“It’s beautiful,” I said simply. Talk about understatement. The ring had TurnStyle blog written all over it, but I didn’t have the heart to gush over the stone or the setting.
Here was the It Couple that Dom and I were supposed to be. We were supposed to be the ones at the top of our careers who’d travel the world together in the midst of our crazy busy lives. We were supposed to be the ones with funny stories and inside jokes about our trip mishaps. And I’d really thought we had all that, starting the moment Dom told me he knew I’d love his grandmother’s favorite perfumery in Paris, which blended a unique fragrance for each and every client. “Yours would have to smell like nights in Bali,” he had said on our first date. “Have I ever told you about the week I spent there? No? You would love it.” Then four weeks later, he returned from a family reunion in Paris, bearing a tiny bottle of perfume crafted just for me.
Stesha walked back to the van with her phone in her hand and the paunchy driver at her side. She sighed with regret as she climbed into the passenger seat up front. “The last couple couldn’t make the trip after all. Family emergency.”
“Oh, no,” Mom said, frowning. “That’s terrible.”
“Well, things have a funny way of working out for the best,” Stesha said philosophically. “Grace has already been at the hotel for two days. So we’ll be a small party. Plus Ruben, Ernesto, a few other porters, and myself.”
On the drive to the hotel, Stesha warned us, “Be careful not to overexert yourselves as you acclimatize to the high altitude.” With a pointed look at my big, strapping father, whose knee was bouncing up and down impatiently, she continued in a stern voice, “I mean it. We’re at eleven thousand feet—almost as high as your Mount Rainier. So drink a ton of water in the next two days, take a nap as soon as we get to the inn, and make sure to eat lightly. As appetizing as roasted guinea pig may sound, hold off on it until your body adjusts.”
“Guinea pig?” I repeated weakly, as Mom twisted the cap off a water bottle and handed it to me.
“A local delicacy.”
The thought of eating one of my elementary school pets pretty much obliterated all my appetite and jet lag. I didn’t protest when Dad suggested a short run while we scoured the hotel room for any and all telltale signs of bedbugs. Despite Mom’s meticulous packing, it took her another good fifteen minutes to get herself ready. So I cracked open the manual for the new camera I’d given to Dad. Since there was only so much a travel-worn person could process about f-stops and shutter speeds, I abandoned that effort and retrieved my old camera. I thought I had wiped the SD card clean of photos, but of course, there he was: Quattro, glowering at me in front of the Gum Wall, with all the staying power of a cockroach after a nuclear blast.
“Oh, who’s that?” Mom asked, spotting Quattro’s photo when she leaned over me to snag her deodorant from the backpack. “He’s rugged looking.”
Dad ambled over. “Hey, that’s the kid from the Gum Wall. He’s got quite the schnoz.”
“Dad!”
“Oh, he’ll grow into that,” Mom said with the same easy confidence that she had when she assured me that I’d grow into my large feet. Unbelievably, she was right, as I’d discovered in ninth grade, the year when boys started pursuing me with off-putting enthusiasm. “And besides, never underestimate the beautifying power of a good personality. So who is he? When did you meet him?”
“We better go if we want to be back on time,” I said loudly. Dad must have agreed, since he hustled to the elevator bank before our hotel room door could even shut behind us.
“You sure about this?” Mom asked as we landed in the lobby, looking guilty for disobeying Stesha’s orders.
“This’ll be the perfect training run for Rainier since we’re already at altitude,” Dad said, ignoring the employees at the front desk, who stared at us while my parents stretched. Of course, people stared. I’m sure they were wondering how we’d pay the hotel bill if we had to be medevaced back to the U.S. “We’ll just take it a little slower.”
But slow for Dad was race pace for most humans. His guiding principle for exercise was to train hard and train often. My lungs protested every step for the first quarter of a mile. There was a reason why all the other tourists lollygagged at a slow, dazed pace. Can you say “oxygen deprivation”?
“Sorry, I can’t keep up,” Mom huffed.
Did that slow Dad? No, he and his lungs of titanium kept on going. After ten minutes, Mom grabbed Dad’s arm and tugged him to a stop. “Honey, please.”