Suzanne Baugess
My father told Kevin and I about a surprise. Mom is going to have a baby. Behind the yellow wallpapered wall he told us, and we ran around the doorway to tell mom. Then the baby never came. The baby never came, and my father took us camping, just the kids without mom.
We drive south from Salt Lake City, through all the red rock parks, stopping at Bryce. Without mom, food is not pretty. Dad opens a can of beef stew and slops it into a pot. I stir the stew over the gas stove while Dad and Kevin chop wood, make a fire, and set up the tent. At night, we name all the animals we hear outside our tent in the moonlight. Slowly we all drift off to sleep.
We wake up with the blue morning rays, but wait in our bags until the sun warms the dessert air, and the condensation drips down to the ground. Only my mom’s missing presence hangs onto the day.
Then, in Velcro shoes and hand down sweats, we set off along the canyon paths to discovery. In southern Utah, the parks have castles of deep red sandstone, with unscalable walls, upon which narrow pathways lead away to what is unknown. So we all three climb up the first stair-steps towards the blue sky. Dad handing me up to Kevin, they pass me one to the other, until we all stand up in the air, the giants looking down on the brush and cacti of the desert floor. My head never felt so light. I feel invincible, tall as any tree, powerful as any force. I run smoothly along the rim of the castle wall, following the curve of the worn sandstone beneath my feet. Then we continue to climb upward, jumping over small fissures, always moving forward and up. I feel like, this upward force will never end. That people cannot survive this high.
Then my body steps too near the sloping curve that leads down. My Velcro shoes slide out in front, my hands and fingers grasping at the smooth flowing sandstone. My mom, where are her strong hands to grab me? I cannot hear anything but myself, as my body builds speed. I keep wondering when my body will leave contact with the sandstone wall, how long? And when will I hit the bottom. I see myself as Alice in Wonderland falling to infinity in the rabbit hole. Then just as quickly my body shoots out into the air, and I land hard on my butt. I look up at two heads peering down.
“Suzanne, are you O.K?”
I check my hands for blood. I look at my elbows. Nothing. I yell back, “Yes.”
“Walk to the end of the canyon, we will meet you there,” my dad says.
“By myself? Come down here,” I say.
But I stop mid-sentence and look out on a path that I must navigate on my own. No one had stepped here; I was the first one, the first footprint, and the first voice. So I walk out on my own. The high castle walls on either side set dark patches of cooling shadows on the ground. Cacti and brush once again stand aright, tall above my head. I follow the lines of the walls. Curving around each new corner, following the maze of fiery red sandstone, until quite suddenly the sand floor spreads into a valley and my father and brother stand before me.
That day I separated for one afternoon from every guiding hand that reached out to save my fall. I turned a corner, and I felt my mom had too.
Suzanne Bauguess is an undergraduate student at Texas Tech University. She will graduate with a B.A. in Natural History and Humanities with minors in chemistry and biology. She has worked at a hippo-therapy ranch for disabled children, and is currently training a service dog. She lives with her husband in Lubbock Texas. .