Rilla took it upon herself to make salami and cheese crackers for everyone for a mid-morning snack, which they ate before hauling. It was a good idea she took credit for when they spent the next few hours in a long slog, belaying Petra’s attempt to free-climb.
In between, they snacked on apples and thick globs of peanut butter, slowly working their way up a leaning ramp of sun-soaked granite toward the Texas Flake.
The shadows slipped over them as they each wiggled up into the chimney.
With her back to the flake and her feet pushing on the wall, Rilla tried not to think of coming off the wall. There was no protection here. The more she tried, the harder it was to not think about it. Her feet slipped and her arms hurt from trying to keep from pushing so hard on the flake.
It was her fear right now, she could feel it. She was tired and sore, yes. But it was fear locking everything tight. She winced and forced her body to move, putting the fear into its place and not allowing it to weigh on her body.
With a relieved sigh, she pulled out of the chimney to the top of the flake and sat astride, one leg on each side of the flake—one in sun and one in shadow. She put her arms up into the wind and tipped her head, sweaty helmet shifting back. Done.
The Boot Flake was next—and it was Rilla’s turn to lead. She found a good rhythm in ascending the aiders, clipping the bolts and fixed gear until she reached the bottom of the boot-shaped flake and needed to dig at her side for a cam.
She was higher than she’d ever been climbing, but the higher she went, the more the ground lost its sense of reality. It faded into gray and blue and greens of otherworldliness. All that existed—all that was real and permanent—was the granite beneath her raw fingers. The rub of the harness on her legs and waist. The dryness of her mouth. Her body moved like a machine—doing exactly what her mind told it to do. Focused. Strong. She’d never felt like this in her entire life. She was in control—and more out of control than she’d ever been. A body held in perfect tension. Maybe this was what life was—a constant state of seeking perfect tensions.
They didn’t talk much as they kept climbing. Everyone was starting to feel the effects of two full days of climbing. But the summit felt manageable. Within their grasp.
Petra had grabbed gear, but still insisted on climbing free—Rilla and Adeena didn’t argue, but it was starting to annoy Rilla more and more. Especially as the afternoon waned.
Adeena did the run for the King Swing—the famous, huge pendulum was a different experience than it had been for Petra and her long legs. Her swings took time to build, but had a power Petra’s hadn’t had.
When it was Rilla’s turn, she swept through the last of the sun lighting the shadows of the Valley and reached for the rock. The force pulled abruptly, and she felt this surge of superhuman strength course through her arms and connect her mind to her feet to find a foothold. Petra and Adeena grabbed hold of her shirt and secured her beside them.
The sun was beginning to set—twisting that familiar deep amber—but with three more pitches until they reached their camp spot, they were either climbing well into the night or bivying below the ledge.
“Maybe both,” Adeena said with a sigh.
“What is that on the horizon?” Adeena asked when they were working over the anchors, switching belay for the next pitch.
Rilla peered into the twilight near the last bit of sun. It was bright and seared her vision. It was hard to tell. “Clouds?” she asked.
“It’s probably just the sunset doing weird things. Or whatever . . . clouds.”
“Fuck,” Adeena said, swiping hair out of her face.
They all kept their eyes to the horizon, even when they put headlamps on and kept climbing in the dark, and couldn’t see what might be coming.
The wind picked up.
“It might rain,” Petra yelled.
In the light of her headlamp, Adeena’s eyes rolled.
Rilla wasn’t having it. She glared up at Petra. “No shit!” she yelled back over the wind.
“We’ll be fine,” Adeena said. “Let’s just get to the bivy before it starts.”
The dark was all around them then—biting with cold teeth on the back of Rilla’s neck as she kept blindly following Adeena, who had taken over on lead.
The first lightning flicker sent her pulse screaming—the granite lit wildly as if there were ghouls and goblins in each shadow. The face turned menacing. But in the fear, she suddenly felt, for the first time, as if the rock was hers. As if she belonged here—more than the other two. She was ugly, and terrible, and full of shadows where she kept finding terrible things. It always felt as if the bright sunshine of the mountains would kick her off; but here, in this night storm on El Cap, her fingers tingled and her body hummed, and she finally felt secure.
“Fuck! Your hair!” Petra pointed.
Rilla tipped her head up to see her hair on end, dancing above her helmet. “Fuck fuck fuck!” she screeched. She was about to be hit by lightning. She could feel it—the hum of the clouds gathering energy and seeking her body.
“Curl in a ball,” Adeena yelled. “Grab your ears.”
Rilla let go, immediately falling on the long stretch of cordelette of the anchors, and bumping against the wall as she hugged her knees to her chest and tucked her ears down. Thank god she’d been anchored. Thank god, because she’d just let go without thinking, and hadn’t double-checked anything. Cringing, she waited to be struck.
The lightning flashed. Thunder echoed.
Her heart beat ferociously.
“Come on. We have to get to the ledge,” Petra yelled.
Rilla only heard “ledge,” but she didn’t need Petra’s encouragement to know they were in deep shit and needed to get up to shelter.
She kept her head down and climbed until she reached the anchors and helped haul the pig.
“Be careful of the next pitch,” Petra said. “There are loose blocks.”
“Perfect,” Rilla moaned.
Lightning and thunder drowned out Petra’s reply. In the flash of light, Rilla realized Petra was scared. And Adeena was calm. Adeena was the leader. Maybe she had been all along, despite Petra’s bluster.
Rilla met Adeena’s gaze. “What do we do?”
“We can’t climb in the lightning,” Adeena said in a lull of the wind. “We need to spread out and hunker down until it passes.”
“Let’s just keep going,” Petra urged. “We’re almost there.”
Petra was delusional. Rilla yanked the route map out of her pocket and kept a firm grip on it in the wind. “The rap bolts are to the left,” she told Adeena, showing her the paper under the light of her headlamp. “I can head out over there. You and Petra anchor to the bolts here.”
“Guys . . .” Petra protested. Lightning flashed on her face, turning it white and blanched.
“We’re listening to Adeena,” Rilla snapped. “She has the most experience.” On the ground, what Adeena had lacked in technical ability was, up here, less important—now Rilla could see how Adeena’s experience with the situation and the stress made her a calm and able leader. It was heartening to realize not everyone showed their potential. That maybe there were things, hidden on the ground, that gave Rilla value. That she didn’t have to be Caroline. She could just be herself.
Thunder drowned out Petra’s protest. And Adeena handed her a rain jacket.
Rilla headed out across the granite, headlamp yanked down to her neck. With the lightning, she couldn’t see anything anyhow. Adeena belayed off the anchors, but if she fell, it would be a swing back underneath Adeena, hitting them with the rope. The light flashed and she spotted the glint of silver bolt hangers. It went pitch black; but Rilla kept her eyes trained ahead. She exhaled, bringing her belly in closer to the rock. They could make it. The storm would pass soon.
The lightning flashed again and she reached out to clip the bolts, fumbling in the blind dark. Quickly, she turned her headlamp on, and clipped another set of bolts and long draws to the a
nchors, getting herself secure.
The wind gusted and roared. The dark seemed a thing to consume her. “Off belay,” she yelled into the wind now that she was anchored to the wall.
She couldn’t hear anything back.
Rising up on the balls of her feet off the rock, she crouched like Adeena had instructed, ducking her head to her knees and covering her ears with her hands. Lightning-safe position—ready to be fucked by a bolt. She closed her eyes and tried to mentally be okay with sudden death.
The rain started. Pelting her back like ice in the driving wind. Lightning and thunder came at once, shaking her to her teeth. Her calves cramped. Her back tightened in the cold rain. Now she prayed for sudden death instead of this slow one where she froze. The rain came harder. And the thunder melted away into the mountains.
She straightened. “Guys?” she yelled into the dark.
No sound.
For the first time, panic seized her heart. She’d always had a partner in this. And even though she knew Petra and Adeena were across the wall just a little ways, she didn’t know. She couldn’t convince herself to believe it. The rain lashed her face. Rilla clutched the jacket tighter and bent her head, hanging in her harness.
She must have fallen asleep, because the next thing she knew she was gasping for air under a waterfall. Automatically, she straightened her legs, pushing off the wall. Was she dreaming? She looked around and it was still dark. Still night. The waterfall gushed over her shins, pouring icy water into her shoes and already wet pants.
“Rilla,” she heard someone yell.
Instantly, she realized the storm had lifted. The wind had died down and the rain had stopped.
“I’m okay,” she forced through her chattering teeth. “I’m in a waterfall.”
“Can you make it back over?” Adeena yelled. “We can bivy and find something dry.”
Rilla looked down at her waist. Her legs were cold and shaky, numb. But they were likely to only get worse, especially if the water didn’t let up soon. “I’m coming.”
It took her three times longer than normal to haul herself up into the rush of water to unclip from the anchors. Torrents spurted over her jacket and into her clothes, dripping ice through her whole body and any layer that might have still been dry.
Shaking uncontrollably now, she clipped the biners to her side and began inching along the still dark wall. After a few steps, she realized it wasn’t pitch-black anymore, but faintly dark gray.
The morning shadows of Adeena and Petra waited against the wall, quiet as she made her way to them. The going back was a lot harder than leaving. A lot harder. She shuffled slowly, hands open on the wet wall. What had she done? What had she done to be here? She sniffed and the misery she’d felt when looking at them turned into misery at looking at herself. She’d stolen Petra’s watch. When all Petra had done was help her. Invited her in. Took her climbing. She kept getting pissed at the rules Petra broke on this climb, because she was pissed at herself.
Rilla reached Adeena, waiting as Adeena clipped her into the anchors. “Thanks,” she said.
“You need to get dry. Petra’s getting you clothes.”
“Are y’all dry?” she muttered through the shivering.
“Mostly. We’ll bivy and rest up. Get something warm.”
“Take your shirt off,” Petra said. “I got a sweatshirt.”
Rilla worked out of her jacket, handing it to Adeena, and then peeled off the soaking layer of thin technical shirt she’d been wearing and the soaking wet bra underneath. “It’ll dry as soon as the sun comes up,” Adeena said, taking her sports bra and handing her a sweatshirt. Rilla yanked it over her head, worried somehow it would slip out of her hands and disappear into the wind.
They wrestled with the portaledge as the sky lightened and the wind whipped the cliffs dry. By the time Rilla had her wet pants off and hanging off the edge to dry, she was in her underwear in her sleeping bag, watching the sunrise.
No one talked. They didn’t even eat.
They all just fell asleep.
Forty
“Sleeping beauty,” someone yelled.
Rilla peeled her eyes open to the bright sky. Fuck. She was soaked in sweat. Moaning, she pushed back her sleeping bag and sat up.
“Hey-o, one is awake.”
“Didn’t even have to kiss her.”
“Just from the power of your manhood that close, it woke her anyway.”
Rilla made a face and turned. A group of four climbers were hauling off the bolts that had been under a waterfall. The one looking at her, not hauling, wore a T-shirt on his head under his helmet. “Did y’all get caught in that storm last night?”
She rubbed her face and leaned against the wall, pushing her feet out over the edge of the portaledge. “Yeah. It was brutal.”
“I bet. Everyone okay?”
She looked to the other sleeping bags. “Yeah. We’re good. What time is it?”
He glanced at the watch on his wrist. He looked military maybe, now that she thought of it. “A little after one.”
She nodded. “Do you have a smoke?”
He laughed. “I think I can spare one for you. Hang on.”
Leaving his friends to finish the hauling, he dug it out of the top of his pack and picked his way easily on a long leash from the anchors.
Rilla made room beside her, stuffing the sleeping bag into her pack hanging beside her.
He crawled to sit beside her and lit the smoke for her.
She took a deep breath. “Oh my god. You are a lifesaver.” She crossed her bare legs and took another deep pull on the smoke.
“We were lucky. We found a bit of a dry spot . . . almost shit my pants with the lightning though,” he said, lighting his own cigarette.
“Tell me about it. My hair stood on end.”
“And you didn’t get hit?” he asked.
She exhaled a long rush of smoke and shook her head.
“Lucky girl. You’re all good.”
His shoulder touched hers and her skin thrummed alive. She wondered what Walker was doing. And a sudden sadness over the way that happened rushed over her. She shook her head and kept smoking. Walker was up here somewhere. Hopefully they’d survived the night.
“Well, you’re about halfway there. Going to keep going or are y’all heading down?” the man asked.
She startled and looked at him, confused. “Why would we go down now?”
He laughed and put the smoke to his mouth. “Damn straight. Good luck!” He scooted off the portaledge with smoke trailing from the cigarette still held in his mouth.
Stretching on the harness she leaned across Petra and Adeena, forgetting she was in her underwear until the breeze hit her ass. “Yo, Adeena,” she yelled. “Wake up.”
“Do you want lunch?” The man behind her asked. “We have extra MREs. I’ll cook for you.”
She glanced over her shoulder, holding her cigarette away from the nylon. “Uh . . . sure? Yeah.” Why not?
He nodded and gave her a thumbs-up, still heading for his buddies.
She finished waking Adeena and Petra—and putting on pants. And by the time they were packed and ready to climb, he handed them each a packet of beef stew.
“What’re your names?” his friend asked as the three hungry girls poured the stew straight into their mouths.
“I’m Rilla,” she answered for everyone. “This is Adeena and Petra.”
“Oh, Petra. Nice.” He nodded. “Petra is beautiful.”
“The place,” one of his friends helped.
“Well, and the girl.” He gestured across.
“My parents visited during their honeymoon, hence . . . ” she waved her hand. Petra looked . . . busted. Her eyes were sunk deep in exhaustion and her hair was knotted on top of her head. Sunburn touched her cheeks. They all looked terrible, and Rilla laughed to realize she literally couldn’t care less. Smiling, she drained the rest of the stew.
“Thanks for this. It was actually really great.”
Rilla stuffed the empty packet into their trash bag and looked up. “Did y’all mind if we jump on ahead of you?”
“No problem.”
It was a good thing they went first. With four men waiting for their turn behind, Rilla found she was motivated to move faster than her aching body would have wanted. They hauled ass up the pitch, moving gingerly over the loose blocks and to the left, where they were able to collapse on a ledge and drink water, and eat another meal.
“See ya at the summit!” The man waved as they pushed through to the next pitch.
Rilla bit into her salted avocado and waved back. The same wind that had lashed angrily at her now gently caressed her face, cooling her as the sun warmed her bones. She wondered again about Walker.
•
It was late afternoon when they reached Camp 4, putting them a whole day behind. It was full of people, including the men from earlier.
Rilla turned back to Adeena and suggested making up time and continuing into the night. “If we can get past the Great Roof tonight, we’ll be in okay shape,” she said. “I just want to get . . . off this wall.”
Adeena agreed.
Tentatively, they turned to Petra.
“Absolutely not,” Petra said.
There was a moment of tension-filled silence.
“Okay, help me. What makes you want to bivy here? How are you feeling?” Adeena said, which was a lot nicer than the way Rilla would have done it.
“I’m free-climbing. I can’t rush the Great Roof.”
Adeena and Rilla looked at each other. They’d both assumed Petra would have given up by now. She wasn’t going to do it. She had, in reality, already failed by grabbing on to gear, and the hardest climbing was still ahead. To climb it now seemed beyond delusional.
“Petra. Honestly. You think you can free it? You’ve only done a third of the leads and . . .” Rilla trailed off.
“What the hell is your problem?” Petra said.
“I don’t want to bivy here,” Rilla said. “We have time. I want to get higher.”
“We’re okay on food.”
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