After I’d apologized at least five times by text for my critique of Dom’s website, then didn’t hear from him for days, he had finally responded. Relieved that he suggested getting together for dinner, I nervously chatted through the appetizer and main course, barely eating more than a bite. As soon as I told him I’d spent the morning taking the senior portraits for two of the guys on the varsity soccer team, he was on my case. I tried hard to understand why he was angry about it when I’d told him way back on our first date that portraiture was how I was helping to pay for college. I was so focused on deciphering his terse words, I hadn’t even noticed the young couple sitting next to us until they were leaving.
The woman with a lion’s mane of blonde hair and a birthmark on her face stood up, glanced swiftly at Dom, and told her boyfriend, “I’m glad you don’t have a problem with what I do.”
The man’s coffee-brown eyes dropped on me before he smiled crookedly at her. A faint scar scored his upper lip. Placing his hand on the small of her back, he said, “I’d be a complete idiot if I did.”
Fuming, Dom pushed back from the table and strode outside, leaving me with our unpaid-for, half-finished dinner. I was positive he was coming back once he’d cooled down in the fresh air. For ten minutes, the waiters walked by our table, alternately curious and pitying as they checked in on me: Was I finished? Did I want dessert? Coffee? The check? But I had no credit card, only a ten-dollar bill, which didn’t cover the cost of our appetizer. After twenty minutes, Dom finally returned, but not before one of the waitresses had asked if she could call me a taxi.
“You can come back tomorrow with the money,” she had offered.
“He’ll be back,” I had assured her.
The waitress had studied me briefly before she attended to the new set of diners at the table next to mine. “Honey, you’d be lucky if he didn’t.”
The waitress was beyond right. So was Grace. I was better off without a guy who’d punish me for not fawning over his website and had an issue with my job. I glanced over my shoulder at Helen, sitting like a pariah on her rock. I knew how she felt. But Hank was staring down at his hiking boots, looking so lost that I felt sorry for him, too. Every minute or so, he’d glance over at Helen, confirm that she was still ignoring him, then stare again at the strips of bare skin between his boots and his rain pants.
A few yards away, Stesha motioned for everyone to gather around her while she relayed our new game plan.
“I’ll be fine,” Helen whispered to me. “Go.”
So Grace and I left her side in time to hear Stesha: “Ruben and I have decided that we’re going to push on to Machu Picchu. From there, buses run regularly down to the town, and then we’ll be able to take the train back to Cusco.”
For a long moment, we stood in awkward silence. No one wanted to stay in this death trap of mud, but no one wanted to leave either. What if worse lay ahead of us? Yet there was zero assurance that backtracking would be any safer. This was supposed to be a once-in-a-lifetime expedition, not the only expedition in our lifetimes. All I wanted was to be safe at home in our little cottage.
“We’ll ask that group without a guide if they want to join us,” Stesha said, nodding toward the leaderless trekkers who were milling around aimlessly.
“We’re slow enough as it is on our own,” Hank countered as he cast about for support. He looked pleadingly over at Helen as though trying to redeem himself. “A couple of us could make it to town tonight if we pushed hard. Get some provisions, be back with help.”
“We need to stick together,” Stesha said.
“But we could do it.” Hank’s eyes glowed passionately as he turned the full firepower of his charm on Dad, the same charisma that I had admired earlier. But charisma meant nothing in the middle of a crisis. Hank told Dad, “The two of us could get to town fast, make sure we’ve got tickets for the train. Buy food for everyone. Divide and conquer.”
Dad replied firmly, “I’m not leaving anybody behind.”
At that, Mom eyed Dad with the same fierce pride she always wore when she talked about him, reminding me of her recurring dream: Dad flying overhead as if he were some kind of superhero. I caught the envious look Helen shot at my parents—the same one I’m sure I wore when I first met her and Hank at the airport in Cusco. My parents—not Hank and Helen, not me and Dom, and clearly not me and Quattro—were the It Couple.
“No one is being left behind,” Stesha said. She pulled herself up to her full five feet. “Right now, everyone’s safety is my concern. There’s a hostel a couple of hours before the Sun Gate. We can take shelter there tonight.”