“Pichincha.” Edgardo points across my chest, breaking the silence.
“I see,” I say.
Pedro reaches silently through from the backseat and offers me pistachio nuts. I shake my head. He shrugs and keeps eating. We park the car at an adobe-style house complete with a stone path. It’s bare-bones, but at this point any evidence of human intent registers as luxurious. We haul our belongings—which for me includes a backpack stuffed with an old sleeping bag of Pedro’s, climbing equipment, beans, and a chocolate bar—over our shoulders. I push a wooden door and poke my head into the house. I see a musty rug, a small kitchen, and a ladder leading up to a floor covered in hay. It’s somehow colder inside than out and smells of mildew. Pedro comes in behind me. He looks up at the rafters, puts his hands on his hips, and whistles appreciatively.
Edgardo appears behind us.
“We cannot stay here.”
“Looks fine to me,” I say, fishing in my pack for toilet paper.
I am fond of this role reversal.
“We must go to the refuge,” he says plainly and glares at Pedro, who should know better.
Apparently, we are trespassers. This little hacienda is not our destination. It costs quite a bit of money to rent and other people have done that already. This evening’s destination is another 1,200 feet up and we will be climbing there on foot. The only reason we stopped here is because Edgardo thought this might be a good spot to layer up.
I unfurl two pairs of snow pants, a sweater, and my fleece vest from my backpack but I am having trouble with the boots. Exasperated, Edgardo grabs my leg, one hand behind the knee and the other on the boot, quickly forcing me to sit on a stone bench. He starts lacing up the boots for me. This would verge on maternal if it weren’t the most violent corset-style lacing session of all time. I don’t know what kind of mother Edgardo had. Mine used to take a heart-shaped cookie cutter to my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
* * *
“Here is where we get out,” Edgardo says, firmly.
It’s beyond me how anyone could discern “parking space” from where we’ve stopped. The rain has turned to snow that comes from beneath the car as much as from above it. No one expected a snowstorm but apparently this one doesn’t look so bad. I am awash with the impulse to be back in New York in my apartment, imagining it in mid-July when it’s too hot to go outside and the first sign of rain is a hollow tapping on the air-conditioning unit. I am freezing already, a fact that Edgardo can’t quite believe, despite the purple hue of my lips. I have been backed into trusting him through circumstance. Like a doctor–patient relationship, no matter how extreme my doubt, he is the only one to tell me what’s normal. The closest second opinion is five hours and 5,000 vertical feet away. I unbuckle my seat belt. I think that I have never been so cold in my life but try to rid myself of thoughts like this. There’s nowhere to go but up.
“Your hands are too cold,” Edgardo observes as he watches me not get out of the car.
I am vigorously rubbing my palms together. I would stick them in my mouth if I wasn’t worried about the consequences of them being wet when I removed them. Edgardo reaches across me to open the glove compartment. I want to hug him for warmth. This is hard to reconcile, since the more I get to know Edgardo, the less I want to hug him in general. Maybe what I really want is to gut him Jack London–style and use his kidneys for mittens. We smile politely at each other. He pockets the can of cologne. I’m not sure whom he’s planning on attracting in a frozen volcano crater. Pedro, meanwhile, goes bounding out of the car, all joints and momentum. The prospect of warmth moves me to follow him. I heave my backpack on and try to keep up.
Edgardo yells after Pedro to slow down. I am like an animal too stupid to know to do this myself. Like those parakeets who have to have their cages covered so they know it’s time to sleep. I don’t know it yet, but with no climbing experience and less than twenty-four hours at 10,000 feet above sea level, I will most likely pass out from speed-hiking. But right now I feel okay, almost chatty, for a whole minute before my heart starts banging in earnest. I take advantage of the howling wind to pant as audibly as I wish.
The ground is covered in layers of thick snow that yield to a second layer of volcanic ash. It looks like crumbled Oreo cookies and provides about as much resistance. There’s the occasional flat rock to step on, which helps, but it’s the low visibility that’s stealing the show. I see no sign of this alleged second shelter. When I shout to Edgardo, asking him where the refuge is, I am told it’s in a little place called “Tranquilo.”
I can feel my heart pounding against polyester, trying to escape from my rib cage. I take my thumbs and lean them against the chest strap from the inside to relieve some of the pressure. What has two thumbs and can’t feel either of them? This gal! Edgardo waits about thirty feet ahead of me with one foot up on a rock, as I huff and puff to shorten the distance between us. His befuddlement at my pace feels genuine. Pedro has been granted
