Page 37 of My Favorite Bad Decision
I laugh miserably, pulling my hair back as I slide into my sleeping bag. “Yes, I know. Itisweird. And my dad thinks it’s not fair to Blake to be carrying them with me still when I’m considering marrying someone else. Not that he cares at all about Blake, but he probably has a point.”
“So you’re going to place them at the summit?” he asks, shucking off his coat before zipping the sleeping bag up around him.
I stiffen. “I don’t know.”
He rolls toward me. There’s a slight clench in his jaw, one I don’t entirely understand. I’d think he’d prefer tonotbe in the vicinity while I dump human remains.
“You’re still not ready? After all this time?”
The breeze outside rocks the tent. “I don’t think that I am.”
“Will you ever be?”
It’s strange...I’ve thought about Rob a lot less than I normally do on this trip, perhaps because there’s been so much else to think about. But that doesn’t mean it will last once I get home. “I don’t know,” I reply. “There are times when it seems like it’s getting better, and times when it isn’t.”
“What’s going on when things are better?” he asks.
You’re there.
I blink, surprised at the thought. A thought I shouldn’t have had.
“I don’t know,” I say again.
My inability to provide a clear answer bugs the shit out of my dad.
I’ve got no idea why it seems to bother Miller even more.
11
KIT
DAY 7: KOSOVO TO THE SUMMIT
16,000 feet to 18,000 feet
It’s pitch black, and it feels as if I’ve just shut my eyes when Joseph wakes us. I turn on my headlamp and roll toward Miller, who’s running his hand over his jaw, groggy and beautiful. Such an odd juxtaposition of childlike sleepiness and a very, very adult full beard.
Rob was lovely, but even he wasn’t lovely the way Miller is. I think I could stare at him forever and never tire of the sight.
“You fucking hate that beard, don’t you?” I ask.
He grins. “It itches. I’d kill Gerald for a good razor right now.”
“You’d kill Gerald even if there was no razor as a reward.”
He laughs. “True. It might be for the best that he left the trip when he did.”
We pull on a billion layers, then chug down some coffee and sandwiches in the dining tent, the chatter nervous, heavy with both excitement and dread.
“Hey,” I say to Maddie, “if you start feeling weird up there, say something, okay? Gideon has oxygen.”
She smiles and nods. “I will. I promise. But I feel good.”
Miller and I return to the tent to shove hand and toe warmers into our gloves and boots, then grab our backpacks. We’re told to fill our bottles with hot water rather than cold because cold water will freeze. It doesn’t inspire confidence.
While we wait for the rest of the group, stomping our feet to stay warm, Miller points out forgotten constellations that people don’t discuss—Tarandus the Reindeer, The Electrical Machine—trying to keep my mind off what’s ahead.
I elbow him. “For a guy who only got into college because his grandfather built the library, you sure retained a lot.”
