Peak by Roland Smith Read Free Book Online Page A

magazines. Camp stove, coils of rope, cams, titanium ice ax, crampons, thermal gloves, digital camera, O 2 regulator and face mask, tent, subzero sleeping bag, sleeping pad, altimeter watch, carabiners, batteries, ascenders, pitons, harnesses, climbing helmet, headlamp ... Everything I needed to get through the death zone.
    Most of the clothes were too small, especially the boots. I suppose Josh couldn't have asked my mother for my sizes without tipping her off. And he couldn't have asked me, because until I passed the physical he wasn't sure I was going, which got me to wondering what he would have done if I had failed the physical.
    But only for a moment.
    The gear called to me, and nothing matters when you are up to your knees in brand-new, expensive climbing equipment.
    It took me two hours to figure out how the altimeter watch worked. An hour to set up the tent. I faced it with the opening toward the window so I could see the Himalayas. I snapped a couple photos of my view with the digital camera, then I got hungry and decided rather than going down to the dining room I'd just cook up some food on my brand-new camp stove. (I know this sounds goofy, but I get a little out of control when it comes to gear. I opened the window so I didn't get carbon monoxide poisoning.)
    As the freeze-dried beef Stroganoff was simmering away there was a knock on my door. I thought it was housekeeping again. They had come by earlier asking to clean the room, but I told them that I had everything I needed and to come back tomorrow. I slithered out of the tent, carefully stepped over the stove (so I didn't tip it over and burn down the hotel), and cracked open the door, hoping they wouldn't smell the gas burning or the food cooking.
    It wasn't the housekeeper. It was a Nepalese boy, about my age but two inches shorter. He was smiling up at my head, which is all I had revealed through the crack. Below my head I had nothing on but my boxers because I had been trying on gear all day and it was getting hot in the room from the stove and the sun coming through the window.
    "Peak Wood?" he asked.
    "Actually, it's Peak Marcello, but yeah, that's me."
    "My name is Sun-jo. Zopa sent me over to bring you to him."
    "Oh sure ... uh..." I glanced at the mess behind me. I didn't want to leave him standing in the hallway while I got ready, which was going to take a while.
    Appearing like a total idiot won over being rude. I let him in.
    Sun-jo looked a bit shocked at the setup, but he didn't burst out laughing, which I might have done if I had stumbled onto something equally as stupid-looking as my indoor camp spot.
    "My dad ... uh, I mean Josh, got me some new gear and I was ... uh ... testing it out, so I would know..." Ah, forget it, I thought. "I'm just making some lunch. Are you hungry?"
    Sun-jo said he was.
    As I got dressed, I watched him checking out the equipment, and I knew he was a climber. No one else would fondle gear as lovingly. He picked up various items like they were more valuable than gold, which they were when they were the only thing keeping you from falling off a rock face or into a dark bottomless crevasse.
    I cleared a spot for us on the bed and served him a bowl of Stroganoff and an energy bar for dessert. It turned out that Sun-jo's father had been a Sherpa. Unfortunately, he had died up on K2 the previous year trying to rescue a group of climbers. Only one of the climbers survived.
    K2 was discovered in 1856 by a surveyor named T. G. Montgomery. The K stands for Karakoram. The 2 means it was the second peak Montgomery listed on his survey. At 28,250 feet it's a bit shorter than Everest, but most climbers agree it's a lot harder to reach the summit.
    I told Sun-jo how sorry I was to hear about his father, but he shrugged it off, saying he hardly knew his dad. He and his two younger sisters had spent most of their lives at a private boarding school in northern India.
    "My sisters and I only came back to Kathmandu on holiday," he said.