Far Country (45 page)

           
Megan reached into the bag and handed him a new marshmallow. “I did that to my
first one, too,” she confided to him.  “You’ll do better next time.”

           
“Thanks,” he managed, feeling somewhat chastened, and spent the next few
minutes concentrating on giving his marshmallow its usual even tan. When it was
ready, Rachel had the chocolate square and the graham crackers ready, and
expertly captured the gooey marshmallow between the two graham cracker
squares.  She gave the sandwich a firm squeeze to spread the fluff and
handed the
s’more
to Steve.

           
Steve whistled, impressed.  “You’ve done that before!” he said.

           
Rachel grinned sheepishly. “I’ve eaten six already!” She whispered.

           
“Six?” That’s got to be a record!” Steve answered, properly awed.

           
Rachel shrugged. “They were good,” she explained matter of
factly
,
sucking the sticky remains of Steve’s marshmallow off her fingers.

           
“Do you know any ghost stories,” Ranger Williams?” Jenny asked hopefully.

           
Steve shrugged. “I might know a couple,” he conceded. “Have you ever heard the
story about ‘The Viper’?”

           
The girls shook their heads. So Steve spent the next twenty minutes, roasting
marshmallows and retelling some of his favorite camping stories. Steve stuffed
the last bite of his third
s’more
in to his mouth,
and shook his head when Jenny tried to hand him the marshmallow bag
again.  “That does it for me,” he declared.

           
“I think you girls have had enough for tonight, too,” Kelly announced, and
handed out moist
towelettes
so they could wipe the
stickiness off of their fingers.

           
“Why don’t the three of you make a bathroom run?” She suggested, checking her
watch. “You need to get to bed if you’re going to be in any shape to climb
Hanging Rock tomorrow!”  She looked over at Alyssa’s tent.  “Alyssa,
don’t you want to come out and at least sit with us by the fire?” Kelly coaxed
softly.  “We still have enough chocolate for a couple more
s’mores
.”

           
“No,” came the sullen reply. Kelly sighed but said nothing more to her niece.
She watched the other three girls make their way down past three campsites to
the public bath and showers. The fire, little more than a few finger flames and
embers now, still occasionally sparked and snapped.  It was a cozy sort of
sound, Steve thought. He stirred the embers with his marshmallow stick and watched
the small tendrils of flames revive for a minute.  Steve glanced up and
found Kelly watching him with a bemused half smile on her face. “So,” he began.
“You know who I am, what about you?”

           
Kelly shrugged.  “Not much to tell, really. I’m a school teacher, fifth
grade. My sister and I live in the same town, right outside of Winston-Salem,
 and she’s all the family I have now. Lisa’s about five years older than I
am, and got married right out of high school. She’s a dog breeder – Irish
Setters.” Kelly sighed. “Our parents died about ten years ago, and I lived with
Lisa and her husband, Andy, until I graduated from college. As sort of a ‘thank
you’ gift, I started taking their little girls camping up here every year to
give them a free weekend.”

           
“You come here every year?” Steve repeated in surprise.

           
Kelly nodded a tiny smile on her lips. “For about the past five years,” she
told him.

           
“Huh, I don’t remember seeing you here before,” Steve replied, frowning a
little.

           
She smiled impishly.  “I remember seeing you, though.” 

Steve glanced up at her
sharply.  Was she flirting with him?

           
 “Really” He said, in disbelief. How can you be sure?”

           
She laughed outright. “You’re crushing my ego, Ranger Williams! You are the one
who has filled out our registration form for the last four years – except last
fall.”

           
Steve was stunned.  She really did recognize him.  Looking at her
now, he could not imagine NOT remembering a girl who looked like her. How had
he missed her?

           
“I – uh, I was home last year, recovering from a rappelling accident,” he
stammered.

           
Kelly immediately looked concerned. “Oh! Were you hurt very badly?” She asked.

           
“Bad enough,” he acknowledged quietly.  “I actually just got clearance to
return to work a few weeks ago.”

           
She gave a low whistle. “Wow, that must have been some accident.”

           
“Nothing I want to dwell on,” he answered dismissively. “I’m just glad to be
back at last.”

           
The slapping of flip flops on the road filled the air, and the three girls
raced back into the firelight.  “Guess what? We saw a raccoon at the
bathhouse!” Jenny cried out excitedly.

           
“He was huge!” Exclaimed Rachel.

           
“He was trying to get the top off the trash can holder,” Megan added. “I think
that he was trying to lift the latch!”

           
Steve grinned at their enthusiasm. “It’s probably old Walter. He’s been working
on that can for a couple of years now. He’s gotten it open once or twice when
we’ve forgotten to relock the padlock, too. He’s a pretty determined critter!”

           
Steve stood up. “Well, I’ll let you all get settled in for the evening. Thanks
for the
s’mores
, and for inviting me to visit your
campfire.”

           
“Will you come back tomorrow night?” Jenny asked hopefully.

           
Steve laughed. “We’ll see,” he said. “Miss Kelly might not want another mouth
to feed tomorrow, too.”

           
“Nonsense, Ranger Williams,” Kelly replied. “We all enjoyed your company, and I
hope you will come back to join us.”

           
Steve felt a warm glow in the pit of his stomach at the sincerity in her
voice.  “Well, we’ll see, then,” he answered noncommittally “Good night.”

           
As Steve walked back across the campground in the direction of his home, he
kept thinking of Kelly’s words: “But I remember you.” “You registered
us”.  How had he failed to notice such a beautiful girl? 
I must
have been brain dead
, he thought disgustedly. But now, the question was
:
what next? She certainly seemed interested in him…but he hadn’t asked a girl
out on a date since high school! Should he ask her out tomorrow? Or maybe wait
a week and call her? It would be less embarrassing that way if she turned him
down, at least
….
and what if he was wrong and she wasn’t interested?
Maybe he shouldn’t say anything at all….

           
Steve unlocked his door, stripped to his boxers and stretched out on his bed.
As he drifted off to sleep, he was no closer to a decision than when he’d left
the campfire.

           
Kelly stood on top of Hanging Rock and slowly turned to take in the view. She
could see the Visitor Center, tiny in the distance, and fleetingly wondered if
the enigmatic Ranger Williams was on duty this morning.

           
 It was true she had noticed him on past visits to the park – who
wouldn’t? Thick black hair, startling blue eyes…not muscle bound but clearly in
good shape – and no sign of a wedding
ring.          

           
The first year they had seen him, Alyssa had been ten and Megan only six. Still
the girls had noticed him too. Or rather, their Aunt Kelly had noticed him, and
the girls had noticed her noticing him.  Alyssa, in her no nonsense little
girl manner had bluntly asked the tall ranger, “Are you married?”

           
The ranger’s reply had been unsatisfactory in every way.  “No, not
really.”

           
“
No not really!”
 What did that mean? That could be anything to
“I’m going through a divorce,” to “I live with someone but we’re not married,
and it’s really none of your business.”

           
It had become something of a game for the girls to look for Ranger Williams and
to ask him some version of the “Are you married?” question every year.

           
Always, the ranger had been politely detached, and the answer infuriatingly
uninformative!  Then last year he was gone, and the girls were both
disappointed that he had not been there for ‘The Question.’  Kelly didn’t
know if she was disappointed or relieved. Despite her many boyfriends over the
last few years, her nieces had always seemed to hold onto a belief that she was
supposed to be with Ranger Williams at Hanging Rock.  They even compared
her boyfriends to him. “He’s no Ranger Williams”, or “Ranger Williams has
bluer
eyes than he has.”  Last year, she had concluded
that he had moved on, and that little game was at an end forever.

           
So Kelly had been almost in shock last night, when, not only had he appeared at
their campsite as usual, but he had noticed HER for once!  And she had no
more idea what to do about it than if he had ignored her as usual!

           
This year no one had asked ‘The Question.’, but clearly, something was very
different.  She thought back on last night.  She had liked the way he
had gotten embarrassed the time she had caught him looking at her with a shy,
almost questioning look in his eyes. Kelly wondered if he would come back again
tonight. Jenny was certainly hoping so….Okay, maybe she was too!

           
Her handheld radio crackled and beeped on her hip.  It was Megan. “Aunt
Kelly, where are you?”

           
Kelly pulled the radio off of her belt and pressed the button.  “I’m still
here on the point. Where’d you wander off to?”

           
Megan responded, “We’re near the picnic rock.  There’s somebody climbing
the rocks and I don’t think they’re using any ropes!  It’s hundreds of
feet to the ground!”

           
Kelly considered the angle they would need to be standing at
to
clearly see climbers on the sides of the cliff. “You’re
all staying on the center rock like I told you, right?”  Kelly
asked.  They climbed Hanging Rock every year and the girls knew her rules,
but she figured it never hurt to remind them.  When Megan did not reply,
Kelly grew suspicious.  She walked back from the point and veered down a
trail to the left, which she knew offered some spectacular views, as well as
some tempting rock formations to climb out on. People climbed out on them all
the time, but she never let the girls go unless she was with them.  It
would be too easy to get silly or distracted, and a careless step could leave
you in a hundred foot freefall! And as Ranger Williams had said last night, a
fall from a cliff was not something to dwell on.

           
Kelly clicked the call button again.  “Megan, I’m heading your way. 
Where exactly are you girls?” Her voice was a little sharper than usual, but it
was still several more seconds before Megan replied.  “We’re Okay, Aunt
Kelly.”

           
Hmmm.
Kelly shot back. “Meaning you are okay NOW? You girls went out of
bounds to see those climbers, didn’t you?” Kelly guessed. “You stay on picnic
rock,” she commanded. “I’m almost there.”

           
When Kelly came out off the trail to the large flat rock where they usually sat
to eat their snacks, she found three of her four charges looking nervous and
guilty.  Kelly was steaming. She compressed her lips into a thin line and
surveyed their uneasy faces.

“So who’s going to ‘fess up?
Where did you go? And where is Alyssa?”

           
Rachel, who’d come on the trip with them for the past two years finally broke
the silence.  “We only climbed out on the first rock, Miss Kelly. 
Just so we could see the free climbers,” she said. “We were really careful!”
She pleaded, seeing Kelly’s look of anger and disappointment.

           
“I’m sure that you were careful,” she said evenly, “but that’s not the point.
You all know my rules.”  She scanned the rocks for her missing niece. “Now
will you please tell me where Alyssa is?”

           
Megan shifted her feet. “She went out on the second rock, Aunt Kelly. I told
her she couldn’t be out there, but she called me a
scaredy
cat. When I told her I was calling you, she took off that way!”  Megan
pointed past the picnic rock to an area they had never really explored before.

           
Kelly let out a deep breath of frustration.  It had taken a great deal of
coaxing, and finally an out and out “you’re coming with us and that’s final”
command to make Alyssa accompany them on the hike.  Her sullen mood had
seemed to wear off on the way up, but now Kelly suspected that her niece was
deliberately challenging Kelly’s authority. First by going out of bounds, and
now by heading off by herself down an unmarked trail!

           
Kelly pressed the call button twice. “Alyssa? Answer me!” But there was no
reply. Kelly continued to try and contact Alyssa for a couple more minutes, but
Alyssa would not respond.  Thoroughly aggravated with the girl, Kelly
started down the faint trail Megan had indicated.