by Jeff Long
Grabbing his rucksack, he mounted the snowbank and followed a hard-packed ski track on foot.
The snow was firm but melting. From the looks of it, touring season was finished. The ski track was at least two weeks old, and in less than a quarter mile the snow was interrupted by a vast disk of green field. The snow picked up at the far edge of the field, then petered out altogether where the tree line stopped and the sun could attack the snow without interference. He cut between Hammer Dome with its
Low Budget, Barbary Coast, and Motor Home for Midgets, and North Whizz Dome with its classic Handbook. By the second mile, John's leg had loosened up. The slope began to decline, though gently enough not to hurt his knee. He unbuttoned his shirt, then took it off and tied it around his waist. The heat worked like a massage on the big muscles along his spine, unknotting some of the nightmare. The bird song was thinner up here because the birds had only begun their annual settlement. John paused to search out animal sign and found some mouse prints, a rabbit run, and,
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Jeff Long - Angels of Light under a tree, the fresh bones and scattered feathers of an owl kill. He tried jogging and only ended up winded and limping. Ten years ago, he'd have felt fresh from the morning after a climb like the Visor Wall. His body was slowing down, though.
"Recovery time" had crept into his vocabulary. Never blatantly, but with a keen eye just the same, he'd taken to noting that Kresinski didn't go storming up new routes the day after coming down from a wall anymore, either. Bullseye, himself losing hair and flexibility, cattily insisted that Kresinski was getting a lease on life with injections of celestone-40 for the arthritis and tendonitis they each suffered. But that was no lease on life. It was the cry of an atheist. Forget it, Kreski, John thought.
We're citizens. Not gods.
Still heading north, he skirted the circular base of a small nameless dome, pulled up through a notch, and faced a thick patch of budding oak saplings. The saplings were so thickly spaced, and a block of stone behind them so obviously a dead end, that anyone else would have retreated Page 120
back down the notch and continued on around the dome in search of passage. But John knew what lay beyond the barrier of foliage and granite. He pushed into the thicket and squeezed behind the stone block. It was a tight fit between the stone and the dome, but the sound of falling water drew him on, and a moment later he was on the inside of a tiny, separate cove.
Many of the Valley climbers had private tree boles or caves or cracks in the rock, bank vaults and safe-deposit boxes essentially, in which they hid their "possibles." What money and drugs remained from the lake adventure, for instance, were salted away in these small, secret places. But only John had an entire south-facing half acre with a twelve-foot waterfall to himself. The cove was special for more than its privacy and size and sunlight, however. Turning around, John faced the wall and felt the breath catch in his lungs. For he was at the bottom of an ancient sea.
It was always like this when he entered. The way he had the first time here, he reached out and gently pinched the foot-long spine of a fossil trilobite. It was perfectly intact, practically alive on the rock, with its broad mushroom head and the ribs right down to the spiky tail polished to a dull green gleam. Stretching on for another twenty yards, the wall blossomed with old fossil life, whole remains mingling with bits and pieces, some tipped, some flat, some actually swimming headfirst into the eroding elements. Somehow this marvelously encrusted limestone slab had surfaced in an area so hidden that no one, not even the Ahwaneechee so far as John could tell, had ever found it. He'd never seen such a mass of creatures in one place, much less tilted up on a vertical surface. Here was how it looked on the floor of the ocean millions of years ago. A necklace of tiny pods, petrified seaweed leaves, hung beside the vertebrae of more trilobites and brachiopod shells and bony creatures.
John walked along the wall.
At the end of twenty footsteps the limestone dove back into the granite capstone, and John stood by the waterfall. Its thin tube of water poured musically into a granite file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/HTML-Jeff%20Long%20-%20Angels%20of%20Light.htm (143
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Jeff Long - Angels of Light bowl, which then emptied into the earth through a hole. By July the higher snow would have vanished. The cove would be silent and dry. John tipped his head back and drank some of the cold water. He took his pants off and washed the still-weeping cut on his right thigh. Then he found a spot in the sun and scooted his back against a boulder opposite the wall, buck naked, to enjoy the frieze of life-forms that had paused for eons. To think. Over the years he'd studied the walls so lovingly that some of the fossils seemed like old friends. There was a lot of comfort here, in part because it was his, in part because God had made this place so calm. Here death was a lie.
Here you could live forever. It made him feel a little decadent, keeping the cove to himself, not unlike hoarding artworks. But then again, remembering that his father had showed him how to look for fossils, it felt like the end of a long hunt. Besides, he'd never exploited the fossils, never broken any away for gifts. Just once, he'd climbed on the limestone fossils. Ropeless, shoeless, savoring the fragility with his bare toes and fingers, he'd got high enough to hurt himself when his holds turned to limestone powder and he fell to the ground, spraining one wrist. Nowadays he respected the wall for what it was, a window on time, and never climbed on it. Here he could feel small but not lost. Tony's face had lodged in among the swimming, teeming forms and quit pursuing him in his sleep. John lay back and closed his eyes, inviting in whatever thoughts wanted to come. Soon he fell into a deep sleep.
Hours later, a woman's voice startled him awake.
"My God," it barked. John jerked up from the slab, groping for his pants, groggy and alarmed by the discovery. It was Liz. She was shocked not by his nudity, but by the wall of remarkable Page 121
fossils.
"Liz!" he said. It had been two, almost three weeks since he'd last seen her.
Everything had happened in between. Almost everything had been lost to him, including her.
She was taller than he remembered, and also heavier, her breasts bigger, her legs thicker, butt wider. Under both eyes there were dark cricles, and her nose was red from crying. She looked miserable.
He'd never even mentioned this place to her, it was to have been a surprise someday.
Right away John knew that she'd followed his tracks. It would have been easy. Over the winter he'd taught her some of his tricks, plus she had a few of her own from park work. One morning they'd played a tracking game in the woods and snow. But that was then, and how had she found his truck to start with? No one knew where he'd gone. He'd thought no one knew he'd even left.
Not much happened in Camp Four that someone didn't see, though. Anyone seeing him leave with a pair of climbing shoes and gym trunks would have known he'd be back by nightfall, and that limited the range of his journey. And there were precious few roads in the park. If he wasn't up one dead end, he'd be up another. It was good to see her. She'd gone to a lot of trouble to find him, and that made him feel good. Maybe they could put things file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/HTML-Jeff%20Long%20-%20Angels%20of%20Light.htm (144
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Jeff Long - Angels of Light behind them. He pulled his pants on and buttoned up the fly.
"I missed you," he said. It seemed like a good beginning. One of them had to say it.
He even opened his arms, further exposing his gladness. But she was mad.
"Who gave you the right?" she stammered, unable to keep her eyes off the wall. At first he thought she was talking about his hoarding the fossils.
"It was going to be a surprise."
"What? Are you crazy?" Her anger stung him. "A surprise?"
Then he realized. "Liz, wait—"
"That was Tucker.
Tucker.
"
Someone had told her then. Katie? Bullseye? What did it matter? "Who gave you that right?"
The shock was fresh, that was easy to read. She was wild. Heartbroken. At least he'd had the whole length of the Visor on which to exhaust his confusion and fury.
"I know."
"You know what?" she shouted.
He had so much to say, and he wanted to keep it so simple. No words came to him.
"Goddamn you, John. He was mine, too." She stabbed her fingertips to her chest. "I loved him."
"I know."
With her hollowed-out eyes and red nose she was ugly, which amazed John because he'd never imagined her ugly. It went beyond plain grief. She was in ruins. Too much food, no sunlight, no company. She looked like a prisoner. "You didn't even tell me,"
she repeated.
"I didn't think."
"No. You were punishing me. Well, it worked, John. You hurt me."
"It wasn't that."
"You know who told me? Little Katie. She said you haven't even told his parents. And I know you haven't told the office."
He had no answer.
"People aren't furniture. They aren't things. You can't lose one and not tell anybody."
"Liz." He bit the inside of his lip, but it didn't work. "He's gone." He didn't say it like Page 122
information. It was a plea. A question. How could he be gone?
"You had no right," she said more softly.
"He's gone," John repeated. It was that simple. Suddenly he wasn't so sure Tucker could ever be let go of any more than he could be found again. Tears ran down his sunburned cheeks onto his chest. They trickled onto his belly. He kept his head up for a minute so that she could see his sorrow and believe in him again. Then, realizing that he was using Tucker's death to try to unlock her, he turned his face to one side.
"She came to my cabin. Did you know it was Katie who took care of you when file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/HTML-Jeff%20Long%20-%20Angels%20of%20Light.htm (145
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Jeff Long - Angels of Light everyone else went up to look for him? Because that's what Tucker would have done.
She slept by your tent and listened to you at night. She brought you water."
"Katie? I thought maybe it was you."
"I didn't even know."
"She could have told you sooner."
Liz shook her head no, shielding Katie from blame. "This morning she came to my cabin because you drove off with your climbing shoes. But no rope. She said John's gone off to jump.
Could I help? Because she couldn't anymore."
"I wouldn't do that."
"I told Katie, yes, I'll go find John," she continued. "Because John's not a strong man."
"What?"
"You're weak. You're selfish. You wouldn't even come tell me Tucker died."
John traced the unhappiness written on her face. It was like graffiti, the hollows and bloodshot eyes and greasy hair. Something more had happened, and he hadn't been there for her. Now she was striking back on her own terms. She'd found him hiding.
Cowering, he told himself, no different from cowering in his tent and cowering in his silence. She meant to be insulting, but not shrill or poisonous. Angry but not hateful.
That wasn't Liz. It was the sorrow and... whatever else had gone wrong. So he didn't say anything to hit back.
"In camp I saw Tucker's things... all over the place." She stopped, upset. "Vultures.
There's nothing left of the poor boy."
"It works that way," said John.
"It works that way because that's how you live it," she bluntly returned. Something was shouting to John between her words, a collapse in her dreams, a surrender, or maybe just heartache. It was all shout, no enunciation. She was bitter, that's all John could say for sure. He waited a moment so they could hear the waterfall.
Then he asked, "What happened, Liz?"
She chose to play it dumb. "What happened? I drove up the Glacier Point road and down to Cascade Creek and to Tamarack Flat. I went all over looking for your truck.
And here you are."
"Liz. What happened?"
"I told headquarters."
"Told them what?"
"Tucker's gone."
That wasn't what he meant. By being literal she was playing dumb. She was dodging him. He was afraid, with that, that Liz was closed to him forever. "Just please tell me what happened," he tried again.
Liz glared at him.
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"Please."
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"You really want to know? They shit-canned me."
"I know," said John.
She looked at him.
"Tucker told me."
"Did he tell you I'm going to jail? While I was sitting there in the office, they arrested me."
"No."
"Conspiracy. Racketeering. Aiding and abetting in the sale of controlled substances.
You want me to go on?"
"They can't do that."
"No? There's going to be a grand jury. Until then, it's 'desirable' for me to continue residing in the ranger compound. In the same cabin. I'm free on bail, John. Two hundred thousand dollars.
My parents put up the ranch as a guarantee. They're loving it."
"I didn't know."
"Don't you read newspapers?"
"I'm not your enemy, Liz."
"Yeah," she snorted.
It was on his tongue to say, I would have helped, but it was him who'd harmed. He was the enemy. Because that's the way he'd lived it. Sorry wasn't even a Band-Aid this time around.
"Besides," she confessed, "I did come looking. But you were gone. You were already up on Half Dome." John sighed. No wonder she looked like shit. They both looked like shit. They'd done a whole lot of fucking up their lives in the last few weeks.
"What did they say about Tuck?"
"The rangers? They said, pretty early to be breaking out the body bags, isn't it? They sent someone over to Camp Four to take statements and find out what the hell's going on. Where do you guys get off, not telling anybody? All you get is more scum on your name. Drug freaks.
Bums. Thieves. Liars."
"Liz," he stopped her. "Tucker didn't fall. He fell, but he didn't slip." John said it impetuously, just to sidetrack her. In fact, he wasn't sure he believed his own story anymore.
"Yeah." Her voice was flat. "Katie told me."
"Somebody was up there with him," said John.
"I also heard you pushed him," she said.
"Katie said that?"
"Katie said everything. We talked for a couple hours. We had our cry. Blew our noses.
Now I know what Katie knows. A whole bunch of not much."
"What if I'm right?"
Liz shrugged. "Katie believes you."
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"You don't."
"Nope."
He blinked. His headache was returning.
"You think this is some horror movie? Nasty psychos with steel hooks? It's not that easy."
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John blinked again. She was going to dice him into pieces with her coldness and cynicism and walk away. She was going to abandon him. There was justice in that, and yet he felt wronged.
"You came all this way to call me a liar?"
She paused. "No. The truth is I came to save you."
"Save me from what?"
"Your own revenge."
"What?" Then he saw the thrust. They were back to suicide.
"Nobody likes empty spaces," she said.
"You sound like Bullseye. A whole lot of hot air."
"I've got empty spaces, too," she went on. "But yours are bigger. And worse. Maybe it's all right f
or you to see it all as murder."
"Hey. Thanks." At last she'd made him mad. He shook his head in disgust. They'd reached the ultimate impasse, pity.
"No," she murmured. "That's not what I came to say. I didn't come to say anything, John."
"Someone pushed him."
Liz hesitated. "It's done, John. They'll find him now. They'll bring him down and we can say good-bye."
"Too late. The animals took him off. You know what Tuck said once? Don't let the animals get me. Well, they got him." He was losing control again. There was flat ground under his feet, and here the vertigo was, killing him.
Liz stepped closer, none too confident that John wouldn't push her away, nor certain either that she even wanted to approach. But she did anyway, and John watched. He watched himself watch.
He couldn't move. "Don't worry, they'll find him."
Before she got any closer he confessed. "I ditched him, Liz. You don't know."
So he was going to push her away. Liz stopped.
"He was sitting there. Just gotta rest, he said. But then he wouldn't stand up. And the last thing he said was fuck yeah, John. That's it. And then I had to go or I'd still be there."
It took a minute, but then she recognized the bones of the Andes disaster. "You're not talking about Tucker," she said.
"Forget it," he said.
"You," said Liz. "You forget."
He drew a breath.
"Forget Tony. Forget Tuck."
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He quit pushing her away. His arms just hung there.