Until It Hurts to Stop (4 page)

I stow most of the items in my pack, leaving the bottles out to fill in the morning. Then I sit staring at my gear. It’s so much more organized than my brain, where more problems than I can tackle at once are wheeling and fighting for space: the challenge of the mountain, the threat of Raleigh, the strange new undercurrent between Nick and me. All of it will come to Eagle Mountain with us, carried in the pit of my stomach.

six

I dream of Raleigh Barringer. She’s on the mountain with us. While jeering at me, she twists her ankle. She needs us to help her down. While she sits on the ground, crying and clutching her ankle, I say, in the exact tone of voice she used on me in junior high: “Oh, shut up. Don’t be such a baby.” I tower over her; she shrinks beneath my eyes.
I wake up sweating. It’s not quite six o’clock.

I sit for a minute watching the ghostly blue light of the predawn sky, listening to the whirring of the last crickets of the season, letting the dream—with its strange mix of fear and power—melt away. Fat chance I’d ever have the upper hand over Raleigh.

I love this time of day, when nobody else is around, when everything is clean and fresh, when there’s more space to breathe. Once I’ve filled my lungs with the morning, I tiptoe upstairs, careful not to wake Nick’s mom and stepdad. Naturally, Nick’s door is still shut.

I tap lightly and push open the door to his room. He’s a blanket-covered bundle, slug-like. I plop down on the end of the bed, drawing an “oof ” from him.

“Ready for Eagle?” I say.
“Mm.”
“You don’t sound ready.”
“Jesus, Maggie.” His voice rasps and rumbles, like a car with

a bad starter. I smile to myself at that thought:
Nick has a bad starter
. That must be why he has such trouble getting up in the morning.

“This is your wake-up call.” I jounce the bed, and he rolls over. “More like my wake-up pain in the ass.” Yawning, he frees his head from the sheets and glares at me. He’s always had the sort of pale-skinned, dark-haired complexion that’s gorgeous when he’s had enough sleep, and ghoulish when he hasn’t. And right now he has that pasty, grimy, up-all-night look. “Why don’t you go down and start some coffee?”

“Fine. But I’m coming back up here in five minutes and if I find you snoring—”
“OUT.”
I figure he’s awake enough now to stay that way. I slip out of his room.

Nick loves his coffee scorching and bitter. I’d sooner drink drain cleaner myself, but I’m willing to brew a pot if it will get him moving. I pad around the quiet kitchen in my socks. As I slide the filter full of rich, dark grounds into the machine, the door that leads out to the driveway opens.

Nick’s father, Dr. Cleary, stands there holding the screen door. “Good morning, Margaret. Mind if I come in?”
“Oh—good morning. Yes, come in.”
I always feel stupid around Dr. Cleary, as if I’m supposed to use bigger words and more formal sentences than I normally do. He’s a scientific researcher with a dozen initials after his name, and he’s been doing something in his lab with protein folding that makes the other scientists salivate and murmur words like
Nobel
. I don’t know exactly what is so thrilling about protein folding, which is probably one reason I feel stupid. Not that I know all the details of my own parents’ jobs, but my dad monitors the electrical grid for Mid-Regional Power, and my mom is a nurse, so at least I understand the main point of what they do.
“You’re here early. Did you stay overnight again?” Dr. Cleary says. “Has my son dragged his body out of bed yet?” He sits at the kitchen table. His shirt is wrinkled, but his sleek, black hair is freshly combed, and he’s wearing a tie. Stubble peppers his cheeks and chin, and his face has the same skim-milk tint that Nick’s gets after too little sleep.
“Nick and I are going hiking.” I fiddle with the coffeemaker, double-checking the settings even though I know they’re correct.
“Ah. Right. Hiking.” His voice has a weary undertone. I think he’s been hoping Nick will outgrow his love of hiking. As if it’s cute for us to “play” in the woods, but someday we’ll do something more worthwhile.
Nick stumbles into the room. He homes in on the coffeemaker—and then stops in mid-step, mid-yawn.
“What are you doing here so early?” he asks his father.
Dr. Cleary laughs. “I never went to bed.”
“Oh.”
Nick has told me his dad pulls all-nighters sometimes, especially if he has an important grant proposal to write, or new data coming in from a late-running experiment.
A stream of coffee hisses into the glass pot. We all stare at it.
My backbone itches. I strain for anything I could possibly say to Nick’s father. I can’t ask about his work because I don’t understand it. I doubt he’d be interested in the daily inner workings of West Valley High School (“Guess what, Dr. Cleary! We now have blue trays in the cafeteria, in addition to the old brown ones!”). And Nick is no help, standing there with a glazed look on his face that suggests he’s technically still asleep. “Coffee?” I ask, just to say something. I grip the handle of the pot, though liquid is still spurting down into it.
“Hold on there, Margaret,” Nick’s father says. “It isn’t ready yet.”
“Oh, I guess you’re right.”
I sit at the kitchen table, across from Dr. Cleary. I trace the grain in the fake-wood tabletop while Nick hovers over the coffeemaker. I half expect Nick to stick his mouth right under the spout and catch the coffee as it squirts out.
“How’s school?” Nick’s father asks him.
“Fine.”
“I hear you’re having trouble in history.”
Nick shrugs.
“Do you study enough? How much do you study?”
Nick sits down at the table with a cup of coffee. I don’t expect him to give me one because he knows I hate it, but he doesn’t offer his father any, either. After a minute, Dr. Cleary gets up and pours it himself.
“I’m going to see your grandmother and your uncle today,” he says. “I thought you could come along.”
“You should’ve called,” Nick says. “I already have plans.”
“Hiking. So I understand,” Dr. Cleary says dryly. He glances at me. “I’m sure Margaret won’t mind if you see your family instead.”
“It’s not your weekend with me.”
Dr. Cleary’s lips tighten. “Now, that sounds like your mother talking.”
Nick takes a long, slow sip. Then he sets down the coffee. “Don’t bring her into this.”
“Or maybe you’d be better off staying home and studying history.”
Nick’s face reddens, but he doesn’t answer.
“Have you thought about our talk the other day?”
“No.” Nick focuses on his cup like it’s about to give him all the answers to the SATs.
“You can’t put it off forever. Use that brain of yours.”
Dr. Cleary leans over and taps the side of Nick’s head, his forefinger giving two slow, deliberate thumps against Nick’s scalp. Nick doesn’t even blink.
After a minute, Dr. Cleary drains his mug and sets it in the middle of the table. We all look at it like it’s a precious work of art he has presented for our consideration.
“Thank you for the coffee,” he says, and stalks out of the house.

Nick and I are still sitting at the table when Perry comes downstairs, his boots thudding heavily against the floor. Perry works construction, but even when he isn’t working, he wears boots. I’ve never seen anything else on his feet.

“Six o’clock on a weekday, I couldn’t get you out of bed if the house was on fire,” Perry says. “Six o’clock on a Saturday, and here you are.” He grins, setting a skillet on one burner. “You kids want some eggs?”

“No, thanks,” Nick says. “We’ll eat on the road.” We always have a big breakfast at a diner on Route 27 when we hike; it’s part of our ritual. I suspect that some secret part of our brains even believes we won’t be able to climb the mountain if we don’t have a Bird’s Nest Diner breakfast.

Nick’s mother, Phoebe, trudges into the room, her eyes open only wide enough to keep her from banging into the table. She zeroes in on the coffee. Nick pours her a cup. As soon as she has pried her eyes open halfway, she says, “Maggie, good morning. I hear you’re climbing Eagle today.”

“Assuming I can make it.”
“We’ll make it,” Nick says.
“I wish I were going with you.” Perry cracks his knuckles while he waits for the skillet to heat.

“You could,” I say.
“If these old knees would let me. You kids have fun—and don’t forget to check in at the trailhead.”

“Yes,” Phoebe adds. “And call me when you get off the trail so I know you’re okay.”
“We’ll be fine,” Nick says. “It’s not Everest.”
I make a face at him behind his mother’s back, since I know that Everest comment is aimed at me, too. He grins. “Call anyway,” Phoebe says.
“If it makes you feel better.” Nick, who has towered over her since he was a freshman, drops a kiss on top of her head. I notice he hasn’t mentioned his father’s visit. Maybe it’s because any mention of Dr. Cleary tends to bring out a dent of worry in Phoebe’s forehead, right between her eyes.
Nick and I pause in the living room to watch the weather on TV. While we wait for the forecast, I sneak a glance at him.
The TV paints a white glow along the edge of Nick’s nose, cheek, and chin. His eyes don’t move from the screen, which is showing a razor-blade commercial about the “closest shave
ever.” I can’t stop hearing those two thumps of his father’s finger against his skull: more than a tap, less than a hit, and profoundly weird. I will never understand Nick’s father. I reach toward Nick while we’re both still facing the TV. My fingertips bump the back of his hand. He doesn’t give any indication of feeling that. I rest my fingers against his, wanting at least to bring him out of his father-induced moodiness, maybe wanting more. But when he turns his head toward me, I pull back my hand.
Before we can say anything, the forecast comes on: mostly cloudy, 30 percent chance of showers. I think of the line in the guidebook about how Eagle can be dangerous in the rain, but 30 percent doesn’t seem big enough to cancel our trip. I’ve psyched myself up for today. If I disturb that balance, it might make it harder the next time.
I don’t need it to be harder.

We step out into the chill of the morning. The heaviness of my pack always surprises me when I first heave the strap over my shoulder. Nick clears his throat and gives a rough morning cough.

My feet brush dew from the grass. Every surface inside the car is morning-cold. We pack our gear in the back. I’m careful not to touch Nick again. When he starts the car, the freedom of the day in front of us rises, and it almost feels as if we can fly.

Eagle waits for us.

seven

We squabble in the diner over whether grape jam is better than strawberry (the latest episode in our fiery, yearslong Great Jam Debate). I pretend that the sight of Nick putting salsa on scrambled eggs doesn’t give me indigestion.

When I ask him if I can have the peeled orange wedge that decorates his plate, he picks it up and brings it right to my mouth. My lips brush his fingers, even though I’m trying not to touch him. He absently sucks the orange juice from his hand while he looks over the check. Is he as aware of these things as I am, of this new tension between us? Or to him, is it all as casual as the other ways we’ve touched in the past: brushing dirt off each other’s backs, inspecting for ticks, holding hands to steady ourselves while on stepping-stones?

As Nick and I start up the Eagle Mountain trail, we fall into our usual rhythm. The first three steps feel wonderful; I could eat up the world in half a dozen strides. And then the weight of the pack descends on my shoulders and hips, and my boots gain ten pounds apiece. I stumble over a rock.

I settle one layer deeper into the hike, and the world settles around me. Now I’m not worrying about running into Raleigh Barringer in the school hall. I’m not analyzing Nick’s every move in my direction. I’m not counting the minutes until the school bell rings or ticking off a list of math problems to solve. I’m here, and this is where I want to be.

Here, with the ferns and moss, with the scabbed bark of trees, the dank smell of mud, the sweet aroma of dead leaves.
Here, with the stream bubbling alongside us, soothing, gabbling in a language that I both understand and don’t understand.
Here, with a rattlesnake that I almost step on.

“Whoa,” Nick says as we freeze.

The snake coils in the middle of the path, shaking its tail in the air. We can’t hear the rattle over the rush of the creek beside us, but we can certainly see it. We back up a few steps, hoping it will uncoil and glide away, like every other snake we’ve ever met.

No such luck. This one holds its ground. I’ve never had a snake rattle at me before, and even though it’s a few feet away, my teeth clench.

“Maybe we can go around it,” Nick says.

“You mean jump off the cliff on the right, or climb up the cliff on the left?”
“Those aren’t cliffs.”
All right, they aren’t
exactly
cliffs. But the ground on the right of the trail drops down a stony incline to a white-water creek, and on the left rises a rocky slope studded with stubby trees and bushes.
“I bet the trail’s wide enough for us to squeeze by,” Nick says.
“Are you crazy?”
“How much striking distance do they have anyway—like, half a body length, right?”
I don’t remember, and I don’t want to test it out. Besides, since the snake is coiled, it’s hard to tell how long it is. “Right, Nick. You ask the snake to lie straight along the ground, and I’ll get out the yardstick I happened to bring, and we’ll measure it.”
“Okay, okay.” He sits on a rock at the side of the trail and pulls out his water bottle. I choose another rock. The snake stops rattling but stays where it is, a spiral in the middle of the trail.
I mentally rehearse everything I’ve learned in first aid about treating snakebite. Then, to distract myself, I get out my guidebook to fungi and look up a crimson-topped mushroom growing near us. “
Russula
,” I tell Nick. “‘The sickener.’ It’s poisonous.”
“Are you suggesting we feed it to the snake?”
“Uh, yeah, I’m sure he’ll open wide for us.”
I love that name, “the sickener.” It leaves no doubt what the mushroom does. What I find especially interesting are the entries for some of the other mushrooms that say, “Edibility unknown.” It’s hard to believe there are mushrooms nobody has ever tried yet.
Not that I’m planning to be the first.
“That snake’s not going anywhere,” Nick says. “Maybe I can get a long stick and move it.”
“No way.”
“Most times when they bite people, they don’t even inject venom.”
“Oh, brilliant, Nick. That’s very comforting. I can’t believe I thought about—” I choke myself off just in time. I’ve almost said
I can’t believe I thought about kissing you.
I’m so used to joking with Nick about whatever pops into my head that I don’t know when to shut up.
“Thought about what?” But he’s looking around for a stick and doesn’t notice that I don’t answer him.
I can see I need to take action here before we both end up stretched out lifeless on the ground, puncture marks in our legs. “All right, let’s try going around him. Up the cliff.”
“It’s not a cliff,” Nick says again. As if calling it something else will make the climb easier.
We scramble upward, using our hands as well as our feet. The rock scratches our fingers and blunts our nails. It’s impossible to keep my fingers and toes away from every cranny that could harbor one of our snake friend’s relatives, so I plow ahead, straining my ears for any hint of a rattle. Grit wedges itself under my nails. Step-by-step, we angle back toward the trail. The snake still rests in the middle of the path behind us, and that is where Nick and I leave it.