Kiss or Kill: Confessions of a Serial Climber by Mark Twight

Author:Mark Twight [Twight, Mark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Mountaineers Books
Published: 2002-08-31T12:00:00+00:00

CATHY BELOEIL AND FRED VIMAL, LE FORON, FRANCE

The world we know is ending. But another's coming hard on its heels. The whole landscape has changed, and whether happy or sad, we remain to live and to tell. Life isn't easy on those of us who survive, especially during the first few weeks. After Fred was killed, there were accidental moments when I thought I could phone him, maybe climb together.

I don't feel sorry for myself. I chose this, or accepted it anyway. I gulped it down whole. I shot the dose. I wish I’d learned the courage to admit to the men and women on the list that I cared about them before they died. I live with the unspoken words inside of me because I can't say them to the people who deserve them anymore.

Fuck your dreams man, this is heaven.

Aftermath: Dédé and Fred's brother went up to recover Fred's equipment and try to understand what happened by doing the climb. The eighth pitch was the easiest on the entire route, 5.9 perhaps, so it was logical that Fred (who’d soloed the Walker Spur in 4 hours 30 minutes and enchained it to the Peuterey Intergrale) didn't put in any gear. If it was cloudy, he might not have seen the huge icicles suspended beneath the summit overhangs. Dédé said, “A few of them fell while I was on the tenth pitch, they exploded all over the eighth…maybe that's how it happened.” Yes, maybe.

2000 AUTHOR'S NOTE

I’ve spent a lot of hours thinking about this event since 1993. I have told the story to countless people during my slideshows, trying to learn its lessons myself.

I first met Fred at the film festival in Autrans, and we got along well. I gave him a ride home, and we talked nonstop during the three-hour drive, even promising to get out climbing together, but I never called him. I chose to eliminate the possibility of experience in order to preserve myself from the pain his death might cause. His talent and ambition were on display, and I saw a bit of myself in him when I was 25. While my paranoia allowed me to survive my learning curve, he showed no restraint or fear. I knew he would die young in the mountains and wanted no part of it. I said “Hello” in the street but that was all.

A year later we ran into each other at a local crag. I was there climbing with Cathy and the two of them hit it off instantly. We started Sport Climbing together, trying to get strong for the season. Fred wanted to go to Yosemite again. I wanted to climb, and it didn't matter where. But the spring weather was fickle, so Cathy and I made plans to climb in the south where the weather promised to be better. Fred said he had some things to take care of in Chamonix, but would join us after a few days. He promised to call Cathy's parents’ place in Le Cannet to arrange a rendezvous in the Verdon.

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