Leah trembled, still silent, so Matt touched her face with his hands, not feeling any difference in temperature. She kept her eyes squinted shut, then suddenly muttered, “Don’t.”
“Leah?”
“D-d-don’t t-t-touch me.” A violent spasm vibrated through her, like she was being electrocuted, jerking her arms and legs. Her feet kicked his shins. Her fists punched his face.
“Ow! Stop!”
“Don’t!”
“It’s okay!” he yelled, which was the opposite of being okay, but he didn’t know what else to say. “It’s okay! I won’t touch you.”
Her eyes opened—a small whine hummed in her throat as she balled her fists under her chin.
“You might have hypothermia,” he said slowly, hoping she understood and didn’t try to punch his teeth in. He didn’t need to lose another one. “It can make you get weird.” He didn’t really know this, but Leah was acting like someone having a really bad drug-induced fit.
“W-where’s Sid?”
“He’s with Tony and Carter, remember?”
“Carter!” Her voice cracked. “I w-want Carter!”
“Carter’s not here,” he said, trying to soothe her. “I’m here. It’s me. Matt. I’m trying to help you.”
“F-f-fuck off.”
She was obviously delirious. He couldn’t see her face in the dark, but heard the tears in her voice. And the panic. “Okay.” He tried to think of something else that might calm her down. “Are you hungry?”
That was probably the stupidest question he’d ever asked—so stupid Leah didn’t answer. Suddenly feeling witless, Matt began to babble, talking as if his life depended on it. Maybe it did. He needed to distract her from the cold. He needed to distract himself. Food, he thought. It always seemed to come back to food. “Well, I’m hungry. I’m starving. Back at home in Des Moines, I used to go to this restaurant called Goobers. They had the best cheeseburgers ever. Thick quarter pounders. Fresh Angus beef. I always ordered mine with bacon. And it wasn’t this skinny little crap bacon either, but the good stuff. Thick-cut pepper bacon. Applewood smoked. Extra onions. Sharp cheddar cheese. Homemade buns. I think they were called brioche or something. They buttered and grilled them.” His mouth puddled with saliva on butter. “And the french fries. Oh my God. Just the best french fries in the universe. Crispy. Salty. Steaming hot. But I never dipped mine in ketchup,” he continued. “I hate ketchup. I dipped them in my chocolate malt. Salty fries and chocolate ice cream.” He could easily picture the table in front of him, hot and waiting for him, like a centerfold porno of food, and he vaguely wondered if talking about it at a time like this constituted a version of torture. Probably.
“K-k-ketchup?” Leah interrupted, shuddering the word like a curse.
“Huh?”
“W-who the h-h-hell doesn’t like k-ketchup?”
“Me,” he answered, hoping this meant she wasn’t going to punch him in the face again. “I hate it. It’s disgusting.”
“D-d-do you h-hate tomatoes?”
“No.”
“V-vinegar?”
“No.”
“Sh-shugar? Salt?”
“No.”
“Tha-that’s k-ketchup,” she blurted triumphantly, as if to prove some point he wasn’t aware of.
“I know what ketchup is.”
“Th-then yuh-yer w-weird.”
“I’m weird?”
She was quiet for a second, trembling against him in such a way that he realized his groin wasn’t as frozen dead as he thought. Things below the belt started to stir. His pulse rose from a half to four-four time. “Wha-what about mu-mu-mustard?”
He exhaled slowly, trying to turn his mind back to food. “I don’t like mustard either.”
“B-b-but there’s a h-hundred ka-kinds.”
“So?”
“De-Dijon m-mustard?”
“Nope.”
“You ever t-try it?”
“No.”
When she answered again, he heard the smile in her voice. “Then y-you d-don’t know t-till you t-try.”
“My mom says that,” he replied immediately. “But I don’t agree. Maybe I don’t know what I like, but I’m pretty sure about what I don’t.”
“Nuh-uh. Y-your m-mom s-sounds-s-smart.”
“Yeah,” he had to admit. “She is.” He suddenly thought of her, wondered what she was doing at this exact moment. It was evening; she might be watching the news, maybe she was even waiting for him to call, not being able to go to sleep until he checked in. She’d always been like that, needing reassurance from him that he would be fine but never believing him until she got confirmation, and he wondered if that was how all mothers were. Or was it just his? And now he could see why she did worry; he could see how she believed something innocent and fun could turn on a dime. How things could change in an instant. Because they had. “My mom is probably wondering what I’m doing right now.”
“C-camping?”
Even Matt had to laugh. “This is the worst camping trip I’ve ever been on.”
“The t-tent is n-n-not so h-hot either.”
She was making jokes; that was a good sign. “Yeah, maybe I should update my Facebook post. Having a great time in Colorado! Enjoying nature and the wildlife!”
She pressed closer against him, convulsing with laughter, and he had the desperate urge to put his arms around her, and not just to keep her warm. “F-Facebook is s-s-stupid.”
“That’s what everyone says.” He rested his hand on her shoulder, needing to touch her, if only a little. “But everyone’s on it.”
“N-not me.”
“Really?” Now he was surprised. “I thought every female was on Facebook. Or at least Instagram. Twenty selfies a day.” He knew people who did this—most of them girls in his high school. Posing with that same acidic look—tilted chin, angling for a mood crossed between bored, sly, and pissed off, a calculated gaze bordering on confusion.
“G-guys d-do it t-t-too,” Leah stuttered, still shaking. He needed to keep her talking, keep her awake, and keep his mind off her body, which was downright impossible. He’d never been this close to a girl before, and though he had imagined more than a hundred times (maybe closer to a thousand) what it would be like to actually get naked with one, he could honestly say he’d never imagined this particular scenario.
“I guess so.” Matt discerned that there was a certain subset of people who didn’t have profiles on the Internet. Types of people you just couldn’t find. And as far as he knew, he could think of six.
1. Old people who thought the interwebs were something to do with technologically advanced spiders.
2. Prison inmates or mental patients (although they might get computer privileges).
3. Criminals hiding from the police and/or mafia.
4. Undercover agents working for the police and/or mafia.
5. People who lived in third world countries with no access and/or people who didn’t own a computer.
6. People who had a secret and didn’t want to be found.
Out of these six options, Matt thought only numbers three and six could be true, and he highly doubted a person could be much of a criminal or police informant by the ripe old age of seventeen.
So he went with number six.
“Leah?”
Quiet.
“Leah, wake up.”
“N-no,” she murmured. “I’m tired. I need to sleep.” At least she had almost stopped shaking, but he was suddenly afraid that was a bad thing.
His hand slid down, dropping from her shoulder to the soft curve of her stomach. He pulled her toward him and she curled into him with a soft sigh. “I don’t want you to fall asleep,” he whispered into her hair. She smelled like the river, fresh and bright and cold and a scent that made him think of the color green. Green. She smelled green.
“I have to. S-so do you.”
“I know.” Fatigue settled in his bones like a lead weight; it was now painful to keep his eyes open. “
How do you feel?”
“Like sh-shit,” she mumbled. “Like I almost d-drowned in a r-river.”
“True.”
“Th-thank you, by the way.”
“Well, I owed you one.”
“Yeah. M-maybe.” More quiet. “I g-guess we’re even.”
That was a weird way of putting it, Matt thought, but it made him feel better. Not as useless and annoying as he did this morning. “I’ve never met a girl like you,” he professed into the dark. Who was he kidding? He’d never met anyone, male or female, like her before.
“Is that g-good?”
“Yeah. Definitely.”
“Thanks.”
She was quiet then, breathing softly, evenly, and he wondered why it was easier to say what he thought now, although this small, dark space did resemble a confessional booth.
Leah’s breathing was soft and wispy, her body snug against his own, and he pulled the extra flap of sleeping bag over them. He didn’t know how long they’d been lying there; his thoughts ran on and time seemed to lose meaning. But he knew he couldn’t stay awake all night listening for her breath, checking for her heartbeat.
“Please don’t die,” he whispered. Matt closed his eyes and thought about praying, but knew it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter what he believed, or if he believed anything at all. Based both on his limited experience and pure rational observation, he knew things didn’t happen for a reason, there was no cosmic scorecard, no judgment day balance sheet, and that a lot of good people had horrible things happen to them, and bad people did sometimes get away with murder. Right now he could pray all he wanted. He could beg and bargain and plead. But it didn’t matter. The universe didn’t care about him any more than he cared about a grain of sand on a beach a thousand miles away. No one was listening.
He knew this.
But he still prayed.
He prayed because he was afraid of being alone.
“Don’t die, Leah,” he repeated with the fervor of a saint. “Don’t die. Okay?”
“Okay,” she finally mumbled back. “I won’t.” She slipped one hand into his (still cold but not as icy) and gave a determined squeeze.
He believed her; he had to believe in something. And so he tucked his chin down, pressing his face against her damp hair with a releasing breath, and waited to stop thinking, waited for things to shut down, go silent and blank.
Sometimes Matt thought falling asleep must be exactly like dying. You don’t really notice it when it happens to you.
TONY
Location: Tent at abandoned NFS cabin, Arapaho National Forest
Elevation: 9,000 feet
“Carter! C’mon! Let’s go!”
Carter crouched over, hurriedly scribbling something on a piece of paper. At the last second he had decided he needed to leave a note for Julie. He ripped a sheet from a small notebook, folded it, and crawled into the tent, hoping she’d return and find it.
Dammit, Julie. Tony clenched his fists and grabbed the sled towline from Will, clipping it on the harness. Why couldn’t you just have waited a little longer? Now Carter was freaking out and wasting time. Time they didn’t have.
“Ready?” Will squared his shoulders. “Left, right, left, right,” he coached Tony, and together they moved forward, back onto the trail Will had made coming down. Now it was all uphill. Tony took a steadying breath and leaned into the weight, not looking back. Carter could catch up.
Right, left, right, left. Tony staggered sideways on the incline.
“We just need some momentum,” Will said. “A little faster and we’ll smooth out.”
“Okay,” Tony huffed, wondering if this was how a sled dog felt. He poked the snow with his poles, matching his stride to Will’s. “I think I got it.”
“Good.”
A few strides later the load lightened, and Tony glanced back. Carter, in his snowshoes, pushed doggedly at the rear of the sled. He had his skis crisscrossed and attached to his pack, and it looked like a more difficult job than the one Tony had.
“Good pace, guys. Steady on. We’ve got a thousand yards,” Will said, eyes straight ahead. He pulled out a walkie-talkie from his side pocket without breaking stride. “I’ll let Ryan know to call UCH and tell them we’re coming.”
“UCH?”
“University of Colorado. They have a helipad that can handle us.” Will relayed a series of commands through the receiver, and the pilot responded through the static. Tony wondered what their conversation meant. A lot of tens were spoken. He guessed it was all walkie-talkie lingo. Will said things like, ten-nine repeat, ten-twenty-five for UCH, ten-twenty-three stand by. The volley went back and forth for a minute before Will uttered a final “ten-four.” It was the only thing Tony understood. Message received.
“Does the pilot know? Did you tell him?” Carter panted. “He needs to know!”
“Yes.” Will didn’t slow down, but continued his relentless stride forward. “I let him know about your friend Julie. He’ll radio the sheriff. Like I said, they’re already out looking.”
“And they’ll find her? Can you tell them where to look?”
Tony didn’t like the sound of Carter’s voice; he wished Carter would just focus on the sled, which was difficult enough. Sid made little groans and gasps when the sled went over a bump or jerked sideways. Good, Tony thought. He’s still there. Complaining was fine. And while Tony wanted to say the right thing to Carter so he would calm down, he didn’t have a clue where to start. So he did the next best thing—he ignored him. “Do you guys work for the park service?” Tony asked Will, trying not to sound like he was going to faint. He’d never passed out before, and given their circumstances, couldn’t afford to find out what it was like. “Like the rescue crew or something?” He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to clear the throb in his temples. Sweat drenched his back. He wanted to stop and remove his coat, but that was more wasted time. Ignore it. Keep going. Right, left, right, left.
Will shook his head. “This isn’t national park land. It’s national forest.”
“Oh.” Tony didn’t understand why that made a difference, though he remembered Dylan saying something about that the night of the party.
“The jurisdiction is Grand County.”
“Oh.”
“We’re volunteers.”
“Volunteers?” This time Tony did stop; his right foot slid so far forward he almost did the splits. Recovering, he jerked the harness with such force, he felt it in his throat. These people volunteered to go out and search for us? To search through an avalanche? To risk their own lives? And it wasn’t their job? They weren’t getting paid? He opened his mouth, trying to say the words, wanting to thank Will, wanting to fall down and cry, wanting to run and hide. I’m so stupid, Tony thought. Stupid and careless. Up until this point, Tony didn’t imagine there were other people in the world who were much different from him. People who didn’t always think about themselves. People like Will. Like Ryan the pilot. Like the strangers searching the woods for them right now. Knowledge was a hot, shameful flood inside him, filling straight up to his eyes.
If Will noticed Tony’s tears he didn’t mention it, but kept pulling forward, eyes looking ahead on the trail. “Well, I always thought this was more interesting than fishing.”
Tony didn’t know what to say to that either, but managed to nod.
“Thank you, Will,” Carter said from the back.
“Yeah,” Tony said softly. “Thank you.”
Will bobbed his head in a quick nod, concentrating on the incline ahead. The snow was soft, sloppy, but the skins on the skis prevented them from backsliding. Every muscle in Tony’s back and legs screamed, but he ignored it, putting his entire one-hundred-forty-five-pound frame into the climb. After what seemed like an hour of pulling, the incline flattened out.
“Great job!” Will did not slow down. In fact, he did the opposite, picking up speed. Tony had never seen another person with this kind of robotic strength. Will was not much bigger t
han him, but showed no signs of fatigue. There was a hardness about his physique, as if his arms and legs were made of steel cables and iron rebar. “We’re close.”
They skied around a wedge of evergreens and the helicopter came into view, red and white and glowing in the sun. And though Tony wasn’t religious, his reaction to the sight was as if he were the most devout Catholic now beholding the face of the Virgin Mary. He fell to his knees in the snow and crossed himself.
• • •
The engine burr vibrated Tony’s bones, and he watched the long blades whip the surrounding treetops into submission. The helicopter, starting up, sounding more like a jet engine progressively building into a supersonic scream. A few moments later he felt the dip and sway as it left the ground. Tony gripped Sid’s hand, holding fast ever since Will and Ryan had loaded him on a stretcher, and watching the trees shrink away as they rose. The sight was so dizzying Tony had to focus on something else, something stationary. Puking here was not an option.
“How long?” he called, his voice barely audible above the engine. Both the pilot and Will had on headsets, communicating back and forth, but Tony couldn’t guess the severity of their conversation. They also wore mirrored sunglasses, leaving their faces undecipherable.
Sid’s face, in contrast, was drawn, his lips dry and slightly parted. His exhalations were as slight as an infant’s. Dark, threadlike capillaries stood out like stains on his eyelids. “Hang on, Siddhanth,” he whispered. “We’re almost there.”
The hospital was twenty minutes away, according to the pilot, and the sky was clear. They should have a fast flight. Carter sat opposite Tony, with his head pressed against the window, scanning the ground with restless eyes, his fists balled against his thighs in such a way that he reminded Tony of a jack-in-the-box, tightly wound and ready to pop.
When Tony looked out the window again he felt less ill. The helicopter was moving forward fast enough that the initial stomach-tilting sensation had left him. Sunlight gleamed off the snow, and Tony examined the terrain below. According to Will, Denver was a thirty-minute flight from their location. Thirty minutes to civilization. A half hour to hope. Tony guessed by the way the ground flew past them that they were going at least a hundred miles per hour, and he did a mental calculation on the possible distance. At least fifty miles. The mountains in the distance, however, seemed immobile.
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