This Face

You’re stuck. The baby cliff face has a few steady holds, but you don’t know where to go from there. You look up. Picture perfect blue. Then straight ahead, centimeters from your nose. Brown, gray, pink rock blurs in front of you. Your breath is shaky, fragile against the rough earth. Gray clouds hang low nearby, and it smells like it’s going to rain. But the sun is on your side. You feel its rays beating down on your shoulders. 

As you were setting up earlier, Matt asked you to “bring down the rope while I check the weather.” He’s pragmatic – that’s why you trust him with your life after meeting only a couple of weeks ago.

“You mean look over there?” you asked him smugly, gesturing to the gray clouds hanging low in the horizon. 

“Yeah.” He responded, gazing at the picturesque billows of silver over the spherical pink brown rocks on the other side of the highway. There’s a postcard, you thought to yourself.

Back to the task at hand. Literally. You’re halfway up the route, from what you can tell. Your feet are on some precarious holds, and there’s nowhere for them to go that’s not above your waist. You’re too short to reach for the hold up on your right side. You shift your leg muscles, trying to find rest in that position. You’re a crippled Vitruvian marionette, with legs splayed out widely and arms slightly higher than your head.

Plunk. You feel a fat drop of rain on your left arm. It’s your second time on the crag, but everybody knows wet rock gets slippery. You reach around your left side, dipping your hand into the bag of chalk. Strain your neck to look down at Matt, maybe 30 feet below you. He probably has a great view of my butt, you think to yourself. But Matt is harmless – another reason to trust. “I can get it, the rock isn’t slippery yet!” you yell down at him, as thunder rumbles in the distance. 

He says nothing, holding onto the tense red rope as you hang on by your fingertips and tippy-toes. Two people, suspended on earth as the air starts to swirl. You are the postcard.

Deep breath. You reach up with your right hand, reaching for a steady hold. You scramble for a space in the rock – a chip in the face. If you can find it, all will be well. For that moment in time, everything will be as it should be. That’s what you’re craving. The feeling of a piece falling into place within you. Something inside you, shifting, as if when your fingers set themselves into that pocket of stone, your body and the rock fit into each other. You’ll lock into place, and for that instant, the universe will have arranged itself perfectly.

You don’t reach the hold. Your feet slip, and you slam against the face of rock. The earth wall you dangle off of, as water starts to patter down more steadily onto your skin. Pain courses through you – you hit your right elbow, hard, on the way down. And you remember where you are. Grey all around you. You scramble to get back in position. Inhale. Exhale.

“Do you think I should come down now?” You yell down to Matt, your strained voice high over the low rumble of thunder approaching.

“Yeah, I would say so.” He responds, unbothered, with his signature matter-of-fact cadence. All of a sudden the clouds rupture. Rain rushes down. Matt rappels you down quickly, the rope getting heavier and darker. Bam. You’re back on the ground. Colder air. Water seeping through skin-tight clothes. Everything is different. Harsher. To think, just moments ago the sun was beating down on you and the rock.

“Take the rope down!” Matt tells you over the rising pattering. He brings the blue tarp over you both, and you hoist the rope down as quickly as you can. Hands up. Grab. Pull. Down. Hands up. Grab. Pull. Down.

“Sing me a sea shanty!” You tell him, with a playful smile on your face. He complies, without batting an eye.

“What shall we do with the drunken sailor, what shall we do with the drunken sailor, what shall we do with the drunken sailor,” He starts, no expression on him.

“Early in the mornin’!” You join in, as you heave the last bit of rope through the anchors at the top of the rock. You’re a pirate on a ship. Nevermind it’s almost dinnertime, and you’ve just come off a rock, onto more rock, in the high desert.

Quickly, quickly, quickly. You grab the pastries you exchanged just a few hours before, when it was sunny. The pie remnants are on a soggy paper plate, which you cover with the well packaged strawberry rhubarb tart he made you. The one you’ll throw away days later, after having forgotten about it.

There’s no time. You stuff everything else into your backpack. Harness still on, chalk bag hanging off of you, shoes still on. Matt throws the gear into his pack, and takes the rope from you, folding up the tarp. You pick up his beret before it floats away on a new stream. You clamp onto it with two fingers, under the short stack of pastries.

Quickly quickly, quickly. You make your way down, following. The crevices are now gushing with water, and small waterfalls, at least triple your height, have erupted all around the face of the rock. The scene is transformed. Light beige rock with grey-blue flowing. Water rushing all around you, and a cacophony of sounds. Pattering. Thunder. A flash of light. 

You pray not to get struck by lightning. It’s too far away anyways, you reason. 

Quickly, quickly, quickly. You splash through the rising water in your climbing shoes. You’re in a high canyon, and fatal flash floods cross your mind.

“Will this ruin my shoes?” You yell at him over the surging storm. 

“You’re not supposed to get them wet, but once should be okay.” He’s a walking encyclopedia on all things climbing. 

Quickly, quickly, quickly. Everything is soaked. He may end up throwing away the remnants of the pie you made. You wouldn’t blame him. 

“Huh, I guess climbing shoes are not bad for hiking! I just didn’t want to slip in my Birks,” you tell him. You wish you had changed shoes. 

Quickly, quickly, quickly. You carefully step on the spherical rocks, toes squished in your blue ballerina-esque shoes. Finger knuckles white from grabbing onto the things. You see the dirt lot. Squish through new mud with Matt. 

“Crazy how it was just sunny like thirty minutes ago!” you marvel, and wait for his non-reaction, raindrops clinging onto you. You daydream about hiking with him in the rain, for hours. 

He looks at you. Smiles. Huh. You notice some red on his face. “Yeah, I’ve never been out here in the rain!” You try to picture the scene from his perspective. You’re both grinning. 

Finally, you make it back to your car. You hand him what’s left of the pie. Sopping wet, you painstakingly peel off your harness and shoes. Your feet are blue – dye from the shoes. Put on the Birks. Quickly! Throw your backpack onto the floor of the passenger’s seat. Place the tart – still in its tray – in the passenger’s seat. Quickly, you turn the car on. Blast the heat. Matt is approaching his car on the other side of the dirt lot. 

Shoot! You still have his gear on your harness. Shivering, you unclip the carabiners from your harness loops. Quickly, you gather his items. Gravel crunching. You look up. Matt is faster than you – he’s already in his car, window rolled down, in front of you. 

“Wait!” You hand him the gear through the window. Water sloshes around you. Sandals soaking.

“Would you like to climb again next week?” Rain falls down all around you. Oh, he likes you. 

“Yeah that would be lovely!” You respond enthusiastically. He was supposed to kiss you in the rain, like in the movies. But this isn’t a movie. 

“Great!” He’s actually smiling. Okay, quickly, get moving. You’re shivering. 

He drives off. You clamber into your car, hastily throwing a jacket onto the driver’s seat. Plop. Sit down. You bring down the mirror. 

Shit! All the tinted sunscreen has worn off. Your lashes have uncurled. You look raw. Pink nose, pink cheeks. Your hair is messy – like a wild woman’s. Oh, this face. You think to yourself. This is the face he was looking at? What shall we do with you?