Chapter Seven
Shadow Under a Wave
by
Carly Ziegler
The only sound on the beach was the crashing of the waves. Over and over again, they crashed into one another under the star-lit sky. Jacob and Luann pulled off the highway into a viewpoint.
“I can’t believe Roy let you come out here, for all he knows I could be a serial killer.”
“He’s not the boss of me, and anyways, he keeps saying he’ll teach me but he always forgets.”
“Well, I’m still learning, so don’t expect to learn from an expert tonight.”
Luann laughed, “I think I’ll pick it up nonetheless.”
They opened their car doors and stumbled out, making their way around to the hatchback to pull out the surfboards. Luann leaned against Jacob’s back as he maneuvered the board out of the car and slammed the hatch shut.
“Wait, I need to put this in the car. I can’t lose it, my mom would kill me.” Luann unhooked the chain around her neck and opened the back door. The car was a wreck inside; clearly the boys had been living out of it since they started their trip. Behind the seat was a cooler. Luann opened it and tossed the necklace inside; at least it would be safe there and wouldn’t get lost in the sty.
I hear your heart beat to the beat of the drum
Oh what a shame that you came here with someone
So while you’re here in my arms
Let’s make the most of the night like we’re gonna die young
Luann pulled her flip phone out of the back pocket of her cut-off jean shorts, the pixilated ringtone drowning out the sound of the waves in the distance.
We’re gonna die young.
“Kesha, huh? I had you pegged for a Roots kind of a girl,” Jacob opened the front door to lock the car as he gazed over at Luann.
We’re gonna die young.
Looking at the screen, Luann pressed a button on the side of the phone to silence the chorus and slipped the phone back into her pocket.
“C’mon Luann! We gotta beat the sun.”
They hopped over the bushes and started down the sand, stripping their clothes and leaving a trail to follow back to the car. Running into the waves, they laughed, fell against the water and swam out, treading to stay afloat. Luann picked it up naturally; she stood up on her third wave. Jacob was dumbfounded. He was falling in love. He told himself it was just admiration. Her shadow under the wave rode peacefully, steadily in front of him. Beautiful.
The next morning, Brian found Jacob asleep on the beach in his boxers next to his surfboard and a pile of his clothes. He kicked Jacob awake.
“Hey. Fuck off.” Jacob mumbled in his sleep.
“Dude, what happened?”
“I don’t know, I think we went surfing last night.”
“Where’s Luann?”
“She must’ve gone home,” his eyes were still closed, but he was squinting in the light of the morning sun.
“Cool, Roy just texted me looking for her. I’ll tell him she’s at home. I thought maybe you got with her.”
“Don’t think so, man. She’s mad about Roy. But I was pretty loaded so you never know what might have happened.”
“Rad. I bet you passed out and she just ditched you. You want to catch a few before breakfast?”
Surf. That woke Jacob right up; he was always ready for the next adventure. He pushed himself up off the sand, picked up his board and looked out at the crashing waves. Perfect.
“Let’s hit it.”
The waves crashed into the sea behind them as they ran out of the water toward their heap of clothes on the beach.
“That was rad, dude, so epic. You alright?” Brian looked back at Jacob, who hadn’t gotten up on a single wave all morning.
“I don’t know what my deal is, I can’t get up today. My head is screaming, every time I stand the waves barrel over me.” Jacob looked out into the horizon, the waves shrieking as they crashed into one another.
“It’s all good, we all have our days,” Brian tried to console his friend as they took turns swigging off a Gatorade bottle. He reached for his phone inside his pants pocket. “I just got another text from Roy, Luann’s not at home.” He slipped his phone back into the side pocket of his pants and tossed them back onto the heap in the sand. “That’s weird, why isn’t she a--”
I hear your heart beat to the beat of the drum
Oh what a shame that you came here with someone
So while you’re here in my arms
Let’s make the most of the night like we’re gonna die young
Jacob and Brian both froze. They looked at each other, down to the heap of clothes on the sand, and back to each other.
We’re gonna die young
We’re gonna die young
“That’s not---”
“It can’t be,” Jacob knelt down and began digging through the clothes. Picking up a t-shirt, he uncovered the flip phone. The little screen on the front read Roy and the phone vibrated as the chorus began to play again.
I hear your heart beat to the beat of the drum
Oh what a shame that you came here with someone
They stared at the phone, after a minute the screen light went out and the music faded. As they stared again at each other, a breeze passed over and chilled the air on the beach. Brian knelt down and dug around for his clothes. He put his shirt on inside out and backwards. “We gotta get off the beach, man.” He hopped on each foot as he put a sandy sock and shoe on the other. Jacob was navigating his way through the pile for a sock, upon finding it; he sat down and began dressing his feet, still shirtless and shivering. Brian dug through the sand, feeling his way around frantically. After a few moments, he pulled his hands out of the sand and tossed his keys from one hand to the other.
"Hope she starts up easy this morning. Come on dude, seriously, we gotta be gone. Now." He started to run down the beach towards the bushes that hid the viewpoint pullout on the highway. Jacob jumped up, picked up the last of the laundry pile and took off after Brian, sprinting through the sand to catch up.
Brian kept his head down as he ran, and wondering what would happen to them if they didn’t get off that beach. As they made their way through the sand, he noticed the scattered clothes that had earlier seemed to speak to the Saturday morning rush. Now they were leading to the car, one piece at a time. He remembered Roy’s comment at the bar the night before about Luann’s short shorts and how those tank tops drove him crazy.
The old Volvo was still there. Haggard and tired, it looked like it would like to stay parked there forever. Brian threw all of his weight into the clutch and turned the key. "Sweet dude, we're golden. I swore we were gonna have to jump her. Let's go."
"Brian, we left the boards down on the beach, I have to grab mine real quick."
"Dude, we can't, man," he trailed off as Jacob took off, hurdling the bushes and sprinting through the sand towards a lonesome board.
While Jacob messed around with the surfboard, the least of their problems, Brian turned the car around, preparing to peel out of there as soon as the board was loaded. Luann clearly hadn’t made it home, and he wasn’t about to wait for Roy to catch up to them to find out where she ended up.
Jacob jumped in the back as he loaded the board, pulled the hatch down after himself and somersaulted over seats as Brian peeled out, racing time down the windy road.
"Are we low on fuel?" Jacob leaned over the center console to check the fuel gage on the dash. He opened up the glove box and pulled out a thick wad of cash, stuffing it in his pocket.
"I thought you were out of money." Brian nudged Jacob to get him out of the way as he tried to change gears.
"I told you Brian, the good Spirit takes care of me, takes care of you too, dude. Ain't gotta worry, we're always alright."
"I don't know about you, man. Nothing but trouble, that's for sure."
"Brian, that's not fair. It hasn't been all trouble. It's mostly fun, right? I mean, come on. We lear
ned how to surf, got what we came for. You rode some insane waves this morning, dude!"
"Yeah, I know. It's definitely been a trip. Let's pull off here and get some gas before we drive back up the coast. I'm going to grab some snacks for the ride."
"Right on dude. How much you want, will forty fill the tank?"
"Close enough. You want some Fritos?"
"Barbeque flavored. Oh-and some of those little chewy red things, like last time."
Jane's Addiction was playing as Brian walked back toward the car. He couldn't help but smile and let out a laugh as he watched Jacob rock out, singing into his shoe, jerking his head back and forth, punching the air. The highway swerved, curved, and opened up wide to swallow that raggedy old Volvo. Jane’s Addiction. Beatles. ACDC. Sublime. The Rolling Stones. Jacob turned up the music, and the boys sang at the top of their lungs, drumming the beat on the dashboard, leaving all of their worries in Santa Monica as they drove north towards Marin County. The station went to a commercial break, and after a beat Jacob reached over to turn the dial. Searching for another station, he landed a signal just in time to catch the last half of a Billy Joel hit.
They say there’s a heaven for those who will wait
Some say its better but I say it ain’t
I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints
Sinners are much more fun.
You know that only the good die young
He stared out at the road ahead of him, his eyes welled up with shame. Turning off the music, he gulped as they rode on in silence. The crash of the waves echoed in his mind. The screaming out of the darkness. The wreckage of his negligence. The clear, starlit sky and the moonlit beach. There had been two surfboards on the beach this morning. She couldn’t have gone home, she hadn’t even made it back to shore. A knot welled in the pit of Jacob’s stomach as the memory of the night before washed over him and yanked his spirit out from under him like an undercurrent.
Jacob veered the car down an exit ramp as the sun laid against the tips of the mountains in the distant north. The purple silhouettes jutted out of the surrounding forests, charging the coming night. Brian let out a soft snore, as his head dropped off his hand, hitting the door, and pounding himself awake.
"Where are we?"
"I don't know, I think I might have missed the turn to head east a ways back, but I didn't want to wake you."
"How long was I asleep? We couldn't be too far off."
"Well, that depends. Where were we when you fell asleep?"
"We had just gotten through Frisco."
"Oh, that was like six hours ago, dude."
Brian yawned, climbed over the backseat and maneuvered the surfboard around to open up the cooler sideways. He shuffled the food around. As he searched for his roast beef sandwich, a chain necklace with a gothic cross spilled out onto the stained, grimy carpet. He froze.
"What's up man? You look like you've seen a ghost." Jacob peered at Brian's pale face through the rearview mirror. "Hey is there another sandwich in there, I had one earlier, but I'm starving."
Brian scooted away from the necklace as much as he could in such tight quarters. "Shh..." Brian tried to speak.
"Maybe I'll move to the beach, I need a change."
"Shh...”
"Maybe next year, I'm supposed to go to school this ter--"
"Fuck dude! What the fuck!"
Jacob jumped in his seat, his elbow coming down hard against the window.
"Ouch, what's your problem?" He jerked his head back to find Brian hovering next to the surfboard, his jaw weighing his face down so that his head might fall right off his neck. Jacob froze. Eyeing Brian up and down, Jacob sat motionless, the waves came back again. He heard the muffled screams under them, crashing, over and over. He remembered Luann, the way her hair held its wave in the salt water, her explosion of laughter as she stood up for the first time and rode. The crashing of the waves surrounded them; his heart ached as he treaded water. She shuttered as he embraced her, let out a nervous chuckle. He had kissed her, under the moonlight. He pulled the car off of the road and sat still.
Brian carefully returned his sandwich to the cooler, scooped up the ice that had spilled over, and meticulously climbed back over the back seat, opened the back door and stepped out of the car. They were parked on a dirt road, just off the off-ramp, before gas stations and restaurants popped up on the little side road in the distance. He walked past the front of the car and Jacob held his breath as he watched him go.
After the devastation of what he had done was slowly absorbed, Jacob quietly got out of the driver's seat, left the car door open, and followed Brian down the dirt road, which seemed to go on forever in an open field, without a house or a car disrupting its path for miles.
"Brian," he didn't know what to say. There was nothing he could say to undo the ugly mess he had gotten them both into. There were no words to take back the memory of that wretched night. "Brian, I'm sorry, man. I don't know what happened."
Silence.
"The night got away from me, it was an accident. Well, not really an accident--but I didn't mean to take her. I think it was supposed to be a joke but I forgot to finish. It was supposed to end, I think, I can't remember, I can't figure it out. I'm sorry, man. I don't know what happened; I don't know what I was thinking."
"Whatever, man."
"You gotta understand, I didn't do it on purpose, it just kind of happened."
"I know, it doesn't matter, dude." Brian was resolute, he stood there waiting. Not sure what he was waiting for, but he stood there anyway, waiting. They stood in silence, both waiting.
"What should we do?" Jacob looked back toward the car, at Brian, and to the highway. The cars hummed quietly as they rushed by the exit.
"What do you think we should do?" Brian turned to look directly at him.
"I don't know, man."
"You got us into this--you've gotta get us out of this one."
"I think I'm gonna throw up, this is weird. You know she wasn't from there? She told me she was from Washington, near Seattle."
"What does that have to do with it?"
"She said she would live and die in the mountains, just went to Cali to explore a little."
"Too bad she only found the ugly in a beautiful place like that."
"She didn't even surf, never learned how. Can you imagine? Living in the sand and never learning how to surf?"
The boys stood in silence, side by side, arms crossed, looking out into the abyss of the open road.
"Let's go, I know someplace we can go."
"Where is it?" Jacob followed Brian back to the car and got in the passenger's seat, ready to let anyone else run the show for a while.
"We're heading east; I've got a friend that will let us crash while we clean up your mess. He's a climber, so he's pretty chill."
"Okay."
They started up the on-ramp and momentarily fell into place, moving synchronized with all of the other little cars, going along with their humdrum lives. They looked the same, all of the cars looked the same, and the raggedy old Volvo blended right in.
"What I can't figure out, Jacob, is why you went off with her in the first place. I was sure you knew Roy'd kill you if you got with her. But then, he just stayed at the bar. It's like he didn’t notice her leaving with you."
"I don't know, man. He was pretty high; maybe he just couldn't care enough to follow us."
"Maybe you're right."
"Luann said that was his first time smoking pot, he never even drank till after high school."
Brian glanced over to the other seat; Jacob's breaths were getting shorter. He was sitting straight up in his chair, blankly staring through the dark at the unraveling highway ahead of him.
"It's gonna be ok, we'll figure it out, man."
"She’s gone, she’s just… gone."
"Jacob, calm down. I told you, we'll figure it out."
"I didn't mean to, it was an accident, I fucked up."
r /> They rode into the night, into the silence, and Brian didn't know if they'd ever be able to figure it out.
It was two o'clock in the morning when they pulled up outside the apartment complex. Brian parked across the street and lightly shook Jacob.
"Hey," he whispered, "we're here. Wake up, man. We're here."
"Where are we?" Jacob looked around outside, groggy, with one eye still shut. He couldn't see anything.
"We're at my buddy’s; we can crash here for the night."
"Is he even up?"
"Yeah, I just texted him. Let's get inside, we'll crash and work everything out in the morning."
"Okay."
Jacob and Brian crept up the stairs to the apartment, Brian slowly turned the doorknob and they tiptoed into the living room. A light was on around the corner in the kitchen and Toby came around with a few water bottles and a bag of chips.
"What's up buddy?" He gave Brian a bear hug. "You guys look like you could use a drink. Here." Toby handed them each a bottle of water.
"You hungry?" He handed Brian the chips as he stuck out his hand towards Jacob.
"I’m Toby, you’re Jacob? Nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet you, too." Jacob took his hand and tried to shake it firmly, but he had been drained of strength hours ago. "Thanks for letting us crash; I know its short notice."
"No worries, bro. I know you're in a bind. I've been there, it's cool."
"Thanks, man. It's good to see you, it's been a while." Brian patted Toby on the back and looked around the apartment. There wasn't much furniture, a worn loveseat sofa, a TV on a stand, and a small table in the corner of the room with a few books and a candle sitting on top of it. Leaning against the wall next to the TV were two crash pads back to back, chalk bags and shoes strewn across the floor in front of them.
"One of you can have the sofa, and one of you uses the crash pads, I'll go grab a few blankets.We'll kick it in the morning, it's pretty late."
"Thanks."
Jacob pulled the crash pads away from the wall and laid them down side by side, tightly fitting them between the TV stand and the sofa, they spread across the entire width of the room. He dropped the crash pad and was snoring before Toby made it back with the blankets.
There was a loud banging outside, Brian woke up and checked his watch. Four AM. He had just gotten to sleep, what could possibly go wrong now? The banging came back, he rolled over. Silence. Banging again, this time it was closer. Jacob and Brian were both awake now. Silent, they met each other’s eyes. It was time. Silence again, Jacob held his breath, closed his eyes and prayed for it to be over.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Someone was pounding on the apartment door.
“Somebody get that...” Toby called from the bedroom at the back of the apartment, his voice muffled by his pillow. Brian got off the couch and crept over to the door, and tried to silently look through the peephole. But right as he lifted the cover to see Roy glaring at him from the other side, Roy’s weight fell into the door, opening it with a crash, jolting Brian backward and pinning him between the wall and the door. Jacob was a puddle on the floor. He looked up at Roy with shame in his eyes.
“Roy! It was an accident; I swear it was an accident! You gotta believe me!”
Roy’s huffed and howled, and his fury boiled through his veins. He pulled back his right arm and socked Jacob in the jaw. Jacob keeled over on to the floor, but rolled over and scrambled to get up onto his feet.
“Roy, please!”
Brian reached out for Roy’s shoulder to pull him back, but tripped on the frayed corner of the worn crash pad and fell sideways. He scrambled to stand, caught a hold of the back of Roy’s plaid Ralph Lauren button-up. The shirt slipped out from the khakis, held up with a thin, black leather belt. As it came untucked, Brian’s hand slipped away and he fell backwards, hitting the back of his head against the window sill.
Another blow to the face sent Jacob flying backwards onto the couch. Bouncing up, he tried to plead with Roy and shove him into the wall.
“Get off me, man. It was an accident!”
Jacob took one more blow, this time to his belly, flattening him again onto the crash pad. Picking up one of his legs, Roy dragged Jacob out of the apartment and down the stairs.
“Roy. Stop! Brian! Help!”
Roy kept on dragging. Two blocks down, his truck was parked on the side of the street. He picked Jacob up off the ground, and sent him right back down again with a blow to the kidney. Brian raced down the sidewalk, trying to catch up. He tried to grab Roy’s arm before he could do any more damage. It was no use; Roy flung his elbow back with all his might, hitting Brian square in the chest, knocking him to the ground. A few feet away, Jacob whimpered, sobbing through his blood. Blood-ridden drool covered his face, his whole body convulsed as Roy’s foot could have ripped a hole in his kidney.
Brian watched his friend fight for his life, thunderstruck. Roy kicked Jacob as he lie sobbing on the ground, over and over again. Brian gathered his strength, pushed himself up off the ground, and leapt through the air to tackle Roy. He shoved Roy against the side of his truck.
“Stop it! Roy, stop! You’re fucking killing him!”
Roy pushed Brian away, trying to break free from being pinned up against his pickup. Brian let go with his right hand, pulled his arm back, wound up, and punched Roy across the face. Roy spun to the side and began collapsing. He caught himself on his way down, resting his weight on the tire. Coughing, he breathed deep. His left fist clenched. Nothing could stop him, nothing could stop the pain. Nothing. He struck Brian in the kidney, a shocking blow that knocked him to his knees instantly.
“She’s dead! She’s dead and he killed her! Get, out!” He put his foot to Brian’s chest and shoved him out of the way. Turning to Jacob, the fury exploded in his eyes.
“You killed her! I loved her and she’s gone. You took her away from me, and I don’t know how to live without her. You fucking dick you took my life away! What the fuck am I supposed to do now?! Fuck you!”
“I’m sorry Roy, I’m sorry. Luann I didn’t mean--I didn’t mean for it.” Jacob sobbed, blood running into his mouth, choking his cries. “I’m sorry…”
Roy reached into the back of the pickup with both arms and brought out a small, lustrous surfboard. It had never been ridden.
“I bought this for Luann. She wanted to learn how to surf.”
As tears filled his eyes, he raised the surfboard up as if offering it to the heavens and came down hard as nails on Jacob’s face, breaking his neck. He picked it up off of the ground; his tears smeared the blood on his face as he raised it above his head. Another hit, again and again. He picked up the surfboard and swung it onto Jacob with all of his might. The last time the board came down Roy came down with it. Roy and the surfboard collapsing on top of Jacob.
“I’m sorry Luann, I’m sorry,” Roy hugged the surfboard and cried like a child caught in the dark. “I should have been there; I should have taken care of you. I love you Lue, I love you so much. Please come back, Lue, please come back! I can’t do this without you, I can’t do...”
The sobbing slowed, and moaning could barely be heard above the wind as the stars shone down above them. Roy wiped the tears and blood from his face as he picked himself up and carried the broken board back to his pickup and gently set it in the back where it belonged. He reached for the door handle, glanced back to realize what had come of him, and loaded himself into the truck. Roy drove away, leaving his humanity behind on the curb, like so much garbage.
Brian knelt over Jacob’s body, patting his cheek, gently shaking his shoulder. “Jacob, Jacob, wake up,” Brian whispered into the night, “come on, it’s over. It’s over, it’s okay. He’s gone. Wake up.” Nothing. “It’s all over Jacob, wake up. Jacob! Jacob! Wake up, it’s over! It’s all over! Come on! Jacob, wake up, please wake up. Oh my god, Jake! Please... Please.” It was all over. A calm breeze passed through the sidewalk, rustled the leaves, and carried Brian’s subtle cri
es into the night. Looking up into the stars on a clear, warm night, tears cascaded down his face.
“Why?” He begged long and loud into the great, dark unknown, jerked his head forward between heaves and collapsed onto the ground at Jacob’s side as if melting into the sand under a scorching August sun.
Jacob lies motionless on his side at the edge of the sidewalk. His head rested on the curb like a pillow, and his right hand hung off the sidewalk just above the street, a chain dangling from his fingertips, the large, gothic cross rests in peace on the ground below.
A sliver of light slipped through the sheets that hung on the wall to cover the window. The birds chirped outside in the front yard. The aroma of maple and coffee sifted into the living room and wafted over Brian, he rolled over onto his back as he opened his eyes, staring at the ceiling.
“Brian, you up, man?” Toby’s voice drifted in from the kitchen. “Coffee’s ready.”
“Yeah,” Brian slowly pushed himself up, off the couch, walked over to the window and pulled away the sheet to peer out at the sidewalk. Clean, crisp. The sun was up and the shadows on the tree-lined street danced in the breeze.
“You got some cream?”
“Milk okay?”
“Sure.” Brian let go of the sheet and turned away from the window towards the kitchen. “Is that French toast?”
“Waffles. Ready for breakfast?”
“Sure thing.”
“You want to climb today? I’m heading out in about an hour.”
“Mmm, yea. That sounds real. I need to get out of my head, I need to learn something.”
“This’ll do it for ya, for sure. Here, drink some coffee.”
They sped out of town in Brian's beat up, faded Volvo that had seen its fair share of bad days. But that faded egg-white boat still drove fast and handled the uneven dirt roads like they were breakfast.
I hear your heart beat to the beat of the drum
Oh what a shame that you came here with someone
“I can’t stand Kesha,” Toby turned off the radio.
“Thanks, man. That song makes me sick.” Brian sank into his passenger seat and closed his eyes to fight back the tears. As they pulled up to the rock, Brian climbed out of the car and searched around, skirting around bushes and collecting sticks which he hucked into the forest for the dog. While his mind drifted, he left Toby to unload the Volvo. He threw the two crash pads and a chalk bag down on the dirt, sat down on the back bumper and lit a cigarette before he laced up his shoes. Those shoes were a curved version of ballet toe shoes, as if a dancer had wrapped her foot around a bar and the shoe stuck the position. They had holes that frayed from the side, allowing a breeze through the chokehold that held his feet.
"Ready, dude?" He tried to bring Brian back to Earth.
"You got some shoes I can use?"
"Yeah, try these; but they might be too big."
"Actually, I wear a nine and a half, and they look kinda small.”
"They're supposed to be too small, if you put them on and they hurt a little, they're probably still too big."
"Whatever you say man, I just want to climb."
"Alright, let's go." Toby stood up and closed the hatch. They each picked up a crash pad and put them on their backs.
Just a few yards from the car, a few large boulders lined up to form an S curve, a wave of rock that threatened to pick up momentum and wipe out the old, battered Volvo. The boys carried the crash pads over to the rocks, dropped them on the ground, and unfolded them in front of the rock. Inside were a scramble of crackers, rolling tobacco and papers, a water bottle, and one dirty, black sock. Back at the car, the chalk bag rested, enjoying the final moments of solitude before the hours of abuse that were sure to begin soon.
Toby examined each hold that was low enough to touch from the ground, taking note of the first four moves of the problem while Brian stood back watching with anticipation, anxious for the rush to hit him.
"This is gonna be kind of tough, dude. You may want to try one of those over there for your first problem."
"I think I can handle it, it looks like fun."
"You might not get very far if you start here, but it's your call."
"Either way. I'll try this, and then I'll go try that."
Toby thrust his hand into the chalk bag as he walked back towards the rock. He clutches the powder inside, and covers his fingers and palms with chalk. Toby prepares both hands methodically, with a rhythm a foot could tap to unconsciously. He dusts off the excess chalk by swiping his hands with each other back and forth. As he knelt down, next to the pad, placing his lit cigarette carefully on a rock, he watched Jay come rushing around the corner with a branch in his mouth, wagging his tail with pride.
"Good boy, good boy." Brian knelt down to pet him. Jay dropped the branch at Brian's feet and sat instinctively at his side, but turned his attention to the rock and the pair stood still as they awaited the beauty of an early morning climb.
The first move of the climb crept along, as Toby meticulously placed each finger tip in its proper place. One foot at a time, he raised them up to the wall and traced the vertical crack in the boulder that seemed to pull his right side away from his left, until he found the hold where he might rest his entire 163 pounds on the very tip of his big toe. Once he was in place, he sprawled out against the rock, he took a slow, deep breath in and shifted his weight to his right foot as he hoisted himself up, reaching his left hand up for the next hold, catching the grip as if his hand had been reeled in with a fishing line.
With a firm grip on the new hold, he raised his left leg up and wrapped it around the curve of the boulder, bracing his ankle against an invisible crevice on the back side. From here, the climb began to take on a life of its own. His left hand moved to the left as his right reached up in search of a grip. His right foot followed each move, finding innumerable holds below his body, allowing a split second of rest between each move as his weight came down all onto the tip of his big toe, over and over again. The pairs of eyes watching the back of the climber never flickered. Brian’s jaw hung unhinged, and he swayed lightly in the wind as he listened to the music of the moves.
Approaching the top out, Toby paused for a moment, allowing a break in the hypnotic dance that the rock had created using his body. In the distance, the crunch of a branch echoed, he turned his head to check the trees, scanning the forest for a stranger or a deer. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, he turned his head back to the rock and tilted his head back to look up to the top out. He calculated three quick moves to hoist himself up and over, where he would be able to stand up, relax, and accept the feat nature had used him to master. As he reached up for the next hold with his left hand, Jay stood and shook out his coat, breaking the renewed silence.
Toby grasped the rock, the grain of the boulder digging into his fingertips. His left foot followed, finding its place just inches away from his right. As he lifted his right foot up, slowly, methodically, his right hand reached up for the next hold. Simultaneously, he found the holds and grasped the rock, hugging it one last time before he exploded his energy off of his right foot, reaching over the top of the rock with his right hand, followed closely by his left. With both hands over the top, his feet scrambled to catch up and as he pulled his knees in underneath him, he planted his feet and rose up to stand atop the boulder. The sun was just under the tip of the tree tops; the sky above them was a cool blue-gray that enveloped Toby as he breathed heavily, in awe of the boulder he had just mastered.
Brian clapped briefly from down below, turned, and picked up a long branch, hucking it into the trees for Jay, who took off instinctively before he had even chosen a branch. As Toby climbed down the backside of the rock, much more easily than he had gone up on the front side, Brian snatched the tobacco off of the ground and began rolling a cigarette. He rolled two, passed one over to his friend, and smirked with a chuckle under his breath.
"You realize I'm going to get addicted to this, right?"
&nbs
p; Toby took a long pull, scoured the ground for his water bottle, took a drink, and threw it back towards the crash pad.
"Everyone gets addicted.” Another long pull, Toby rubbed his hands together to wipe away the left over rock. “Do you meditate?" Brian’s eyes left Jay in the distance, he looked over to Toby, searching.
"What'd you say? Meditate? No, not really. Why do you ask?"
"You need to. Grab that chalk over there."
Author Bio
Carly Ziegler recently relocated back to her hometown, Bend, to relax, write, and most importantly, find adventures. She is currently pre-nursing at COCC, runs every day, and lets the wind take her where it will.