The Art of Holding On and Letting Go (2 page)

She paused on one tiptoe, her right leg trembling. Sewing machine leg, when your muscle fibers twitch uncontrollably from fatigue. Or Elvis leg, as Uncle Max liked to call it. She needed to drop her heel. Like right now.

My hands rose to my face as Becky soared off the wall, arms and legs spread wide.

The crowd groaned, and Coach Mel swore. I cringed. We'd have to wait for the scores later, but she must be out. I couldn't imagine coming all this way to be eliminated during the qualifying rounds.

I waited, but Becky didn't join our team in the stands. Climbing was a weird sport that way. Officially, we were the USA team, but we all had to compete individually. We lived and trained in different places, and we were all competing against each other.

I watched the rest of the competitors, my neck growing more and more stiff and cricked from looking up at the climbing wall. I rolled my head around to relax the muscles. I needed to stand and stretch, move.

“I'm going for a walk,” I said to Coach Mel.

She nodded without turning to look at me, her eyes focused on a climber from Germany on the wall.

I went back to the isolation tent to get money from my backpack. A volunteer escorted me inside; they had to make sure I didn't talk to anyone who was still waiting to climb. My chunk of pyrite sat beside my pack where I had left it, and I zipped it into a pocket for safekeeping. I didn't see my thermos of peppermint tea, though. Thanks, Becky.

Back outside in the competition area, I spied Becky with her parents huddled in a corner. I expected to see them consoling her, but they looked at a phone and her dad's huge camera—talking and gesturing. Were they analyzing her climb, trying to strategize? I was curious, but I didn't join them. I still didn't know what to say to her. But if she wasn't crushed about her fall, I wasn't going to feel bad either. Finally, the jittery tension unwound from my muscles.

I darted through and around clumps of spectators, disappearing into the crowd. Outside the competition area, a colorful market lined the sidewalk. It wasn't as big as other markets I had been to in other countries; it seemed to have popped up just for tourists at the climbing event. Even with all of my traveling, this was my first time wandering off by myself. The freedom made me giddy; light and airy enough to skip. My parents must be feeling that way too. Way up high on the summit of Mount Chimborazo, the top of the world!

I wandered from one table to the next, gazing at hand-sewn purses, leather belts, and scarves. The alpaca wool blankets looked so soft, the colors vibrant, the patterns intricate, but I was afraid to stop and touch them. When I was in China with my parents last year, the rule was, “You touch it, you buy it.” The vendors wouldn't leave us alone if we showed the slightest interest.

A man motioned to a tall stack of black fedoras as I passed his table.
“
Señorita
?”

I smiled but kept moving. He didn't call after me, and the woman at the next table didn't even look up from her weaving. Not like in China where they followed us. “You likee, you likee? Big daddy have money. Big daddy buy.” It had been so funny to see the little Chinese men and women herding my tall, burly Dad toward their stalls.

I smelled smoke and roasting meat, but I didn't see any food. I didn't seek it out, either, because I'd heard they ate guinea pigs, and that I did not want to see.

I finally gave in to my urge to touch the colorful wool, running my hand along a row of striped blankets, soft as cashmere. I hoped they were still here when my parents got back, so we could buy one to take home.

Up ahead, a woman sat on a bright red blanket, jewelry spread out at her feet. I wasn't one to wear much jewelry, I didn't even have my ears pierced, but I hovered over a row of beaded bracelets.

The woman wore a dark green fedora and a white peasant top. She had a baby wrapped in a rainbow-striped sling with a mass of dark hair peeking out. Even the baby had her ears pierced.

“Buena suerte,” the woman said, lifting a bracelet and motioning for me to hold out my arm. I crouched at the edge of her blanket, and she slid the bracelet onto my wrist.

The beads were ivory with swirls of chocolate and caramel, weathered looking, and strung with an almost invisible elastic. They looked ancient, like maybe they really could bring good luck.

“Taguas,” she said.

I squinted at her.
“Taguas?”

She reached into a wooden box of beads and pulled up a handful, letting them slowly fall through her fingers.
“Taguas.”

“Taguas.” I pointed and smiled. “Gracias. Uno mas, por favor,” I said. “Para mi madre.”

She nodded and handed me a second bracelet. This one was a rainbow of colored beads. Not quite pastels, but not bright either, they almost looked edible.

“Gracias,” I said and handed over my money.

“Buena suerte,” she said again.

I headed back to the competition, repeating taguas and buena suerte out loud, enjoying the sound of Spanish rolling off my tongue.

By early evening, the climbing judges announced the competitors who would advance to the semifinals. My stomach fluttered when my name was called, even though I expected it. I grinned and shrugged off my teammates' congrats. Four out of six of us were advancing, but I was the only girl.

I caught Becky's eye, still unsure what to say. “It was a really tricky route.”

She shrugged. “I don't know how you do it, you climb like a freaking snail. At least Mama is off my back now. Daddy got the best shots of me climbing, wait until you see.”

I half-laughed, half-snorted. Unbelievable. She'd altered her climbing style to pause long enough for good pictures! She held out her phone, and our teammates gathered to see. Instead of climbing, she'd been posing. She'd flown a gazillion miles from home just to enhance her brand. I shook my head, completely unable to relate.

Our team returned to the hostel for dinner, jostling and joking as we stomped through the entryway. Our host was an American expat, a mountaineer who came to Ecuador to climb twenty years ago and never left. My parents had shared adventure stories with him before leaving for their expedition. He had a salt-and-pepper beard and switched back and forth from English with us to rapid-fire Spanish with his staff. His last name was crazy long and Polish, but he told us to call him Mr. S.

He asked us about the competition, and Zach grabbed my wrist and thrust it up in the air.

“The championess!” he shouted.

Becky's eyes were laser beams. I jerked my arm out of Zach's grasp and elbowed him. I'd compete with Becky on the climbing wall but not over a boy. Zach was cute but like a brother to me. We'd climbed together at the same cliffs when I lived in Colorado years ago.

“Congratulations,” Mr. S. said. “Ah, tagua nuts.” He pointed to the bracelet on my wrist.

“Nuts?”

“Tagua nuts come from a palm tree that grows here. It's also called vegetable ivory. Much better than killing elephants for their tusks. It can be carved into all kinds of shapes for jewelry or buttons or figurines. Sometimes they're left natural, and sometimes they're dyed and polished.”

Each of the small, round beads on my bracelet was slightly different in coloring. “Are they supposed to bring good luck?”

“Sure. Buena suerte.” He laughed. “Why not?”

Becky leaned closer, and I held up my wrist for her to examine the bracelet. She snapped a picture with her phone.

“I have something special to show you,” Mr. S. said. “A volcano began erupting today. Tungurahua has been belching since early morning. Don't worry, we're not in any danger—it's pretty far away. But come up to the deck and see.”

We followed him to the deck and draped our arms over the railing, searching the distant horizon.

He pointed to the south. “The sky is filled with ash.”

“I don't see any lava,” Coach Mel said.

“No lava this time,” Mr. S. explained, “just plumes of ash spewing everywhere.”

“It looks like LA smog,” I said. From the mountaintops near my home in the Angeles Forest, the city often appeared as a smudge in the distance.

“Tungurahua means Throat of Fire. We used to think these volcanoes were dormant, but Tungurahua came to life in 1999. Some days are quiet, but other days it puts on a show.” Mr. S. turned to me. “Depending on the winds, climbers may need to turn away from their summit attempts on Mount Chimborazo and the other nearby peaks. The ash is blinding, like a snowstorm.”

I froze, then leaned in closer to catch Mr. S.'s words.

“Too bad your parents might not be able to summit, but they'll be back early now, huh, to watch their
championess
climb.”

I stared at Mr. S., but before I could fully process his words, my teammates whooped and hollered, jabbing my shoulder, slapping me on the back. I had been holding my breath, and now it came out as a gasp.

“Time for dinner,” Coach Mel said, clapping her hands. “Fuel for tomorrow.”

As my team filed back into the lodge, Mr. S. nodded at me. “I didn't mean to worry you. Your parents are experienced mountaineers; they know how to stay safe. Tungurahua's eruptions interfere with many climbs on the surrounding mountains. It's the chance you take here.”

I looked back at the smoky sky. Climbers caught in any kind of storm was bad news, whether it was snow or volcanic ash, whether they were experienced or not.

“Your parents should be here watching you anyway,” Mr. S. said. “Come on, let's eat. Our cook has prepared a special meal. Sea bass, fried plantains.”

Later that night, I lay awake, listening to Coach Mel snore from her bed across the room. A lantern sat on the bedside table; she hadn't let me light the candle inside. Toxic fumes from Becky's manicure session hung in the air, stinging my nose. They were probably flammable.

Becky hadn't been happy with our rustic rooms. She lived in a big house near Atlanta, two hours away from rock-climbing mountains. Becky did most of her climbing in the gym. The wood-planked walls and floors of the hostel were comforting to me though, like my cabin in the mountains.

It wasn't like we were poor, but we really had to save and rely on sponsors for our gear and travel. Becky posted pictures from her first-class airplane seats, and her bedroom closet looked like a Lululemon store.

Becky sighed from the top bunk and rolled over, shaking the flimsy bed frame. “Zach likes you,” she whispered.

“Me? You've got the boobs and fancy nails.”

“You are blind.”

Her accent made me smile. “I'm just one of the guys.”

I wasn't here to find a boyfriend. Or become an Internet star.

“Sorry I lost your good-luck thermos,” she said.

We had searched but hadn't found it. Someone must have picked it up; it wasn't like the isolation tent was that big.

“It's okay. I'll check the lost and found tomorrow.” I spoke like it wasn't a big deal, but my stomach fluttered at the thought of climbing without my calming peppermint tea. “What really happened on the wall today?” I asked. “You weren't climbing like yourself.”

“I knew I wasn't in the right position to make it over the crux. I was going to have to back down a few feet and start over, and then I would run out of time.”

“So you just gave up?”

“I turned it into a better opportunity,” she said. “I could feel my dad's camera zooming in.”

“You might have been surprised at what you could do.”

“I wasn't going to flail on the wall and get caught in all kinds of awful pictures. I had to let go before someone got footage of my sewing machine leg. If I was going to fall, I was going to look good doing it.”

So she had let go and flew like Peter Pan. I clasped my hands behind my head. There had to be more to it. The springs of the bunk above me glimmered faintly in the dim light.

A deep snuffling snore erupted from Coach Mel, and Becky and I stifled our laughter.

“Who's that Max guy that's out with your parents?” she asked. “He's hot.”

“Eww. Uncle Max is almost the same age as my dad.”

Becky giggled. “He's still cute. Even my mom called him hunky.”

I snorted. “He's not really my uncle. He and my dad have been best friends and climbing partners since they were teenagers.”
Plus he's gay
. But I wasn't going to share that with Becky. Max was well known in the climbing world, but his private life was private.

Becky sighed again and was quiet.

At least I still had my worry stone from Uncle Max. He had lived with us on and off for as long as I could remember, especially in the winters when it was cold outside. It was like I had three parents. He'd followed us all around the country. Each time we moved, he'd be right behind us in his little VW van, sometimes the same day, sometimes a year later. But he always showed up eventually. I knew he'd had boyfriends over the years, but they never seemed to last long.

I twirled my new bracelet around my wrist. My mind was finally quiet enough to sort out the reality of the Tungurahua eruption and what Mr. S hadn't said. My parents and Uncle Max should have reached the summit of Mount Chimborazo early this morning. The volcanic ash storm may have prevented climbers from beginning their expeditions today, but what about the climbers who were already on the summit?

Six months before our Ecuador trip, a rock had crumbled in Dad's hand, and he'd taken a forty-foot whipper off the cliff, the rope stopping his fall barely ten feet from a giant boulder on the ground. I could picture my dad perched on the cliff like a great bird. Big and powerful, yet full of grace, like an eagle. Until he wasn't.

They'd be fine. Just like Mr. S. had said, they were experienced mountaineers. They knew how to stay safe.

A veil of dust obscured the mountains in the distance, but the sun burned bright for the rock climbing semifinals. I clung to the climbing wall twenty feet above the ground. Not a desperate cling, it was more like static electricity. I actually felt a magnetic power. My foot balanced on a dime-sized nub of faux rock. I pivoted, reached for the next hold, and pinched the thin flake. I inched my feet up the wall beneath me, rubber-soled climbing shoes gripping the vertical surface. My chest rose and fell with each slow, steady breath.