Shadow of the Mountain (10 page)

G
eneva stood at the crossroad, her eyes scanning the folds of the hills where they were lit with the thin blue light of early morning. Her heart was beating fast, though she’d biked the three kilometres to the junction at a leisurely pace. Kaitiaki, catching the lifting rays of the sun on its eastern face, looked distant and unapproachable.

She folded her hands into her armpits and jigged on the spot, her daypack bouncing against her spine. The ten minutes she spent waiting for the van to appear did nothing to steady her nerves.

Angus grinned as he slid open the side door. ‘You made it then.’

As if it had ever been in doubt. Geneva clambered in, dumping her pack on the seat beside her. Keith grinned over his shoulder. ‘Great day for it. It’s a shame Tink couldn’t make it.’

Geneva nodded, sitting on her hands. She didn’t trust her voice not to betray her nerves. Keith studied her. ‘You okay?’

‘Yep.’ She knew there were shadows under her eyes. She’d spent half the night tumbling through distorted memories in her dreams.

Kaitiaki looked even less achievable from the sheltered
half-moon
of the car park. Geneva stood near the back of the van and tried to keep her eyes away from the mountain’s forbidding bulk.

‘Right,’ Keith said, handing over her pack. ‘Food, water bottles, warm clothes, waterproofs?’ Geneva nodded and Keith turned to Angus. ‘Checked the gear?’ Keith asked.

‘A-OK,’ Angus announced. ‘Double checked?’

‘Aye-aye, skipper.’

‘In good spirits?’ Keith asked, his eyes lingering on Geneva. She nodded and began a sequence of stretches, hoping to nudge her body into some sort of enthusiasm. Her need to climb the mountain seemed to have evaporated as suddenly as, months earlier, it had gelled.

‘Let’s get started then,’ Keith said. ‘Easy first hour, then into the serious stuff.’

As they walked through the bush of the mountain’s
lower
slopes, Angus fell into step beside her. ‘Are you feeling all right?’

Geneva nodded. ‘I’m a bit tired. I didn’t sleep well last night.’

‘This trip’s your baby, isn’t it?’ he said.

Geneva shrugged, retreating into the unruffled silence of the bush. The trees that covered the mountain’s lower slopes were roped with vines, some hanging in loose swathes, some grown into the trunks of their hosts where they bulged like aging veins. On south-facing branches lichens clung in frayed loops, lending a false hint of lushness.

The first stage of the climb was leisurely, Department
of Conservation steps breaking up the steeper sections. When she’d been here with Stephen they’d climbed on the mountain’s western flank, ticking off specific rock pinnacles and bluffs that he had judged worthy. But this was the way he’d come on his last trip.

By mid-morning they were clear of the trees, heading across the boulder strewn slope that led to the rocky bones of Kaitiaki. Through the trees Geneva had shut off all thoughts of the climb, concentrating on the bush, enjoying a day out. Now it was back, sharp-edged at the front of her mind.

‘You could spend a week taking in the main climbs,’ Keith said conversationally. ‘Today’s agenda is the Lizard — unless we want to start with something smaller?’ His eyes ranged from one to the other before drifting up the mountain. ‘Goat Crag’s a good climb,’ he said.

Geneva said nothing, and Angus filled the silence. ‘May as well stay with what we’ve planned,’ he said. ‘We can always do some of the other climbs another day.’

Keith nodded, hitching his pack. ‘Okay. No time like the present. Geneva, do you want to lead?’

The wall of rock he set them on soothed her — there was a lot to be said for letting your body take over, follow
familiar
moves, feel its way on the rock. Mind in neutral. If she let thoughts creep in, she felt anything but neutral. She felt trapped.

She shook sweat from her eyes as she topped their third pitch, relieved to hand the lead back to Angus. As he set off up a smooth curve of rock, Keith came to stand at her shoulder.

‘Doing okay, lass?’

She nodded. He looked ready to say more, and she bent
to retie a shoelace. She could do this. She had to. Keith’s
attention
had turned to Angus. Geneva concentrated on her breathing. When Angus signalled that he was ready, she flexed her fingers and began to climb.

The sun was arcing towards its zenith. Sweat pooled in the small of her back and plastered loose strands of hair to her neck. The short, sharp pitch was the most demanding yet. She felt a muscle strain in her shoulder as she over-reached.

Above her Angus yipped as a rock broke loose and skipped down the slope toward her.

‘Sorry!’ he called.

Geneva froze as it bounced past her, rebounding in expanding leaps until it smacked to a halt on the ledge below. She stared at the spot, her torso pressed tight against the wall, heart thudding against her ribs like a small and terrified animal, trapped there against the rock.

She closed her eyes and laid her cheek against stone. The world seemed to sway and her fingers clenched: if she moved, she’d fall. She pressed herself into the corrugations of rock. If she were smaller there would be handholds, tiny crevices where she could hide. She heard a low moan and forced her eyes open.

The rocks below looked the same, scattered and rough. She could no longer pick out the stone that had fallen. An urge to jump swept through her. Her fingers convulsed. Rock hitting rock; bodies hitting rock.

The sounds around her coalesced into her name. She turned her head a fraction. Her chest ached and her head was filled with buzzing almost loud enough to drown the voice: Keith’s voice. A tiny bubble of sound escaped her.

‘Breathe, Geneva!’

Her lungs were burning. She snatched at a breath and heard it rattle in her chest.

‘Slowly now. In. Out.’

She should have told him about Stephen. Emotion filled her throat, hot and thick as ginger pudding and custard that refused to go down.

‘I want you to climb down now,’ Keith called. ‘Easy does it: step at a time. I’ve got you on the rope.’

Sucking tiny gasps of air, Geneva began to move, one by one stretching her cramped fingers, tentatively feeling with her toes. Her body felt ancient, unwilling. Keith’s voice drew her downwards: two steps; three. Always harder
climbing
down than up. Her foot reached, caught, she shifted her weight then she was falling, her foot slithering, knee grazed, fingers scrabbling for a hold.

The rope took her weight and Keith lowered her down. As her feet touched the ledge she felt his hand on her back. She couldn’t meet his eyes. ‘Sit,’ he said. She felt him unclip her harness.

She slumped obediently, her breath still ragged. Keith squatted in front of her. She pressed her palms flat against the ledge, fingers spread, trying to find something solid to hold on to. Only when she wiped her face on her arm did she notice that she was crying.

‘Spit it out,’ Keith said, one hand resting on her shoulder.

‘I can’t … I can’t do this.’

‘You don’t have to, lass. Not like this.’

Geneva tried to steady her breath. ‘It’s not … I …’

‘Don’t be too hard on yourself,’ Keith said. ‘Give it time.’

Time. Geneva swallowed.

‘Everything all right down there?’ Angus called.

What was Angus going to think? She dropped her head lower. The pressure of Keith’s hand on her shoulder lifted. ‘Come on down,’ she heard him call.

Geneva wiped her face with the back of her hand and counted a rhythm for her breath: in to four, hold for two, out to four.

Angus’s feet dropped to the ledge with a thud. ‘What
happened
? Did you hurt yourself?’ he asked, his voice filled with concern.

Geneva shook her head.

‘You haven’t told him?’ Keith asked.

‘Told me what?’ Angus said into the hollow silence.

Keith put a water bottle into her hand. She studied his boots, where they stood a foot in front of her. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘I think we’d best call it a day.’ Angus began to interrupt but Keith didn’t give him the chance. ‘Something to eat then we’ll head down, nice and slow. When you’re ready, Geneva.’

She looked up and found them both watching her. She nodded. ‘I’m sorry. I … I think I’m okay now.’

Keith nodded. ‘Eat something, then we’ll see.’

Angus dropped his pack and sat beside her. ‘What’s going on?’ he asked.

She took a swig from the water bottle. ‘I … I kind of panicked. I’m okay now.’ She couldn’t meet his eyes and concentrated instead on the slight pressure of his arm against hers, the sun-sparkle in the water through the plastic bottle, the broken sphere of a pebble that lay by her left heel — anything but the reasons for the panic attack. She leant back against the
rock, feeling its strength, its lack of give.

Angus said nothing. After a moment he dug a couple of snack bars from his pack and handed her one. Her throat rebelled against the sticky sweetness but she choked it down, following it with a swallow of water. She wondered how much Keith knew, and why he hadn’t said anything before.

‘Okay,’ Keith’s voice broke into her thoughts. ‘Let’s go, shall we?’

Geneva nodded, feeling for the moment anaesthetised from the emotion which had wracked her. Keith reached for her hand and pulled her up. Angus was slower to find his feet. She felt clumsy and awkward as she reached for her pack.

When they reached the base of the first climb, Keith paused to sort their gear. The climb down had been silent, as if the mountain’s secrets had swallowed all others, leaving no more than an echoing void where words should be.

‘Last chance to admire the view before we head back into the bush,’ Keith said, coiling the rope between elbow and thumb with swift, practised swings.

Geneva’s feet turned obediently. In front of her, Kaitiaki’s skirts spread in successive waves of green, the dips of valleys like folds in the cloth. She felt Angus at her shoulder.

‘You all right?’ he asked.

She nodded. The day felt surreal.

‘What happened?’ Angus continued. ‘I saw you come off. You were climbing down, yeah?’

‘I freaked out. Keith told me to come down.’

‘It happens.’ Angus hesitated. ‘Any idea why?’

Geneva let her eyes wander over the bush. ‘I … I told you I’d done a bit of climbing before. Some of it was here.’

‘You’ve climbed here before?’ he repeated, still not putting it together. How could he? She couldn’t give him the words.

‘A couple of times. Not since — not for a long time.’

Sunlight leaked across the rock where they stood. ‘With Stephen,’ she said finally. ‘I — I should have told you. About him, I mean.’ But she couldn’t, not earlier, and not now. The words clumped in her throat.

Footsteps registered and Keith’s hand fell lightly on her shoulder. ‘Maybe you’d better just spit it out, lass.’

Angus turned to stare at Keith. Geneva swallowed, feeling foolish. She hadn’t lost it like this in months. She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said feebly.

With an impatient jerk, Angus turned. ‘Yeah.’

‘It’s about Stephen,’ she said, clearing her throat. A bird call broke the silence. She took a breath. ‘Stephen died here,’ she said. The words weren’t as hard as she’d feared. She swallowed, keeping her eyes closed, feeling the burn of tears lessen.

‘Climbing,’ Angus stated.

She nodded.

‘The picture in the living room, that’s you and Stephen, right?’ Her father had taken the photo on the trip they’d done to the Pinnacles. She nodded but Angus’s thoughts were
already
two steps ahead. ‘And that’s why you wanted to climb Kaitiaki — because he died here.’ Geneva could hear the foolishness of it in his succinct summary. The silence of the mountain ticked around them, chipping at her sense of who she was.

‘I thought I needed to,’ she said finally.

‘Everyone deals with grief differently,’ Keith replied quietly. ‘There’s no right or wrong way.’

Angus moved abruptly, stooping to pick up his pack. Geneva stared at the set lines of his face. ‘I should have told you,’ she said.

‘Yep,’ he agreed, hitching the pack onto one shoulder as he jumped down to the track that led away toward the trees.

T
he drive home was tense and silent. In other
circumstances
she’d have put it down to tiredness, but the way Angus refused to meet her eyes made it clear it was more than that.

She didn’t blame him for being angry. She should have known she wouldn’t be able to hack it — or at least that it was a possibility, and that possibility was enough to put the trip in jeopardy. She remembered Stephen after a climbing trip when one of his mates had been injured, not seriously, but avoidably. ‘The dork put the lot of us at risk,’ he’d ranted. ‘He knew he wasn’t up to it but he didn’t even warn us. I mean, how could you have focus when your parents are in
meltdown
? His mother looked worse than Chas when she got to the hospital, and she couldn’t even find his dad — turned out he’d shot through the night before. But despite World War Three going on at their place, Chas just decides to tough it out. He nearly took Budgie with him when he came off the wall. Things could have been a lot messier.’ He’d stamped
angrily
around the kitchen.

‘You shouldn’t do that to your mates. One of the
fundamentals
of climbing is you get your headspace right.’

Geneva squeezed her eyelids tight against tears. It had
been crazy to climb Kaitiaki without telling the others why it mattered; without warning them she might lose it.
Resting
her head against the window, Geneva slid her brain into shut-down, letting every rut in the road bounce her forehead against the glass.

At the junction where they’d left her bike Keith got out of the van.

‘Angus.’ She hesitated but he wouldn’t meet her eyes. ‘I need to talk to you…’

He grunted.

‘Can you … Are you doing anything tomorrow?’

‘I’m busy.’

The silence spread thick and muffling as candyfloss, choking in her throat. Grabbing her backpack, Geneva stumbled from the van. Keith was standing at the rear with her bike. ‘How about we throw the bike in the back and I drive you home?’ he suggested.

She shook her head.

‘Lass, don’t beat yourself up about today. It’s not
important
.’

She nodded and took the bike, determined not to cry again in front of them. In the van Angus was staring straight ahead.

‘You take care,’ Keith said, reaching a hand to squeeze her shoulder. She swung herself onto the bike. ‘See you Wednesday,’ he added.

She didn’t think so. Not any Wednesday. There didn’t seem any point in going back to the club. Except … except for Angus.

Geneva rolled away from the sunlight that crept through the skin of her lids, pulling her into consciousness. She must have forgotten to close the curtains. As she moved she felt the twinges that yesterday had left: tightness in her calves,
grittiness
in her eyes and throat.

She curled in on herself, remembering. Would Angus still be angry? It was her fault if he was. If someone had freaked like that with her, stuffed the trip, put them all in danger … She dug her nails into her balled palms. If only she’d told him.

Sitting up, she wrapped her arms around her knees. She wished she’d never heard of climbing; that she lived a million miles away; that Kaitiaki didn’t exist. Most of all, she wished that. The sound of the phone ringing snapped her attention away from wishing. Angus! What would she say? Should she apologise, or try to explain, or —

Her father’s voice at the door interrupted her panic. ‘Genna? Are you awake? Phone for you.’

‘Coming,’ she called, her emotions a volatile mix of
excitement
and dread as she tumbled across the room.

‘Hi Geneva. I just wanted to check how you are,’ a voice announced when she lifted the receiver from the kitchen bench. She couldn’t place who it was.

‘Fine,’ she said. ‘I’m fine. It’s nearly nine,’ she added stupidly.

‘It is.’ There was a hesitation. ‘Is that too early for you?’

Keith! It was Keith. ‘No, I’m usually up way before this. I must have slept in.’ She curled her toes against the tiles.

‘You probably needed it. Look, I think we should talk about yesterday. I don’t want to make a big deal out of it, but I think it would help.’

Geneva didn’t respond.

‘I’ve lost some good mates to the mountains,’ Keith said after a pause. ‘I do know how it feels.’

Geneva nodded, forgetting he couldn’t see her, her fingers tight around the receiver. Across the kitchen Inez jumped from a chair and stretched, her back arching into an
improbable
curve.

‘Come in and see me some time this week, eh? Whenever you like.’

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Maybe.’ Adding belatedly, ‘Thanks.’

‘No problem. Look after yourself, all right? Oh, and it’s none of my business, but maybe you should talk to Angus.’

She made a non-committal sound.

‘Over to you.’

Geneva’s hand was shaking slightly as she returned the phone to its cradle. Keith was right: it was none of his business. She felt cornered, her emotions simmering not far from the boil.

‘Everything okay?’ her father asked, strolling into the kitchen.

Geneva nodded. ‘Fine.’

‘Sounded like a Scottish accent,’ her father continued.

‘I wouldn’t know,’ she snapped.

‘Oh.’ He paused. ‘Sorry.’

Grabbing a battered looking banana from the fruit bowl Geneva marched from the room, leaving both her father and Inez staring after her in surprise.

Geneva had no intention of talking to Keith, or going to the club practice. At lunchtime on Monday she met Dayna in the foyer of the library.

‘Hi, Geneva. Hey, did you pick up a programme for the festival?’ Dayna asked.

Geneva shook her head. ‘I’ve been a bit busy.’ She hesitated. ‘When did you say it starts?’

‘Last weekend. I’ve seen a couple of films already. There’s one on Wednesday that —’

‘I’ll come.’ As soon as the words were out, Geneva wondered whether she’d sounded a bit desperate in her haste, but Dayna didn’t seem to notice.

‘Great! Have you ever seen any of Deepa Mehta’s films?’

Geneva shook her head, contributing little while Dayna rambled on about movies. When the bell rang she was surprised to find the time had gone — and that she felt the better for it. Once or twice Dayna’s acerbic observations had even made her laugh.

‘We can go round to my place first, if you want, so we can change and get something to eat before we head into town.’ She sounded hesitant, the animation she’d shown while she was talking about movies beginning to give way to her more familiar shyness.

‘That sounds good,’ Geneva said, slinging her bag over her shoulder. ‘Anyway, I’ll catch up with you tomorrow in maths.’

‘I’m on library duty at lunchtime.’

‘I’ll come by and say hello.’

Dayna’s face relaxed into a smile. Geneva wasn’t quite convinced about the movie — sub-titles had always seemed
too much like hard work — but she was grateful for the distraction, and she admired Dayna’s enthusiasm. Besides which, it was bound to be less stressful than the climbing club.

To her surprise, Geneva enjoyed the movie. Dayna was a genuine film-buff but she didn’t come on too strong and they had more opinions in common than Geneva had expected. Cycling home afterwards she felt replete, as if she’d regained something she hadn’t realised she’d lost. As she drifted to sleep later that night it occurred to her that, since Kitty’s defection last summer, she’d been lonely.

‘Hi, Angus, it’s Geneva.’

‘Hello.’ He sounded cautious. It was nearly a week since the abortive trip to Kaitiaki, and he hadn’t made any effort to get in touch.

‘I was just wondering how you are. And, I guess I wanted to say sorry.’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘I wondered if we could talk.’

‘Might have been good if we’d done that before now,’ he said, his tone neutral. ‘What happened to you on
Wednesday
?’

‘Something came up.’

‘You could have let someone know.’

‘Yeah, I guess. I’m sorry. Angus?’ She took a breath. ‘It wasn’t that I didn’t want to talk to you about … about Stephen. I just couldn’t. It’s different now. I’d like to try.’

There was a silence. Geneva didn’t break it. The ball was in his court.

‘I could come over tomorrow,’ he said eventually.

‘That’d be great!’ She breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Angus? I’ve missed you.’

A silence stretched between them.

‘I’ll come after lunch,’ Angus said at last.

She spent the morning on edge. When the phone rang at eleven she pounced on it. It was Dayna, full of enthusiasm about another movie. Geneva let her rave for a while
before
agreeing to meet outside the movie theatre the following afternoon. An hour later, Sonya rang.

‘I saw your father in town a couple of days ago,’ she said. ‘We were talking about you and he said you’d wondered whether Kitty might like a kitten. I think it’s a lovely idea.’

Geneva had forgotten it. ‘Oh, right. Good.’ She hesitated. ‘How’s Kitty?’ Geneva had seen her at school a couple of times but by now they were adept at avoiding one another.

‘Making progress. She’ll be off crutches and onto a walking stick in a few weeks, they think.’ Sonya sounded almost too hearty. ‘She finds the physio quite tiring.’ That explained Kitty’s periodic absences from class. ‘Anyway, I won’t keep you. I just wanted to thank you for your support. I know Kitty hasn’t made it easy.’

Understatement. Geneva brushed Sonya’s thanks away, relieved when the call ended. Right at the moment, Kitty was the last thing she wanted to be thinking about.

Inez rubbed up against her legs and Geneva stooped to pick her up, receiving a grateful purr. ‘Why are people so
difficult
?’ she asked.

Inez mewled in reply then, with a quick twist, leapt from Geneva’s arms and strode determinedly towards her bowl.

‘Cupboard love,’ Geneva said, reaching into the pantry for cat biscuits.

The mundane action settled her nerves. She made herself a sandwich and went to see if her mother wanted anything. She was asleep, her face lined and tense, a crumpled tissue wadded in the hand that lay beside her face on the pillow.

Geneva retreated, closing the door quietly behind her.

Soon after, Miriam’s car swung in a broad arc around the gravel parking bay and for a single, horrible moment, Geneva worried that Miriam had come too, ready to muscle her way in with a medley of brisk platitudes. She could scarcely mask her relief when Angus appeared at the door alone, her jangled emotions making their greeting more formal than she’d planned.

‘I’ll make coffee,’ she said. ‘Or tea, if you’d rather?’

‘Whatever.’

She was relieved to keep her back turned and her hands busy. She should have planned this better. Handing him a mug she led the way to the den.

Angus came swiftly to the point. ‘So, what did you want to talk about?’ he asked, dropping into a small, floral armchair: her mother’s.

Geneva folded her legs onto the couch. She could see the tension in his shoulders, his unsmiling face, the leg that jigged as he stared at the room’s pale grey walls, mismatched
paintings
, memorabilia — at anything but her.

‘It’s not easy, talking about it,’ she said.

Angus let out an explosive breath. ‘Neither is having
someone
you thought you knew lose it halfway up a mountain because there’s this whole agenda you know nothing about.’ Abandoning his coffee he surged upright and began to pace the room, pausing in front of the low bookshelf where a handful of framed photos sat in a thin film of dust.

‘I didn’t know I’d react like that,’ Geneva said, watching his stiff back.

Angus turned to look at her. ‘You could have put all our lives at risk, you know that?’

It was true. She stared at her hands, curled tightly in her lap.

‘So why didn’t you tell me?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said. Her face felt wooden. ‘I didn’t think it through. I just thought it would help me, if I climbed the mountain.’

Angus nodded. ‘And I guess I was pretty useful for that.’

Geneva glared, stung by his tone. ‘What do you mean “
useful
”?’

‘You couldn’t climb Kaitiaki on your own. I hope it wasn’t too onerous for you, getting me onside.’

Geneva felt blood rush to her face. ‘You’ve got a nerve! You think —’

‘I’ve got a nerve!’ Angus exploded. ‘You’re the one who doesn’t trust me enough to tell me why we’re climbing the bloody mountain. Keith, yeah, but not me.’

‘I didn’t tell Keith, he —

‘I can’t compete with a ghost, Geneva.’

‘You don’t have to! It’s not about competing! It’s —’

Angus moved abruptly. ‘Well that’s the way it bloody feels!’

A thread of anger laced itself into Geneva’s blood. ‘You
know, it’s not actually about you! Stephen was —’

‘Right. Exactly right! It was never about me. It was about Stephen.’

Colour seethed into Geneva’s face. ‘So what if it was?’ she demanded.

The door suddenly opened to reveal Geneva’s mother, one hand clutching the doorknob as if it was all that was keeping her upright. Her forehead was pulled into a ladder of lines and the shirt she was wearing was inside out. With an effort Geneva controlled her temper.

‘Mum.’

‘Geneva? I heard someone shouting…’

‘It’s nothing, Mum. You don’t need to worry.’

Angus stepped forward. ‘I’m sorry if we disturbed you, Mrs Knowles. It won’t happen again — I’ m just going.’

Geneva turned to glare at him.

‘It was nice to meet you,’ her mother said vaguely.

Geneva swallowed. She hated the battered look her mother habitually wore. She hated the lurch she’d felt when her mother appeared; the feeling that she was being slowly disembowelled. She dug her fingers into the soft upholstery of a chair that stood nearby. ‘Angus —’

Ignoring her, Angus stalked past her mother and along the hall. A moment later she heard the front door close and an engine start. Tears prickled in her eyes. She’d meant to explain, to apologise — she wasn’t sure how it had gone so wrong. From the window she could see the line of dust that the car left lingering above the driveway.