Meet Me at the Summit

by Mandi Lynn

  “Thanks for the imagery,” I tell her, taking a few more steps back.

  “They pull things out of the hole every year, I guess to unclog it.” Lori frowns, reading the sign.

  She continues to read through a few more signs they have scattered around, and I take more photos. Lori jumps in to be included in a few photos, posing in front of Morning Glory and making the occasional weird face.

  We head back to the bus, and by the time we reach the parking lot, we’ve walked two miles without realizing it. By this point in the day, the sun is going down, so I get on the road again and then make a turn for the campground I had booked for us so we can set up camp for the night.

  “So, what’s the plan for dinner?” Lori asks as I park the bus. The campground isn’t anything fancy. It’s mostly trees and picnic tables, but there are power and water hookups for our convenience.

  “I bought food right before I picked you up at the airport. We can either do traditional hot dogs over the campfire or I can make us a fancier dinner on the grill. I was thinking some sort of stir fry,” I say, leafing through the mini-fridge that has food stuffed in like it’s a game of Tetris.

  Lori taps her chin dramatically, looking around us. There’s a giant RV parked on either side of our campsite, making us feel extremely small in comparison.

  “Honestly, I kinda wouldn’t mind hot dogs and s’mores. Do we have s’mores?” she asks.

  “I didn’t think you’d allow me not to have s’mores ready for you.” I laugh, reaching over to one of the cabinets to reveal s’mores supplies.

  “Then you’d be right,” Lori says, grabbing the bar of chocolate off the shelf.

  It only takes us a couple of minutes to get the bus into camping mode. The pop-out is up, the fairy lights are on, and we pull out the food we need and spread it out on the picnic table.

  I’m starting the fire in the firepit, but it’s mostly just a lot of smoke and very little flame. It takes me a few more tries of lighting a match and putting in leaves and small sticks to get it to catch.

  “What are your plans after I leave?” Lori asks.

  “Well, I don’t think I can drive home in three days,” I say, taking a step back to watch as the flames. “Or less than three days. When are you flying home?”

  “Saturday,” she says. Which means I definitely won’t be home in time for work Monday. Which means I definitely have a phone call to make.

  “Lori,” I say with a groan.

  “Hey, if you want to drive home tomorrow, you can. My mom gave me permission to get a hotel room, and I know how to Uber,” she says, holding her hands up in defense.

  “I’m not going to just ditch you.”

  “Because you know you want to explore Yellowstone more,” she offers.

  I glare at her, but she’s right. “What do you suggest I do?”

  She smiles and turns toward the bus. I’m left sitting in front of the fire while she shuffles through her suitcase again. I hear the door of the bus slam shut and when she walks back over, she’s holding a large black binder.

  “I’ve got a plan for you,” she says. She doesn’t hand it over. In fact, she opens the binder, laying it out across the picnic table. She pats the seat next to her.

  I don’t walk over right away. “Of course you do,” I say, standing with my arms crossed.

  “So, you need to go to Colorado. I mean, half your hikes in that notebook of yours are in Colorado, and it’s as simple as driving south rather than driving east when you leave here.”

  “It’s just that simple,” I say, the sarcasm heavy in my voice.

  “Exactly. I’ve got a few campsites highlighted for you, and some of them accept camper vans, which is basically what you are. It’s a bit of a stretch to call that thing a bus when it’s smaller than most vans. This means your campsites are kind of like glorified tent sites where you don’t need as much room, but you still have electricity and water hookups. More expensive than tent sites, but less expensive than RV sites, which I assume is what you’re paying for now?” she asks, raising an eyebrow as she turns to me.

  “Yeah,” I say, my curiosity piqued. I didn’t know I could get a less expensive site while still getting access to hook-ups.

  “You’re welcome for making your trip more budget-friendly,” she says, turning to another page in the binder. “I made a list of campgrounds that are willing to give you these cheaper sites. I already called to double-check.” Lori points to a page with a long list of addresses with notes written for each one in the margins.

  “You called all these places?” I ask, walking to look over her shoulder. There must be at least twenty campgrounds on this list.

  “Yup, and I highlighted the ones that are close to some of the places on your hiking lists. And I know you don’t want to go on these hikes alone because it’s dangerous, but you won’t be alone.”

  I raise an eyebrow at that, but she silences me by putting a finger up.

  “Let me finish,” she says. “I looked online and found a Facebook group for hikers in the Colorado area who hike Fourteeners, and there’s one really good group that I found. I joined it myself to do a little investigating, and people post in there all the time to find other people to hike with! All you have to do is make a post and meet up with the person. Or, even better, a group of people. Because meeting one person, if they’re a murderer, they might murder you. But if you meet with a group of people, odds are not every person in that group is a murderer, and murderers don’t usually murder when there are witnesses.”

  A loud and sudden laugh erupts from me. Lori smiles, pleased with my reaction. “Oh well, that’s good,” I say. “It would put a damper on the trip to get murdered.”

  “Just join the Facebook group,” she says, her voice serious now. She pulls her phone out of her pocket and taps through the screen. “I just sent you an invite.”

  I sigh as I sit down next to her and pull her phone out of her hand so I can look through the group. It’s the same type of Facebook group I’m a part of for New Hampshire. People post pictures of their hikes, report on trail conditions, and yes, they also post looking for people to hike with. I’d used the group to find a hiking partner once before when I’d wanted to hike a ten-mile loop but my dad was busy. Rather than hike alone, I posted to a women’s-only hiking group to see if anyone wanted to meet me at the trailhead. The next day I hiked with a woman named Ellie who brought her dog Ringo along for the ride. We both survived hiking with a stranger and lived to tell the tale.

  “Why do you want me to go to Colorado so bad?” I ask, handing her phone back.

  “It’s not Colorado necessarily; it’s the trip as a whole. I know your dad isn’t here anymore, but he’d be so jealous of this trip. He’d probably be calling you every day asking where you’ve camped for the night, not because he’s worried about you, but because he’d want to live vicariously through you. And I know I’ll never understand what it’s like to lose both my parents at once, but I know this isn’t what they’d want for you. If your dad were here, he’d be calling your boss for you to put in your resignation.”

  “My mom wouldn’t want that,” I say.

  “Your mom also wouldn’t have wanted you to drop out of college, but you have to do what’s best for you. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have dropped out of college. It just means you’re still figuring things out, so why not figure things out here in Yellowstone, or out there in Colorado? Because New Hampshire wasn’t helping you.”

  I bite my lip, trying to push away thinking about what my parents would say if they saw me now. Both my parents wanted such different things for me. My dad was the wild and free spirit, and my mom was the headstrong, responsible one. If they knew about the bus, they’d probably fight—Dad for it, Mom against. Or at least, I think that’s what the case would be. I’ll never know for sure.

  “I just want to go hom
e.” The words are a whisper that brings me back to when I was a little kid. When I went on my first sleepover, I couldn’t sleep. I begged my mom to take me home. When I called her on the phone, she asked why I didn’t want to stay. I didn’t know why I wanted to leave, just that I wanted to go home.

  “Why?” Lori asks.

  “Because it would be easier to come home where at least I feel safe.” The words come out, but they don’t mean what I’m feeling.

  “You don’t feel safe?” she asks.

  “I guess that’s not what I mean.” I shake my head. “It’s just, if something goes wrong, there’s no one there to fix it.”

  “Ethan said he’d help you. And I’m just a phone call away,” Lori says.

  I pick my head up and stare at her. “Wait, how do you know that?”

  She freezes, aware of the information she accidentally spilled. “Because he found me on Facebook a few weeks ago, sent me pictures of the bus, and asked for advice on how to convince you to go on the trip.”

  My body reacts before my brain can properly process everything. I jolt away, not out of betrayal but out of sheer shock. “He what?”

  “He wanted to know more about you and what he could do to the bus to make you love it. I helped pick out the colors.” She shrugs.

  “And that binder?” I say, pointing to it. “The trip to Yellowstone? How long have you been planning that?”

  “For about a month, when I realized you needed a lot more pushing.” She drops her head, guilt painted on her face.

  “Pushing is right!” I say, walking back toward the bus. I mean, it makes a little more sense now, at least, as to why the bus is so darn perfect for me. Because Lori was behind the scenes stalking my Pinterest board and making a carbon copy of everything I like. I laugh a little, looking at the bus. How did I not see it before? Or at least get a little suspicious? “I’m a little amazed this bus didn’t already have fairy lights in it or decorations,” I say, pointing to the lights hanging from the ceiling.

  I hear Lori laugh, and she knows she’s off the hook the instant I crack the joke.

  “Ethan said it would feel more at-home if you added the decorations yourself.”

  I shake my head as I walk back to the picnic table, sitting down beside her now. “Oh my God,” I say, still blown away. “You got me. I fell for it.” I put my hands up in surrender.

  “We weren’t trying to prank you,” Lori says, her voice apologetic.

  “I feel a little pranked.”

  “No, we were just…” Lori stops, and I pull the binder from her, flipping through the pages, curious how much work was put into this if she’s been hiding it for a month. There’s a map with points highlighted. It’s organized by location, then destination, like places to camp, eat, hike, and explore. I don’t need to plan my trip at all. It’s all here in its color-coded glory.

  “I don’t want to see you sad anymore,” Lori says. “It’s not even that you’re sad, more that you’re just running on autopilot. Nothing makes you excited anymore. You don’t hike, and the rare times I drag you out of the house, you’re going through the motions without experiencing anything. Like you’re trying to humor me and convince me that nothing’s wrong. But all I can see is how you’re not here.”

  She stops speaking.

  I push the binder back toward her. I rest my head in my hands, staring off into the fire.

  “I don’t know if this trip will help,” Lori adds. “But at the least, it will break the rhythm of waking up and going to work every day.”

  “Okay,” I say, turning toward her.

  Her face lights up a little. “You’ll do it?” she asks, squinting her eyes, slightly skeptical.

  “Yup,” I say. “I’ll join the Facebook group.”

  Her face falls. “Progress is progress,” she says, getting up to go sit by the fire.

  Chapter 10

  “Can’t you just tell me where we’re going?” Lori is practically jumping out of her seat. We’ve been driving for almost an hour to Lamar Valley, a hiking trail known for spottings of bison, moose, elk, and bears. I’d picked it out last night after Lori fell asleep, and I stayed up on my computer. For once, it was my turn to take the lead.

  “You’ll see when we get there,” I say. And according to the GPS on my phone, we’d be getting there soon.

  “You know I’m not a hiker.”

  I let out a laugh. I’d tried taking Lori hiking time and time again, but if it was over three miles, it wasn’t going to happen. At least, not without complaint. This trail was seven miles, but I was banking on the fact that it would be flat enough for her to do it. That, and she’d be enticed by the wildlife.

  “You’ll like this hike,” I say, pulling into the parking lot. When I put the bus into park, Lori’s eyes go wide.

  “This is it?” She looks out the window, a little panicked. “We’re in the middle of nowhere and this is where you want me to spend my last full day in Yellowstone? Hiking?”

  “You wanted me to hike, so let’s go hike.” I unbuckle myself, trying to hide my snickers as I hop out of the bus. Lori follows close behind.

  “I want you to hike, but I figured maybe you’d do that when I leave tomorrow. Or maybe if we do hikes, it will be on trails that are short and surrounded by bathroom buildings.”

  I walk around to the other side of the bus to open the front door and reach in for a water bottle from the mini-fridge. “There’s a porta-potty right there.” I point, tossing her one of the water bottles.

  Lori frowns in the comical sort of way that maybe I’m getting back at her just a little bit for hijacking my plan on driving straight home.

  “I’m fine,” she says, eyeballing the porta-potty.

  “Come on, you’ll like this one.”

  I lead the way on the hike, with Lori following close behind. She warms up to the hike the farther we go when she learns that it’s mostly flat. I brought my camera along for the hike, but I also swapped out my lens. Normally I use an 18-135-millimeter lens, which tends to be the most versatile lens for close-up shots with minimal zoom, but today I came a little more prepared. Lori still doesn’t know I chose this trail hoping we’d see bison, but my giant 500-millimeter lens might have been a tip-off that something was up. I was just glad I’d thought to pack my entire camera bag for the family reunion. The lens is massive and weighs about three pounds, but if we see any animals off in the distance, I should still be able to snap a few photos.

  We’ve been walking for no more than an hour, with nothing more to see than a couple of birds, when Lori perks up behind me.

  “Wait! Marly, quiet!” Lori says, grabbing me by the arm.

  I stay quiet despite the fact Lori was the one talking just seconds before. Lori’s sorta like a hyper Chihuahua in the wilderness. She knows she spotted something off in the distance, but she doesn’t know what to do now. We’re going about twice as slow as I normally would, just in case there were any animals to be spotted.

  “Zoom in on that!” Lori says, whispering a little too loud.

  I pick up my camera, zoom as much as it will allow, and snap a picture. I pull up the photo preview and show Lori. There are three bison in the photo, with perhaps a dozen more in the background. It’s a little surreal to see them, mostly because we are just in a valley of mostly nothing. If they wanted to charge us, they could.

  “Look at them! Can you take a few more with your camera?”

  They’re eating out in the field, and I take as many photos as I can, trying to get the zoom and focus right. “I think there might be a few babies in the group,” I say, pointing to the significantly smaller bison in the photos.

  “Oh my God!” Lori says, jumping up and down.

  I haven’t taken this many photos in a long time. I carry my camera with me like an extension of my body, but it’s been a long time since I’ve loved the
process of taking photos.

  Even when I was taking photos with Ethan, I didn’t feel the spark I used to. I might as well have been taking photos on my phone rather than carrying around a three-pound camera. When I was hiking Mount Rainier, I didn’t have to worry about the settings on my camera to make the shots look good. The scenery looked good on its own. But this is different. I know the bison are there in the distance, even if they just look like brown blobs with legs from here. By photographing them with the camera, I’m able to see them better than I thought possible. I have to work for these photos, adjusting the shutter speed to account for my hands shaking when I hit the shutter button. The aperture also has to be perfect to make sure the bison are crisp but the background behind them is blurred to create a portrait-like feel for the photo of this massive animal. When I look at the photos, I can see their coarse hair sticking out in all directions with bits of grass caught in it. While Lori points me to photos she wants taken, I’m already one step ahead of her, fully immersed in the photography process.

  As we continue to walk, we come across a few elk, much closer to us on the side of the trail. There’s also the occasional sun-bleached bones of animals, which really gives it a different feeling than any other hike I’ve been on in the past. It always amazes me that despite having hiked so much of my life, there are these corners of the world that are so different.

  “Thank you,” Lori says suddenly. She hands back my camera, which I’d given to her to flip through some of the photos.

  “You don’t regret spending your last day in Yellowstone hiking without a toilet in sight?”

  Lori just laughs and runs ahead of me to a small bridge that goes over a river. She stops midway and sits on the edge, letting her feet hang over the water.

  “What are you doing?” I ask.

  “Enjoying the view,” she says, pointing to the mountains that are jutting out in the distance, hugging the valley.

  I join her and listen to the flowing water. You’d think after growing up next to the White Mountains, I’d get used to the views, but I never have. And Yellowstone might as well be a different planet. Where New Hampshire is rolling mountain ridges and green forest, Yellowstone is rocky summits and an endless wilderness. Even the colors are different, less green and more, well… yellow. I close my eyes, trying to soak it all in.