Peaks and Valleys

Tracy shocked me. Until the night she called me Rob, I never had the slightest thought that she would betray me. I thought about it as I drove and hoped neither would be in the office so I could think about the situation before I broke the news to them they'd been caught. I half way hoped to speak with Franklin before I told Tracy and Rob they were history.

Unfortunately, both were at the office when I arrived, but, luckily, both were on the phone so I was able to slip into my office with no fanfare. I looked at the mail I had grabbed on my way in and my heart sank. There was an official envelope from the Nepalese government. I had opened several just like it over the past few years. There was always a letter inside explaining why our outfitter wouldn't be climbing Everest.

I had just opened the envelope when Tracy came into my office and kissed me from across the desk. I know she saw the look of dismay on my face and was about to ask me when she saw the envelope. "Oh," she said. She looked sad, then Rob came in.

"Y'all sit for a moment," I said. I figured to break all of the bad new at once. I was just about to deliver the speech I had composed in my head as I looked at the papers from Nepal. I almost began before I saw the fact that I was holding permits instead of a rejection letter.

"Damn," I thought to myself. "This really mucks shit up."

I should have been overjoyed at the opportunity to climb Everest, but to do so I needed Rob. I alone didn't have the required experience to lead the expedition and I knew the Johansens already had a Kilimanjaro climb slated for themselves. I would have to wait to dissolve everything.

"What's wrong, Rad?" Rob asked from the chair he'd chosen.

"Well," I said trying to make my real displeasure look fake. "It looks like we are going to have to figure out the logistics of taking twelve clients to Nepal to see the top of the world."

They both looked confused for a moment, then it dawned on Tracy what I had just said. "We're climbing Everest?"

I smiled and nodded and Rob jumped up. "Damn, mate, you really had me going. Now we have got real work to do."

We had six weeks and we'd need every last second of it to get ready. My divorce and business dissolution would have to wait.

While we were all planning for the Everest trip, I was making plans of my own. Due to a "mess up" in the flight booking, my flight to Nepal left a day later than everyone else's and my return was two days earlier. I wouldn't get as much rest before flying home, but I would get a two day head start on moving out.

I never got Franklin alone to talk to him, so he'd be just as surprised as anyone when the hammer came down. He stood to come out with his investment intact, either way. I would feel him out on working with me to rebuild.

The day before I flew to Nepal, I saw Herman Schneider one last time. He had an audio he was certain I needed to hear. My blood ran cold as I listened to the chatter. I came away with the same conclusion as he had. They planned to kill me.

* * * * *

I left Herman with instructions to expose my killers if they succeeded.

"You're still going?" he asked me incredulously.

"Yes I am," I said. "This might be my only chance to climb Everest and I'm not gonna let them keep me from it. Besides, that plan is for the descent, you heard him say he wanted me to summit."

"Best of luck to you, Rad," Herman said. "I hope you come out alright."

I thought of the ways they could kill me and figured how to counter each. The most obvious way would be to sabotage my gear. I kept a good eye on my equipment and always double and triple checked everything.

The second way would be for me to have an "accident" during the climb. I would be sure that there was always someone nearby me to see if they did something. Any accidents for me might land them in the clink.

The easiest way to get me would be to tamper with my oxygen. The most likely thing would be to load empty canisters into my pack. I was ready though, because while training for K2, the Johansens had taught me how to climb without oxygen. Many had scaled Everest without oxygen canisters, but it wasn't suggested.

During the weeks of acclimation and climbing to the higher camps, I watched my two "cohorts": like a hawk. I knew whatever they planned would come after summiting. Rob had said he wouldn't deprive me of that. "Besides," he'd told Tracy. "Look at the sympathy we can generate if our founder dies on Everest." My lawyer had been left with instructions to work with Herman. There would be no business if I died. They would go to jail and my grandparents would get my assets. We were at Camp Three doing practice climbs when Rob almost died.

Rob was about sixty feet ahead of me on the slope when the crampon on his left foot snapped, sending him hurtling down towards our group. Two of our porters, Dawa Norgay Sherpa and his brother Mingmar Gaylay Sherpa tried to arrest his slide and were knocked down themselves. Luckily they stopped their fall before they slid any distance. I managed to brace myself with my ice axe and caught Rob before he could hit anyone else.

We departed for Camp Four a day later. Rob was wearing my spare crampons since his couldn't be repaired. Tracy had tried to initiate sex a couple of times, but I remembered a Sherpa legend about the gods frowning upon fornication on their slopes. She knew I wasn't particularly superstitious, but I pointed out the ill-fated 1996 climb after a TV personality had snuck a lover on the hill for a tryst.

I wasn't sure if I bought into the whole legend or not, but on my first, and possibly last, climb I wasn't taking chances, nor was I sticking my cock into a shared pussy. Perhaps had I not been avoiding her I might have noticed the next issue sooner than I did.

We arrived at Camp Four just before sunset. As Tracy, Rob and I settled into the tent that would shelter us for the next few hours, I noticed Tracy's skin had a bluish hue to it. I pulled her closer to me and I could hear her breathing. I knew from experience that she had high altitude pulmonary edema. Tracy was literally drowning in her own fluids. I had heard of the condition but had never witnessed it. Rob had disappeared for the moment so I couldn't consult him, so I went to find Jim Smythe, the medic on our climb.

Jim agreed with me that Tracy should return to Camp Three to be evacuated as soon as possible. He went to find a porter to escort her while I went to tell her that she needed to go back down.

"I am not leaving this climb, you asshole! Why are you doing this?" she screamed when I told her.

"Tracy, damn it, you can die if you don't go."

"Damn it, Rad, I have waited just as long as you have to make this climb and not you, nor Jim nor Rob will tell me I can't make it!"

"Damn it! Stop being a stubborn ass and listen to me. I want to be a divorcee not a damn widower! I am telling Rob and the Sherpas that you will not be climbing with us. You are leaving the mountain A S A fucking P!"

"Divorce me? You want to divorce me for climbing a mountain without your permission? Fuck you, Rad."

"No I'm divorcing you for fucking that douche bag, Rob. You are not climbing."

I grabbed my pack and left the tent. I found Jim and two Sherpas and informed them that Tracy was being stubborn and would not be climbing. Jim assured me that she would be taken back down and moved to a hospital for treatment.

I busied myself melting ice for drinking water and rechecking my equipment. I noticed that either Tracy or Rob had loaded my pack with oxygen cylinders. I surmised that they were empties from the return pile and went to find full bottles. I looked into the tent I had been in with Tracy and discovered her pack was gone. I assumed that the Sherpas had taken her back down the hill. I also discovered that the full oxygen supply had been depleted. I thanked God once more for the Johansens.

At one thirty in the morning, Rob approached me and yelled over the howling wind that I was in the anchor group and the lead was pulling out in ten minutes. I couldn't see his face so I had no idea whether or not Tracy had told him that they'd been discovered before she left.

A few minutes later, I could see the lights from the lead party heading up the trail toward the summit. The second and third group soon followed, then my group started toward the top. A couple of hours before sunrise I could see the lights from the lead group. I counted four climbers. I knew when I saw four in the second group that somehow Tracy had joined the first group for the climb.

I had to put her out of my mind and concentrate on my breathing. I knew I probably only had enough oxygen to summit and then I'd run out. I was being as conservative with my meager supply as I possibly could.

As the sun came up, my group was waiting for the last member of the third group to scale the icefall that led to the final climb. I was concerned because I had used more oxygen up to that point than I had intended to. I knew it would be a fight to the summit because already my body was breaking down. My muscles burned with their lack of oxygenated blood and every step was like I was carrying a truck on my back.

After what seemed like several grueling hours, I saw the first group reach the summit and begin their descent. I could see one member of the lead group stumbling a lot as another tried to help. Helping someone too much up there could spell death for both people, but as long as the one being helped was able to move along, they might be okay.

As the first group approached my position, I could see that it was Tracy who was stumbling. Rob was helping her as much as he could. As they neared me, I saw just how bad she was. I could hear her rattling chest over the wind. Rob was weary from helping her and didn't look like he would make it down. He knew that extra exertion on the mountain could mean death.

They brushed past me as I worked my way up, and I gave a quick prayer for their safe descent, but I had to put my full concentration back into what I was doing. A slight distraction can kill you on Everest.

An hour later I stood at the top of the world. For a moment, I allowed myself to just take in the view. Growing up in Texas I never imagined such heights; now I was as higher than many would ever be. I was also one of a select handful of people to scale the highest peaks on every continent.

I stepped off the summit and began my descent. I could see a line coming up the ridge and wondered if they'd all summit in time to make it back to the camp before dark. I was dismayed to discover that the oxygen bottle I was using was empty. I had three more in my pack, but I had figured they were also empty, so I was surprised to get a lung full of oxygen from the bottle I had just opened.

I didn't ponder the situation because walking back down was taking just as much effort as the climb had taken. As I neared the icefalls, I saw a pack in the snow. It was Tracy's. She had an identical pack to the one I wore. I knew them apart because mine was missing a zipper pull. It had been broken off during my Kilimanjaro climb a few years earlier. When I got to the bottom of the fall, I found her. She was breathing, but barely. I took the oxygen bottle I was using and put it to her face. Her eyes fluttered.

"You have to keep moving," I told her. The further down you get the easier it is for the Sherpas to help you." She nodded her understanding.

With the help of another member of my group I was able to get her back onto her feet. I gave her one more bottle of oxygen from my pack and returned to my descent. As I crested a ridge above Camp Four I saw him. Rob was staggering along and almost fell off the edge. I took a good pull off my remaining bottle of oxygen in case I had to give it to him, but as I neared him, he fell off the side.

I heard him hit the slope below and knew there was nothing I could do but get to the camp and send the Sherpas back to find him. I met three of them as I made it to camp. They were on their way to get Tracy and one other climber who hadn't made it from the second group. In camp I sent the remaining porters after Rob.

I sat in the medical tent for an hour breathing, from the larger oxygen bottles that were there and recovering to make the descent to Camp Three. One Sherpa came in and told Jim Smythe that Rob was dead. What they found would be on my mind all the way home.

Tracy was carried to Camp Two where she was helicoptered out. I got word of her condition as I left for home two weeks later. It struck me on the flight home what had happened, and I made a few phone calls from the air phone. It was costly but I needed things done by time I got back to Boulder.

* * * * *

Franklin had been told about Tracy's and Rob's deaths before I got home. I sat in the office as he wheeled his way in.

"Rad, I'm so grief stricken over Rob and Tracy. How are you holding up?"

"I'm sure you are sad, Frankie," I said knowing he hated to be called that. "You're probably even sadder that your plan failed asshole."

"Wait. What? Rad I know you're hurting but..."

"Shut the fuck up, you phony fuck. I know you tried to kill me. I know you and Rob planned to kill me and you planned to kill Rob, only Rob fucked up your plans."

If looks could kill I would have been dead right there. "You are insane, Rad. How did you ever come up with such a wild theory?"

"It's simple, Frankie. You tried to kill me by sabotaging my crampons. Same way you tried to kill Rob. But you see, I never climb with the set I kept at the office. The set my grandfather gave me for graduation is the set I wear to actually climb in. The other set I take in case someone needs a set...like Rob did after his set you messed with broke on a practice climb."

I could see the realization hitting him as I continued. "Then Rob tried to load my pack with empty oxygen bottles, only he fouled up and loaded Tracy's pack instead. Tracy had no oxygen and Rob died when the spare set of crampons failed. You were the only one who had access to those crampons, Frankie. Rob knew I don't wear them on climbs like this nor would he have climbed knowing he was wearing defective gear."

I saw tears flowing as he realized he was fucked. "I loved Tracy," he said. "Being paralyzed meant I could never please her like a man should please his woman. I allowed her to get her sex from anyone she fancied. Then, before her ski trip to Colorado, she caught me experimenting with a guy we knew. I was drunk and allowed him to use me orally, so to speak. Tracy broke up with me and met you."

Tracy had told me about an ex that had turned gay. Until I got back from Everest, I had no Idea Franklin was that ex. Herman had dug that up after hearing more audio from Tracy's purse.

"So when Tracy's dad suggested that we make you a partner, you were just trying to get her back?"

"Yes," he admitted. "I wanted her back and knew you had to die. She was dedicated to you."

"So dedicated she fucked my partner."

"I was shocked about that too Rad. He was a charmer but I never figured out how he got to her. My guess is he played on her fear while you were on K2. I blackmailed her into continuing though."

"I know," I said looking up to see the shock on his face. "I've had her under surveillance since I got back. I heard you telling her to keep fucking him. I also heard Rob talking about killing me to some other floozy. Oh, by the way, Detective Rodriguez from the Boulder PD is waiting outside to talk to you. Oh, and Frankie...I cancelled the insurance policies before I left for Nepal. As CEO I have that power, so you can cancel the handicapped equipped Corvette you ordered."

"Oh, and Frankie, Tracy is alive...barely. She might live long enough to meet your cell mate."

* * * * *

As I stand on top of the world for the third time, I recall the events of the past six years. Tracy never fully recovered from her edema and died a year later. She lived long enough to see her lover imprisoned for Rob's murder. She gave me a quick divorce. Since we had no children, it was simple. She returned to live out her remaining months with her parents.

Franklin was sentenced to fifteen years. His wheelchair bought him some sympathy, but in the end he had to do his time. I never heard anything about him after he went in.

Four women came forward to try to claim Rob's share of my business in the name of his bastard children. In the end they got nothing, because my attorney had dissolved the business during the three months I was in Nepal. Tracy's father got his investment back and I had enough left over to self-fund a few climbs.

Gray and I opened an outfitter business the next spring. He leads the raft and kayak side, while I handle the climbing and mountaineering aspect. We joined forces with the Johansens to provide global climbing experiences for our clients.

I look out over the world, and fancy that I can see the spot where my wedding ring landed when I flung it from the summit during my second climb of the world's highest peak. I can still remember the morning sun glinting off it as it descended out over the snow-covered peak. I've spent my moment at the top, now I head back down.

I will spend a part of the following months in Sweden with Inge. We have a casual relationship now, but recently I've sensed that she wants more. After we get back from Nepal, I will see where more leads us.

Fin