Page 44 of Valley Girls
“Well, you won’t get a better chance than this,” he said matter-of-factly, leaning against the rock.
“It’s expensive,” she argued.
“You seem like an enterprising young woman.” He raised a meaningful eyebrow. “Who recently relieved me of five dollars.”
She laughed, leaning forward on her hands. “It’s dangerous.”
“Would you like it if it wasn’t?”
She snorted. “It’s not something I’m good at.”
“I guess that’s why they call it learning to do something.” He folded his arms against his chest. “It seems like you’re trying to talk yourself out of even trying. Why do that? This is your chance to try something you seem interested in. You can’t expect to wake up a good climber, when you haven’t put in the work and effort toward becoming one.”
She winced. He was talking about climbing, but somehow, she felt the truth of it in the deepest parts of herself. It was true. That was what she’d been expecting—to change the minute she determined she should. Terrified when she was not immediately the things she envisioned. Panicked she never would be. Maybe ...maybe, it wasn’t that she couldn’t change, but that she was afraid to try all the things required to change. Maybe it was like he said, she kept expecting to change without putting any of the work and effort into changing.
He shook his head. “Your five fell out,” he said, reaching down and putting the money back into her hand.
She looked at the crumpled bill and her buzzing thoughts narrowed down to something clear and sure. She could find a way to make money in the Valley. She could do her schoolwork and figure out how to climb. She could pack her own snacks and learn fast. She could prove to everyone, she was something. For the first time, the thought of the impossible was more excitement than dread. Fear, but with longing. The future unknown, but with potential that had not been there before.
It wasn’t a question of if she could succeed. It wasn’t a question at all.
She couldtry.
Stuffing the five back into her sock, she took the lighter, relit the weed, and put her elbows on her knees. And as another cloud slid its shadow over the Valley, she let her thoughts do the same—let the sorrow and fear and hope skim the surface of her mind so that in five minutes when she was done, she could stand and go down into the Valley and begin.
“CLIMBING.”
When people say, “It can’t
be done,” or “You don’t have
what it takes,” it makes the task
all the more interesting.
—Lynn Hill, first person to free-climb The Nose (5.13+) on El Capitan
Fifteen
Rilla pumped her legs as fast as she could.
Heavy boots thumped behind her. “I know where you live,” Ranger Miller—Dick Face—yelled.
Rilla risked a quick glance over her shoulder.
He was gone. The only things behind her were ogling tourists, clutching bags and children closer.
Shit.He’d caught up faster than she expected.
Rilla’s side hurt and her lungs drew sharp, but she turned and doubled her speed. Her sneakers flapped on the asphalt, sending shocks up her bones as she hurtled through Half Dome Village. She hopped curbs. Pitched right. Left. Right again. Around tourists. Past Andrew, the pool boy, who paid her three dollars to clean out the filters of all the disgusting shit that accumulated from heavy use of the heated pool. He was laughing.
“Shut up, Andrew,” she spared a precious breath to holler as she glanced at the road and made sure she wasn’t going to get run over by a bus, a clueless European driving an RV through America, or any of the tourists rubbernecking out the windows. All clear.
Run. Run. Run.
She had to beat him.
The road behind her, she kicked up gravel and bounded into the meadow. The wooden planks of the meadow path beat a new rhythm against her feet. Ahead, a tall stand of dark pines clustered along the Merced. The gray granite Royal Arches rose high above them as a backdrop. The way it looked right here was almost as if she could hold out both hands and touch either side of the Valley. An illusion. All she needed was to get to Thea’s before Ranger Miller got there. If she beat him, even by a hair, it would be fine.
