I glance over my shoulder as if my butt cheeks somehow tripled in size.
“Kidding!” Her smirk belies the word.
I shove my hands into my back pockets; it’s either that or strangle her and I don’t want to star in a real-life Orange Is the New Black. “I thought you were training in Telluride.”
“Plans changed. Where’s Brett?” She makes a show of glancing around. “He texted me to come, you know.”
He did? Then again, that’s no big surprise. Brett’s brainwashed by Harper. He always grills her about the famous skiers she rubs shoulders with and then brags to his buddies, basking in her glory. I barely even notice it. Everyone who gets within my sister’s orbit turns into a starfucker.
A cheer erupts from the living room. “Drink! Drink! Drink!” the crowd chants, and Brett’s trademark whoop is loudest of all.
“So are you coming to the airport tomorrow?” I ask.
“Why?” Her brows smash together like I’ve just asked her to mentally compute the square root of 43,650.
Because you must have some shred of sisterly affection within you? “I’m leaving the country for almost a whole month.”
“Eh, I give you a week,” she says, turning away.
“A week?” My voice rises and I have to take a breath, count to three. “Care to translate?”
“One week before you’re flying home with your tail tucked between your legs. You know this trip is a joke, right?” She rolls her eyes. “I mean, you? Backpacking in South America? Please. People are taking bets on how long you’ll last.”
I huddle against the banister, cheeks burning. “What people?” Harper and I don’t even have the same friends.
“Everyone,” she says in a singsong voice, rocking on her heels. “I know you want attention and all, but let’s face it, you’re out of your league.”
Baiting me is her favorite pastime, and I’m getting tired as hell of it. “That’s the pot calling the kettle black. The sky won’t fall if you support me for once—”
“Support you?” Her voice drops to a hiss. “You mean like I did my entire fucking childhood?”
“You want to hash this out again? Mom and Dad really wasted their cash on all our sibling therapy sessions. Shoot me, I was a sickly kid—my life revolved around breathing treatments.” She never lets me forget how many birthday parties and vacations I ruined.
“At least I did something cooler to get in the spotlight than wheeze.” She beckons to her groupies. “Come on. This party looks lame. Let’s see if we can liven it up.” She slings her arms around the shoulders of the two guys closest to her, squealing as they whisk her off her feet and carry her down the hall without a backward look.
I bite the inside of my cheek, trying not to cry as I march up the stairs to my bedroom. I can do this. It’s the perfect chance to prove my own capability. A trip alone to South America won’t be easy, but the world is my oyster, right?
Right.
I think.
I enter the bathroom and reach for my toothbrush, catching my reflection in the mirror. My eyes shimmer with unshed tears.
“Stop it.” I shake the toothbrush at my crushed expression. “She’s wrong. You can kick butt.”
There’s no doubt the next few weeks will bring unexpected hardships and occasional discomfort, but that’s part of the experience.
After all, a little grit makes pearls.
I wake an hour before my alarm clock is set to go off. Anticipation makes it hard to stay asleep. The spot next to me in bed is empty. Brett must have crashed on the couch. He’s been drinking more and more since having nothing to show for all his job hunting, but I don’t want to leave without saying good-bye, or worse, stick my roommate with cleaning up his puke.
I creep down the stairs and pick through the comatose bodies scattered through the living room. No boyfriend. Unease slithers up my spine. He wouldn’t have driven anywhere in his condition, right? The basement door is open, so I descend, flicking on the light. The couch bed is unfolded, and a body is tangled in the sheets. Wait. Make that two bodies.
“Brett?”
He stares back with wide, bloodshot eyes. “Fuck.”
“What are you doing?” My stomach muscles cramp as my brain struggles to process the scene.
Harper half sits and snakes her hand over his waist with a sleepy giggle. “Me.”
I open my mouth, but no actual sound is forthcoming. “You… slept with my twin sister?” Ah, there’s my voice, barely a whisper.
He scrubs his face before turning to lace his fingers with hers. “I—shit. Look, Auden, don’t freak out. I think I’m in love with her.”
“Jesus Christ, you have got to be kidding.” My vocal cords kick into gear. Borrowing shoes without asking is one thing. Snide comments another. But screwing my boyfriend is a declaration of war. Looks like my previous opossum survival strategy, aka “roll over and play dead,” was a dismal failure.
I turn away because what Harper wants is to watch me lose my shit. Like hell will I give her the satisfaction. No way does she return Brett’s feelings. Not with how she always mocks his beer gut behind his back. This was a calculated attack designed to strip away the sheen from my trip. When I get to my room, I don’t even slam the door. Instead, I sit and fold my trembling hands in my lap. I’m at the end of my rope with my sister. Maybe she’s won this battle, but there’s no way she’ll win the war.
.
3
RHYS
The wind wails through the beech trees, Patagonia’s wild version of a cradlesong. The banshee lullaby means it’s time to brew another cup of Earl Grey, skim Heart of Darkness, and ignore the falling barometer. Lying low for a good-weather window is almost peaceful, except for one looming fact. Beyond this dark valley, La Aguja, The Needle, the whole reason for my last-ditch Chilean trip, waits. I trace my thumb over the letter folded between the final pages.
No. Not true. I slam the book with a thump. The granite buttress isn’t waiting. It doesn’t give a flying fuck about my goal to make the first solo, unsupported climb to its summit. Stone exists in a state of indifference, rising beyond rage, shame, judgment, those of us unable to be satisfied with a flat life. Do or die trying—the words have a certain dramatic flair, a nicer ring than Do or bash your skull against a rock slab.
The cost of my attempt may come at the ultimate price, but even such an exacting toll is worth the chance.
Probably nothing to the old legend, but that’s all I’ve got left to lose.
Desperate men do desperate deeds.
The tent shakes as I crawl from my sleeping bag and kneel in the vestibule, grinding open the rainfly’s zipper. Cold air whips my face. The wind has a hell of a bite tonight. The Andes are known for sudden, violent weather patterns, and it looks like they plan on living up to their reputation. Mine is the only tent here. I have C
ampamento Britanico to myself, a backcountry campground in Valle del Frances, an out-of-the-way section of Torres del Paine National Park, named for a British team who climbed here in the late sixties.
These gusts must clock in close to seventy kilometers an hour. Rain is imminent. Good. Shite conditions will keep the hikers along the popular main route at bay. Southern hemisphere summer means the trekking season is in full swing. Tonight they’ll cower in one of the trail-side refugios with warm beds and hot meals. No one will bother coming up here, and that suits me better than fine. I need a fucking break from people.
I’ve had more than my fill of bloody journalists camped on my doorstep, or ringing and e-mailing at all hours, saying the same words a million different ways. “We’re giving you an opportunity, Rhys. Share your side of the story. The whole world wants to know what happened with your brother on that mountain.”
I crawl outside and push down my woolen beanie before it’s snatched away. My bare feet sting against the earth, but I need to keep my body tough, my instincts honed.
A snout pokes from the bracken.
“Halò, Zorro.” My shout is piss weak against this bloody howl. “Ciamar a tha thu?”
Mum’s a member of the Scottish National Party, speaks fluent Gaelic, but to her great annoyance, I only ever picked up the most rudimentary phrases. “Hello, how are you?” tests the outer reaches of my ability.
The gray fox has been checking on me since my arrival yesterday morning. Black fur bands his eyes, hence the nickname. Zorro’s not much past a pup, curious, albeit wary.
“Looks like we’re in for a bit of it, eh?”
He opens his mouth, hard to say in a yawn or silent laugh.
“Got any big plans this evening?” Good thing no one can see me chatting up a fox like a lonely dobber. “Me?” I jerk a thumb to my chest. “Suspect I’ll be getting rat-arsed to ride out the storm.” There’s a flask inside my backpack. Whiskey is a sure way to annihilate bad dreams.
Zorro’s ears twitch, and he huffs once before slinking into the shadows.
I grab an overhead branch, gnarled from the brutal elements, and haul into a series of pull-ups, striving for a slow, steady rhythm. “One. Two. Three.” Soon it’s “Sixteen. Seventeen. Eighteen.” As my heart rate increases, my shoulders burn, and my triceps scream, I focus my attention through the clearing to Cerro Aleta del Tiburón. The prominent rock shears the overcast sky like its namesake, a shark’s fin, a blatant reminder of the danger associated with my objective.
I need to yank my head out of my arse and get back in the game, because it’s almost time to put the last thing I’ve got on the line—myself. No one’s ever successfully survived a solo climb on La Aguja, but that doesn’t mean this trip is a death wish. Far from it. My mission is to survive, conquer, and yeah, risk it all, because I’d rather nail my nuts to my knees than continue living like a ghost.
Everyone wants what they don’t have. I used to fancy myself set apart from the rat race, believed mountaineering kept me humble, pure even, but it turns out I’m just another greedy bastard. In my case, instead of a sports car, money, or a beautiful woman, I crave forgiveness, but I haven’t earned the right to ask for it.
Cold rain splatters my face, an introductory drizzle, coming harder by the second, and I stride back to the tent. The world calls me a monster, a murderer, and for once “they,” whoever the fuck those tedious opinion makers are, have it right. I spent the last few months before South America sequestered at Da’s place in the Colorado Rockies, where he’s one of those evangelical ministers. My own religious views fall in the gray area between atheist and agnostic, but the many Bibles on his guest room bookshelf provided reading material when late-night cable or bourbon refused to numb me.
I read and reread one particular passage until my eyes lost the ability to focus. “If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it, for better to lose a part of your body than the whole of your body to go to hell.”
I flex my right hand, the knuckles scarred and fingertips callused. I hate this part of me more than anything else. Here’s the hand that cut my brother loose, my best friend tied to my body for protection on the mountain, sentenced to the worst kind of death.
I duck into my tent to escape from the bitter wind. Let the weather rage. Anything is better than to have people hound me for my story.
There’s nothing to tell. I traveled to hell and haven’t found a way back.
If atonement doesn’t wait atop La Aguja, I’m out of options.
4
AUDEN
It’s a truth universally acknowledged that a single girl alone in dark woods with a complete stranger does not wish to be asked, “What did I tell you my name was again?” I’m only a handful of hours into the South American backpacking expedition designed to ring in a new year and kick-start my big La Aguja story. Nowhere does the plan include an untimely end in a temperate Patagonian rain forest. Looks like the random hiker who’s dogged me since starting at the trailhead has finally succeeded in killing our struggling conversation.
Hopefully that’s the only thing he’s going to kill today.
“Excuse me?” Trepidation slams my belly like a hard-flung stone. Why would he give me a fake name? Maybe I heard the guy wrong, a caffeine-deprived auditory hallucination. Knotty trees line the trail, forming a dense wall that blocks any possible escape route.
The stranger repeats the strange question before resuming his off-key humming of Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’.” Yep, looks like my ears are in fine working order. I’m alone in a foreign continent with a potential nutcase, just my luck. My heart pumps harder, eager to offer its two cents. Yo, I’d sure love to remain in this cozy chest cavity.
This guy has been driving me crazy for miles, and I’d done my best to tune out his warbling and direct my attention to the beautiful forest, seemingly lifted from the pages of Tolkien. Right now I’d swap the emergency chocolate stashed in my backpack for a hot elf to the rescue.
Norman Bates Jr. zeroes in with an uncomfortably intense gaze. “Sometimes I tell people different names!”
“But… why?” I’d mistaken Diedrick—or whoever the hell he is—for a typical run-of-the-mill Annoyasurus. There are plenty of his species roaming about, overeager guys looking for love in all the wrong hostels.
“I’m Dutch!” He gives a maniacal giggle. Why does he slap an exclamation mark to the end of every sentence?
“So was van Gogh.” Not exactly a poster boy for mental health.
He claps and bounces as if I answered a game show’s prize-winning question. “You’re so funny! Ah, I love American girls!”
I’m pretty sure that I’m not in actual danger, but this is definitely one strange fellow. We’re on one of the most classic treks in the continent. Another hiker will happen upon us momentarily, and anyway, I’m booked into a refugio for the night. My name is on a list. I’ll be expected. Parque Nacional Torres del Paine staff maintain four huts along the trail, marketed to folks who want to experience the great outdoors without the more hard-core “roughing it” aspects. For a reasonable price, one can spend the night in a cozy bunk, eat a hot meal, and get a cold beer. I’m hardly giving Lewis and Clark a run for their explorer money, but hey, not bad for an asthmatic with a fondness for memory foam. I’ll sleep in comfort all the way to the La Aguja climbers’ camp.
Please let this hike be a good idea instead of a situation where my parents will eventually have to alert Interpol, who’ll discover my dismembered body stuffed inside a tree hollow.
Sometimes having an overactive imagination is more of a curse than a blessing.
Besides, I could be missing for weeks before my folks even noticed. All their attention is currently focused on their golden daughter and her gold-medal dreams. Their last e-mail made that point exceedingly clear: “Merry Christmas, honey! Glad you arrived safe and sound. Good timing to be away. Your sister is in a mood, and it’s better that we help her focus for the Olympics a
lone.”
In other words, don’t come back and set Veruca Salt off.
Harper didn’t send a single word of apology. No earth-shattering surprise there. It could be that she was too busy training. Or it could be her heart is three sizes too small. Whatever the reason, Someecards is her preferred method of communication. Guess they don’t make one for “Hey, twin, sorry I got busy with your boyfriend the night before your trip. My bad.”
OK, concentrate, Woods. Get that head back in the game. This Dutchman doesn’t know who he’s dealing with. I’m not taking shit from anyone.
Not anymore.
The new tune Diedrick is humming sounds vaguely familiar. It’s not… Oh, God, it is… “Eye of the Tiger.” Please, Sweet Little Non-Colicky and Well-Rested Baby Jesus, I’d offer up my eardrums to be magically teleported from this torture.
“True or false?” I level my best “don’t bullshit me” expression at him. The one perfected while conducting interviews for the university paper on topics like the Board of Regents tuition hike proposals or the spike in sexual assaults in the dorms. “Is your name really Diedrick?”
“Ding! Ding! Ding! Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner.” He gyrates his hips in a manner truly unpleasant to witness. I’d get stabbed by his beef bayonet if those khaki shorts were any smaller. He pulls out a roll-your-own cigarette from his shirt pocket, lighting it before I can stop him.
“No, wait. Don’t…” His exhalation wreathes my head. “Please put that out.” I wave my hands in front of my face with a grimace. Smoke is one of my worst asthma triggers.
“Hold on… Yes… Good. That’s it. Freeze.” Diedrick thoughtfully chews his cigarette, framing my face with his hands, ignoring my plea. “With the mountains behind you, and that pose? Oh, wow, what a great shot!” He claims to be a freelance photojournalist, and the expensive gear slung around his neck suggests he’s told the truth, at least on that front.
“Cigarette. Out.” I’m enveloped in yet another horrid stinky cloud before he catches the point of my frantic miming and grinds the stub with his boot.
