When she gets out of the hospital, she’ll go home with a neck brace, a prescription she’ll never fill because pain meds make her feel loopy, a key ring with only the key to her front door, and an appointment to get her stitches out. She’ll register for Netflix to stave off the boredom and binge adventure documentaries when the nightmares steal her sleep. She’ll look around her cluttered apartment and wonder what has changed.
On her first day back at work, with the fading bruises almost hidden under a cakey layer of makeup and a strategic yellow scarf, she’ll find flowers at her desk that make her sneeze. She’ll make it all the way to 1:00 pm, and then she’ll walk into her manager’s office and declare her resignation with a finality that surprises even her. She’ll sit the rest of the day in a drowsy Taco Bell that’s the only thing open within walking distance, drink too much Mountain Dew and wonder what has changed.
After the insurance check comes through, she’ll find herself in a gym. She’ll work and sweat and push herself, endurance training with a furor she never put into her day job. She’ll buy a bicycle. She’ll shower cold every morning, fill herself with protein, stare at the unfamiliar muscles that confront her in the mirror and wonder what has changed.
Her sister will try to stage an intervention when Phil announces that she’s going to climb Everest in the spring. She’ll brush off all their pleas and counsel, and scoff at their concerns. She’ll empty her apartment, making room for all the gear, and spend months trekking at altitude to acclimatize. She’ll reach base camp right on schedule, and beneath strings of fluttering prayer flags, she’ll look up at that mountain and wonder what has changed.
Adrenaline coursing through her, she’ll make the final push for the summit on the 24th of May. As her lungs scream for air, she’ll come across a body in the ice, a crumpled warning, frozen in time. Right there, at 8,500 meters, to the dismay of her guides, she will turn around.
She’ll take down the picture of the mountain on the fridge that’s fueled her drive. She’ll cancel Netflix, turn down three job offers before she accepts the right one, get a cat and four houseplants. Her climbing gear will gather dust in a basement storage locker that she’ll never open again. And on the 17th of August, on the first sunny day that month, she’ll pick up her sister for a family picnic in a new-to-her sedan. Over cold fried chicken and lukewarm potato salad, while the nephews catch frogs and the grownups hope for rain, everyone but Philomena will wonder what has changed.
This piece was first published in Many Nice Donkeys Volume I, Issue IV.
Aly Writes 