Finding Elevation by Lisa Thompson

Author:Lisa Thompson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Girl Friday Books
Published: 2022-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

520 feet

We walked separately down to the water, Anders faster than me. I wanted to go slowly, to savor. When I joined him on a tree-sized piece of driftwood, I heard stones rolling under the waves as they came and went. I laid my head on his shoulder.

Anders and I had been dating for barely a year. Though he had sweetly studied high-altitude mountaineering, the risks and dangers were new to him. During our first date at a dank speakeasy on Capitol Hill, he, unlike all the other guys I’d dated, had reacted mildly to my mountaineering accomplishments, and I’d liked that.

“Are you worried about anything?” I asked him now.

“Hmm, no, not really. I know that you’ll be safe and smart. I trust you.”

In the past year, I had intentionally put myself into situations to determine whether I could be both safe and smart in the mountains. I’d let the achy sting of winter creep into my fingers while climbing frosty rock at Washington Pass, and I’d scrambled my way into untenable rock that I could barely descend on eastern Washington’s bluffs. With experienced partners, I’d tested my assessment of winter snow conditions on Little Tahoma, Mount Rainier’s baby sister. Still, I believed that Anders was worried, that he should have been worried, but didn’t want to create more stress by saying so.

“What are you worried about?” he asked. “That’s the more important question.”

I laughed to deflect, but he was looking at me now, and his raised eyebrows wouldn’t let me.

We should have had this conversation a month ago, I thought. I shrugged and intentionally looked from the water to him. “You know I don’t commit to any mountain unless I understand its risks and challenges.” I saw names from my spreadsheet flash in my brain as I spoke:

Dudley Wolfe—1939—altitude sickness / exhaustion

Pasang Kikuli—1939—disappeared

Arthur Gilkey—1953—suspected avalanche

Ali, Son of Kazim—1979—fell into crevasse

Alison Hargreaves—1995—fall

Gerard McDonnell—2008—avalanche

“I know that doesn’t protect me against objective hazards like rockfall and avalanches.” I let my voice trail off, not even convincing myself anymore.

My response was meticulously crafted bullshit, the same bullshit I’d spewed to Jeri and Kara during our champagne-happy-hour send-off a week ago. They’d both watched me skeptically and nodded slowly, unconvinced, too. I hadn’t told them this, but I would need to keep their strength close on K2. I needed Kara’s fight-before-flight attitude and Jeri’s lighthearted wisdom. And from Anders, I needed a belief that I was doing the right thing.

Because what I wouldn’t say to any of them was that what concerned me about climbing K2 was dying—unknowingly trusting the wrong rock and feeling it cleave from the mountain into my gloved hand, my weight shifting uncontrollably from security into the power of gravity. What concerned me about climbing K2 was hearing the roar of tons of loose snow accelerating toward me with destructive ferocity. What concerned me about climbing K2 was believing that I had correctly set my rappel device, leaning backward to trust it, and free-falling into the sky. What concerned me about K2 was someone adding my name to the list.

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