Page 6 of Adam's Rising

Thomas should have entered the military with Jeff, or at least finished entering the U.S. Coast Guard Reserves. Thomas should have shipped the two of them off to a foster home. Thomas should have…How many times will I have to play over the should-haves in my head?

Adam pushed the pedal to the floor, speeding down the center of the highway, so there was less chance he’d run off the road again.

“You shouldn’t have forced me to leave,” Adam muttered under his breath, hoping that the roar of the engine drowned out his cries and senseless words, words that no longer mattered. Hehadleft. And nothing would change that. Nothing would bring back his brother. Thomas was everything to him. Yeah, Thomas had screwed up, but what he’d done, he’d done out of love.

God help me, Adam prayed silently.If Peter ever utters another bad word about Thomas, help me not to throw him down.

At the intersection of their road and Park’s Highway, Adam looked both ways — not that anyone would be out past midnight; well, no one other than drug-dealing murderers — then carefully turned left.

The radio crackled softly, the silence broken by a familiar chord.Free Bird. Lynard Skynyrd. Thomas’s favorite song.

Peter reached for the knob, turning up the volume.

“No.” Adam’s voice was low, but he flicked off the radio hard enough to rattle the knob.

Peter’s hand hovered over the dash. “Dude, I love that song. Thomas said it was the —”

“I know what he said,” Adam said quietly, eyes locked on the road. “I have to concentrate. The road is slick.”

After a few minutes, Peter removed his jacket, rolling it up like a bedroll and shoving it between the seatback and window. He curled his long lanky legs beneath him and rested his head on the makeshift pillow. A few minutes of soft whimpers emanated from Peter’s side of the cab, but then his breathing settled into a deep and steady rhythm.

The car remained silent as Adam carefully threaded the mostly two-lane highway. He did his best to follow the tracks of previous drivers, mindful of the high snowbank on his left. Like the road to his house, the right side of the highway — the east-facing side — got more sun, so the snowbank was shorter, nothing like the five- to ten-foot drifts on the east side of the road. Even driving south, the left-side of the road was still dangerous. If he hit black ice or, stupidly, swerved so he didn’t hit a moose, he could end up buried in that snowbank.

His grip on the steering wheel tightened as he recalled Dad telling Thomas when he was teaching him how to drive, “Ya go slipping in’ta one of those snowbanks, and no one’ll fin’ ya ’til spring. Parks swallows cars like The Big Su swallows trees — whole.”

Squished on the bench seat between Thomas and their father, Adam hadn’t thought much of the warning at the time, just chalked it up to one of Dad’s lessons. Adam scoffed quietly. His father had taught them how to hunt — and not be prey — and yet, he’d never warned them about gun-wielding drug dealers who showed up at midnight.

While their father was a horse trainer by trade, he worked search and rescue whenever needed, so he was forever teaching his sons about the dangers of the land. Ironically, even with all of his father’s training, both he and his mother had died in an auto crash — after a 7.6 magnitude quake caused landslides and cracked roads.

Adam blinked back the memories and the tears that came with them.

* * *

Although the sunwouldn’t come up for another hour or so, deep-pink and red-fringed clouds hovered above the white-draped Chugach Range. At just over thirteen thousand feet, Mount Marcus Baker stood out among its neighboring peaks, which average around six to seven thousand feet. Thomas had said that even though Denali was seven thousand feet higher, technical challenges and glaciers madeMarcusa tougher climb. Still, Thomas had insisted thatsomeday…

Adam sighed softly.Somedayno longer existed for Thomas. No new mountains lay ahead of them; they would never climb Denali again —Denali… His thoughts shifted to the ongoing debate about the official name ofThe High One. Just recently, President Carter had supported a bill that would recognize the traditional name, but Congress blocked the change. To Adam and his family, though, it would always be Denali, and the irony hit him upside the head.

Thomas had instructed Adam to assume his name. Adam could ask others to call him by Thomas’s middle name, but just like Denali had lost its native name because of some prospector’s idea to honor President McKinley, Adam was sure to lose his identity by taking on his brother’s name. He wouldn’t just lose his name; he would lose two years of his life. He wouldn’t graduate high school. He wouldn’t go to prom with — He lifted his eyes to the rays of sunlight poking between the visor and the doorframe, hoping to dry his stupid tears. He had no right to cry about losing two years of his life when Thomas would never experience anything again.

In less than two hours, he’d left several inches of snow on the ground, the only home he’d ever known, and a brother he loved more than peanut butter, horses, and a roof over his head — since he’d chosen to stay with Thomas rather than hope for a warm government-funded house with three meals a day.

Two hours away, and his life would never be the same, but he had a life. More importantly, he and Peter had a chance at a future because of Thomas’s sacrifices.

Adam eased his foot off the gas as he approached the turn to Wasilla.

Take a left on Main Street, or continue until I reach Anchorage?

For that matter, maybe even farther.

After their parents’ deaths, TV and movie ratings were no longer a concern. Although his brother had insisted that bedtime was ten, when Thomas went to the drive-in, Adam and Peter huddled in the truck bed, their sleeping bags cinched around their waists so their hands were free to eat buttered popcorn — a total treat Thomas had provided them after he’d “come into some cash,” as he’d put it. Several times during the movie, Thomas had rapped on the window, declaring, “You boys better be sleeping back there.” But on the way home, Thomas had elbowed Adam’s side, chuckling, “Imagine living in a van, drag-racing for money. Picking up girls…” He’d nudged Adam’s ribs again. “It’s almost time we have thetalk, brother.” Thomas had sighed. “I know the flick was set in L.A., but I was imagining Florida. Jeff went to spring break in Daytona Beach, said the girls were wild—” Thomas had glanced over where Adam sat in the middle to where Peter had curled up against the door. “Someday, Adam… Someday our world will be right again.”

“Someday…” Adam repeated Thomas’s words aloud.

“Adam?”

Adam jumped. The quiet truck had lulled him into a near trance, allowing him to imagine a future that would never happen. No matter how much he wanted to think he could start a new life, the events of the evening would assure that his world would never be right again.

“What are you doing, man?” Peter glanced from one side to the other of the intersection.

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