FirstLineFiction beta

from Contest #8

'I wouldn't do that if I were you,' she told me the first time we met. It was lucky for me that I was, not only, being supported by my friend, Harry, but I was also a very productive gym member. What does this mean? With her startling me in the middle of my climb, I didn't plummit to my death. Instead, using the newly defined arm muscles I worked so very hard for, I clung to the wall at the nearest ledges and pulled myself up. As I struggled to regain my footing, I heard giggling coming from below. I tried to glare down to express my aggravation, but trying to face downward, while up so high, while holding myself up, and attempting to form a pissed off expression at the annoyingly obvious novice Rock City Climb members, caused me to lose my other footing, and spin around. I hear Harry's grunt as he is abruptly handed all my weight. I can't help but curse out loud.

"Careful there, Jay," Harry yells with a strained voice. He gives me slack to work with.

"I know. I got it," I say stiffly. I feel my knee caps swelling, and accept the new bruises as additions to my "screw up" collection. A few from my first climbing adventures, a few from my attempts to show off, and the one, huge bruise along the back of my arm from slipping in the shower. But, of course I told Harry I was being a "real man" and decided to scale the cliffs by Asheworth's Lake, all by myself. He didn't believe I was dumb enough to climb on my own with no equiptment. I replied with two words: adrenaline rush. He rolled his eyes and laughed.

"Screw it," I call down to him. "Just get me down." I've had enough scares for one day. As he lowers me down, and I push off the wall, bouncing as I descend, I wonder if the pests who felt it was necessary to voice their opinions during one of the hardest climbs of my life, The Death Wall, the most difficult wall at Rock City climb, are still standing around for me to curse out. I scan the faces. It didn't take long to see the two girls watching me approach the ground, thanfully, by my choice.

I see they are younger than me, because of the way they cling to each other, and stare with childish smiles at me. Like a child, begging to be held. One, with black hair, sprinkled with freckles, and dark eyes, whispers in the other's ear, then tugs at her arm as she laughs and begins to run away. The other girl says no, and lets the other girl leave. She does not even take her eyes from me. I hit the ground, and begin unhooking the line from my belt. There is a loud cough from behind me. I turn around and see her. I thought she would have left by now...She stands in front of me, waiting for something. Almost as if she is expecting me to apologize. Harry joins my side.

"What?" I say to her, puzzled by the strange way she is looking at me. It seems my reply was the invitation, and she skips over to me, her smile widening, and I see the youth in her eyes more clearly. It's shocking, and I jump back a bit from her energy.

"I was trying to help you out," she tells me. "You were never going to make it to the top that way." I say nothing, and look to Harry, who is preoccupied with eyeing a group of young girls who are setting up to climb beside us. I dare not look at her face because I'm afraid of the next bizarre and confusing expression she will shoot at me. I was surprised to find her looking defeated, and she moves her smile away and her eyes to the ground. "I- I'm sorry about yelling it out to you. I guess I should mind my own business." I am befuddled at how rapidly somber she became that I cannot reply. The young girl vanished before me, and her eyes flashed old secrets with their darkness. She apologized again and backed away, heading in the direction of her friend. I must have seemed so cold to her, and my lack of friendliness made her feel rejected, and essentially, yes, defeated, like the manner she scurried away in.

I leave Harry, who is now helping the group of girls beside us, and slip away to walk with suddenly somber girl. "Why would you say I'd never reach the top that way? Do you work here or something?" Her long, brown hair hides her sad eyes, and she refuses to respond, or even look at me. "Listen. I was just mad about losing my footing. You startled me, but if you know a secret trick to the wall, I'd appreciate it." She stops walking. I stop. People dodge us in the walk way with their climbing bags, with shopping carts, with bulky purses, and climbing rope, hurrying for the entrance to the rest of the mall ahead of us.

"I know a thing or two," she finally says, allowing her face to show as she flips her hair aside and smiles at me flatly. I return a smile this time. "My dad owns Rock City, but I'm not allowed to climb. He won't let me because he thinks I'm not careful." She seems embarrased. A nervous laughs spurts out from behind her sweet, spring smile. "Apparently, he thinks I will get hurt because I'm always slipping in the shower." She laughs, and I freeze at her words. "So I just memorize the books on the different walls and techniques for climbers to, you know, make it to the top." I stare in silence, and she waits, nervously, and when I do not respond, she folds her arms and watches the people who walk past us. She bite her lip, and looks back to the ground. I can tell she is searching for a way out of this conversation. She doesn't know what to do.

"That's ironic," I tell her. I pull my arm from my jacket, revealing the bruise on my back arm. I tell this girl, stranger, suddenly somber girl, that I will tell her the story of the bruise. "But only," I say. "Only if you promise not to tell my friend, Harry." She is laughing now, a bit confused or maybe just suprised, but assures me that if she ever meets my friend, Harry, she will keep my secret. I point out Harry behind us, and she giggles, smiling more than she can help. It makes me want more of her girlish smile.

"Seems my trust will be tested sooner than I thought," she remarks. We laugh and I tell her about the source of my bruise, and my entire bruise collection. We talk for hours, and have talked many more since, over the year and five months we have been dating.

Irony is a funny thing, and Casey, my Rock City girl, formerly known as "suddenly somber girl" is now my future wife, and in my "done right" collection, you see her name, the only and the most cherished item in my collection.

 

 

 

back to Contest #8