Paradoxically, hiking was both harder than I'd remembered and less disastrous of an experience than I'd expected. The climb up the first couple of rises, a loaded backpack digging into my shoulders, had my sides cramping and my head swimming from lack of oxygen. The farther we went though, the easier it got, and by the time we reached the high point in the trail that looked out over the valley, I found that I'd stopped having to concentrate on the act of walking and could instead enjoy the scenery.
Apparently DIY construction work and a morning jog weren't a bad substitute for a gym membership.
"I bet we can see the town and the reservoir from here," Connor said, indicating the valley with a jut of his chin.
"You think?"
On the few occasions I'd driven down into Cortez, I'd noticed a big body of water off to the north while passing through Dolores, but you couldn't see all that much of it from the road.
"Let's check it out," Connor suggested.
We stepped off the trail and picked our way through the mix of rocks, scrubby grass and cactus that separated the path from the cliff's edge.
There'd been a steady stream of signs along the way reminding hikers to not leave the official trail, but you could tell that this was one of the places where people frequently ignored the rules and veered off for a more scenic perspective. The ground was littered with narrow footpaths; grass flattened and earth packed down by the passage of many a hiking boot.
Reaching the edge, I could see why. It was a hell of view.
There was, in fact, no sign of the town, but below us the Dolores river valley wound away to the south, a rich green furrow in an otherwise arid landscape. To the east, the line of the San Juan Mountains stabbed up through the foothills, the jagged blue-grey slopes incongruous in the surrounding quilt of muted greens and browns.
Living in Defiance, up in the mountain themselves, I hadn't, until that moment, really appreciated their scale.
I'd know they were massive, but holy hell, I thought, a chill prickling across my scalp.
I must have voiced the exclamation because Connor made a noise of agreement. Then he spoke and I could hear reflected in his voice the same reverence that was electrifying my own nerve endings. "I could never live somewhere else," he breathed. "This place, these mountains, they get in your blood."
"I can believe it," I said, and meant it.
Seattle was bordered by its own set of mountain ranges, but this. Maybe it was because I had grown up with the Olympic and Cascade mountains for a constant backdrop, but there was something different, something... staggering, about the world laid out before us.
"You should see it up in the Gunnison," Connor went on. "Black Canyon, the West Elk range. Sometimes I catch myself wondering why people decided to settle here. Why they didn't keep movin' on to nice sunny California. I mean, hell, here it can drop a foot of snow on your head the first day of summer. And in the winter?" He let out a low, dismissive whistle. "But then I stop and look around and I get it. You know? You can see god in these mountains."
And gold and oil, and all the potential free labour, I thought, but I kept that to myself. This was a beautiful moment in a beautiful place. No need to go shitting all over it with my embittered world view.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Connor slant me an amused look. "I spent a few months in college down in Florida," he said. "Driving back, seeing that first peak rising up in the distance? I cried like a baby."
"Man," I said, catching his gaze; returning his grin. "You have it bad."
"Damn straight."
---
"So, Florida," I said.
We'd tossed a blanket down on a lichen covered outcrop of rock overlooking the valley and began unpacking lunch. The air was still; thick with the sharp, tannic scents of ponderosa pines and juniper.
Connor grimaced. "It was a phase," he admitted. "A very long phase. I spent every last minute of my teen years hating Durango and chomping at the proverbial bit to get out."
"Literally and metaphorically?" I ventured, only half joking.
He didn't look up, but I caught his answering smirk. He was bust assembling chorizo, goat cheese and a selection of sundry greens atop slices of sourdough bread.
No wonder he'd stared at my granola bar like it was a poor relation.
"That was part of it," he agreed. "Or maybe that was the underlying affliction and everything else was a symptom of it. I had it in my head that if I were just somewhere, anywhere that wasn't backwards-ass rural Colorado, that I would magically make sense to myself. So...Florida."
"Orlando?"
Another grimace. "Tallahassee."
"Ah," I said. "Good old Florida State."
"Yep. Of course, it didn't work," he added, handing me a sandwich. "I was still me. Just sweatier and sunburnt."
"Still," I said. "It can't have been all bad. I wouldn't call Tallahassee a liberal Mecca, but compared to..." I gestured with my sandwich to indicate the state at large.
He raised one shoulder in a lazy shrug. "Yeah, but I was still trying to reconcile who I was, all the pieces. Sexuality, religion. Not exactly something a simple change of scenery could fix. And at the end of the day, it just wasn't home, you know?" he said. "That was the big irony. I spent all those years hating it here, only to realize that I couldn't stand to be anywhere else."
"You and your mountains," I said.
He spread his hands, wordless and unrepentant.
"And so you came back," I said.
"And so I came back," he agreed. "Finished up my degree at Mesa State, got a job, settled down."
He didn't add that he'd figured out who he was along the way. Didn't have to. I'd seen that the moment I'd met him. It radiated from the guy like an aura.
"Why child psychology?" I asked. "And don't give me that line about a shorter degree."
He was silent for a moment, brow scrunched up in consideration. "I suppose that was part of the whole reconciling religion thing. Growing up, it was the answer to everything. Depressed? Pray about it. Failing at school? Pray about it. Don't fit in?"
"Pray about it?" I concluded.
Connor nodded. "Even at that age, I knew there had to be better answers out there. Don't get me wrong," he said. "My faith is still very important to me. But faith can't be the one and only, be-all, end-all solution to every problem."
"Don't send god to do Zoloft's job?"
He let out a short, sharp laugh. "Not exactly the way I'd have worded it, but."
We talked in fits and snatches after that, content to hike and let the silences stretch until something that seemed worth saying popped into our brains. A story Connor had heard on the news, a ridiculous anecdote I'd remembered from the bar. I discovered that he could cook, but didn't particularly like to, that we both loved soccer, and he wanted to try coaching Cortez's summer rec team, but was afraid of how the parents would react. That he liked microbrew and Tai food and could afford a house, but lived in an apartment because he didn't have time to shovel sidewalks or take care of a lawn. In turn I told him safe, impersonal things about the Olympic Peninsula and Seattle and all of its post-Woodstock eccentricities. And he was as good as his word, never bringing up my aborted career or my rumored penchant for back alley trash fires. Not exactly fair play, but in that moment, I couldn't bring myself to feel all that bad about it.
---
The sun was setting and the bar was packed by the time we got back into Defiance. Not an open parking space in sight. Connor pulled the Jeep up alongside a rusted-out panel van and, after a check of the mirrors, put it into park in the lane.
"I'll call you?"
"Absolutely," I said and kissed him for the second time that day, leaning across the the center console to cup a hand behind his neck.
Up close he smelled like sweat and pines trees and Barbasol aftershave; all things I'd been too highly strung to notice that morning. Eagle Scout Yankee Candle, I thought, and knew he had to feel me smiling against his lips.
I made myself pull back, determined to not go all horny teenager on him again.
"You know the bar's number?" I added.
Connor bit back a husky laugh. "You seriously need to get a cellphone, Chris."
"And ruin my old person street cred?"
He raised a hand, dragged a knuckle along the line of my jaw. "New Castle is playing Manchester on Wednesday. If you could get the night off...?"
Talk soccer to me? Grinning I leaned back in and kissed him again, a quick, intent meeting of mouths.
"I'll try," I said, reaching for the door latch. "Call me Monday."
The hotel's front doors were usually locked, so I dodge my way around a pair of swaying CenturyLink repairman and went in through the bar. Inside it was chaotic, bad country music cranked a few octaves too loud in an attempt to compete with the inebriated Saturday night chatter. Which was, of course, making the natives caterwaul all the louder to be heard over the music.
I gave the scene a once-over: Erin behind the bar, looking harassed; Katie, holding a serving tray, making leisurely small talk at one of the corner tables; Jamie nowhere to be seen - and beelined for the office to turn down the crooning.
When I reemerged and slid behind the counter a minute later, Erin was trying to slice limes. And her fingers.
"Hey now, slow it down," I said, appropriating the paring knife before she succeeded. "Where's your brother?"
"I'm going to murder her," Erin snapped by way of answer.
The accompanying glare in Katie's direction left no need for further explanation.
Well, I thought, that was at least progress in the right direction.
I tried again, slow and steady, hoping I could mellow her out by example. "Jamie?"
"We have so many orders-"
I took her by the shoulders. "Breathe."
"But-"
"Breathe."
She opened her mouth, closed it again. Then spent a few frenetic seconds grinding her teeth before she finally exhaled.
"It's like this every Saturday night. We'll get caught up," I soothed, hands still firmly on her shoulders. "But Jamie was supposed to be here tonight to help you cover. Why isn't he?"
She exhaled again, but this time it was more of a sigh.
"Auntie Paula's truck won't start and tomorrow's the farmers market so she has to have the truck, so Jamie went over to try and fix it and-" she gestured exasperatedly back at the lime, as if that were somehow the evening's chief offender.
"So," I said, sorting through her burst of words and picking up what I guessed was the thread of events. "Since Jamie's playing mechanic, Katie volunteered to help out?"
Erin growled.
"One more time, but in English."
She glared at me, but nodded. "Only she's not helping. She's just running her mouth. She never used to be like this," she added. The 'before you showed up,' was unspoken, but clear.
From what I'd seen and what Jamie had told me of Katie, I rather suspected that Erin was the one who was changing, not her. Better to keep my mouth shut on that point though and let Erin come to her own conclusions.
"You want we should give her the boot?" I asked instead.
"I can't."
"You can."
"She's one of my best friends."
With friends like that. "Then I'll do it. Let me be the bad guy."
"Oh god," Erin groaned." And then, even more forlornly, "Oh god. Her she comes."
"I've got this," I said, giving her shoulders a squeeze.
"Little busy in here to be practicing your meditation," drawled Katie, propping an elbow on the bar behind us. "Don't-cha' think?"
Ignoring the barb, I gave Erin a final, pointed look. If you don't want me to do this...
She pulled in a long breath, then said, jaw set in resignation, "I'm going to clear tables."
I let her go, trying not to look as proud as I felt.
"Thought you took the day off," Katie said, once Erin was out of earshot. Her mouth was curved in what was probably meant to pass for a smile.
I plastered on my best, most saccharine fuck you expression in return and held out a hand for the tray she was still gripping. "Got back early."
Her nostrils flared, lips going thin and all pinched at the corners for a beat before morphing into a smug grin. Swinging the tray out from under her arm, she held it in both hands and placed it on my palm, like a Japanese cashier passing me my receipt.
"I sure hope they don't get too nasty," she said, flicking a glance over her shoulder to the crowded tables. "Once word gets round.'"
She paused, eyebrows raised, waiting for me to ask what the hell she was talking about; practically vibrating with anticipation. Then, seeing that I wasn't going to play along, she huffed a breath out through her nose.
"Missus Ambrose, saw you this morning," she said, drawing out each word, her apparent glee only slightly dimmed by my lack of cooperation. "Making out with mister fancy doctor in his car."
Not what I'd expected.
I tried to keep the surprise out of my expression, but some of it must have shown because I saw the answering satisfaction flash across her face.
Fixing a sympathetic smile in place, she went on. "And of course she told Pastor Riggs, and well, you know how their generation is."
At which point one of the guys at the end of the bar started yelling for more Heineken.
She straightened up, giving me a final pout of fake-ass concern before taking her leave. "Good luck."