I strapped on my gaiters, rolled up my jacket, and placed it inside the sleeping bag with her. I grabbed the matches and lighter fluid, buckled myself into the harness, took one last look at the warm fire, and pulled her out the door and back into the never-ending snow.
Surprisingly, I felt good. Not strong, but not tired and not as weak. If I had to guess I’d say I’d lost more than twenty pounds since the crash. Maybe twenty-five. A lot of that was muscle. Not all, but most. Losing it meant I’d lost some strength as well. The good news was that, with the snowshoes, I was a bit lighter on my feet. I didn’t have as much strength, but I didn’t have as much to haul around either. If you didn’t count Ashley and the sled. I probably hadn’t been this light since high school.
I tied a long tether from the harness around my shoulders and handed her the loose end. “If you need me, just tug that.”
She nodded, looped the tether over her wrist, and tucked the tarp up under her chin.
We walked out into glowing daylight. Within minutes we were climbing up the ridgeline en route to the trail leading out of the valley and through the notch. I seldom felt much tension on the harness because the sled glided well over the snow. The snow was blowing into my face, landing on my eyelashes, blurring my vision. I was constantly wiping my face.
My plan was simple: start walking and keep walking. Logically, and based on a rudimentary reading of the 3-D map we’d found, I’d calculated we were probably looking at thirty or forty miles, fifty on the outside, from any kind of road or something man-made. I hadn’t given much thought to how far I could pull this sled. I tried not to think about it. I guess I thought I could make thirty. I had my doubts about fifty. If it turned out to be more than that, our chances were slim.
Our path took us down small hills and up short rises, but on the whole I could tell we were losing elevation and, thankfully, the path was mostly clear. That meant I wasn’t spending a lot of energy stepping over and under debris, which allowed me to put more of my energy into moving forward. And I was comforted by the idea that we were on a path. A route taken by other people. And those other people had to come from somewhere.
By lunch I calculated we’d walked three miles. By midafternoon we’d covered six. I wondered what time it was, and out of habit, stared at my watch. The cracked crystal and condensation beneath the glass stared back at me. Toward dusk the trail came down off a small hill and flattened out. I’d pushed it, and hard. I looked behind us, thinking back through each turn. Maybe we’d covered ten miles.
WE SPENT THE NIGHT beneath a makeshift shelter using our tarp, which had grown tattered, and some limbs I cut to help shed the snow. Ashley lay snug on the sled. She shrugged. “There’s only room on here for one.”
I lay on the cold snow, a wool blanket and my bag separating me from the snow. “I miss our fire.”
“Me too.”
Napoleon was shivering. “I don’t think he’s too happy about this either,” I said, and pulled him up close to me. He sniffed me and my bag, then hopped across the snow and dug himself in with Ashley.
She laughed.
I rolled over and closed my eyes. “Suit yourself.”
BY MIDMORNING WE’D COME DOWN another four or so miles, and the temperature was warmer. Maybe just around freezing—the warmest it’d been since the crash. On the hillsides, small shoots and twigs shot up through the snow, suggesting that the ground rested only a few feet beneath us rather then eight or ten. While we had lost elevation, down as much as 9,000 feet, the surface of the snow was wet and pulled at the sled, increasing the workload.
Around mile five the trail dropped down, widened, and straightened. Almost unnaturally. I stopped and scratched my head. I was talking to myself, pointing at the trail before me.
Ashley spoke up. “What’s wrong?”
“This thing is wide enough to drive a truck down.” That’s about when it hit me. “We’re on a road. There’s a road beneath us.”
To our right I saw something flat, green, and shiny sticking up a few inches through the snow. I brushed away the snow. Took me a minute to figure out what it was. I started laughing. “It’s a road sign.” I dug out around it. It said EVANSTON 62.
“I want to see. What’s it say?”
I stepped back into my harness. “It says Evanston, this way.”
“How far?”
“Not very.”
“Ben Payne.”
I shook my head and didn’t look. “Nope.”
“How far?”
“You really want to know?”
A pause. “Not really.”
“That’s what I thought.”
She tugged on the tether. I stopped again.
“Can we make it?”
I leaned into the harness. “Yes. We can make it.”
She tugged again. “Can you pull this thing as far as that sign says we need to?”
I tightened my buckle and leaned into the weight of the harness. “Yes.”
“You sure?”
“Yep.”
“’Cause if you can’t, just tell me. Now would be a good time to come clean if you don’t think…”
“Ashley?”
“Yes.”
“Shut up.”
“You didn’t say please.”
“Please.”
“Okay.”
We walked five miles, most of which sloped downhill. It was relatively blissful walking. Night came, but with colder temperatures the sled slid easier, so I walked a few hours more. Putting ten miles on the road. Twenty-five since the A-frame. Walking on the road was a lot like walking around the lake—keep the trees on either side and walk down the white stuff in the middle.
Sometime after midnight I saw an odd-shaped tree, or shape, to my right. I unbuckled and investigated. A building, eight feet square, with a roof and a concrete floor. The door had been left cracked open, so snow had spilled in. I dug out an entrance and slid the sled down into it. A laminated sign hung on the wall. I lit a match. It read THIS IS AN EMERGENCY WARMING HUT. IF THIS IS AN EMERGENCY, THEN WELCOME. IF IT’S NOT, THEN YOU SHOULD NOT BE IN HERE.
Ashley’s hand found mine in the darkness. “Are we okay?”
“Yeah…we’re good. I think we actually have someone’s permission to be in here. Except…” I unrolled my bag and climbed in. The floor was hard. “I miss my foam mattress.”
“You want to share mine?”
“Don’t think I haven’t thought about it, but I don’t think there’s room on that thing for two of us.”
She was quiet.
“How’s the leg?” I asked.
“Still hurts.”
“Differently or the same?”
“Same.”
“Let me know if it starts feeling different.”
“And when it does, just what will you do about it?”
I rolled over, closed my eyes. “Probably amputate. That way it’ll quit hurting.”
She slapped my shoulder. “That’s not funny.”
“Your leg is fine. It’s healing nicely.”
“Am I going to need surgery when we get out of here?”
I shrugged. “We need to look at it under X-ray. See how it looks.”
“Will you do the surgery?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“’Cause I’ll be sleeping.”
She slapped my shoulder again. “Ben Payne…”
“Yes.”
“I want to ask you a question, and I want an honest answer.”
“Good luck with that.”
A third slap. “I’m not kidding.”
“Okay.”
“If we needed to, could we get back to the A-frame? I mean…if conditions were worse…is going back still an option?”
My bag had become tattered, having lost some of its down insulation. Cold spots appeared. Sleep would not be easy. I thought back through the miles since the A-frame. Most had been slowly losing elevation. I was pretty sure I could not make it back.
“Yeah…it’s still an option.”
“Are you lying to me?”
“Yes.”
“So, which is it? Yes or no?”
“Maybe.”
“Ben…I still have one good leg.”
“No.”
“So, there’s…no going back? We’ll never see the A-frame again?”
“Something like that.” I stretched out flat, staring up at the ceiling. Clouds had moved back in, so it was dark. Felt like we were in a hole, which, given the eight feet of snow banked against the walls around us, we were. After a few minutes, she quietly slid her hand inside my bag and placed it flat across my chest.
It stayed there all night.
I know.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
We started again at daylight. Ashley was chatty and I was feeling the effects of yesterday. Not to mention the fact that our road was slowly turning upward. Gradual at first, it turned ugly four miles into the morning, gradually snaking and twisting its way up the mountain I’d been staring at for the last two days. Given the incline and the wet, sticky condition of the snow, pulling the sled became a lot harder. I tightened the straps on my snowshoes, dug my hands beneath the straps, and leaned into it. It took me three hours to walk the next mile. By lunch we’d made five miles total and probably regained a thousand feet in elevation.
And the road was still going up. And the snow was blowing into my face.
By dusk we’d made a total of seven miles, but I was spent and my legs were cramping. I needed several seconds’ rest between steps. I kept hoping we’d find another warming hut, but we did not, and I could walk no further to find it.
We camped next to a spiraling aspen. I tied the tarp around it, anchored it to the end of the sled, rolled out a blanket on the snow, set my bag on top of it, and was asleep before my head hit the ground.
I woke in the middle of the night. Snow was falling heavy and weighing down the tarp. I pushed it up from underneath and dumped off the snow. I ate a bite of cold meat, sipped some water, and poked my head out. To the north, the clouds were clearing. I slipped on my boots, strapped on the snowshoes, and went for a walk, climbing up another several hundred feet. The road on the mountain was winding tighter toward the summit. The only encouraging thought was knowing that if we had to climb up it, then we also got to come down it. The road turned left sharply, and I bent over, catching my breath. My legs were sore and cramped quickly.
Standing straight, I stared out across the darkness. The clouds were low, tucked down into the mountains. More cotton on a wound. Beyond that, maybe thirty or forty miles, it cleared. I squinted. It took me a second to realize what I was looking at.
I untied the tarp, folded it, and startled Ashley. She jerked. “What? What’s going on?”
“I want you to see something.”
“Right now?”
“Yep.”
I buckled up and began pulling. What had taken me fifteen minutes alone now took an hour. I walked faster, hoping it would stay clear just a few minutes longer. Hoping she would get a chance to see it. My stomach muscles and the muscles on the front of my neck were sore, I was winded, and the straps were cutting into my shoulders.
We rounded the corner, I pulled her up to the ledge, and we waited for the clouds to clear again. The wind cut through me. I slipped on my jacket and hid my hands inside my sleeves. After a few minutes, the clouds rolled off and the view cleared. I pointed.
A single lightbulb sparkled some forty-plus miles in the distance. Beyond that, further to the north, a single trail of smoke.
She clutched my hand, and neither of us said a word. The clouds came and went. Rolling in and out on the wind. I took a reading on the compass, careful to let the needle settle and get an exact reading. Three hundred and fifty-seven degrees, almost due north.
She said, “What’re you doing?”
“Just in case.”
We stared at it for the rest of the night, hoping for more holes in the clouds. It had an orangish glow, which made me think it was some sort of street or utility light. Something big enough to be seen this far away. We finally lost sight of it when the sun rose in the east and the world became a white-capped carpet once again.
The road had brought us back up to around 11,000 feet. I needed sleep, but I knew I couldn’t. I was too excited. We trudged across the snow quietly. Thinking about the picture in our minds. The thought of a world out there with electricity, running hot water, microwavable food, and coffee baristas.
The mountain plateaued. We walked several miles across what felt like the top of the world. The wind was steady, straight on, burned my face. The air was thin, and the snow stung my cheeks. I leaned into it, numb, wanting more air, counting the miles in my head. Maybe forty-five to go.
I walked, counting backward. Talking to myself. “Forty-two to the lightbulb…forty-one to the lightbulb…”
When I got to forty, we came down into a saddle atop the mountain. A bowl protected from the wind. Halfway through it, we discovered another warming hut. This one bigger. One room, three metal bunk beds with mattresses, a fireplace, and enough wood for an entire winter. Above the door it read RANGER’S CABIN. Inside I found the same laminated sign.
Given the lighter fluid we’d stolen from the A-frame, getting a fire going was easy. I stacked the wood, doused it, and lit the outside. The flame caught, traveled inward, and blazed. Once I was sure it had caught, I pulled out of my wet clothes and hung everything on the bunks. I got Ashley situated, then fell into my bed and didn’t remember falling asleep.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
She shook me. “Ben…you in there?”
“Yeah.”
The day was full. Overcast but not snowing. Not yet. I didn’t know what time it was, but it had to be close to lunch.
“You slept a long time.”
I looked around, trying to remember where we were.
My legs were sore. My feet felt like hamburger. In truth, all of me was sore. I sat up, but my legs and stomach muscles quickly cramped. I stretched, easing the knots out. Ashley handed me a Nalgene bottle mostly full of water. It was body-temp warm and felt good going down my throat.
I ate, sipped, and wondered how far we could get today. Thirty minutes later, I was leaning into the harness, pulling.
She tugged gently on the tether. “Ben?”
I spoke over my shoulder. “Yeah.”
“Do you happen to know what day it is?”
“Twenty-seven.”
“Four weeks ago tomorrow?”
I nodded.
“So…today is Saturday?”
“Yeah…I think so.”
I pulled on the harness, pushing my legs into the snowshoes.
Ashley jerked the tether again. “You know, I’ve been thinking.”
“Yeah?”
“This losing weight stuff has been so easy that I think we need to capitalize on this whole deal.”
“How so?”
“We need to write a diet book.”
“A diet book?”
“Yeah…” She sat up. “Think about it. We’ve eaten almost nothing but meat and drunk only water and a few cups of coffee and tea since the wreck. I mean, look at us. Who’s going to argue that it doesn’t work?”
I turned. “I think our current diet is sort of a derivative of the Atkins or South Beach diet.”
“So?”
“Well, what would we call it?”
“How about the North Utah diet?”
“Too blah.”
She snapped her fingers. “What’s the name of these mountains?”
“The Wasatch National Forest.”
“No, the other name.”
“The High Uintas.”
“Yeah, we could call it the High Uintas Crash Weight Loss Diet.”
“Well…it sure has worked for us. No arguing that, but I think it’s too strict, and too expensive, for most people.”
“How so?”
“Well…we’ve eaten mounta
in lion, trout, rabbit, and moose and drunk only water, tea, and coffee. I just don’t think the average American is going to pay good money for a 300-page diet plan that I just gave you in one sentence. Not to mention the fact that you can’t get mountain lion at your local meat counter.”
“Good point.”
I knelt and tightened one of my boots. “The whole thing is too simple. Needs to be more complicated, and you need to make people think it either originated with astronauts in space or actors in Hollywood.”
“Well, you can make it more adventuresome by crashing people into mountains, then letting them walk out with nothing but a dead pilot, a compound bow, an angry dog, and a messed-up girl who missed her own wedding.”
“I can pretty much guarantee that they’d lose more weight that way.”
She paused. “Are you going to go see Grover’s wife?”
“Yes.”
“What will you tell her?”
“The truth, I guess.”
“Do you always do that?”
“What?”
“Tell the truth.”
“Yes…” I smirked. “Except when I’m lying.”
She stared up at me. “How can I tell when you’re lying?”
I tightened the buckles, leaning forward, breaking the sled loose from the grip of the snow. “You’ll know ’cause I won’t be telling you the truth.”
“How will I know that?”
“Well…if I look at you in the next two or three days and tell you I’ve just ordered a pizza and that it’ll be here in fifteen minutes, you’ll know I’m lying.”
“You ever lied to a patient?”
“Sure.”
“What’d you tell them?”
“‘What I’m about to do won’t hurt a bit.’”
“I’ve heard that one.” She probed. “Ever lied to your wife?”
“Not about stuff that mattered.”
“Like?”
“Well…when we first started taking dance lessons, I told her we were going to a movie. We didn’t. We went to this studio where this guy made me wear funny shoes and attempted to teach me how to dance.”
“I’d call that a good lie.”
“Me too, but it’s still a lie.”
“Yeah, but it’s justified. It’s like the Jews in your basement thing.”