With Every Breath (Wanderlust #1)

by Lia Riley

  I don’t know how to do that.

  I’ve scrambled back into my pants by the time he returns and am rubbing my face like I can scrub sense into my thick head.

  “Climbing starts tomorrow,” he says. “There’s something of a celebration going on in the hut. Would you like to go?”

  No is my initial impulse. Our time is unraveling to hours. But if I hold on, it’s not going to stop the fraying. Time continues relentless and unyielding. Being around others might give me space from our intensity. Make the inevitable parting easier. “Sure,” I say, plastering on a bright smile. “Sounds fun.”

  When we enter the cramped hut, guys are everywhere. The space smells like body odor and alcohol. Someone has an iPad set up, playing fast-paced indie rock. Everyone is laughing and most look spaced-out.

  “Hey, check it out. Rhys Dog is in the house,” some guy calls out, another American by the sound of the accent, his features blurred behind a veil of pot smoke. Anxiety licks at me. I’m not going to be able to hang out long with that going on. I linger by the open door, averting my face to the fresh air outside.

  “Here you go, love,” Psycho says, advancing toward us with two mugs. “Told you I’d make you tea.”

  Rhys ignores him, a little awkward considering we stand right in front of him. I take the mug, sip, and restrain myself from making a face. It is as bitter as witches’ brew. Is this the maté everyone drinks in South America? It must be an acquired taste.

  Psycho gives me a wink before returning his attention to Rhys, grilling him about the climb. Rhys answers in monosyllables, omitting the fact that Cameron is on his way.

  I take another gulp of tea. Gross. This stuff seriously tastes foul. The smoke starts to get to me. I cough, and Rhys looks alarmed.

  “Are you all right, Auden?”

  “I—I—I’m fine. But I don’t think I can stay in here. Need fresh air.”

  “You’ll feel better in about twenty minutes.” Psycho snickers.

  Huh?

  Rhys looks around the room, grabs the tea from my hand, takes a swallow, and spits it on the ground. “What the fuck?” His fierce look strikes like a sudden squall as he flings the mug’s contents in Psycho’s direction.

  “Bloody hell, mate. That’s not on,” Psycho says, wiping his T-shirt. “What a bloody waste of perfectly good shroom tea.”

  Shroom tea? Wait. My stomach gives a sickly roll. “Did you give me mushroom tea?”

  Psycho laughs, and others join in. That’s when it starts to click. Everyone in here is laughing because they’re all tripping balls.

  I’ve never taken drugs. Smoking is out of the question, and I’ve always been way too paranoid about hallucinogens. I press a hand to my forehead, my throat tight. What the hell is going to happen to me?

  My blood is a river of ice, and it’s only when I taste the copper tang of blood that I realize how hard I’ve bitten the inside of my cheek.

  “You fucking imbecile,” Rhys growls. He’s drawn himself to full height and looks as if he’s going to transform into a grizzly shifter. His lips curl, revealing clenched teeth as his fist draws back.

  “Wait, no. Rhys. Wait.” I grab his arm. Sure, I want him to punch Psycho. Fuck, I want to punch Psycho. I don’t know why that weasel has it in for me, but I can’t deal with him now. His beatdown can come after I figure out how to get this crap out of me.

  That’s when a most unwelcome face appears behind us in the doorway. This guy turns up as often as a bad penny.

  “Hello, Auden.” The Dutchmen waves brightly. “You had some of my mushrooms, yes?”

  “You brought them?” I say.

  He nods and laughs, clapping his hands together. That manic giggle is nails on a blackboard.

  “What are you still doing here?” Rhys’s voice is flint striking. Sparks are practically visible. He’s incandescent with rage.

  “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, again,” Diedrick says with a satisfied smile.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” Rhys growls.

  Psycho shrugs. “I’m working with him. He needed a source, someone who knows you.”

  Rhys stares incredulously. “And you spoke to him?”

  “Free speech, mate.” Psycho bends to retrieve the mug Rhys threw.

  “Seriously, deal with him later.” I tug Rhys’s hand. “I need your—”

  Thwack.

  The sound of Rhys landing a punch to Psycho’s jaw vibrates through the hut in a big, wet wallop.

  Psycho grunts, stumbles onto his back foot before using the stance to switch momentum, barreling toward Rhys, head ramming square into Rhys’s chest. Rhys is taller, but Psycho is built like a brick house.

  This is not what I need.

  People stare, some vacantly, others frightened or amused.

  My stomach twists, really hurting. This isn’t a dull, hollow ache, but a slow recoil, like my insides are encountering the mushrooms and going hell no.

  “Stop!” I shout. “Please, Rhys, stop.”

  Hard for him to respond when he’s fallen to the ground, tussling with Psycho. Their low grunts and swears are overshadowed by the other guys laughing, as if this is all absolutely hilarious.

  I don’t want to leave Rhys, but he chose fists while hallucinatory mushrooms circulate my system. Going all WWE won’t solve a damn thing. It’s gross, but I have to take matters into my own hands and make myself sick.

  I push past Diedrick and stumble outside, beelining toward a grove of trees. Can I induce throwing up? A shudder runs through me. I hate being sick. I haven’t done so since I had an awful stomach bug at sixteen. I loathe it so much that I’ve never even drunk much. I have honestly planned to never vomit again. Ever. And here I am getting ready to force the feeling on myself.

  More cheers erupt inside the hut.

  Stupid men, always so quick to deal with their problems through fists and tempers. Women should just rule the world. Psycho is jealous of Rhys and trying to get under his skin, and Rhys has basically set up a welcome mat to be mind-fucked.

  My stomach lurches as if my intestines are playing a game of cat’s cradle. Sweat beads my hairline. Seriously, can I stick a finger down my throat? The idea makes me gag all on its own. Good. I mean, terrible in that gagging is an awful feeling, but good in the sense that maybe I’ll be able to force this tea out through sheer strength of will. I refocus and speak out loud. “Throw up. Do it. Rid yourself of that nasty stuff.”

  Turns out that I’m one shitty Jedi. No mental powers here. How much time left do I have? I don’t know when the effects will start or what’s going to happen. The unknown scares the crap out of me. I shove my finger into my mouth, reach for the back of my throat. Ouch. It hurts, and there’s a vaguely uncomfortable tickling sensation. After that?

  Nothing.

  A whole lot of nothing at all.

  What the hell?

  I try again and still nothing. I’m crying now, my finger down my throat, and when I look up, there it is, La Aguja, the summit breaking free from the cloud’s hold long enough for me to glimpse it. Way up high is the mushroom-shaped ice cap that makes the peak so treacherous.

  “Goddamn it,” I yell, slapping the tree beside me. That’s when I realize that my arm doesn’t feel connected to my body. The idea is scary but also hilarious. I sit down and laugh in hiccupping chuckles. The trees start giggling, too, softly in the wind.

  The sun is setting. Whoa. I’ve never seen a sunset like this. How do you feel a sunset? That’s what’s happening. My cheeks are wet; for some reason I’m crying. The colors intensify, and the sheer beauty wraps around me like an invisible rope, squeezing my heart.

  There are voices.

  Someone is talking.

  I know that voice, but I can’t respond because I think I lost my mouth. I feel for my face and there it is. Yes. Two lips. A tongue. Teeth. I count my teeth. I can’t say anything, but I like hearing my name.

  There are footsteps nearby.

  “Fuck, c
an’t find her.”

  “Your girlfriend will be fine.”

  “She’s not my girlfriend.”

  “Fuck buddy?”

  “Do I need to pound your fat head again?”

  “So it’s not serious?”

  “She’s nothing, you ken? Back off and forget about messing with her to get to me.”

  That’s Rhys. He says I’m nothing.

  I’m nothing.

  I’m nothing.

  And I should move. Follow him. Chase him down and tell him to say it to my face. But I can’t move.

  Nothing doesn’t move.

  Nothing has nothing to say. All nothing does is curl into a ball and rock.

  I’m eighteen and home from my first semester at college. Harper greets me at the front door with an unexpected hug. The only other time I remember her touching me willingly is when she pinched me in the bathroom after our tenth birthday party. She’d pointed at my reflection in the mirror. “You are nothing,” she whispered. “You are me, but I am already here. You’re the leftovers. Nothing. Don’t forget it.”

  I screamed and Mom found us. Guess who got yelled at for upsetting her sister? Me. Because Harper had her ears covered and was saying, “Auden is crazy, Mom.”

  Tonight, though, she’s acting more or less friendly. Mom makes a welcome-home dinner, and it’s normal, at least normal for my family, which means that we stay surface level, but still, there were actual questions about my classes, Harper’s new coach, Mom’s marathon training, and Dad’s work. We are able to communicate like we have a cordial grasp of the English language, not like we individually spoke Russian, Chinese, French, and Hindi and are expected to hold a conversation.

  Harper keeps smiling, and it lowers my defenses. Then, right as Mom offers chocolate ice cream without her usual “once on the lips, forever on the hips” disclaimer, the doorbell rings. I get up to answer it, and there he is.

  Jed Royce.

  My ultimate high school crush.

  Oh. My. God.

  Soft snow is melted in his thick dark hair. I shut my mouth. Wouldn’t do to have drool splash on the toes of my pink Ugg boots. My heart beats so hard that I swear if he looks down, it will be forming one of those cartoon-shaped imprints through my shirt. This was the moment I waited for during the four long years at Aspen High, the moment that prevented me from really being able to crush out on any of the guys at the University of Colorado.

  How do you compete with a guy who looks like he’s starring in his own Patagonia ad?

  “Hey you,” he says with a flirtatious smile.

  This is my moment. He’s driven over in a passion-fueled frenzy my first night back from college because at last his love needs to be shared. He needs me. Come, take my hand, Auden, he is about to say. Come to me and let me make you a woman, treat you to all the physical pleasure you can stand.

  He takes a step forward, and that’s when I hear, “Dude, that’s Auden.”

  Behind him stands Brett. Another guy from my high school, also a student at the University of Colorado, his features as bland and indistinguishable as a glass of water.

  “Oh. Hey.” Jed clears his throat as his gaze searches over my shoulder. “Is your sister home?”

  “Here I am.” Harper appears, shoving past me to fling herself into Jed’s arms. I watch my mirror image kiss my first love. I think you could call it kissing. It might have been attempted murder through tongue strangulation. My sister does a few moves that might be better suited to soft-core porn than on the front step while Brett and I exchange awkward waves, clear our throats, and look up at the night. The snow is falling, but not hard enough to bury me.

  That’s when Mom appears, beaming. Granted, Harper has quit doing the crazy hip thrusts and is now just burrowed up against Jed like he is the ratty old bunny she used to carry around. The bunny that had been mine, from Grandpa. He’d given Harper a reindeer, but she wanted Bunny and I let her have it. Just like now I watch her go for the guy I love. Or at least kid myself that I love. As unpredictable as Harper can be, in one way, she demonstrates remarkable consistency.

  She is never sorry for her actions.

  She watches me from Jed’s embrace, and the hatred on her face frightens me.

  Afterward, I went for Brett, because he was there, mostly, and seemed to be OK with me. And I was fine with him. He road biked so his calves were nice and his grade-point average respectable. We didn’t have anything approaching a grand passion, but people would refer to us as Grandma and Grandpa with some affection. What we lacked in passionate intensity, we made up for in easy. We didn’t have a handsy stage when we couldn’t get enough in the bedroom, rather skipped to the get-along-without talking stage.

  He didn’t ask me to check him for hemorrhoids or anything, but within a few more decades, the idea wouldn’t have shocked me. Everything with Brett was simple, boring, like, “Eh. Good enough.” Eventually, Harper decided even good enough wasn’t enough for me.

  Although she says I’m nothing, she still wants all my somethings. Her coach raves about her “killer instinct,” but as soon as the Olympics are over, I’m not so sure she won’t land herself in jail.

  But maybe she is right.

  Rhys thinks I’m nothing, too. And why wouldn’t he, after everything I’ve done?

  And haven’t done.

  He’s a guy who lives at the peak, and I’m lost, wandering valleys.

  Nausea rolls through me. There is a light from a star, and it’s glowing, lasering between my eyes. I want this to stop. I want to be normal. How can I get back to myself? I place my forearm in my mouth and bite. It hurts, and I bite harder. The pain keeps me anchored in some form of the present.

  “I’m not nothing. I’m not nothing. I’m no thing. No thing.”

  Then Rhys is there. “Auden? What are you talking about?”

  I start laughing because all I can think of is that W. H. Auden poem, “Musée des Beaux Arts,” where the boy falls from the sky and the moment is everything and nothing. Extraordinary things happen while people walk past. The last few days with Rhys have been everything, but it’s time to crash back down to reality.

  “I am no thing.”

  “Nothing?” Rhys cradles me against him, and I can tell he doesn’t know what I’m saying, but maybe he does and it’s a big fake. Maybe he thinks I am Harper. Maybe I am Harper and have always been her, and holy shit, now I’m thrashing against his arms. I need him to let me go, because what if he tries to kiss me thinking I’m Harper, not the other one?

  The nothing.

  26

  RHYS

  Breathe in. Breathe the fuck out. Keep going because it’s the only thing that keeps me focused. Auden lies beside me, not moving from the recovery-pose position I set her in an hour ago. Every time she whimpers, my heart rate increases as if I can somehow outrun her pain. It’s not working. My limbs are numb and my skull ready to explode. I’ve never tripped, but Cameron has a few times—spent the whole time laughing. Auden’s having a bad one.

  She’s here, but not really. It’s an effort to get her attention. She barely speaks, and when she does, it’s garbled.

  I rest a steadying hand on her shoulder. “You took psychedelic mushrooms,” I repeat for the sixth or seventh time. “This won’t last forever.”

  “I’m broken,” she moans. “My mind is broken.”

  “You aren’t brain damaged. Remember, you can’t relax before your body does. Take another deep breath.”

  She obeys, and I rub her back in slow circles, whispering reassurances. At last she dozes off to sleep. I wait for a bit, reassure myself that she’s out hard. I don’t think she consumed enough that the effects will linger long, but I’m so fucking pissed at Psycho. I nailed him a few times, but it’s not enough. He’s crossed his last line. We’ll have serious words, and I plan on throwing in a few more fists to his gut to punctuate the point.

  No doubt he used her to lash out at me, put me off my game before tomorrow’s rush to get on th
e mountain.

  Joke’s on him. I have bigger plans than La Aguja on the cards.

  With a last check on Auden, I creep from the tent to assess the situation. Climbers not climbing can be worse than an old-women sewing circle for stirring up drama.

  The gaucho smokes contentedly beside a log, reading a newspaper. His son is behind him, flitting through the trees, waving a stick, battling invisible demons. The games we play as children that never fully cease. The father notices my stare and gives me a nod. “La chica esta bien?” he calls.

  “Ella esta durmiendo.” She’s sleeping.

  “Que hombre con los hongos.” He spits. “Hijo de puta.”

  “Sí,” I respond. The guy with the mushrooms is definitely a son of a bitch, and then some.

  The hut is vacated except for Murray. He glances up from his book, giving me a long look.

  “I’m no’ here to fight more,” I say.

  He closes the cover and straightens. “How’s your girl?”

  “Resting. That was a dirty trick.”

  “It was. You had the right to act as you did. I’ve known Psycho a long time, but he’s a dick.”

  “Where is he now?”

  Murray gives a laconic shrug. “Hiding out somewhere with his tail between his legs. He’s jealous of you, you know.”

  “Don’t know why.”

  Murray gives me an assessing look. “You’re better than him.”

  “Maybe. Depends on the day.”

  “You really going to solo La Aguja?”

  “I’d meant to, but plans have changed.”

  A look of relief crosses his craggy face. “That’s a bloody load off my mind. I didn’t look forward to watching you become vulture bait.”

  I lean against the doorframe. “You have some faith in me, huh?”

  “Listen up, Rhys. You mind hearing some old-man advice?”

  “You? Old?” I guess he’s right, though. Despite his being fit as hell, he’s got to be close to fifty. He’s got an impressive climbing résumé, and the fact he’s lived this long means he gets my respect. No question.

  “I’ve been around awhile.”

  “Aye, more than most.”