Finding Jim

by Susan Oakey-Baker

  “Yes, he’s fine.” I got up and paced.

  I knew Jim was not fine. He was alive but he had watched his friend fall. I wondered if he would ever be the same again.

  “Oh, Sue, you know, I’m not all that surprised.” Dad pressed on in a soft voice. “That’s why I hugged Jim when he left. I knew there was a good chance we would not see him again.” His words hit me like a wall of ice-cold water.

  “It could have been Jim” is what Dad was saying. It could have been Jim. Later, I read that 33 per cent of the climbers who attempt the summit of K2 are killed. So of course it could have been Jim, but I was not even aware of that statistic at the time. I shook my head to push the painful truth aside. It could have been Jim.

  I walked for hours along Jericho Beach until there was no more sand, and I climbed the steep embankment up to the university library. Inside, I ran my fingers along the book spines and pulled out a volume of poems by Earle Birney. I scanned them, looking for key words: grief, husband, wife, mountains, fall. Back and forth until I decided on a poem from Last Makings.

  When we must part

  sweetheart, think that my death

  swings wide your harbour’s mouth

  to welcome in the young & joyful

  the quick eyes ready for the searoads

  time is yours for choosing

  the love to sail the world with

  (and the father to make with you

  the unborn waiting to be loved)

  if clouds hang heavy now

  remember how your gentle sun

  wheeled my rough planet round you

  believe in my belief

  that you were made to shine

  with love

  and being loved

  swim proud dear princess

  let no one dim

  the brilliance of your mind

  let no one bind

  the courage of your heart

  my small one so tall in patience

  i think you will grow wise as Orcas

  yet never lose your dolphin curves.

  I copied the words on the inside of a card I bought for Patti. On the way home, I picked up a few bags of groceries for her. I couldn’t decide if I should get comfort food or healthful food. The bags bulged with potato chips and mixed greens.

  When I arrived at Dan and Patti’s log home on the banks of Indian Arm, the front door was open a crack. I tapped on the swollen wood and felt the salty residue stick to my knuckles. No answer. I eased the door open and peered inside as if I expected a burglar to appear. Swoosh, swoosh, a tall man strode toward me, hand outstretched. “I’m Patti’s brother.”

  “Hi, I’m Sue.” I shook his hand.

  “Patti and Ryan are in there.” He relieved me of my shopping bags and pointed with his chin.

  I tiptoed to the door of Patti’s bedroom and heard sniffles. “Come in, Sue.” Patti’s voice was high and strained. I stood in the doorway. Ryan, Patti’s son, sat on the bed facing her and held her hand. Patti dabbed at her red nose with tissue. “We’re coming out now anyway, right, Ryan?” Patti tried to smile and raised herself jerkily from the bed.

  “Are you okay, Mom?” Ryan reached forward, ready to steady her.

  “I’m fine, honey.” She laid her hand gently on his arm.

  I moved forward to hug Patti. “I’m so sorry, Patti.”

  In the living room, Patti patted the couch beside her and I sat down.

  “This card is for you.” I placed the white envelope in her palm.

  “Thank you.” Patti opened the card, and I watched her eyes roam over the words. About halfway down the page, she crumpled at the waist. “Oh, God.” She closed the card, crying, and looked at me, “Thank you. I’ll have to finish reading it later.”

  She must have come to the part in the poem about having a baby. It was too late to take the poem back. I wanted to take away some of her pain. I didn’t want to cause her more. At the same time, I knew that nothing I said or did would bring Dan back. And this poem honoured their dreams together.

  “Jim sounded strong when he called. He was crying but his voice was strong,” Patti reassured me.

  “If there’s anything I can do…” I held her hand.

  “My family is here.” The room was so quiet I could hear the ocean lapping outside.

  Four days later, Jim’s parents picked me up to go to Dan’s memorial service. Entering the church was like walking into a forest. Evergreen trees towered and waved through the floor to ceiling windows and skylights. People flowed in like water, some eddying around a collage of photos of Dan. He looked so happy.

  Patti took big gulps of air before she stepped up onto the stage-like platform.

  “Thank you for coming, everyone. I’ve brought some vegetables and flowers from our garden because Dan and I really enjoyed the garden. It represents so much life. I am so proud…” Patti lowered her head for a second and then continued, “I am so proud of Dan for being the first Canadian to summit both Everest and K2. And I think it is very important for us to acknowledge Jim’s achievement of summiting K2. He will need our love and support when he gets home.” A lump formed in my throat, and I sat on my hands in the wooden pew.

  After the service, I waited in my seat for the crowd to disperse. A friend leaned over to me and whispered, “I wish Jim were here.” I covered my mouth with my hand and sobbed as silently as I could.

  On the way home in the car, Jim’s mother, Mom Haberl, turned around in her seat to ask me, “What do you think Jim would like best for an airport reception? A lot of people are talking about going down to meet him – Matt, Alastair, Kevin. What do you think?”

  “It would be great for Jim to see his closest buddies there. That would be a huge show of support.”

  “We’ll see.” She faced forward again. I pondered her question, and by the time they dropped me off I wasn’t so sure of my answer. I wanted to do what would be best for Jim.

  That night, I dreamed that I met Jim at the airport and gave him a hug but he didn’t return it. I squeezed harder, but he just gazed off into the distance.

  Shortly after I woke up, Jim’s younger brother called to say that the family thought it best if I went alone to meet Jim at the airport in Seattle. I was the one he would want to see. Jim would be home in two weeks.

  The Sunday morning of Jim’s arrival dawned beautiful and sunny and I walked to the beach for a swim. It will relax me, I thought. After a shower, I scrutinized my closet and soon covered the bed in discarded outfits. The clock ticked. My nervousness turned into procrastination, and I left 15 minutes later than planned. “Why do you do that?” I berated myself. I was often late. I drove down to the Canada–US border and clenched my jaw when I saw the lineup of cars and the estimated one-hour wait. I had only allowed 45 minutes for the border. I planned to be holding the eight-foot-long poster I had made that read “Welcome Home! Congratulations!” as Jim arrived. Now, Jim would arrive and I wouldn’t be there. The car heated up as I waited, and the skin on my thighs stuck to the seat when I raised my legs to get some relief from the burning, sweaty feeling.

  I pulled up to the arrivals area of the airport just in time to see some K2 shirts and team members loading a car. I ran over. Steve said that Jim went back into the airport one last time to find me because he knew I was coming. I turned to see him striding toward me.

  “Hey, there you are!” He beamed.

  I ran to him, squeezed him and kissed his smooth cheeks, his lips, and we laughed. I felt his flesh and knew without a doubt that he was alive.

  “God, it’s good to see you,” I gasped while I buried my nose and mouth in the warm earthy smell of his neck.

  “You too. You look great.” Jim grinned as he scanned my tanned shoulders.

  My cheeks ached from smiling.

  “Where’s all your stuff?” I asked without letting go of his hand.

  Together we hefted two square burlap packages containing handmade carpets into the trunk. Beside them we crammed his clim
bing pack and duffle bags. At every opportunity, I ran my hand down his arm, rested my fingers on his shoulder or grazed the back of his neck. Each touch set off another adrenaline high. He was alive.

  As we drove to one of the climbers’ houses in Seattle to go over the details of Dan’s accident, I focused on directions. I chatted with the energy of a small bird and laughed at nothing. As we pulled into the driveway, Jim’s facial muscles tightened to pull in a breath. I followed his gaze to the front door where Dan’s father slumped, eyebrows raised in Jim’s direction. I squeezed Jim’s leg, leaned over and kissed his cheek.

  “Dan’s family is keen to talk to the team alone so we thought it would be best if all of the other partners and spouses went for a walk together. Okay?” Jim glanced at me and looked back at Dan’s father.

  “That’s fine. I love you,” I said quietly.

  “I love you, too.” Jim ambled away from me. He was swallowed by the arms, voices and gut-wrenching sobs of those who desperately needed to hear his story. The juxtaposition of the two groups struck me. We were ecstatic to have our loved ones home, while Dan’s family and friends were torn apart.

  An hour later our group returned from our stroll, laughing and enjoying each other’s company. I squinted into the sun to see Jim smiling down at me from the balcony. I covered my mouth and stopped laughing, but when we got close enough he said, “It’s nice … to hear the laughter.” I breathed a sigh of relief.

  Driving home to Vancouver, Jim rested his hand in mine as he always did in the car, but it felt lighter, as if the slightest movement would jar its hold. Our words skipped around as if they were not certain whether or not they wanted to be heard. I alternated my gaze between the road and Jim and was grateful not to have to keep eye contact.

  “Jim … I,” and my gaze flipped back to the road, “want to be there for you, but I’m not really sure what to do.” This was unfamiliar territory for me. Generally Jim took care of me and requested very little attention in return. In fact, he was uncomfortable as the one in need. He didn’t like to feel indebted.

  “This is great, Sue, you don’t have to do anything,” he reassured me.

  “But I mean if you want to talk about it, I’m happy to…” I trailed off.

  “It’s just great to be home,” he said and kissed my neck. It was going to be okay. We were going to be okay. For the rest of the trip we exchanged stories, news and plans for the future. Where did he want to stay in Vancouver? He had no fixed address. He could stay with his parents. I offered for him to come and stay with me. He agreed immediately, but there were butterflies in my stomach telling me that he was uncertain. Usually he was so thoughtful, deliberate and confident about his decisions. Now I second-guessed him silently.

  At my condominium, Jim fielded phone calls from newspaper and television reporters. Everyone wanted to hear the story of how Dan died. Soon the living room was full of portable studio lighting, huge camera lenses and microphones. Jim was emotional as he described how he and Dan walked arm in arm to the summit of K2. In short childlike sentences, he described how Dan fell. The headlines didn’t hold much back:

  K2 Scaled, Draws Blood

  K2 Climbed, Claims Yet Another Life

  Climber Recalls Deadly K2 Day: Jim Haberl Watched Dan Culver “Roll By”

  Climber Who Died After Besting K2 Eulogized As “Bright Shining Blade”

  A Life Lived To the Outer Limit

  K2 Assault: His Ambition Was To Preserve the Wilderness

  Dan Culver Had Died Doing What He Wanted To Do

  When all of the cameras were gone, Jim sat motionless on the couch. He would tell his story many more times.

  THREE

  AFTER K2

  (SEPTEMBER–NOVEMBER 1993)

  Mountain Equipment Co-op sponsored Jim to give a K2 slideshow at John Oliver Secondary School in Vancouver. One thousand people stamped their feet and shook their umbrellas as they squished into the auditorium. More than a hundred people clamoured at the door where tickets were being scalped. Jim surveyed the throng of people, some standing at the back and down the sides of the auditorium, and clasped his hands in front of him. “Wow!” he exclaimed. Eleven members of my family occupied the row right in front of Jim’s podium. I grabbed both of his hands, kissed his cheek and wished him luck. He wore a K2 T-shirt and jeans and stood alone onstage.

  The show began with photos of Jim’s close friends: his younger brothers Pat and Kevin, buddy Matt from Camp Potlatch, high-school friends Eric and Geoff, climbing partners Michael and Mike. His voice choked up and his hands trembled as he thanked these people for being in his life. “Here we go,” he half joked to the crowd. “Shake it out, Jim.” And the climbers in the audience chuckled at this climbing expression used to calm the jitters.

  The natural storyteller in him took hold, and he relaxed as he detailed the long trek into base camp, the countless storm days, the slow ascent to the summit. The audience watched silently as Jim simulated just one step of his 13-hour summit day. He breathed slowly and heavily into the microphone 15 times, then stopped and said, “And then I took another step.” For 13 hours he used this as his mantra to keep forward momentum, 15 breaths and then a step. And if he couldn’t take a step after 15 breaths, he made up for it with the next step. Thirteen hours to gain an elevation of 600 metres, and there he was, just below the summit. Jim dug out a little platform in the ice and sat down to wait for Dan. It was their dream to reach the summit together. When Dan arrived, 45 minutes later, they linked arms and walked the final steps to the summit and hugged.

  There was a holding in the crowd then, as if people had taken a deep breath.

  Jim explained, “You know, we could see clear down to China from there. It was a pretty neat feeling.” With those unassuming words so typical of Jim, the crowd let out its breath and laughed, and applause erupted. Jim and Dan were the first two Canadians to reach the summit of the world’s second-highest peak and the crowd celebrated what it must have felt like to be at the top of the world.

  When the noise died down, the screen went black and the light from the podium carved shadows in Jim’s face. “This is going to get harder,” he said and took a deep breath, “But anyways…”

  I leaned forward in my seat.

  Jim gripped the sides of the podium, closed his eyes and cocked his head. He ground out each word through his stiff jaw. He rocked his head from side to side as if trying to dodge the pain.

  “We were focused now on getting down safely to camp,” Jim explained. Jim led the way and had descended the technical bottleneck section when he heard a loud crack behind. He turned and saw a shock of blond hair and Dan cartwheeling down the steep slope. Dan stabbed repeatedly at the snow with his ice axe, trying to get a purchase. Seconds passed and then he was gone. Jim opened his mouth and then closed it. He opened it again and a cry for help came out, and then he followed the body imprints. They became progressively farther apart and deeper and more jagged. Jim retrieved Dan’s hat. He carefully picked his way down the slope until it dropped off the impossibly steep south face of K2. He sat down in the snow and felt the salt of his tears stinging his cracked lips. Dan was dead. He knew it. But a voice inside of him nagged. What if he got caught up somewhere and is waiting for me to come and rescue him? What if? But logic told him Dan was dead, and now Jim needed to get it together to survive. So, he put his heart into a bottle and set about climbing back up to Camp Four. Partway there, he met up with his team members Stacy, John and Steve, who were dressed for rescue. They had heard Jim’s call. Jim managed to breathe out, “Dan is dead,” and he crumpled backward into the snow.

  As I listened to Jim’s story, my body tensed. “No,” I wanted to scream. I wanted to wrap myself around him. I wanted to rewind the story and rewrite it so that Dan and Jim descended safely and returned home to a hero’s welcome.

  The last slide of the show was of Dan – a tribute. Jim finished by saying, “Reaching the summit of K2 was an incredible experience, but I would trade
it in a heartbeat to have Dan back.”

  It was a choice he did not have. He made a different choice by climbing K2.

  As the applause built to a roar, I beamed at Jim. The lights came on and excited murmurs filled the space. Jim hung around the podium, and people moved forward to congratulate him. I waited until he was alone. He squeezed most of the air out of my lungs with his hug.

  Despite Jim’s letter detailing how much weight he’d put on at Base Camp, he had actually lost 10 kilograms on the mountain, and weighed about 55 kilograms. One morning, he clutched at his stomach and grimaced but insisted he was fine. I convinced him to see a doctor, who prescribed Flagyl to treat giardia. The next night, my stomach turned; it was clear that I had caught whatever Jim had. Each time I got out of bed, Jim’s body tensed beside me. He asked me if I was okay, but he kept his distance. I did not ask him for help because he was having a hard enough time looking after himself. As I hunched over the toilet, I longed for the “old Jim,” who would have held my hair back and out of the vomit and rubbed my back.

  The next night, I woke up to Jim’s whimpering. He yelled so loudly that he woke himself up. I put my hand on his arm and asked, “Are you okay?”

  “Bad dream.” He pulled the covers up around his neck. I wrapped my body around him and tried to absorb the pain.

  As we both struggled, the void between us intensified. One evening Jim and I sat on opposite sides of my living room, and I asked him to let me in, to help him with his grieving. Jim gazed past me and said, “I don’t think it’s fair to ask you to carry the burden of the risk I have taken. It wasn’t your choice to climb K2, it was mine, and you shouldn’t be asked to share the cost.”

  I sat up at the clarity and practised nature of his words. As I leaned forward to assure him I wanted to share the burden, he looked at me with dull eyes and continued, “Sue, I’m having trouble finding my feelings for you.”

  I gulped and held my breath. A few tears trickled down my cheeks, but Jim remained on the other side of the room.

  “I think it would be best for me to go and stay at Eric’s place.” Eric lived in Squamish, an hour’s drive away.