Pop! Goes the Weasel.

“We’re not alone,” she whispers to her ice axe, gripping it tight. The sharp end facing out.

New moon. Dark sky. No light pollution. Under the tall canopy the branches and leaves cut silhouettes from the luminous band of Milky Way that arcs across the sky. A twig snaps. Distant. Another. Each crack and snap, each step, honing in on her position. Circling. Ever closer.

She silently mouthed the nursery rhyme.

All around the mulberry bush

The monkey chased the weasel

This programmed comfort ritual from her childhood. Hiding from the beasts under the bed. Hiding from the monsters in her closet.

Another step in the dark. Closing in.

Let’s go bag a peak Pete had said. It seemed an innocuous enough proposition. Tag along, he said. It’ll be a blast. The thing is, once they bag one peak, they want to bag them all. These peak-bagging list-junkie friends of hers. The Smoot’s list - Washington’s one-hundred most epic peaks. The Bulgers list - Washington’s tallest 100 peaks. The Rainier 100. The Cascade Volcanoes. Beckey’s Great Peaks. The lists go on and on. Peakbagging is an addiction that she had just begun flirting with. This peak was just another little taste. Pete was a full-blown, hard-core, peak-bagging, list-junkie.

The monkey thought 'twas all in fun...

Pop! Goes the weasel

The thuds of her heart pulse fast in her ears. Double time. Crouched, hiding, she tries to reign in her loud breathing. Each inhale and exhale loud like a steam engine. Restraining her locomotive legs. Her fight or flight brain in full flight mode. The only fight left spent fighting the urge to blindly bolt through the forest. Clotheslined by a branch. Concussed by a black elm. The harder she muffles her frantic breath, the louder it grows. Eyes darting in the pitch, following the trail of twig snaps and leaf rustles. Straining to catch a glimpse in the moonless, new moon dark. The night light glow of the milky way band all but useless.

The forecast had been perfect. The Pacific Northwest not known for its Indian summers but don’t look a gift mountain goat in the mouth Pete said. A November weekend with no precip in the forecast. No rain or snow. No need for heavy packs. Go light. Go fast. It seemed a good idea. Putting her life into the hands of forecast models. Computers and algorithms. Putting her life into the hands of the halo of Pete’s vast experience. Friendship and adventure. This abject surrender of preparedness. Pete the mountain-mentor.

There exists an open secret in the upper left edge. The denizens of Seattle and Portland and Bellingham and Tacoma all know it: Hikers disappear in the mountains of the Pacific Northwest. Regularly. And unless the person of interest, the body of disappearance, is of the young, cute, female variety, it doesn’t spark collective interest. Doesn’t make the news cycle. Occasionally a body gets recovered. Those stories are easy to explain. Easy to digest. Falls and frail bodies. Cold and rain and exposure and hypothermia. Accident reports. Explanations. Lessons to learn from bad decisions or lack of preparation or bad navigation or bad luck. But the bodies that simply disappear into the abyss of the dense forest and craggy peaks and thick, shifting snow and unforgiving land. No accident reports or post-event analysis of poor decisions or recovered bodies to settle the spirit. The disappearance an unexplained void. There’s a group psychosis to it. A willing amnesia. This tenable sacrifice.

Another snap. Another step. Closer still. Circling in.

They were supposed to have been back to the trailhead hours ago. Well before sunset. And now, here she was, alone, crouched, hiding, twilight having long surrendered to the night. Fever dreams of fear. Trembling hands and white knuckles wrapped in a baseball grip around the shaft of her ice axe. The sharp point of the pick following each new snap, each new step, circling. Ready to chop and swing and at least go out with a fight.

Penny for a spool of thread

Penny for a needle

That's the way the money goes...

Pop! Goes the weasel

The day’s adventure had started as planned. Early start for a long drive. Up and off the interstate, out the 2-lane highway, deep into the wilderness. Off the asphalt, up a dusty, single-lane mountain road. Switchback after switchback, higher and higher. Each foot of elevation gained in the Subaru one that would not have to be gained by effort and sweat. Limbs brushing the side panels leaving dusty contrails of forest pinstriping. The road ending in a bulb barely wide enough to execute a seven-point turn. There, at the end of it all, they parked. The only vehicle today. Maybe the only vehicle this season. Boots tied. Gaiters velcroed. Daypacks slung on shoulders, ice axes stowed in their loops, pick in, spike up. Her ice axe new and pretty. Pete’s ice axe beat to shit from chasing those lists. The trail just a forgotten bootpath. Adventure awaited.

The thick vegetation quickly gave way to open forest, the undergrowth snuffed out by a thick canopy. The forest floor padded by leaves and decay and soggy snow melt. Eventually they escaped the canopy, venturing beyond the tree line. The cool shade beneath the trees gave way to rock and sun. Boulders and talus and scree and dust and patches of hard, icy snow deep in the recessed shade of northern exposure. Helmets donned, kick steps and ice axes brought them safely across the permanent snowfield, above the runout of high consequence broken limbs and helicopter rides. Past that crux, up the ridge they scrambled, eventually setting eyes on the day’s objective. A tricky knife-edge ridge section just beneath the summit.

Pete had taken the lead without discussion. Pete the mountain mentor. Pete the peakbagger. Pete the list-junkie. She stayed back, in safety, out of his fall line, ensuring that if he kicked a rock loose she would be out of its accelerating path down the slope. Safety second. If safety was first she’d be at home sitting on her couch. She watched as he methodically worked his way up the knife-edge. Careful hand placements. One limb moving at a time. Grip and test and pull and shift weight and reposition foot. Repeat. Three points of contact. She liked this about him. His attention to detail. His carefulness.

And then it happened in the slow motion known only to the helpless bystander. The powerless witness. The impotent non-participant. The rock Pete was pulling on, the one he had already dutifully weight-tested, suddenly dislodged. His foot slipped. His weight shifted. For a moment he froze in time, suspended in a will-he or won’t-he balancing act. A circus performer. Death-defying stunts for your amusement. Pete, the peak-bagging trapeze artist. There was nothing she could do but hold her breath, with heart-rate spiking, adrenaline coursing through her veins, fear ripping through his. And then, the moment of balanced indecision over, his weight now too far gone, the pendulum’s precipice overshot, he went off the other side and out of view. With a guttural scream. Then, quickly, to silence.

She screamed after him.

The expanse ate her voice.

No echo in return.

No reply from Pete.

Just silence.

Fun peak, Pete had promised. Easy day he had assured her. Go light. Go fast. No problem.

A solo adventurer is, unequivocally, the worst party size. If you get hurt on your own you’re fucked. Better hope your will to live is measured in equal parts with your tolerance for pain. Not far behind the solo adventurer, however, is the party of two. With two you’re left with more questions than answers. Do you leave the injured person? How long does the injured person wait for help to return? What if the help-seeker gets lost or injured on their way out? Can the help-seeker even find their way back to the injured? So many questions. Sticking together is nearly always the best option. A party of three starts to get better choices. A party of four is the real sweet spot. One stays behind with the injured, two go for help.

But here they were. Party of two.

She hoped they were still a party of two.

She begged that they were still a party of two.

In the middle of the North Cascades. Remote trailhead. Obscure peak. Alone. Not proper solo fucked but not far off.

She screamed his name again.

The silence of nothing in return.

Her fingers trembled. A quiver in her voice. Adrenaline-dump tears swelled. She fought them back. Not the time for it. Get your shit together.

Three long breaths. In nice and big. Out nice and slow. Collecting. Not acting rashly. She crept to the lip of the knife edge, movement by movement. Slow. Methodical. And peered over. The back side was steep. And at the bottom, where the steep gave way to sloping run out, was Pete, folded into a heap, face down, at the end of a slide path through the scree. His body motionless. Pete the rag doll. Pete the crash test dummy.

She screamed his name again.

Begging.

Desperation in her voice.

He didn’t move.

“Pete, get the fuck up!” she yelled, angry, letting the tears go now.

She rested her forehead on the edge, clinching her eyes shut. Her tears dripped into the dry dusty rock and evaporated. She stayed on the ridge above Pete’s body for far longer than she should have. Hoping. Then she started down. On her own. Too late.

The Ten Essentials is a hallowed list of survival items every outdoor adventurer should have in their pack on every trip. Navigation, light source, sun protection, first aid, knife, fire, shelter, extra food, extra water, extra clothes. Had her pack contained the ten essentials should would have been in good shape. But it didn’t. Maybe Pete’s did, but that was no help to her now.

What she had in her pack was meager. Sad. A cell phone for navigation and light. No compass or paper maps. No headlamp. She had a chapstick-sized tube of SPF 50. Her first aid kit consisted of a couple band-aids for blisters and a couple ibuprofen for pain. No knife or matches. No tent or bivy or even a poncho. Her remaining food consisted of some dried mangoes from Trader Joe’s, an almond butter packet, a Kind bar, and the remainder of a small bag of Albanese gummy bears. A nearly depleted Camelbak bladder contained the entirety of her water reserves. A single wind shirt for warmth. This abomination of ten-essentials preparedness. The poster-child for a post-trip postmortem of how not to be ready for an emergency.

She made it back down to the tree line after sunset, twilight quickly fading into blackness. The warmth of the day had already made a hard shift. The cold was setting in fast. She donned the windshirt and zipped it tight to her chin. She resigned that a cold night under the canopy was her safest option. She kicked a pile of leaves into the crook of roots beneath a tree, then stuffed her daypack with more dry leaves. There, in her nest, she curled up, hugging the backpack for warm. Visions of Pete’s crumpled body, Pete’s smile, Pete’s thirst for adventure, brought the tears again. She let the pity of herself, the sadness of Pete, wash over her. She dozed for the moment.

When a noise wakes you from sleep, your brain replays a shitty A.M. recording back to you. Was the bang a door slam? A gunshot? A backfire? Through the fuzz and static you can’t be sure. This noise in the forest that woke her up. Was it the bark of a pika? Was it the hoot of an owl? Her eyes open now, not daring a movement, she listened. A snap of a twig. Then, another.

She sat up and grabbed her ice axe. The leaves beneath her crunching. The noise giving away her location. She went statue still. Not daring to move again.

Another snap. Closer. Circling.

She crouched and mouthed the comforting childhood lyrics. The ones that had successfully fended off the closet monsters and beasts under the bed.

The painter needs a ladder and brush

The artist needs an easel;

Another snap. Closer still. Working back the other way.

The glow of the Milky Way, her eyes full adjusted to the darkness, cast the tiniest amount of light. She could see something coming. A mountain lion. A bear.

Didn’t matter.

She held her breath. The steam engine.

It crept closer.

The dancers need a fiddler's tune...

Pop! Goes the weasel

Another snap. Another crunch of leaf. Too close now. Close enough now.

Over her head. The ice axe arced through the sky. With violent intentions. With every muscle in concert. Fight mode fully engaged. The sharp end of the axe down. Slicing through the air. Aiming for the center of the beast under the bed. Aiming for the middle of the closet monster. At the end of that arc, the pick, the sharp end that keeps climbers from sliding to their death, its jagged teeth made for gripping ice and snow, connected with something. A loud crack filled the silence. The pick sank in and those teeth lodged tight. The monster let out a guttural scream and recoiled, yanking the ice axe from her grasp. Disarmed now, she turned and ran. From fight to flight. She ran for her life. In the dark. Blind. Not caring if a branch clotheslined her. Not caring if she concussed herself into the trunk of a black elm. Running in full, abject, whole body, whole mind, terror. Adrenaline dumping. Legs turning over. Quads pumping. Fleeing from the beast.

I've no time to where to sigh

Or to tell the reason why

Kiss me quick, I'm off, good-bye...

Pop! Goes the weasel

The Park Rangers say that Pete’s injuries were vast, but survivable. His vocal cord had been crushed. His ankle was broken. His shoulder was dislocated. But his will to live had been strong. He had struggled his way back to the tree line. They found him there with her ice axe buried deep into the top of his skull.

They never did find her body.

It was all over the news.