mountains, far too puny to conquer. Beneath those snaked a perfectly blue river amidst a green ocean, dotted by urban lakes here and there. The two were standing upright now, on a short level ledge. This far up, invincibility was something you could grasp in one hand.
Mark and Vanessa were halfway towards the next stretch of vertical climb when disaster struck. One second the woman was looking at one particular part of the river, which snaked around to form the letter M, and the very next instant her red shod foot went right through ice. A crash spun her around in the air, and she had just enough time to go completely limp before a meaty thud announced her plop onto the ground. During that moment, she kept her mouth firmly shut, both to avoid the infamous tongue bite and to keep Mark from doing something stupid. Nonetheless, as she lay disoriented on cold floor, the woman heard three distinct sounds:
“Vanessa!”
Crash!
Thud!
Vanessa turned around to face the sky. A glimpse of it could be seen, a stretch of clear blue. However, that glimpse could only be seen through a hole about her size and almost circular in shape. Immediately she tried to stand, but her neck hurt. “Mark?” She called out instead. A sound came from directly behind her, and she hoped that it was a man turning onto his back and looking at the similar hole she could see across from her own.
“All okay, Ven,” he said slowly but with deliberate reassurance. He had to have broken something. “You?”
“Alive and well,” She answered, feeling her neck loosen up. Slowly, she put her hands on the ice beneath her whilst staying in place, just as she’d been taught. The worst you could do is step on another unstable spot and fall even further. Behind her, Mark did the same, and then the two turned. They inched slowly closer to one another, engaging in what must have been history’s slowest, most careful embrace. Then he tightened. “I’m so glad you’re okay,” he breathed into her neck, his grip almost vice like. She didn’t complain.
“I love you,” she said. He assured her the sentiment was mutual. They may have said it a few times, in fact. Then the two inched around on all fours, testing the area they were within. They were in a tall icy cavern spanning about fifteen feet in most directions. Where sunlight seeped through thinner ice, it was almost white in brightness and bluish hues. Otherwise the surfaces were a darker and more sinister shade. Assured that their footing was stable enough, Mark went on to check if he was able to climb out of their entrapment. After searching around for a few seconds, however, he spun to Vanessa. “I can’t find my pick-bag,” the man proclaimed in confusion.
She looked too. Indeed, there was no sign of it in the cave. “It can’t be above, can it?” asked she, worry creasing her face. What Mark called his pick-bag was full of climbing essentials from shovels to pickaxes and rope.
“I don’t think so. I mean, it was all a blur, but I almost remember it skidding over… there!” He pointed to where a skid mark could just be made out, leading to what had earlier appeared to be a dark wall. Initial excitement at the wall revealing a passage to freedom was swiftly dampened, however, when Mark and Vanessa discovered the presence of an enormous void. It was so deep that they could not peer into its true bottom, but the two could make out the man’s blue bag somewhere on a precarious point, stuck in icy wall. Blue and red were his favorite colors, although he generally shied from wearing them, thought Vanessa absentmindedly as she decided there was no way for the two to go down there and retrieve their belongings. “We’re going to have to wait here.” Concluded Mark. Luckily the short frequency radio was in his second bag, and they were close enough to reach camp. True cold hadn’t started to settle yet, but the cavern was chilly enough that Mark whipped out a few thermal blankets as the both huddled against one another against a wall of ice backed by hardened rock.
Disappointments are said to come in curses of three, and so it was in this situation, thought Vanessa. Their first stroke of misfortune came when she tripped and fell into that one particular stretch of ice. The second was Mark dropping his pick-bag into the hidden chasm just beyond. The black cat’s third eye, however, was when the people at camp told Mark and Vanessa they might not be able to find them for as long as ten days.
“We just don’t know enough about that area!” the man had announced, urging Mark to remain calm, ration their food, and hang on tight. “We’ll get to you as soon as possible, and everything’s going to be alright!”
For a few minutes, Vanessa struggled against gut wrenching guilt as Mark hugged her and told her not to be afraid. All the climbing trips they’d made with full backpacks, and they’d never needed most of the rations. Climbers took extra on purpose, usually. “It will be okay,” said Mark with a strained smile, trying to reassure his wife. “If we’re careful, we can make our food last for ten days. You have enough for seven in your bag alone!”
“Honey?” asked Vanessa, crying a little bit, sure that she’d killed herself and her husband with her.
“Yes, sweetie?”
Instead of saying anything, Vanessa just emptied her bag onto the icy floor. Before Mark’s bewildered eyes a cylinder of helium, a lighter, balloons, signs and confetti as well as a single candle-studded muffin fell out. It had a blue wrapper, and was filled to the brim with chocolate chips. Truth be told, had it been under any other circumstances Mark would have been thrilled.
“Surprise,” she whispered. A myriad of emotions flitted through his face, settling on one of pained acceptance coupled with what must have been the closest thing to a loving smile he could manage under the circumstances.
“Oh, baby,” he said.
That first day was the stuff of nightmares. There was truly little worse than thinking that you were the reason for another person’s misfortune. It was bad enough when that misfortune presented itself in the form of a ruined evening or an embarrassing situation, but it was entirely another when your idiocy was a string weaving their doom. That was the situation Vanessa found herself in, and she tried to keep it in as much as possible. In her misery, however, there was a companion, and he happened to ease her pain. He whispered in her ears, telling her that no one could have foreseen their dilemma. He told her of love and of dreams, of survival and happiness. He told her that the surprise was actually great and it made him happy to see she’d tried so hard to make things perfect. “Even the banners are all blue and red!” he’d exclaimed, causing her to shed hot grateful tears. The muffin now stood next to their bag, defiantly delicious looking.
It was on the second day that hunger began. They had sat there quietly, conserving their energy and eating as little as possible. In order not to go insane, Mark had given her half of his journal to write in. There was little to write, but the action created a spark of creativity. As the two sat and talked about what they were going to do when they got out, Vanessa suggested with hesitation that they light one of the candles on the muffin each day. “It can be like a counter of days,” she said, and the man grinned. “It can be motivating.” She was now determined to do all she could to help save the both of them. Mark agreed, and the Muffin seemed to as well.
On the fourth day, their rations ended and Vanessa’s determination began to waver. They sat in hunger and dreamt about what they could eat after leaving. Luckily, water wasn’t an issue, for the lighter could be used to melt ice. The muffin was now slightly infested with burnt candles, and a little hard.
It was on the fifth that Vanessa kept apologizing to Mark over and over. Each time she did, he told her that she’d done nothing wrong, and that he was happy to be with her. “Like I said, honey. I’d rather spend time with you like this than be with anybody else. I love you.” That night, she felt so bad that Mark gave her his journal. She read by candle light from his birthday cake.
Surprisingly, the sixth day was one of the most romantic she had ever experienced. She spent all of it reading through her husband’s diary. Not a bad word about her was written on the thing, not even about the time she tried to sing for him after eating some bad shrimp. Every t
ime she was mentioned, even in passing, he added a little heart above the A. She was always my darling, never that annoying or stupid girl that she saw in the mirror. Every so often, there was a passage where he expressed concerns about her mood or happiness, and it was always on times she hadn’t told him. “You noticed,” she breathed. “I always tried to hide it… I’m so sorry, honey!” The muffin, at that point, drooped slightly.
“That’s alright,” he said, “There, there. You’ve made me the happiest man alive. There’s nothing to apologize for.”
The next few days were mostly a haze. A storm raged for most of them, battering them with cold and snow and depression. She barely remembered the two talking about their life together, him telling her that he was going to write a story about the situation and call it Muffin Top. Being so hazy, Vanessa laughed herself silly despite Mark not being a natural comedian. She also begged him to eat the muffin at some point, saying he deserved to survive. He’d refused and they sat watching the thing in what was akin to despair. The cold, hunger, and thirst induced by the lighter dying almost drove them insane. “I think that I have a crush on you,” she whispered at some point, and he chuckled.
“I think I like you too. Maybe I can make you happy?”
“Yes please!”
They were the words exchanged when they first decided to become a couple, her just out of college, and he a simple intern at a newspaper. They’d repeated them at the wedding, her in white and he dressed in a top hat and blue suit. They repeated them again in that cavern, with a single muffin and a lit candle standing attendance.
On the ninth day, a strange sound awoke the couple from what had seemed like a deadly nap. At first, they did not know what had filled them with hope, but then the sounds came closer. Thump, thump, they went, like a disapproving giant. Then they were there and snow dropped onto their cavern, right where their makeshift manhole was situated. “Anyone there?” A man asked.
“Help,” they croaked, throats parched and eyes scarcely believing.
Within a few hours, they were out and onto a helicopter. The floated away with a thwup, thwup, and Steven assured both of them that everything was going to be okay. They had left almost everything behind and were covered in blankets, holding onto each other tightly with little more force than a child could summon, but as much as they could muster. Water was given to them slowly, but both refused food. Instead, Mark and Vanessa took a bite of the slightly rotten muffin each, the one covered in burnt out candles. It was the best thing either of them had ever tasted.
*
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