The Ascent(25)

“Jesus, that’s some story.” Hollinger turned to Curtis Booker. “And you?”

Booker said, “You jump out of enough planes, climb enoughmountains, you eventually hear about Andrew Trumbauer. Three years ago, I put together a climb in Alaska. Andrew was one of the guys who signed up for it. Never met him in person, but I knew who he was. I agreed to take him on—there were about fifteen of us—and thought everything was set. But he never showed up.”

“Sounds like Andrew,” remarked Chad. “Good old reliable Andrew …”

Curtis grinned. “I thought about doing the same to him on this trip, actually.”

“Why didn’t you?” I said. For some reason, the notion of screwing over Andrew appealed to me.

“Because I’m too goddamn excited to cross the Canyon of Souls. Anyway, old Andy probably made a wise decision skipping out on my little exhibition.” Curtis lowered his voice and said, “I lost two men in the death zone on that climb.”

“The death zone?” Shotsky said, his voice suddenly shaky.

“Fuck, man,” Chad interrupted. “You’ve signed up to cross the Canyon of f*cking Souls, and you’ve never heard of the death zone.”

Chad was an *, but he was right: Donald Shotsky hadn’t done his homework. Beside me, I could almost feel Petras cringe.

“The death zone,” Curtis explained, “is the place high on a mountain where you don’t get enough oxygen. We had oxygen tanks for the summit climb, but at twenty-six thousand feet, the human body goes bad real fast.”

“Are you kidding me?” Shotsky said. Both his thick, red hands were plastered to the tabletop, and I noticed a fine glimmer of sweat breaking out along his brow. “There’s a motherf*cking death zone?”

“Both guys died of edema,” said Curtis. “Was the worst climb I ever made.”

“Will we be climbing into the death zone?” Shotsky wanted to know. “I mean, how high are we going?”

“It’s in the middle of Godesh Mountain,” Petras said. “It’s adifficult climb, but the Canyon of Souls isn’t as high as twenty-six thousand.” He shot me a glance, and I waited for him to wink. “I don’t think so, anyway,” he added. The wink never came.

“You afraid your heart’s gonna give out up there, Shotsky?” Chad said, running a hand through his bleached hair.

Shotsky waved a hand at him. “Fuck off, snow bunny.”

“Because I ain’t gonna drag your rigor mortis ass back down the hill; that’s for damn sure,” Chad went on. Had they been friends, Shotsky would have most likely continued to wave Chad off. But they weren’t friends—they’d just met this evening, in fact—and it was evident Chad’s words were irritating Shotsky. “Or maybe I’ll just ride you down like a sled,” Chad added, oblivious to Shotsky’s growing agitation.

Shotsky’s face creased. His hands balled into fists on the table. “How ‘bout I ride you like a sled, f*ckface?”

“Cool it,” Petras said.

“Whoa.” Chad balked, throwing his hands up in surrender. “I didn’t mean nothing by it, bro. I’m cool. Just making light of the whole thing.” His gaze swung in my direction. “Right, Shakes?”

Something snapped inside me. I sprung across the table and grabbed a fistful of Chad’s sweater. With my free hand, I struck him on the left cheek, which caused his head to jerk to the right. I refused to release the hold on his sweater even after his chair tipped and spilled him to the floor.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Petras muttered into my ear. His big hands were on my shoulders, prying me off Chad. “Ease off, Tim. Ease off.”

Finally I released my grip and allowed Petras and the others to drag me across the table.

Hollinger bent over Chad and asked if he was all right.

Chad laughed and scooted against the wall, his eyes locked on mine. I found myself praying for his nose to start gushing blood—somehow I thought that would make the scene all the more dramatic—but that

never happened.

“Nice,” he called to me, grinning. “Got a hell of a swing there. Guess this is amateur hour, huh?”

“Asshole,” was all I could muster. Petras was still holding me back.

Andrew appeared in the doorway, smiling down on us like the Creator Himself. “Very nice display,” he said, applauding. “Glad to see you boys playing nice together. I’m sure there exists a more than suitable quote about men growing up into boys or something like that, but I don’t know any.”

“He started it,” Chad barked. A second later, he must have realized how childish it had sounded, because he chuckled.

“I can’t let you ladies out of my sight for one second, can I?” Andrew said, folding his arms and leaning against the wall. “How’s the food?”

“Ain’t the food that’s the trouble,” Shotsky growled.

“Tastes like the padding of my sneakers,” Hollinger commented, perhaps in hopes of diluting the tension, “but at least it’s hot.”

“The food’s purifying,” Andrew said. “I want all of us to be cleansed and ready for the climb. No smoking joints, no alcohol, no greasy cheeseburgers.”

“God, I could use a joint,” Shotsky said.