Читать книгу Thirst - Heather Anderson - Страница 17

My dance with Death began as a shuffle across the Tonto Platform into the midsummer sun. My skin no longer produced sweat and I was certain I was going to die. Temperatures here often soar over 110 degrees and I was completely and utterly without water. Over the previous three months, I had gone from neophyte hiker to canyon explorer, but it had been a steep learning curve.

A large boulder cast a small blob of shade and I collapsed into it, my back sliding down the rock until my butt was in the dirt. My legs flopped outward. I was panting. How far was it to Hermit Creek? It seems like I should have been there already . . .

My mind drifted as I stared at the soaring walls of the Grand Canyon. I was not in the main corridor. I was well away from where most people hike and rangers frequently patrol. It was my second overnight trip, and the first one on my own away from the busy Inner Gorge. The weight of my backpack helped cement me to the ground.

“Well God, I guess this is it,” I murmured.

The full moon had already risen just above the red stone walls, its whiteness stark against the cerulean sky. I stared, hardly comprehending what I was looking at. How long had it been since I’d had a drink? Two hours? Three? Maybe more . . . How long have I been sitting here?

“Thank you for giving me something beautiful to look at, at least, before I go.” I closed my eyes, feeling disconnected from my body. I thought about how dehydration kills. It was almost as if I could feel my blood’s viscosity increasing in my veins.

I imagined Death extending his hand to me . . . Do you want to dance?

I opened my eyes again and pulled strength from the beauty of the moon and sky, from the canyon itself. Something deep inside me pushed back against Death’s invitation. I wanted to live.

If I can just make it to the Hermit Creek Junction. It’s only one more mile from there. I can make it one more mile. I have to. I must. I can. I cannot die here. I refuse.

Too dehydrated to even say my mantra aloud, I rolled to my side and pushed myself onto my hands and knees. Slowly, dizzily, I pulled myself to my feet using small knobs in the rock. I leaned against the boulder as I shuffled my feet around it, back onto the westward facing trail. The sun’s intensity felt like a physical blow. I stumbled to a weather-beaten sign on the other side of the boulder. Grabbing hold, I fought to focus my eyes on it long enough to read: Hermit Creek 1 Mile.

I would have cried if I’d had any fluids left to spare. Stumbling and uncoordinated, I made my way straight into the sun—a floundering mess. After an eternity of telling myself to just keep going, I followed the trail down into a side canyon. Below me crystal clear water poured across rocks as it bounced toward the Colorado River. I threw myself into the creek and lay there, face up, letting the water cascade over my body and into my mouth. Death and I may have had our first dance that day—a drunken waltz through the desert heat—but my dance card was not yet full. I would live to dance again.