This story by James Blume ’19 was part of a portfolio of work that earned a 2018 NCTE Achievement Award for Superior Writing. The photograph is also by James.
Photo by James Blume ’19
The Rock Face
Some of the girls were down by the river, timing themselves as they sat in sports bras and short shorts in the run off, screeching in giggles as they tested who could lay the longest in the near freezing water. The stream itself was shallow, the water only wrapped around their waists, leaving dark stains up their legs. Blocks of hollowed out snow, melting from within, cradled the opening. It dripped downward in a slow transparent current into the girls. One of the fishermen we passed on the way up said this past winter was one of the harshest he’d ever seen here, enough snow to make many of the normal passes impassible. The same snow thawed in the summer sun.
Above them, I lay shirtless beside Will and David, lazing on the boulder next to piles of stripped off clothing, peeled off watches and tossed off backpacks. I rested my head on the brain of pack using the zipped up rain layers as a pillow, the rim of my hat shading my face.
David and I applied sunscreen on each other with a drip bottle, rubbing the lotion’s white dots into the knots of our backs. We did it in an awkward kind of way, uncomfortable as we touched and timidly asking each other to make sure that that spot or this spot was fully covered. It was easy to burn here. The sun was warmer in the altitude. Closer.
The last week alone, my arm turned a red to a pink to a dirty tan of darkened skin and layers of dust. David had it worse though. A pale Midwesterner, he was six four and burnt faster than paper. Everyday, he’d emerge from our tent with a peeling red on his neck and ears, and a laughing smile on his face.
“You’re a rock climber, right? Wanna go climbing? There’s a place I saw that looked pretty cool further up the mountain.” He interrupted the quiet just as I had finished smearing the last of the lotion into his skin.
“I didn’t know you climbed,” I responded.
“My girlfriend is into it.”
“David, you got a girlfriend?”
We nudge Will awake as we get up from under the sun.
“Yeah. Three months.” We descended the rock face, balancing ourselves with roots of the plants and short turfs of moss grappled on the boulder’s edge.
“I thought you’re gay.”
“Bi.”
I think about our two-man tent, us three, huddling in our underwear in the night. I forget the thought.
We reached the bed of the stream. The mud was sodden and fleshy with water and fallen leaves cold under my toes. I carried my sneakers by the laces. We hiked along the edge, searching for a vanishing point downstream where the water subsided. Rocks and twigs and small plants curved across the side. The stream flowed down the middle in a clear, gentle push.
Around fifty feet down, the water narrowed. It was still far, but only a couple feet wide now. I ran off a large rock into a leapt over the water, stumbling as I landed on the other side. David and Will paused on the other side, unsure if they should make the same jump. But they followed suit, crossing the stream with ease.
David led, guiding us to the rock face. Bringing us through the undergrowth, he smiled as he described some perfect climbing walls he saw further up the hill. A yellow action camera swung round his wrist. His hair was straight, greased down from days of no bathing. Will waddled behind us, stumbling over roots and overturned rocks. His shirt was on now. A gold crucifix necklace hung on top of his collarbone. He looked different without glasses, older.
“So David. How long did you know you were Bi?” I asked honestly curious.
“I don’t know. Two years now.”
We emerged from the woods to see boulders stacked on top of boulders. Many as tall as 15 feet surfaced from the ground like a wall. The rocks hugged the mountainside in long, unbroken lines. The sun was heating up, leaving the stones a warm yellow hue as they cooked.
We started climbing, laughing how comically unprepared we were and at the ridiculousness of the climbs. We brought no shoes, no chalk, no mat to catch us if we fell. I’d never climbed outside before. Will never climbed at all and would flap his arms around wildly trying to grasp easy holds and slipping back on the ground in controlled falls. David was only slightly better, barely pulling his body above the rocks in a struggled show of muscle.
The first rock we climbed was small, almost too small to even call a climb. David the tallest of us was able to grip the top, stretching his arm from the ground. The arching wall could be climbed in at most two moves. Still we played on it, changing the footings and starts until we contorted against the stone, holding our weight with finger grips on the small impurities of the rock. Our bodies warmed up, sweating under the sun, as we climbed.
We talked as we worked. Will proudly told us about his life in Chicago. He was an acolyte for his church, he explained. The past year, he was a candle bearer, solemnly spending his Sundays floating across the church aisle in white. I couldn’t imagine him in that outfit or walking down a church’s aisle. I couldn’t really imagine anyone below the age of thirty finding religion. But I laughed and said nothing of it. Told him instead about my baptism in some branch of Protestantism that I couldn’t remember the name of.
We took turns. Between attempts, I showed them different moves. How to use their feet to balance their weight and maximize leverage. How the climbs are called puzzles because it’s less about strength and more about understanding. I asked David if this was what he did with his girlfriend, just enjoyed the wilderness, enjoyed each other.
He laughed, starting to climb the same puzzle I just finished. His hands gripped the same holds, his feet leaned on the same jugs. His body danced up until he was sitting next to me. He told me about Minnesota, describing lakes in the summer and cold winters with layers of snow piled outside like sand dunes. He told me about his girlfriend back home, how the two of them are on and off again. He told me how he loved to climb with her and that she was beautiful. For a moment I wondered if I reminded him of her, but I forget the thought.
“You have a girlfriend too right?” David asked.
“I’d been with the same girl for two years,” I told him surprised by the memory.
I felt sad for a second for forgetting her. For forgetting how I’d told her I loved her. Of holding hands or swimming in the ocean, calf deep in the June water. I missed her. It’s easy to forget.
I didn’t say this to David. I didn’t say any of it.
Instead we wandered further uphill. My hands started to blister in white crusts of dead skin and pink tender blobs of flesh where my fingers met my palms. The boulders up ahead were larger, more intimidating, tall enough that any fall on the ground would be more than a just small drop.
“How did you know you were Bi?”
“I just knew.” I thought about what it would mean if I came out, would I be a brave or just a liar? Was it lying if I didn’t know?
The wall was beautiful. Wet stone ran across the thing in darkened streaks. Green layers of moss grew, feeding next to the water runoff. The rocks came together in harsh, jagged overlapping edges, forming holds and jugs in the water. Wildflowers popped out the corners of the footholds. It was the perfect wall.
Will turned away on some other rocks downstream, leaving the two of us alone, just David and me smiling at each other, excited. I hugged the wall slowly at first as if to cradle it in my hands. Explored the grips in light touches, feeling the bumps and edges of the rock until I could trace it blind like the knots of a back. I tightened my grip. Pulled myself up in lockstep with the wall. My feet rested on its curves and my hands lost themselves in the jugs between the stones. I reach upward, tilting forward, gently tugging on the moss like hair, careful not to hurt it.
I sat, halfway up, resting with a foot nudged in the break of the wall. From the awkward squat, I looked down. I was high now. Higher than I’d free climbed before. This was new for me. Hanging unsure without a belay to stabilize or a mat to catch me. I looked down again, seeing the rock floor that would catch me if I fell and I saw David smiling. Brown hair, pale skin and pretty eyes below me. I kept climbing up. Away.
From there, I finished the climb quickly, death gripping the holds and then flopping on top of the monster. Breathing and sweating I watched the view. Alpine trees huddled together in the distance. The sun receded in a slow a disappearing act, the desert night going quickly cold.
David was coming up, struggling on the same holds as I did, kicking his way in a formless scramble. I grabbed his hand, pulled him upwards. He landed on top of me. For a second I wondered what would it mean if I kissed him, just a quick one, like a first kiss, but somehow different, more mature.
I pushed him off me and high-fived him. From there we sat, watched the mountainside. The sun glowed a faded orange on the green of the trees. In the distance, the melting snow appeared faded white, its texture featureless. We could hear the shrieking of the girls down by the stream. As I got up, I knew we’d never be here again. We all knew it. But for a moment, we lied to each other, promised each other that someday we’d return.