Fiction 2
A Flash of Gold, continued from fiction 1
Dorothy turned to Foster. "What now?" She asked in a low voice.
"I guess we have to go back."
"We can’t possibly make it back in time for your meeting if we go all the way back. It’s a long ways, rough, steep, and it will get dark soon." She looked up. A long steep slope of dirt and scree rose fifty feet to a 25-foot wall of vertical rock. Trees grew sparsely in the bank. She knew from experience that there were breaks and chimneys in the cliff.
"Can we get up that way?" he asked.
"Maybe." She started up. It was steep and there was ice under the leaves. She slid back down. Tried again, and slid down again. He watched. She realized that he might be able, with his lean body, long arms and legs, to make it up even if she could not.
"You go. You can probably make it. Go to your meeting. I have a headlamp in my pocket. I can go back the other way."
"But we left your car at Danzer's."
"I'll walk to the pizza place down the street from
"No! I'll call on my cell phone and tell them I'm held up. In a few minutes, when I know someone will be there."
Dorothy turned and started back. She moved slowly. She'd been hurrying as fast as she could and now she was tired and discouraged. It was a long ways back, and in the twilight, the trail was hard to see. What trail? The trail was submerged. There was no trail. She picked her way carefully back the other way, feeling slow, feeling like she was holding Foster up.
"Go ahead without me,” she said again.
Again he refused. She looked ahead, and up toward the cliffs. There was a flash of gold. A small yellow bird flitted through the hemlocks. A warbler, probably, though it was hard to tell in the fading light.
Then she recognized the spot. "Foster," she said, excitedly, “this is where I found your ring. Right up there," she pointed. "Look, the trees here are closer together, maybe we could get up here."
He waited, saying nothing. She scrambled up to the first tree, holding roots and braches, slipping back, catching herself, scrambling forward. They had progressed back to the south far enough that there was no snow or ice, but the soil was soft, wet and muddy, the rocks were loose and it was steep. She followed a fallen tree up to another tree, and then Foster was beside her. He'd climbed up in a twinkling what for her had been a struggle.
She crawled up along a downed grapevine, hand over hand, setting her feet, pulling herself forward. Her heart started thumping. She was breathing hard. Foster scrambled lightly up beside her. They continued this way until they were about halfway up the steep slope below the rocky cliff-top. Her breath was ragged and burning, her heart pounding painfully, but Foster in his tweed sports jacket and twill pants looked entirely unruffled. She had mud on her face and hands, caked on her knees, jammed under her nails, and all over her jacket and hat, and he looked like he had just stepped off the pulpit. She was exhausted. She wanted to tell him to just go ahead, but she knew he would not leave her in such a dangerous place where one missed step could send her plunging down the embankment. Even Billy Angel would have stuck with her at this point, if angrily. She wished she could rest, but it was getting darker and colder by the second.
Her heart was still pounding when she started forward. She made it up to a crag of a stump, then up a fallen tree to a standing one. Then there was nowhere to go. Just an open empty slide of crumbling mud and rock. Somehow, Foster scrambled ahead and grabbed a tree, extending his arm down. She took his hand and he hauled her up.
“Thanks,” she said. “And you are cute.”
He blushed. Even in the near dark, it showed. He went ahead, pulled her forward. They went on like this now, repeating and repeating. "Are you anchored?" she asked, each time, not wanted to send them both hurtling down. "Are you sure?"
Finally, they reached a group of fallen trees and used them to make it to the top of the dirt cliff--and to the bottom of the rock. "I have to rest," she said.
"It looks like we might get up over there," he said, pointing. "Shall I go look?"
"Sure. It'll give me a chance to catch my breath." He disappeared into the gathering gloom and she studied the rocks above her. It looked as if they might be climbable. There was a twisting chimney with steps--surely Foster could climb it. But could she? Even if she might have been able to earlier, she was getting more and more tired.
When he came back, he said he might be able to get up the rocks where he's looked, but wasn't sure if she could. She pointed up. "How about there?"
There wasn’t much to see now, a faint opening in the lower rocks, a rectangular space in the dark sky above. "Shall I check?"
"Yeah."
Dorothy waited, her heart still pounding in her ears, her chest hurting. She was balanced precariously on the edge of the near precipice, which was muddy and slippery. She held onto the edge of a rotted stump, not sure that if she started sliding it would hold her. She wondered if her heart was pounding from the exertion, the nervous fear, or both. Her chest hurt, and she reminded herself that she had just had a EKG stress test and the doctor had told her her heart was fine. It didn't feel fine. Was he sure? What if he was wrong and she had a heart attack right here, below the cliffs on this high muddy bank?
She scrabbled up to the edge of the rocks where the hill leveled slightly and tried to grasp the stable rocks, but they were covered with mud and leaves and the mud was starting to freeze as the cold of evening deepened. She used her hands to clean some of the mud from the rocks hoping to get a better grip, but more slumped down and her hands were getting muddy and numb.
Finally, she got a grip on the rocks. I can't hold this too long, my hands are too cold. We could get stranded right here, and die of hypothermia. And hopefully not. She needed to keep up her spirits.
Foster reappeared in the darkness. "Well, I can get up there, at least to the first level, and I think I can help you up, too. Let’s try." He disappeared into the gloom and Dorothy followed slowly, dragging herself up along the rocks, gasping and panting, her heart crashing. She felt unbearably heavy and tired. Heart attack, she thought. No, I have a good heart. I’m just tired lugging this heavy body up these steep rocks.
The rocks were slimy with mud and leaves and newly forming ice. There were few secure hand holds. Her butt was absurdly heavy and hard to pull op the rocks. I'm no spring chicken, she thought, ruefully.
She was climbing through the chimney, up step-like rocks, each much higher, much much higher, than normal steps on stairs. But then she came to a step which was too high. By stretching her leg up, she could barely jam her foot on the edge, and could find no handholds. There's no way I can get up this, she thought.
Then Foster reached from the darkness head with his hand.
"Are you secure?" she asked. "Because, if not, we'll both fall and that would not be fun."
He assured her he was and stretched his hand to hers. He was wearing gloves and they were soggy with mud. She thought it would be better if she could grasp his wrist and he hers, but she could reach it, so she held tight to the gloved hand, hoping the sodden glove would not pull off. His hand closed tightly and reassuringly around hers.
She heaved and he pulled and nothing happened. Then slowly she rose into the narrow chimney which he was already occupying. There was nowhere to go but beside him, crushed in an opening that would hardly contain her bulk, never mind his. She was pressed against the preacher in a way she could never have imagined. Her heart pounded louder than ever--could he hear it? Feel it?
Somehow, they had to move to continue upward.
Carefully, she slid her foot backwards, looking for the farthest edge of stone. She felt for hand holds and backed away until she hung precariously backwards and he was able to turn and continue up. As soon as his back leg lifted from the hole, she eased gratefully forward and followed him up the slick rocks.
Slowly. Pausing for breath. She could hear him waiting. "I'm so sorry, Foster," She said. "I'm so tired. I'm not sure I can do this. I may not be able to go any farther, I'm too bushed."
"We'll wait, then." He sounded calm and patient. Billy Angel would never in a million years have sounded that calm and patient. He would have been angry, cursing, trying to hurry her. Except maybe when they were courting. Dorothy wondered if Foster was abusive to Clara after the courtship period was over. She couldn't imagine it. She was more likely abusive to him.
He was still waiting, patiently. But what if she just couldn't do it. At all?
Next was another high step, maybe even higher than the last one. He had those long lean legs. Hers were short and round. They hadn't always been round, but they were now. Ironically, it was she that had been a mountain climber all her life, not Foster. And it was she who was the weak link in this chain. But she had always been at least somewhat thinner, until recently. After menopause, she had gotten steadily fatter.
"I was remembering how you helped out with the relief drive for the Tsunami victims," Foster said. “Such hard tireless work. Such organizational skills."
"All ropes and lights," Dorothy answered. “I was devastated by the immensity of the tragedy. I hate to see even a worm suffer on the road or a raccoon get hit by a car. Human suffering is so painful to me. Especially the children. But I'm not that organized and can be fairly lazy. You're trying to encourage me, I know, but it won’t make my body lighter or less exhausted."
"I do want to encourage you. And I think you are brave and strong and an amazing woman."
"Oh, piddle; I am just the opposite of that. I struggle every minute. Well, lots of them, anyway."
"And you accomplish a lot. I've seen you in Sunday school and in choir and raising money for the homeless. What you accomplish, in spite of all your protests, is incredible."
"You wouldn't say that if you really knew me. If you saw the mess in my house and the mess in my life."
"Yes I would. Come on, give me your hand, let's get one step higher."
Dorothy couldn't reach his hand. He stretched farther and farther down and she farther up, pressing against the dripping icy rock. As their fingers touched she started to slip back. Back toward the edge, toward the precipice. She dug her nails into the rocks as slid, and they broke, tearing into the quick. Then they held and she scrambled panting back into the hole. Inching carefully forward, panting, crying silently, she tried again. This time, she got the soggy glove. He heaved and she pushed. Nothing.
"I have to get my breath." He was bent over, stretched tight. It probably hurt him. But all he said was. "Okay, try again." He pulled, she pushed, and she rose slowly up the rock until her butt was poised in space over the cliff with 65 feet of nothing and rocks below. She was afraid he'd drop her and she'd tumble to her death.
Then she was in his arms again, in the tiny press of rock, the damp walls close around them, his lean minister body warm and moist with exertion. She shivered. He tightened his arm around her. Pulled her closer. Squeezed her. Gently.
"Dorothy," he said, "Will you marry me?"
"Foster Clarence Lovejoy!" she said, "You don't ask a lady to marry you on your first date, all mud and crud and tears on the side of a cliff. We might not even live through the hour."
"All the more reason to say yes."
"No. I won't say yes. Not now. But I will say maybe. I will say this: if we live through the night and after you have a chance to think about it when we're not pressed together like this, if you still want to, I will allow you to court me. I will say yes to that."
"Yes, what a sweet word yes is. I think we will marry. I'm so happy."
She looked up at him and he kissed her. Long and sweet.
"Maybe," she reminded him. She was smiling, but she wasn't sure he could see her smile in the dark. She backed away and he reached up to the next level. There was a ledge up there, and more steep rock above that. He disappeared into the darkness and returned a few moments later.
"Give me your hand," he said. She reached out to him, and he pulled her gently up. She could have climbed this step, it wasn't as high as the last one and there were lots of handholds. But she let him help her. She looked up at the next cliffs. The chimney continued up, narrow and steep.
"Guess what?" he asked.
"What?"
"This ledge leads around to a break in the rock. We can just walk along the ledge, though the break, through the woods to the trail and back to the car."
"Really? You're joking right?"
"I am absolutely serious."
She turned on the indiglo on her watch. "It's
"Will you have dinner with me after the meeting? I want to start courting you. Immediately."
"You're supposed to wait a little and see how you feel."
"I know how I feel," he said, pulling her close and kissing her. And kissing her. She kissed him back.
"Well, okay, then, my house after the meeting."
He reached in his pocket and slipped his wedding band back onto her pointer finger. "This is just to wear until I get you a real one. Just a reminder of tonight. And may we never throw our rings over a cliff or lose them in any kind of dough."
"Amen."
If he didn't faint when he saw the mess in her house, maybe they would marry. Someday. Tonight, if she could ever scrub the caked mud off her hands, and if her dumb heart would just stop pounding, she'd whomp up a mighty fine dinner for two. With candles.
Mary Stebbins
Available 
(0504022b; 050401—first draft finished
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