The Peak

From fyr wiki

She trudged upwards.

So far, she’d seen no one else on the trail, but she knew there were others. She could hear voices in the wind every so often.

At the last waypoint, the ranger had told her that 2 parties had just left. She didn’t expect to catch up with them, unless they stopped. But in any case, it didn’t matter. She was on a mission. The Summit! She’d dreamed of it almost all her life. She had tried to go before, each time something causing her to abort the hike. Once, when she was less than an hour away.

As she moved carefully along the path, she recalled that last attempt. That time she had not come alone, but with the man she had hoped to marry.

The hike had started off with them in good spirits. He, talking animatedly about when he’d last been, and she, stopping to snap photos at intervals.

She soon noticed, however, that her constant stopping was beginning to annoy him. Once, she’d seen a better specimen of a calla lilly than she’d got on file thus far and his comment had been “Didn’t you already get that flower?”

She’d mumbled a quiet apology and snapped a quick shot and moved on as bidden.

By the time they’d got to the first waypoint, he was complaining openly: “Why did you bother bringing so much equipment anyway? It’s heavy and cumbersome and it’s not like you’re using any of it.”

Nevermind that it was supposed to be an image capturing hike as well, and that he’d known this from before they’d started - she just wanted the whole thing over with.

“I haven’t had the opportunity to use them yet” was all she said.

“Well, let’s just keep going.” was his response.

The second waypoint minutes away, he had started talking about all the sacrifices he had made to accompany her on this trip. She blew.

“How is it you never expressed any reservations before we started? If you knew you were going to hate it so much, why did you insist on coming?”

She realized her mistake the minute she uttered the last word. For there ensued the most violently upsetting argument they’d had yet. Ineveitably, they’d turned back at that point, taking the return trip in an uncomfortable silence, not stopping until they had got back to the lodge.

She became aware suddenly that she was standing staring at the rock where it had all fallen aprart, a group of about 5 people approaching from down the path heading in her direction falling silent as they caught sight of her.

There was guide with this group whom she wasn’t quite sure she had managed to fully convince she was fine. Nevertheless, they moved on without her soon after.

Suddenly, she wondered why she had come - alone without even her point-and-shoot camera. The weight of the question caused her to sink to her knees on the path.

With a rush of ambivalent tears, she reminded herself it was because she needed to complete the journey. That it was not about photographs now, but about finishing what she had dreamed of and started and never managed to accomplish. A symbolic journey that would affirm her confidence and faith in herself and take her to the one place she had always found intriguing.

She got up and moved on.

 : :

Ten minutes later, she passed the 3 groups of people at the second waypoint. Herself, not stopping. Her mind set on the path ahead. And she found her mind starting to wander again.

They’d almost broken up that day. But something kept them from taking that step. They’d travelled back to the city together in the silence of a temporary truce. The next few days were quiet between them. And then one night, the unthinkable. A freak accident took him from her forever when a trailer travelling on the same highway as he, careened across into his lane and drove his car into a copse of mangrove trees. Even if the fire-fighters had managed to detangle the car from the debris of mangrove roots and reeds, the steering wheel had shattered his chest killing him almost immediately.

The weight of the urn suddenly made her sit firmly on the path. His ashes. The family had given them to her saying she deserved to have them. After a year of looking at it in the special alcove in the house, she’d finally decided to bring him up here to rest finally where her heart had dreamed of being almost all her life.

She stood shakily and looked around. The path had leveled without her noticing - so lost she’d been in her reverie. And just up ahead she could see the last climb to the peak.

She trudged on.

 : :

Standing there at the top of her world was rather anti-climatic. It was foggy and she couldn’t see much. There was one other group sitting on a grassy patch about 20 feet to her left, staring at her. She ignored them and walked to the tree at the edge of the lookout point.

She couldn’t see much except for a few trees and shrubs and a blanket of white. But she stood looking out nevertheless, breathing deeply and closing her eyes briefly. And suddenly she felt him there. Smiling at her. “You made it. I love you” his presence seemed to say.

After a minute or two, she sat on the ground and carefully removed the urn from her backpack. She held it close and whispered:

“No matter whether we’d still be together now or not, you were gone too soon. And I hope you can rest easy here with my heart on Blue Mountain Peak.”

With that, she set the urn down, got up and turned back toward her new life - alone.

-- Fyr ©March 2004

---