by Nina Revoyr
“I’m just saying.”
“He’s right, we shouldn’t see them,” Tracy said. “But I have bear spray, just in case.”
“Bear spray?” Gwen repeated.
“Yeah, it’s super-intense pepper spray, ursine strength.” She reached into the bag beside her and pulled out what looked like a miniature fire extinguisher—red, cylindrical, eight or ten inches long. “I brought it just for you. I don’t usually carry it on trips in the Sierras—it’s more for grizzly country. But I figured it would make you feel safer.”
“Thanks,” Gwen said, “it does.”
Soon they were sitting in their chairs again, staring at the fire. They heard a small but growing chorus of frogs, singing to each other and the night. They decided on a wake-up time—six—and a departure time of eight. They pulled out the topo map and tried to link it to the hand-drawn map, but the features in the landscape didn’t easily match. Then they followed the trail to Lost Canyon on the hand-drawn map and estimated how far they’d go the next day. If they broke the route into four somewhat even parts, they’d reach Lost Canyon on day three.
Todd felt the reality of the trip setting in. Tomorrow they were going into the unknown wild with nothing but a hand-drawn map. He was nervous—when he vacationed with his family, he plotted out routes and rest stops and stopping points with to-the-hour precision. This trip was different—less predictable, less certain. But maybe their change in plans was a blessing. He’d wanted to see how he would do if left to his own devices. And now here they were. As he crawled into his sleeping bag in the cramped intimate space of a two-man tent shared with someone he’d just met that day, he felt a surge of anticipation and excitement. Tomorrow, he’d be walking farther away from his life—or maybe farther into it.
Chapter Seven
Gwen
Gwen woke to total stillness, a quiet so deep and pure she wasn’t sure that she was really awake. There were no passing cars, no distant sirens, no voices floating in from the street. As she listened with her eyes closed, she realized that the absence of human sound didn’t mean it was silent. Birds were singing—three, no, four different kinds—trees were rustling in the wind, and she could hear the steady murmur of the creek. She opened her eyes and saw that Tracy was already gone. She wiggled out of her sleeping bag, zipped open the door of the tent, and peered out. A clear day—up between the canyon walls the sky was icy blue. But the canyon itself was still in shade, and when Gwen stepped out, she rubbed her arms and bounced on her toes at the cold. There was no sign of movement from the other tent, no sign of Tracy, either. She looked at her watch—5:47—and was glad that she had thirteen minutes before Oscar’s alarm woke the guys up and their morning tasks began. She walked into the woods to squat and pee—her original shyness about this act somewhat cured by long hikes in LA. Then she made her way past the tents and up the creek, where she found a boulder at the edge of the water and sat.
For the first time since they’d left the city, she felt truly relaxed. All day yesterday, she’d been uneasy about the trip. She’d enjoyed the cash store, its cluttered charm and odd people, but had been troubled by how dismissive Oscar and Tracy were, and then later, by Todd’s naïveté. And she’d felt on guard at the ranger station, where she and Oscar had gotten curious looks from some of the other people. This is our wilderness too, she’d wanted to say—but as usual, she kept her mouth shut. And then the change in route had unsettled her, not to mention their drive down the bumpy and deserted road to get to an unmapped trail.
But dinner had helped. Tracy’s competence with the fire, the fact that the fire pit had actually been there, had reassured her. And she was feeling more at ease with the guys, as Oscar’s edge dulled a little and Todd loosened up. But she’d also been aware of the world beyond their circle of light, the deep growing darkness of the woods. And as the evening went on she’d grown anxious again—not only about their trip, but about being so far removed from everything she knew, with no easy way to get back. She remembered how she’d felt when her great-aunt died and she was about to enter foster care—the fear and uncertainty, the sense that no one knew or cared where she was. As the darkness had settled around them, the trees transformed into silent sentinels that looked ready to wake up and move. And when everyone shoved their food and toiletries into the black cylindrical canisters, when they debated about how far away from their tents was far enough to place them, when Tracy put the bear spray right next to her in the tent, fear had filled Gwen’s chest and prickled her skin; she was sure that a bear would appear at any second, at first indistinguishable and then suddenly there, as if formed of the darkness itself.
But there’d been no bear, not even a hint of one. Just the hard, cold ground, with a few rocks digging into her, ground that she realized too late was slightly sloped, so that she always seemed to be rolling left, and when she finally did manage to get to sleep, she dreamed of falling over a cliff. It had taken hours, though, to sleep. She had lain awake with her eyes open, listening to the frogs, jumping at every sound in the woods, while Tracy—positioned head to toe—slept heavily beside her. She’d needed to pee but was afraid to leave the tent, the relative comfort of her sleeping bag. And so she’d stayed in one spot, alert and cold, until sleep finally overcame her. The last time she’d looked at her watch, it was almost one thirty.
Now it was morning, though, now it was light, and the fears of the dark had subsided. She was proud to have made it through the first night—and glad to be awake, and alone. The creek was chattering and lively, making its way past mossy rocks and under fallen branches, rushing in the spots where the banks grew narrow, flowing gently when the shoreline receded. The trees looked harmless in daytime, and in the light she saw the bark, the beautiful parallel downward patterns that moved and flowed like water. Gwen heard the high-noted chirping of one bird, the lower calls of another, the insistent tap-tap-tapping of a woodpecker, which she spotted high up in a tree, its red head a blur against the black of its body. The tree was full of pine cones which dangled like earrings. Across the creek she saw two squirrels winding down around a trunk, tails swishing, both of them stopping just above the ground and nattering at each other. She looked up and saw that the top third of the canyon wall was touched by light, so bright it appeared to sparkle. Huge swaths of granite were broken up by small plateaus that housed hearty, improbable trees. What a beautiful place, Gwen thought. She had never been anywhere like this. She couldn’t believe how different it was from the chaparral and dusty trails near LA.
But even as she appreciated the beauty of the spot, she felt sad about Robert. She just missed him, was all. There was so much he had never gotten to do, and it felt unfair that she was in this lovely place that he would never see.
Suddenly she thought of a story that Devon had told her, about a hiker who’d been killed by a falling boulder. It had taken him a long time to die. The boulder, a bathtub-sized chunk of granite, had caught the man square in the chest and pinned him to the ground. The hiker had two friends with him, but they couldn’t get the rock to budge. One of them stayed with him while the other went off for help. The trapped man’s legs were free, his face unobscured, so his friend talked to him and wiped the sweat off his brow while he slowly bled to death from inside. By the time the rescue workers arrived three hours later, the man was unconscious. It took them the rest of the day to dig him out.
It occurred to Gwen that this was what grief was like. It was like being crushed under the weight of something that she couldn’t get out from under, or remove. And she wasn’t sure, even as she went on with her life, that it wasn’t slowly killing her.
Now she heard voices behind her—Todd and Oscar had emerged from their tent. Oscar was fiddling with his gear, and Todd was stretching, bending over to touch his toes and then leaning sideways. Gwen sighed and walked back to the tents. For a moment she was self-conscious about not having on any makeup, but her concealer was buried somewhere in her backpack.
“Morning,” Osca
r called as she approached. He was wearing sweatpants and a jacket and his hair was a disheveled mess, which made him look younger, endearing.
“Morning,” she said. “How’d you guys sleep?”
“Okay. Except I woke up once when I heard footsteps outside, thought it might be a bear. But it was just Todd, out to take a piss.”
“You do look kind of bearlike,” Gwen noted.
“Good morning to you too,” Todd answered. Then, to Oscar: “Wish I’d known you were awake. I could have messed with the tent and really had some fun.”
“Very funny,” Oscar said. Then, to Gwen, “How’d you sleep?”
“Not so great. I kept thinking I was hearing things. But I feel good now. It’s a beautiful morning.”
“It is,” Oscar agreed. “But it’ll be even more beautiful when we have some coffee.”
“I think Tracy’s working on that now,” Todd said.
Gwen looked toward the fire pit and saw that Tracy, who’d reappeared, had a fire going and was placing a pot of water on the grill. “I’ll go help her,” she said.
Tracy was already in her hiking pants and fleece jacket, with her hair pulled into its usual ponytail. She looked happy and awake, not a hint of sleepiness or stiffness, as if she’d spent the night in a luxury hotel.
“Good morning, sleepyhead!” she called out. “You hungry?”
“I am, actually. Hey, where’d you go?”
“Just up the trail a ways. To see how it looked. I woke up around five and it was already light, and I knew I wouldn’t get back to sleep. The trail looks good—clearer than I expected.”
“That’s good.”
“Yes, it is. You want some coffee?”
“More than anything else in the world.”
Tracy had brought over one of the bear canisters, and now they took packets of instant coffee and made themselves two cups. Eventually the guys came over and they all had bowls of instant oatmeal, which Tracy had brought for the whole group, sitting in their chairs from the previous night and laughing at their nighttime discomforts.
“How is it that you sleep so well outside?” Todd asked Tracy, after it was clear that all the others had slept badly.
“Clear conscience,” Tracy replied.
“How do you manage that?”
“It’s easy. Pure living. Plus, I don’t have kids.”
Both Todd and Oscar groaned, and Gwen imagined they felt the pull of their families. She was feeling guilt too, about not being able to call her sister on her birthday. And she wondered about the group she missed yesterday, about how Sandra Gutierrez was doing. But in truth, she was glad to be away. She suspected that Todd and Oscar felt the same, because they were, despite their momentary outburst of guilt, both giddy and energized. She was relieved that they seemed to be getting along and weren’t trying to out-guy each other.
After they ate, they all washed their dishes and repacked their food. Then Gwen changed out of her sweats and into her hiking clothes. She captured her hair in an elastic band and reluctantly put on a hat; she was not one of those girls who felt cute in a baseball cap.
Then, a flurry of organization. They folded their tents up and Tracy and Todd stuffed them in their packs. They sorted out clothes they didn’t need and threw them into the back of the car, Gwen trying to shake the feeling that she was forgetting something crucial. They filled their bottles from the stream and treated the water with a screwdriver-sized ultraviolet contraption. They adjusted and tightened their hiking poles—all except Oscar, who hadn’t brought any. By seven forty-five, everything was either in the car or their packs, and the campsite looked as clear as it had when they’d pulled in the day before.
“All right, we need a picture,” said Tracy, and so they lined up near the fire pit. They were now in their respective hiking outfits—Gwen in olive pants and an eggplant-colored long-sleeved shirt, Tracy in clay pants and a light brown button-down, Todd in a gray-blue long-sleeved shirt and tan hiking shorts, Oscar in black nylon shorts Gwen remembered from the gym, and a rust-colored pullover fleece. Tracy placed her camera on a tree stump, then ran over to join the group; she hoisted her pack on just as the timer counted down and the camera clicked. She retrieved it, looked at the picture, and held it out for everyone to see. “Off we go,” she said. “Explorers in the wild.”
Oscar looked over her shoulder and grinned. “What a bunch of dorks.”
“There’s just no way to look cool, is there?” Gwen agreed, laughing. “With these big old packs and poles.”
“I think we look pretty studly,” Todd said. “If you don’t mind me saying so, ladies.”
“I agree,” Tracy said flatly. “Carrying forty-pound packs for thirty miles, up to 11,500 feet, isn’t my definition of dorky.”
“Okay, okay, sorry!” Oscar said, shaking his head. “All right, we’re adventurers. We’re pioneers in the wild.”
Gwen knew what Oscar meant. Sure, a thirty-mile loop in the backcountry was a big undertaking. But they were in the Sierras, in a designated Wilderness Area—not too far from civilization. All of them had steady, responsible jobs; two of them had families. They could pretend to be whatever, whomever they pleased. But in the end they were four adults in their thirties and forties, a lawyer and a youth counselor, a trainer and a realtor. They were not extraordinary people.
They walked over to the trailhead—an unobtrusive passage through a thick cluster of trees—and then they were hiking, and Gwen could hardly believe they were on their way. The trail led through forest, then curved closer to the canyon wall. She was aware in a different way of her body itself—the effort of placing one foot in front of the other; the extension of her arm to plant a pole. And she was conscious of the pack on her back, which was like carrying a small child, except it didn’t adjust itself like a child would and simply added weight, so if she leaned left the pack tipped with her, threatening to pull her over; if she stood up straight it pulled her backward; if she bent over the pack pressed her toward the ground. After ten minutes she learned how to use the poles to help distribute the weight, another ten and she developed a kind of rhythm. She was third in line—Tracy led and Oscar followed, Todd brought up the rear. She watched how the others picked their steps and used their poles, and tried to ignore the pressure on her shoulders and hips.
They walked silently on soft trail, through cover of forest. They left the first canyon and entered a larger one. Here the granite walls were more varied—huge rounded domes with clear marks where bits of rock had crumbled off; and cliff walls where the rock had fallen away in squares, leaving shapes like the blunt-featured figures on Easter Island. After thirty minutes, Todd called out, “Hold on for a minute, I’ve got to tie my shoe.”
Oscar sat down heavily on a fallen log and swung his pack off his shoulder. From the look on his face, he was as glad to stop as Gwen was. She found a thigh-high boulder and lowered herself slowly, resting the pack on the rock to remove the burden from her shoulders. The hip straps dug into her stomach and she breathed in relief as she undid the buckle and slipped her arms out of the shoulder straps. She reached behind awkwardly to grab her bottle and then gave up and turned around, pulling the bottle out of the side pocket.
“I forgot how damned hard it is to walk with a pack,” Oscar said, taking off his fleece. His pack, an old-fashioned external frame, looked like a loaded sled set on its heels.
“It’s pretty tough,” Gwen agreed, and she glanced over at Tracy, who was still on her feet, looking up the trail, bear spray clipped to her belt. She stood there easily, bouncing on her toes, as if she carried nothing at all.
“We’ve gone one mile,” Tracy announced. “Only twenty-nine to go.”
Gwen took this in without comment, but her heart sank. They’d gone one mile? With all that effort? What had she been thinking? This was infinitely harder than any hike she’d ever done in LA. How was she going to make it thirty miles with a heavy backpack? Right now, she wasn’t even sure if she could make it another mile.<
br />
“Why are we doing this again?” Oscar asked.
“Aw, come on,” Todd said, hoisting his pack back on. “This is great.”
“Yeah, let’s go,” Tracy said. “Only three more hours until lunch.”
Oscar looked at Gwen and opened his eyes wide. “You heard her. Only three more hours till lunch.”
Gwen twisted her arms at uncomfortable angles to get them into her shoulder straps, then reclipped the buckles at her waist and chest. She didn’t know how she would stand up again. She tried once but the pack was too heavy; she managed to raise herself about three inches and then sat back down.
“Lean forward onto the poles and bend your legs,” Tracy instructed, and she tried once, twice, before she finally got her feet set under her and pushed with her legs, shooting up so fast that the weight of the pack carried her forward and almost tipped her over.
“This is going to get easier, right?” she asked.
“Not really,” Tracy answered. “You just get used to it.”
This didn’t reassure Gwen, but as they continued on, she found that Tracy—as usual—was right. The pack was heavy, unwieldy—but she was getting used to it. She stopped thinking about the whole trip and focused instead on placing one foot in front of the other, using the poles to help her as she stepped up onto rocks and as the trail began to slope uphill. They had spread out now, fifteen or twenty feet between them, and Gwen was glad for the space and privacy. The woods around them were green and lush; the trees were clothed with bright green-yellow moss and the ground was covered with ferns. It looked to Gwen like a scene from a children’s book, some fictional benevolent forest. Several tree roots sprang up from and reentered the ground, like eels whose smooth, dark backs breached the surface of water. The landscape gave way to more open terrain, and eventually the creek revealed itself to be the fork of a larger river. They followed this new river past huge granite outcroppings like the toy building blocks of the children of giants. They continued under sheer granite walls, meeting up with the river again, where a jumble of fallen boulders caused the water to twist and spray; they walked close enough to feel the mist on their skin.