Page 134 of Valley Girls
“Come on. We have to get to the ledge,” Petra yelled.
Rilla only heard “ledge,” but she didn’t need Petra’s encouragement to know they were in deep shit and needed to get up to shelter.
She kept her head down and climbed until she reached the anchors and helped haul the pig.
“Be careful of the next pitch,” Petra said. “There are loose blocks.”
“Perfect,” Rilla moaned.
Lightning and thunder drowned out Petra’s reply. In the flash of light, Rilla realized Petra was scared. And Adeena was calm. Adeena was the leader. Maybe she had been all along, despite Petra’s bluster.
Rilla met Adeena’s gaze. “What do we do?”
“We can’t climb in the lightning,” Adeena said in a lull of the wind. “We need to spread out and hunker down until it passes.”
“Let’s just keep going,” Petra urged. “We’re almost there.”
Petra was delusional. Rilla yanked the route map out of her pocket and kept a firm grip on it in the wind. “The rap bolts are to the left,” she told Adeena, showing her the paper under the light of her headlamp. “I can head out over there. You and Petra anchor to the bolts here.”
“Guys ...” Petra protested. Lightning flashed on her face, turning it white and blanched.
“We’re listening to Adeena,” Rilla snapped. “She has the most experience.” On the ground, what Adeena had lacked in technical ability was, up here, less important—now Rilla could see how Adeena’s experience with the situation and the stress made her a calm and able leader. It was heartening to realize not everyone showed their potential. That maybe there were things, hidden on the ground, that gave Rilla value. That she didn’t have to be Caroline. She could just be herself.
Thunder drowned out Petra’s protest. And Adeena handed her a rain jacket.
Rilla headed out across the granite, headlamp yanked down to her neck. With the lightning, she couldn’t see anything anyhow. Adeena belayed off the anchors, but if she fell, it would be a swing backunderneathAdeena, hitting them with the rope. The light flashed and she spotted the glint of silver bolt hangers. It went pitch black; but Rilla kept her eyes trained ahead. She exhaled, bringing her belly in closer to the rock. They could make it. The storm would pass soon.
The lightning flashed again and she reached out to clip the bolts, fumbling in the blind dark. Quickly, she turned her headlamp on, and clipped another set of bolts and long draws to the anchors, getting herself secure.
The wind gusted and roared. The dark seemed a thing to consume her. “Off belay,” she yelled into the wind now that she was anchored to the wall.
She couldn’t hear anything back.
Rising up on the balls of her feet off the rock, she crouched like Adeena had instructed, ducking her head to her knees and covering her ears with her hands. Lightning-safe position—ready to be fucked by a bolt. She closed her eyes and tried to mentally be okay with sudden death.
The rain started. Pelting her back like ice in the driving wind. Lightning and thunder came at once, shaking her to her teeth. Her calves cramped. Her back tightened in the cold rain. Now she prayedforsudden death instead of this slow one where she froze. The rain came harder. And the thunder melted away into the mountains.
She straightened. “Guys?” she yelled into the dark.
No sound.
For the first time, panic seized her heart. She’d always had a partner in this. And even though she knew Petra and Adeena were across the wall just a little ways, she didn’tknow. She couldn’t convince herself to believe it. The rain lashed her face. Rilla clutched the jacket tighter and bent her head, hanging in her harness.
She must have fallen asleep, because the next thing she knew she was gasping for air under a waterfall. Automatically, she straightened her legs, pushing off the wall. Was she dreaming? She looked around and it was still dark. Still night. The waterfall gushed over her shins, pouring icy water into her shoes and already wet pants.
“Rilla,” she heard someone yell.
Instantly, she realized the storm had lifted. The wind had died down and the rain had stopped.
“I’m okay,” she forced through her chattering teeth. “I’m in a waterfall.”
“Can you make it back over?” Adeena yelled. “We can bivy and find something dry.”
Rilla looked down at her waist. Her legs were cold and shaky, numb. But they were likely to only get worse, especially if the water didn’t let up soon. “I’m coming.”
It took her three times longer than normal to haul herself up into the rush of water to unclip from the anchors. Torrents spurted over her jacket and into her clothes, dripping ice through her whole body and any layer that might have still been dry.
Shaking uncontrollably now, she clipped the biners to her side and began inching along the still dark wall. After a few steps, she realized it wasn’t pitch-black anymore, but faintly dark gray.
