PhD, found herself clambering on all fours across the rubbery tubes of Dixie’s raft, trying not to slip as she made her way to the back. She would have preferred to ride in JT’s boat, but the fat girl had just taken the front seat, and JT signaled Evelyn to find another boat. She reminded herself that a woman could row as well as a man and scolded herself for presuming otherwise.
But here they were, finally starting their journey! Evelyn had signed up for this trip as a gift to herself for her fiftieth birthday, and she’d been planning it for well over a year, reading guidebooks and history books and all the personal narratives she could find. A professor of biology at Harvard, she applied her vast research skills to scouting out the best equipment on the Internet—sunblock shirts and insulated water bladders and quick-drying pants that unzipped to become a pair of shorts.
Evelyn hated being unprepared.
Now, with an awkward lurch over a mound of gear, Evelyn found herself in the back well of the boat. The young man from Cincinnati was already sitting on one of the side tubes. Evelyn steadied herself and set her day bag down and wiped her brow.
“It’s a bitch, isn’t it, just getting in and out,” he said.
Evelyn didn’t want to think that she was in the same category as this young man, who had informed them all last night that he didn’t know how to swim. Evelyn knew how to swim. She knew how to canoe and sail and kayak too. She just didn’t have a lot of experience climbing in and out of big rubber rafts.
“So I forget—is this your first trip down the Colorado River?” Peter asked.
Actually, it was the first time she’d even seen the Colorado. She’d gotten her first glimpse earlier that morning, when the transport bus stopped at Navajo Bridge, which spanned the river just before the turnoff to Lee’s Ferry. Lots of people liked to walk across the bridge, the bus driver told them. Evelyn got off the bus and joined the others, but midway she stopped and peered over the iron railing. There it was, five hundred feet below, a glassy blue ribbon flanked by green bushes and pink cliffs. Where were the rapids? Where was the roar of white water? All she could hear was the drone of cars crossing the bridge.
In fact, if she closed her eyes, she could have even been back in Boston. She thought of the man who’d left her six months ago with the briefest of letters, whose golden heart she still wore around her neck. She reached up and fingered the heart. It was smooth and warm, as familiar as a tooth. She recalled its red velvet box, the white satin inside. She remembered the touch of his bearded chin against her chest, how he bumbled with his glasses before they made love.
Suddenly, on a whim, Evelyn reached up and unfastened the chain. Dangling it over the railing, she pictured his face once more, then let go. Golden threads in midair, the heavier heart glinting below—Julian’s gift evaporated in the hot desert air. And with it, she hoped, any gloom that was trying to seep in and ruin her trip.
“Yes, it’s my first trip,” Evelyn replied now.
“Mine too,” said Peter. “I’ve never even been in a rowboat. Want some help?”
She was trying to clip her day bag to the web of straps that crisscrossed the pile of gear. She shook her head, but the straps were too tight, and she had to wait while he wedged his hand beneath to lever some space so she could slip her carabiner through.
“Tight little buggers, aren’t they?” he said cheerfully.
No doubt wanting to imply that he had more experience than she! Down in the bilge, a puddle of cold water collected at her feet, and she wished she’d thought to get out her neoprene socks. But she wasn’t going to go through the rigmarole of unclasping the carabiner and opening up her bag again.
So much work, just getting settled in a boat! How she hated being a novice!
Up front, the old couple had settled themselves efficiently, as though they’d done this a thousand times before. Meanwhile, Dixie waded knee-deep into the icy water and began coiling up the thick nylon bow line, which she then jammed into its own loop, giving it a fierce tug.
“All set?” she asked, and after getting nods all around, she gave the boat a push and