LITR 3731: Creative Writing
Student Fiction Submission 2005

Lindsay Niemann

Night Hiking

            Was it worth it?  This incredible idea of hiking the Camel Back Trail at dusk, just in time to see a full moon shine bright over a clear, blue glacial lake.  Was it worth it?  My acquaintances thought so, but I wasn’t convinced.  Had we thought about the fact that we would be hiking back down this mile-long trail in complete darkness?  I hadn’t, and my lack of a flashlight confirmed it.  Hopefully someone else brought one, I thought,  if not, we will be hiking by the light of our full moon, that is, if these clouds lift.

            “Hey, don’t bother waiting, “I shouted.  “We’ll meet you at the top.”

            My roommate and I watched the others disappear around the curve of  the mountain.  As the sun set on the horizon, the mountain air grew colder.  I took off the jacket that was tied around my waist and put it on.  Tall, lodge pole pines were swaying in the wind that was gradually gaining strength.  The trail was a rocky terrain polluted with tree trunks knocked over by wind storms, and although only a mile long, by the time we reached the top, we will have hiked 1000 ft in elevation.  It was a steady incline and my lungs were killing me, as well as my feet, but this is what I came to do.  No turning back now.  I kept a keen eye open for bears, wolves, and coyotes, clapping my hands every so often to warn these predators of my presence.  As another precaution, I also attached my keys to the belt buckle of my pants so they would jingle every time I took a step.  I was fully covered,  I thought.

            My roommate and I rested for a moment and took a couple of gulps from our bottles of water.  We didn’t rest long for fear that the others would get too far ahead.  I cringed at the idea of being out-hiked.  We trudged forward in a useless attempt to catch up, but as my wheezing worsened, I knew I wouldn’t be able to maintain a steady pace.  I could hear my roommate wheezing along with me.

             “It’ll be much easier coming back down,” I said.  “This incline is killing me.”

            “ Yeah,” she responded breathlessly.

            Yeah,  I thought, easier, unless we get eaten by a grizzly.

            We continued hiking in silence, and by the time we reached the top, our long-winded hiking pals were already seated, smoking and situated on a long bench overlooking the lake.

            “Hey, you guys finally made it,” Matt said with a patronizing smile. 

“We waited until you guys got here to spark this thing up.”  He put out his cigarette and pulled out a fat joint that looked more like a cigar.

 We sat down, still exhausted, and took part in the offering.

There were five of us.  My roommate and I, Matt, Brad, and Rachel.  Matt was a loud-mouthed, punk-rocker from Portland, who had a personal vendetta against mainstream America, but everybody knew he was a closet norm.  There was Brad, a truck driving, gun totting hunter from Dallas, and Rachel, an ex-mental patient who had attempted suicide so many times nobody paid much mind anymore. My roommate was from Vermont.  She was quiet and reserved and unlike the rest of us eccentrics.  I was from Louisiana and in need of something besides swampland and endless rain. Our ages ranged from the early twenties to mid-thirties, and I was somewhere in the middle, too young to comprehend life and too old not to care.  We were seasonal employees working at a ski resort in the Crazy Mountains in Chico, Montana.  It was still early October, and although ski season didn’t start until November, we were asked to show up early to help prepare.  Soon, tourists from all across the globe would be in Chico enjoying the popular slopes.  We had only been working together for two weeks, and although we were still getting acquainted, we had a common bond just knowing we had left our homes to be in Chico for the winter season.  For what ever reason, we needed to get away and Montana was the perfect retreat.

“So, did anybody bring a flashlight?”  The following silence answered my question.

“Shit, nobody brought a flashlight?”  Matt introduced the question again.

Brad began laughing, “Well ya’ll, look on the bright side, at least there’s a full moon.”

“Yeah,” my roommate piped in, “we don’t need no stinkin’ flashlight, we’ll just use the light of the moon to guide us back down this treacherous mountain.”

We all laughed despite the situation and continued toking on the slow burning herb.  I took two hits and passed it to Rachel, who had distanced herself from the rest of us.   The metal bench we were sitting on was probably about ten feet in length, and the four of us were sitting within arm’s reach of one another. Rachel sat on the very edge of the opposite end of the bench, and I had to stand up and walk over to where she was to pass the offering.  It was odd behavior to be anti-social in such an obvious way, and even though it was a well-known fact that Rachel had emotional problems, I had never witnessed it first hand.  When I handed her the joint, she took it, saying nothing, and then handed it back to me after hitting it twice.  I walked it back over to Brad, who was next in line.  I’m not doing that again, I thought.  What I found even stranger was the fact that none of us tried to talk to Rachel.  We just ignored her weirdness and figured she’d come back around eventually.

“We’re not going to see the moon tonight if these clouds keep rolling in,” I said, attempting to break the uncomfortable silence.

“We’ll just have to wait it out,” responded Brad matter-of-factly.  “They seem to be moving pretty fast anyway.”

“Man, I don’t want to be stuck up here during a thunderstorm,” my roommate said nervously.  “We’d be sitting ducks, perfect candidates for a lightning strike.”

“Don’t worry about that,” I said, trying to calm my anxious roomy, “Brad’s like 6’3’ or something, he’d get struck before any of us.”

My roommate and I laughed, but Brad seemed to ignore my comment looking as if he was deep in thought about something.  He spoke suddenly and disrupted the stubborn silence that just could not be permanently broken.

“I brought a gun,” he said, pulling out a handgun from his backpack and carelessly pointing it up in the air for all of us to see.  “Just in case we run into a bear or something,  I got us covered.”  This little gesture actually got Rachel’s attention, who was still off in her own depressed world.  She looked over, stared at the gun, and let her eyes drop back down towards the ground.  

“You brought a fucking gun man, how lame is that?”  Matt was obviously not impressed by Brad’s show-and-tell.  “You think that’s actually going to do anything to a grizzly anyway, man?  It’s just going to piss the thing off.”  Matt took the last hit off the joint and stomped it out in a way that would make Smokey The Bear proud.

            “Well, shit Matt, it won’t kill the bastard, but it’ll scare ‘im off anyhow, keep ‘im from chowin’ down on us.”  Brad seemed surprised that Matt wasn’t a gun enthusiast like himself. 

            “Guys, it’s really getting cold up here, I think I’m going to start heading back down pretty soon,” my roommate said, changing the subject.  She was shivering, and with the sun completely gone, we were left in darkness except for the glowing orange lights from our lit cigarettes.  Our full moon could somewhat be seen behind a veil of gathering clouds, but it was a dull light, not even bright enough to reflect off a would-be-glimmering glacial lake.  These clouds aren’t going anywhere, I thought, but unlike my roommate, I wasn’t ready to make that trip back down the mountain yet.

            “I’ve got something that’ll warm you up,” I said to my roomy.  I pulled out a full bottle of rum from my pack and took the first swig.  It burned all the way down my throat, and I had to chase it with water, but it warmed me up right away.  I handed the bottle to my roommate, and she took two swigs before handing it over to Brad.

            “Rum eh, why couldn’t you have brought some SoCo?  I’m not a big fan of rum.”  Brad took the bottle anyway and bogarted it just like he did the joint.

            “Well, I don’t know Brad.  Why couldn’t you have brought a shotgun instead of a measly little hand gun?”  I smiled while saying this, but honestly,  I really didn’t like Brad, and Rachel, well, Rachel was just freaking me out.  She was still sitting on the other side of the bench starring off into nothingness as if she was the only one up here.  We continued ignoring her.

            “You wouldn’t even know how to shoot a shotgun,” Brad said, defending himself and taking another swig of the rum.

            “I’ve handled a shotgun before,” I retorted, angry at his sexist remark.  “The only reason you would say something like that is because I’m female.  I’ll bet you wouldn’t have said something like that to Matt.”  I was mad.  I grabbed the bottle out of Brad’s grip and took two more swigs.

            “Yeah, I know how you southern men are,” I continued.  “You gotta take care of us helpless women cuz we just can’t…”

            “Hey, what the hell is SoCo anyway?”  Matt interrupted my ranting, and I couldn’t help but laugh as I handed the bottle over to him.

            “It’s Southern Comfort, and for the record, it tastes like complete shit,” I said, still irritated with Brad.  Just then, Rachel got up and walked into the woods without saying a word.  I figured she had to use the bathroom, but after about fifteen minutes (fifteen minutes of rum induced, idol chatter), she still had yet to return.  My roommate became worried, but the rest of us were too stoned and drunk by that time to care.

            “Rachel,” we cheerfully bellowed, “Where, oh, where did you go?  RACHEL! RACHEL!” We were really enjoying using our outside voices.

            “Hey Brad, why don’t you take your gun and go find the little lady,” I said with contempt.  “She probably needs a big, strong man like yourself.”

            “What she needs is a psychiatrist.”  Brad got up, tossed his cigarette over the edge of the mountain, and with his gun still in hand, walked a couple of feet away from the bench, turned his back to us and dropped his pants.  He then relieved himself while still carrying on a conversation with anyone who would listen.  He began talking politics and defending the NRA as if any of us even cared.  Brad’s really drunk, I thought, and I wondered how I would be able to get the gun away from the angry, drunk guy who thought he had something to prove.  I was drunk too, but I trusted myself, and I hardly knew Brad.

            “Do you actually think it’s a good idea to take guns out of the hands of civilians?  Hell no!  The criminals will still have guns and we’ll be up shit creek.  Back home, everyone carries a gun for protection.”  Matt passed me a look as if to say, “Hey, let’s push this annoying bastard over the edge, he’s got a pretty good chance of hitting the lake.”  Instead, the three of us looked down at our hiking boots and tried to tune him out.  I don’t know what was more annoying, his extremist politics or his man-made waterfall.

“I’m going to find Rachel and then I’m heading back down to the campsite.”  My roommate stood up and proceeded to leave.

“Wait a minute,” I said with concern. “You can’t head back alone, besides, Rachel’s probably halfway down the mountain by now.  Let me finish my cigarette, and this bottle of rum, and then I’ll go with you.”

“Hurry, I’m cold and hungry.”  The irritation in her voice was obvious.

Brad finally zipped up, but as he turned around, he dropped his gun, causing it to go off.  We all screamed profanities, except for Brad, who was laughing like an absolute madman.  I don’t know where the bullet went, or which direction it took, but none of us were hit.  I was livid.

“Give me the fucking gun Brad,” I said viscously. “I’m holding it till we get back to the campsite.”

“Hell no!  I’m not giving you my gun.”

“Give her the gun Brad.”

“Oh, c’mon Matt, it only had one bullet anyway. The chamber’s empty now.”

“I don’t care man, give it to her. I think we’d all feel safer. You’ve had way too much to drink.” Matt stuck out his hand waiting for Brad to give it up.

“Here, take it! Damn thing’s empty anyhow. Here, I don’t need it, it’s useless, just give it back to me at the campsite, OK?

“Fine, whatever, just give it to her.” Brad reluctantly handed his deadly toy over to Matt, who then handed it to me. 

The gun felt alien and heavy in my grip.

“I’m headin’ back down,” Brad yelled, already a good distance away.  “To hell with the moon, these clouds ain’t goin’ nowhere.  See you bastards at the bottom.”  He stormed off into the darkness, and Matt and I sighed relief as we watched him disappear into the swaying trees.  The cold was seeping in through my layered clothing, and the wind was hurting my eyes.  I took the last sip of the rum and noticed white flakes were falling on my black gloves.

“Hey guys, it’s snowing,” I proclaimed with mild excitement, but when I turned around to face Matt and my roommate, I saw only Matt.

   “She must have left when we were arguing with Brad.  We better get going too before the snow gets worse.”

“Yeah, you're probably right,” I said, putting the gun in my backpack and following Matt to the narrow trail that lead to our campsite.

It was almost impossible to see.  The ground was quickly turning white and I kept tripping over rocks and fallen pine trees.  The wind was fierce and I couldn’t see Matt ahead of me.  Falling snow flakes impaired my vision and the rum was impairing the rest of me.  I was not prepared for these conditions, and as I pressed on, trying to avoid falling and breaking my ankle or my head on a rock, I realized I was alone.  Matt was completely gone, the others were probably at the campsite by now, and I was alone in the Crazy Mountains on this dark and rocky trail during a snow storm.  Don’t panic, I thought, just don’t get lost. 

An unfamiliar noise caught my ears.  Over and over again it came sounding as if native tribes were beating on ceremonial drums.  What is that knocking sound?  It can’t be an animal.  No animal makes that sound.  I picked up the pace, but my feet were clumsy causing my shoe to get stuck under a fallen tree.  I lost my balance and fell forward freeing my foot but falling hard to my knees.  I screamed out in pain and leaned back against the wooden culprit.  I sat still, waiting for the pain to subside and wondering how much further I had to go.  Little less than half a mile.  I can handle that.  My body was burning from the intense wind, but I had to rest a little longer.  My knees were still killing me.  I heard something straight ahead that sounded like a large animal snorting or grunting.  My ears became radars and I broke out into an ice-cold sweat.  Tales of bear attacks began racing through my mind as my paranoia rose to a level red.  Slowly, I reached for my backpack, felt around, and pulled out Brad’s handgun.  I gripped it with both hands, placed my right index finger over the trigger, and pointed it towards the sound.  I waited, stone still and alert.  I heard rustling and saw a dark figure emerge from the dense forest.  Without thinking, with the jerk of my nervous finger, I pulled the trigger and an unexpected shot rang through my ears.  An elk ran past me and I jumped to my feet at the sight of it.  “An elk,” I laughed.  “That’s all it was, a freakin’ elk?”  I continued hiking in confidence and laughing out loud at my needless fear, but something else caught my eye causing me to come to a dead stop.  Something was lying in the snow, and as I hesitantly crept forward, I recognized the motionless form.

“Oh God,” I whispered, standing over it with a blank stare on my face and fighting the urge to faint. 

“Oh God… Rachel?”  My voice was loud and intrusive.  “Rachel?”  My eyes were frozen and my body was locked in place.  What was she doing out here?  Why wasn’t she at the campsite?

 Snow was still steadily falling and the wind sounded more like an ocean.  I stood there, no longer affected by the weather.  I stood over her contemplating the reality of the situation.  She was dead, and although it was dark, I could see the right side of her head covered in blood.  I looked up to see tall lodge pole pines viciously swaying in the wind creating a hollow knocking sound as they hit one another.  Brad’s stray bullet, I thought, that’s what happened.  It was Brad’s bullet. 

draft exchange report

I E-mailed Devon and asked her if she would mind reading my short fiction story and giving me some feedback.  The next day she e-mailed me back with some helpful comments about my story.

Devon said that she did not anticipate the chain of events that took place and that the end was not predictable.  However, she was under the impression that the story was part of something bigger and that it wasn’t finished yet.  I didn’t know how I wanted to end the story, but after receiving her feedback, I’m considering changing the end either by adding more or providing more information and closure.

Devon also liked the visuals and said, “I felt as if I were in the forest with them…the whole ceremonial drums/trees knocking together/elk thing really worked for me.”  She also said that she really liked my character development.

One area of the story that she said I might want to change is when one of my characters leaves the scene abruptly. “When you talk about Rachel leaving, it happens a little too fast.”  I agreed with her and have since gone back and made some adjustments.

I also E-mailed Audra and asked her if she would read my story.  She E-mailed me back the next day with some comments.

Audra said that it was a great story and she didn’t see anything that she would change.  She said that she was “really sucked in,” and that “nothing was confusing and it was really well written.”

One thing that both Devon and Audra commented on was the fact that I never give the narrator a name.  This wasn’t on accident, and although I don’t think it’s relative for her to have a name, I’m still not completely sure.

Overall, I was happy with the feedback I received and found their comments extremely helpful and insightful.  It sure does help having another set of eyes view your work.