by Lia Riley
But you don’t always have to like the people you love.
I realize I’m heading toward the base of the mountain and increase my speed, until I’m practically jogging. Then I’m there, bracing my hands against the cold granite and staring up. “Fuck you,” I yell, to La Aguja for existing so people can risk their lives on it, to Rhys for being stupid and reckless enough to do this rather than face his demons, to me for being unable to fix anything. I pick up a stone and palm it between my hands before heaving it back and throwing it hard. It bounces off the wall like nothing ever happened. I pick up another and throw it harder. Soon I’m raining down rocks on the mountain, and all the while it’s only becoming more apparent there is nothing I can do.
I collapse, panting, beneath a tree and rock my head back, seeing the dawn dappled through the canopy. Rhys wanted forgiveness from his brother, and that’s never going to happen now. Instead, he is going to hold himself responsible and take part in some sort of a death struggle, as if that will give him absolution. It won’t. The realization swells within me. The only person who can forgive Rhys for the accident with his brother is Rhys.
Forgiveness doesn’t come from others. It comes from yourself.
He needs to give himself permission to move on with his life.
I close my eyes and listen to the world waking up. I need to forgive myself, too, for not being able to have a functional, healthy relationship with my sister. When I get home, I’m not going to start World War III. I’m not engaging in petty revenge. I’m going to stop trying to make things OK between us. She holds things against me that I can’t control. Resentment is her choice, but I have one, too. I can walk away. As much as Rhys needs to retie what’s severed inside him, I need to cut Harper loose. Maybe someday she’ll want to pursue a kinder relationship, but I’m not going to beat myself up trying to force that.
I forgive myself for walking away and setting clear, protective boundaries. I’m not going to be her doormat ever again.
There are enough amazing people in the world who might want my love and friendship, like the guy back in the tent on his damn suicide mission. He’s changed his mind once. Maybe he can change it again. This is just his initial rash impulse. Once he’s settled down, he can start grieving, and he’ll come to his senses.
I stand up, and morning is here in earnest. The clouds erase and there, far, far overhead, is the summit. There is no way I’ll ever stand up there. I’m not someone who is ever going to perch in the aeries of the world. But if that old legend is true, and what I want most in the world is up there, then maybe I can, I don’t know, commune with it?
Because what I want most is for this guy I’ve fallen madly, deeply in love with to love himself even a fraction as much. To realize that he can rise above this darkness and remember that even in the biggest storm, once you pass through the clouds, the sun is shining.
I walk briskly back to the tent with hope in my heart. Hope that’s dashed into a hundred little pieces when I find the tent packed and my bag loaded and ready to go. My bag alone.
Rhys crouches beside it. “I’ve given you my tent,” he says. “Has all the proper poles. You know how to put it up now. I don’t think you’ll get into any more trouble.”
“Rhys, please.”
He stands and extends a scrap of paper. On it is scratched two phone numbers. “I know you want to do your story, but can you please go call my mum? The other number is Amelia. Tell them… Tell them I’m sorry.” His voice cracks.
I wrap my arms around his waist and stare up, wishing my eyes had the power to hypnotize. “Come with me. Call them yourself.”
“I will. When I return.” He gives me a tight smile. “I don’t mean to commit suicide, Auden. I’m not going to throw myself off the mountain. This climb is something I talked about, dreamed about with Cameron. I owe it to his memory to stand on top. What I want isn’t ever going to happen now, but maybe from up there he’ll hear me better.”
“Oh, Rhys.”
“Maybe you’ll hear me, too, Auden.”
“I can hear you fine here. Please, don’t do this.”
He sets a hand on top of my head. “Last night you told me you loved me.”
“I do. I meant it. I know it’s crazy, but, Rhys—”
“I love you, too,” he whispers, and the words sound exactly like good-bye.
28
RHYS
Why are you doing this?” Tears flow freely down Auden’s cheeks.
“You don’t understand.” I press my lips and offer a silent prayer that the sadness in her eyes won’t undo me. “My love hurts people.”
She braces her stomach as if I’ve caused her physical pain and swallows back a sob. “Are you kidding me? How can you say that? How can you actually believe that?”
“My brother is dead because of me, because I let him down, first on the side of that fucking mountain and again by no’ having the courage to face him. He had to come track me down and…” That’s it. I can’t say more. My throat swells shut.
She reaches for my hand and presses it against her heart. Behind her Murray walks to the hut, probably getting ready to cook up breakfast. He starts to wave, but notices our grim posture and averts his face like we’re not there.
“Auden.”
“Tell me you don’t feel this.” Her voice is more miserable than angry. “We have a connection, Rhys, and that doesn’t occur every day. It’s never ever happened to me before, and from everything you told me, it’s never been this way for you either.”
The truth in her words punches my gut. I can’t walk away and leave her crying. As much as I want to go, desperate to escape, retreat into myself, the tears dripping off the end of her chin are some form of cement, rendering me in place.
“We’re connected,” she repeats, her eyes wide, trusting, so convinced she can make me understand. “It’s different from being up on a mountain, but I’m tied to you. We’re partners, and whatever happens to you affects me now.”
And that’s when she does it, gives me the way to escape her. She placed her trust in my hands without realizing it was a knife. Everything she says is true, but it takes me back to the night without hope, the hungry wind, the relentless ice and unceasing dark. “That’s your fatal mistake,” I say flatly. “Trusting me.”
She wipes her eyes. “No! There’s no way this is a mis—”
“How can you forget? I’m the last person you want to tie yourself to.” I force my face to be utterly emotionless and my insides to settle, just like before, that terrible night. The hardest part is the lead-up; the final severing happens in an instant. “I’m the guy who cuts the rope.”
She’s falling, and unlike Cameron, I have to bear witness, watch as her features collapse.
“The world is right,” she snarls, bending to grab her pack. “You really are an unfeeling, psychopathic monster. I’ll go call your family. There is no way I’d stick around here and write a story about a mountain of dreams. It would be a lie. This is a mountain of nightmares.”
I give her a sarcastic salute and my hand doesn’t even tremble. She’s going to walk away, and that will be that. We were never meant to be. I’m fit to be no one’s partner. There’s no escaping the inevitable. I am a monster, wreaking hurt, pain, and destruction on the few people who are unlucky enough for me to care about them.
Why isn’t she gone already?
She closes her eyes and sucks in a shaky breath. When she opens them again, they are red rimmed, and brokenhearted. “For what it’s worth, I am truly sorry about your brother.”
She sounds like I feel—gutted.
With that she turns and starts to walk away, slower than even her normal pace. Please don’t think I’ll stop you, because I won’t.
Halfway to the trail, she pauses and turns. “And for whatever else it’s worth, I’m not sorry we met.”
My legs are moving before I can stop them. No. Fuck. Letting go needs to be simple, one quick flick of my wrist and then gone. I can’t
grapple to hang on. But my body isn’t listening to my mind, and I’m pulling her against me in a fierce bear hug, breathing in her scent, the memories from the past few days swirling behind my lids: her pale, frightened face peering into my tent, her kitten knickers, the way she breathes in deep sleep, the cheeky glint in her eye when she gives me shit, the way she falls apart when I’m inside her.
“The mountains will always be here, but this chance won’t be—don’t let me go,” she says, muffled against my chest. “As soon as I saw you, I knew my life would never be the same. You are my best adventure. We both came to this place with a goal, but can’t we move on, make a new one?”
“I’m sorry. I can’t be the guy you need right now or ever. You’ll thank me for it.”
“Don’t condescend and tell me how I should feel,” she grinds out. “Say Rhys and Auden aren’t happening.”
I open my mouth to say the words and they turn traitor, refuse to come.
“You wanted to ask forgiveness from Cameron and that chance is gone, but that was never how things were going to play out. Your brother had already forgiven you. Of that I have no doubt in my mind. But none of that matters in the end. Only you can truly forgive yourself. Only you.” She pokes my chest, punctuating the last words. “And if you cut us loose, will you really be able to forgive that?”
I don’t have words. I can’t even hold her gaze. Instead, I look up, and the mountain, La Aguja, towers overhead in all its glory, not a trace of cloud in the bluebird sky. Will I forgive myself if I don’t make this climb for my brother?
“Here’s what I can’t excuse,” Auden says. “Myself if I stay and watch you risk your life due to a misguided attempt at absolution. The only way you are going to begin to deal with your grief is to come now, with me. But I’ve already asked. So I’m going, and all I can do is believe that once I’m gone, you’ll figure it out that I’m right.”
“Auden…” I don’t know what I even want to say. Every part of me is shutting down.
She takes a long shuddering breath. “If you ever find yourself back in Colorado, look me up.”
“I will.”
She rises on her toes and brushes her lips against the side of my cheek. “I love you, but you have a hell of a lot to figure out.”
Then she’s gone. My arms are empty, and when my eyes finally refocus, her shadow is lost in the forest.
I stumble back to my gear. Someone says my name, but I don’t turn my head, don’t have the energy to do anything more than hold myself together, and I’m doing a piss-poor job of that.
“Rhys! Mate!” Murray comes over, holding out a mug. “Have a drink.”
“No coffee.” I don’t need to be more hyped up than I am.
“No coffee.” He thrusts it at me.
I sniff and recognize the bite of alcohol. It’s barely morning, not a good time for drinking. I drain the cup in three swallows, the burn in my esophagus doing nothing to dull the burn in my heart.
“Girl problems?” he asks when I hand back his cup.
“Cameron is dead.”
His eyes widen. “What?”
I tell him the story in as few sentences as possible. “Auden doesn’t think I should do the climb, but she doesn’t understand. This is the only way I have to be close to Cameron, to say good-bye.”
“Walk with me,” Murray says.
He takes off toward the mountain and I follow, unable to summon the strength to resist. Our boots crunch the undergrowth, and half a dozen times I wonder if I’ll be sick. My bones seem filled with lead. If I slept now, I might never wake up.
“I’ve been around a long time,” he says at last. “Seen lots of friends go.”
I know by “go” that he doesn’t mean “lose touch.” He means “die.”
“Every accident is unique, but many share a common quality.”
“What’s that?” I say wearily.
“They forget that to successfully make a climb, we have to want it bad, so bad we’ll do anything to make it.”
“Exactly. That’s what I—”
“Not finished with my point here, mate.” He halts me with a raised hand. “And at the exact same time, we need to be willing to let that want go. That’s the paradox. We have to want it more than anything and yet still be able to walk away.”
“I’m afraid I’m not wired that way. Hard-nosed bastard and all.”
“I know you are afraid. Remember, though, fear isn’t something that just happens. We allow it to come into our lives, give it a place at the table, and feed it.”
“When did you get so wise?”
Murray gives a sad smile. “Never said I was wise, mate. I’ve just been around longer than you. Once I had a girl, and I walked away, afraid of being tied down.”
“And what happened?”
Murray stares into the distance, his gaze inward, seeing an invisible face. “I’ve never stopped regretting it.” He gives his head a shake. “So what are you thinking?”
“I don’t know, man, and that’s the problem. To be on that mountain, I need to be all in. But the same is true about love.”
“There’s no race to the finish here,” Murray responds. “Why don’t you walk a bit longer, and I’ll see you back at camp. If the weather holds, Psycho and Goon are going to be champing at the bit. Probably start our push tomorrow. You’re welcome to join with us. Psycho will whine, but I’ll sort him.”
“Hey, thanks,” I say, extending my hand. “I’ll think it over.”
“Remember, the mind can be one hell of a convincing liar.” Murray gives me a final nod and leaves me on my own. “Let your heart tell you what needs to happen.”
I walk through the forest with his words ringing in my ears. This is what I wanted. No one else. If I’m alone, I can hurt no one, except myself. No one else. If I’m alone, I can hurt no one, except myself. Auden told me she loved me, and she meant those words. I saw the truth in her eyes, in every inch of her face. Her love is a gift, one that I couldn’t accept, not when I hate myself too much.
I find myself at the base of La Aguja and rest my hand on the stone. How badly I’d hoped forgiveness waited at the top, but what if Auden’s right, and the only way to have what I want is to reach within myself and find it?
“Cameron,” I whisper, “what should I do?”
There’s no reply, only the wind, a light rustle this morning, a faint symphony of branches rubbing against one another.
My brother may be gone, but I know what he’d say if he stood before me. He’d tell me to stop being an arse. Dwelling on what a fucking failure I am won’t make me successful. Telling myself that I will hurt the ones I love so I need to stay away won’t bring me peace.
“Someday, maybe,” I tell La Aguja. “But first I have other things to do.”
If I’m going to be the guy who deserves a girl like Auden, then I need to first face down a different kind of mountain, conquer my own self-doubt.
29
AUDEN
Dad picks me up at Denver Airport. “How was your little trip?” he asks, taking my backpack.
My little trip. Yeah, right.
“Good,” I answer, and that’s plenty of information for him. He chats a bit about his work and Mom while we walk to the parking garage and then mostly about Harper. She’s being pegged as “the one to beat,” by the Olympic press, and I don’t doubt it. On the drive home, I close my eyes and pretend to sleep. He turns on some classic-rock station and sings under his breath, oblivious to the fact my lip keeps wobbling.
If I never tell anyone about meeting Rhys MacAskill, maybe it will be like it never happened. When I walked away, I knew that was it, but still, a part of me, a stupid part I wish I could slap like a mosquito, kept hoping he’d appear behind me on the trail. His hair would be mussed. He’d be out of breath.
“Auden,” he’d say in the smooth lilt, and that would be enough. That he came for me would be enough.
Instead, I got to the end of the trail the way I began—alone, wit
h no story, with nothing at all. A bus idled, ready to return to Puerto Natales, hikers filing on one by one, all buzzing from their time in the park. A few paused to snap one last picture or do a funny duck-face selfie. I stepped on, and when the driver rolled into first gear, pulling the door closed, the sound of wheels on the gravel had a note of finality.
I wanted Rhys to fight at all costs, fight for me, but more important, for himself.
All I can do is hope he eventually gets the courage.
Right now he could be on La Aguja. Right now he could be—
“Home again, home again, jiggidy jig,” Dad calls out four hours later. I never did sleep, but I rub my eyes anyway, feigning a bleary wake-up expression.
My sister’s white Tacoma truck is in the driveway. The bumper sticker on the back has two black diamonds and reads I’M DIFFICULT.
No shit.
She’s already gone, overseas, ensconced at the Olympic Village. Mom and Dad are taking off to join her in a few days. They babble about her all through dinner, with only the most cursory questions about my time in South America. It’s like I’ve never been gone. And to tell you the truth, it’s a relief.
When I go upstairs to my room to change into my favorite fuzzy pajama pants, they aren’t in the top drawer. Harper must have packed them. That she’d raid my drawers despite everything only shows me that I’m right in my decision to distance myself from her. I sent her an e-mail my last night in South America.
Harper,
For a long time, I believed you made me feel bad about myself. That was wrong. I’m responsible for my own feelings. You can’t “make” me insecure or hurt unless I give you that power.
Those days are over.
I can’t maintain a relationship with someone who wants only to take and never give. You aren’t willing to accept my limits and have consistently revealed in your actions that you don’t value me. Sadly, our relationship does nothing but deplete me.
