Journey

The late autumn breeze did not feel cold on Steve's neck as it blew through the mountain pass. Having already come a long way to get here, Steve sat upright against a boulder near a trailhead to behold the peaks all around.

Sunlight was beginning to reach down into the canyon to the west above the trailhead’s small parking lot. The lot was empty now. Earlier, a young couple had hiked by Steve back to their car, a red pickup truck with a black shell, and driven down toward the valley. They hardly seemed to notice him as he waved, lost in conversation.

He didn’t mind.

These mountains were intimately familiar to Steve, running along the valley where he had spent most of his life. He couldn’t help but get a little emotional sometimes when he came to places like this that he had not visited for many years. In fact, he had not been to this particular trail for decades. Since 1967, to be precise, when his uncle brought him up here when he was an eleven-year-old boy.

“You could barely keep up with him if I remember right,” a voice called out to Steve from somewhere behind. Steve didn't turn around to find its source. He was still getting used to that voice, soft and buzzing in an almost machine-like rumble. It might have sounded inhuman were it not so peculiarly warm. Like an old friend speaking through a staticky radio.

Steve was getting old now, and maybe he was losing his mind a little. If that was the case, his children were kind about it, teasing him less when he seemed to forget something. He caught himself sometimes getting a person or place name wrong in a story, but he kept going to see if anyone would correct him. Most of the time, they would not. He was getting to that age where people took off the gloves and respected their elders.

He chuckled to himself at that thought. Steve the Elder.

“Uncle LaMare told me a cougar would eat me if I didn’t hike fast enough,” Steve replied. “Mom said he was just teasing, but he claimed he’d rather me get eaten than have to carry me up or down the trail. Made me wonder why he wanted to take me hiking at all.”

“Because your mother made him,” the voice answered. “You wanted to spend more time in the great outdoors. She and your father were busy working. Better in their minds to send you into the wild than come home to a dirty and disheveled household.”

The thought of experiencing his longtime deceased parents coming home to anything but a pristinely clean house made Steve anxious, even decades removed from the possibility. Steve had known too much fear of punishment as a young child to cause any real trouble at home. Maybe that’s why he didn’t see a lot of home during the summers of his childhood, which he didn’t mind the least bit. Being with aunts, uncles, and cousins was way better than in a prison of porcelain, glass, and luxurious green and red carpets.

Steve got briefly lost in the memory of his childhood home until the voice prompted him again. “You wanted to come here,” it said. “Would you rather be somewhere else?”

“No,” Steve replied. “I’ve sat here long enough. Not long ago I couldn’t have made it this far. I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

He stood, his legs still feeling surprisingly strong. He wondered why he had even stopped to rest at all just after beginning the hike, other than to take in the view. It was like he was resting out of habit, not out of need. He had grown accustomed to requiring long breaks even after walking short distances. This morning he had felt like something was going to go wrong with every step he took. A debilitating ache was going to return. His legs would give out and force him to call home for help. No, he had come this far without trouble. It seemed like he was actually, for the first time in a long while, ready for the fun part.

Steve set out, putting in his mind to not let himself rest again until he was truly tired. He took one step. Then another. Hundreds followed as he trekked up a long, straight trail in the mountain’s shadow. After that came a steep switchback up the mountainside. The sun peeked through little breaks in the ridge, the morning heating up yet not burdening him. He felt stronger, not weaker, with each step. There was no sweat on his brow. No ache in his feet. No dry lump in his throat when he went too long without taking a drink. A sense of deep exhilaration filled his entire frame.

The voice kept away for a long while. Steve was never completely sure if it was fully gone, though it seemed like, whenever it was around, it was eager to speak with him. He enjoyed being alone if he could be. He lingered near the top of the switchback in the last bit of shade to take in the view now that he was much higher. The sun was nearing its peak. He admired the dozens of meadows below now shining in the light of a clear sky and the scene of thousands of trees and leaves aglow in yellows, oranges, and reds.

Had he really come up so far on his own?

His joy in this great accomplishment, appreciated in absolute isolation, made him wonder if the voice would return were he to tarry. He set out again, clinging to this newfound independence. He wanted to be alone today. He had thought of this hike in particular when his nephew asked the other day what he would do when he felt better. Now that he was recovering, this place drew him almost immediately. He had to take advantage of it. He couldn’t let himself become weak again, at least not until he had reached the final crest to look over the valley beyond the canyon.

So long as you can manage to get yourself to the top, you can let gravity help get you back down.

“Just don’t throw yourself down,” the voice warned, emerging as though a person stood right next to him.

“And what if I do?” Steve raised an eyebrow and glanced at a steep drop off to the left. That moment confirmed something he had suspected about the voice, that it could sense his thoughts, and even anticipate them. This revelation surprisingly didn’t trouble Steve. In fact, something within him welcomed it. There was something freeing about being understood, almost perfectly.

The voice didn’t reply this time, and Steve continued on his way, though he sensed its lingering presence. It was behind him, buzzing ever so quietly, like a fellow hiker humming a low tune.

“Why are you helping me?” Steve asked.

“Am I helping you?” it replied.

“You brought me here,” Steve answered.

“Are you sure about that?”

Steve scoffed but did not formulate a retort. It had been hard for him to recall why he had come here today. He had no plans. He was feeling good. This place entered his mind, and he just went for it. It felt too easy. The voice made everything feel too easy. It had only been three days since he was lying on his back and feeling just about as bad as he ever had. Then he slept for a long while, and just like his wife always seemed to promise, he woke up feeling better. At first he kept it simple, visiting some family and friends at the hospital. The next day he felt even stronger, visiting his sister, who had lost her best friend, and also going down to the lake where he used to hunt. Still, most of his time the last few days was spent with his wife, his children, and his grandchildren.

Today was different. It was a day just for him. He hadn’t taken one of those in ages. His wife would forgive him. He slipped away before she could notice and planned to come back before she could have too much time to worry. It felt like there was no better place to be today than exactly where he was.

Another switchback flattened at the top into a grove of trees. The leaves of the trees here were mostly fallen, so high up in the mountain, crunchy from several days of dry air with no rain or snow. He admired them but resisted the urge to stray from the trail and feel their crunch under his feet. He was nearing the end. One more unavoidable steep climb was all that stood between him and one hell of a view. Steve smiled to himself. The heat of the midday sun did not oppress him. A suddenly stiff wind did not resist him as he climbed against it. His body felt lighter with each step, almost as though he would float away were he to jump, his feet the only things grasping onto the earth itself.

“This is all in your head,” he mumbled to himself.

“True, but not true,” the voice called, from far ahead this time.

The answer unnerved Steve a little. He was starting to become aware of something he had found himself hiding from, which kept him from replying back to the voice with another question. A hunger began to rise within him. Not for food or drink. He was surprisingly satiated even though he forgot his sunflower seeds and water bottle this morning, too eager to get going before the sun rose.

He was typically very methodical in preparation for something like this. The morning alarm would go off at five, no snoozing allowed. He would brush his teeth, put on his gear, kiss his wife, who hopefully would stay asleep, and grab a small bag he would have packed the night before. More recently, it was drives, not hikes, he was making, so his travel pack was always ready in the car. He would take his grandchildren across the state line to get fireworks or cheaper supplies for their grandmother’s business. They would always get a treat at the gas station on the way.

Steve emerged above the final ridge. The scene before him struck him with awe. The valley and its cities stretched out around the lake. How the landscape had changed over the past half-century. He tried to imagine in his mind the view his eleven year old self would have seen. To his surprise, in an instant, that exact image emerged, appearing in the air before him. Cities shrunk and blended into blossoming farmlands. Some towns disappeared entirely to trees and grassy fields. The highway was gone. He was struck with a feeling of longing for the places he had been and the people he had known.

“Fifty-seven years is a long time to come back to a place,” the voice said.

“It feels like it was only yesterday from all the way up here,” Steve replied.

He sat, again in the same spot he remembered so clearly sitting on as a young boy. He was alone when he first sat down here because he had raced Uncle LaMare to the top, who was cursing him out after falling trying to keep up. The empty spot to his left was, a moment later, replaced with the image of LaMare, who sat down next to him after a few more incoherent curses.

“Why would you ever want to leave this place, Steve?” LaMare said.

Steve searched his memory for the right words to reply with. He felt insecure here next to LeMare again, though he knew it was only a memory. Like his eleven year old self, who wanted so badly for his uncle to like him. LaMare had never left this valley, the place he had grown up decades before, during the great war while Steve’s parents were both serving abroad.

“The world is big, Uncle LaMare. I want to see it. New York was incredible. There’s more out there.”

“Maybe,” LaMare replied. “Just don’t forget to come back.”

A violent gust of wind blew up from the canyon below. The memory of LaMare vanished as the wind hit him, but something remained in his place. A pulse in the air, like a presence that the midday sunlight bent around. It glowed. Steve stared at it for a moment, a shimmering of light at its edges. It shone even brighter after a moment, connecting with a growing feeling deep within Steve. A gnawing that had been getting stronger ever since the day Steve began feeling better. An emerging truth that was now coming into clear focus.

“Do I really have to leave my family behind?” Steve cried.

He felt the presence of tears gathering around his eyes, but there were none to wipe away. Yet, the motion of rubbing his eyes somehow helped with the pain in his heart.

“Does the sun leave the earth?” the voice answered, its echo reverberating within the blur of light.

“The sun is never really here,” Steve replied.

“Yet, you can still feel it,” the voice corrected.

Steve smiled at this as he sensed greater familiarity and connection with the voice. He was more confident now that he knew it from somewhere. It pulled at him like a fish line he was caught in, though he could not help also feeling the sharp pain of the hook tugging at him because he didn’t want to leave his loved ones behind. He realized that he had been fighting it these past three days. It was so much stronger than anything he had ever felt before. The heat of the midday sun. The bite of the cold autumn wind. They were nothing compared to this sensation, like he was being drawn to the warmth of a fire but foolishly longing for the cold night because the people he cared about were lost somewhere out there.

“It doesn’t have to be a goodbye,” the voice clarified. “Simply let go and trust that they will feel your presence when they need you.”

Steve looked out at the valley. He scanned the stretches of cities where his loved ones might be. Where his wife rested on her day off, perhaps still in bed. Where his children and grandchildren bustled in their homes here or beyond the mountains to the north and south.

“And what if I need them?” he managed, the words coming out with great difficulty.

The voice’s reply was slow. Steve looked longingly from place to place, regretting he had not said more before coming here.

“No one believes me at first when I say this,” the voice finally answered. “But that’s the easiest part. Are you ready to let me show you?”

Steve was afraid, but the pull strengthened nonetheless. He could sense it overpowering him. He needed only to let go and it would take him completely. It was so warm. So inviting. So peaceful. He felt his fears fade away with every passing second.

All at once, he closed his eyes and released himself.

Thousands of memories poured into his consciousness like the cracks of lightning illuminating the darkness. The first time he held his baby brother. The day he met his wife. The birth of each child and grandchild. Their first words. First steps. Family trips. Wedding vows. Laughing and crying together. Long hugs and longer talks. It all poured into him, each experience as real and vivid as the tremble in his heart.

The memories drowned him, but it was okay. Like he was thrown the entirety of the world and yet could somehow catch it. The images didn’t crash to the ground. Rather, these mini worlds within worlds folded into themselves and merged somewhere deep inside of Steve. Then they became silent, leaving only one image before him. An image he had thought on more and more the past few weeks. The image of his father. Not as his father was when he died, but on a baseball field coaching Steve’s little league team. His back was to Steve, but then he turned and looked this way. It was like looking through a picture frame. He knew his father wasn’t there, yet he felt that he could be if he wanted to be. And that was enough for Steve to completely give in.

“Take me to him.”