Wholesome Short Stories

Walls

Chase looked at the ground sweating, both from being slightly out of shape and the fact the instructor had just told them it was the time when holding onto a wall 20 feet in the air, they were to now let go of said wall, trusting that some machine would stop them from flying through the air and landing very ungracefully (and probably painfully) at the bottom.

See Chase had always liked going up. When they were a kid they gravitated to any climbing wall they saw, at camps, school fairs, birthday parties.  The problems just came when Chase had to go down.  The idea of letting go of supporting yourself and trusting someone else to catch you was terrifying to them.  They'd scale these walls so fast that all the other kids would be in awe until the crying that always came when they had to come down.  The person they'd all seen seconds prior was no more, and what was left was a scared little kid who needed to be rescued by climbing staff.  Literally. Every. Time.  It got to the point that Chase's mom banned them from climbing, it was too embarrassing for her to watch anymore, the outcome was always the same.

This ban really started to suck when Chase got their hands on a book about kids climbing Mount Everest.  It put dreams in their head that they knew probably would never happen.  For the same reason they felt pulled to the top of walls, Chase started to feel pulled to the top of mountains.  Conveniently, there were always mountains in their town; the piles of snow created by the zambonis from the hockey arena.  That winter Chase was obsessed.  Every day they visited, geared up in a full snowsuit (like how they would be on Everest of course) to conquer these enormous mountains.  So many routes, they came at the piles from every side, going up and down and up again, beating personal best times, using only feet, only hands, even wearing their backpack with a very heavy 3rd grade math textbook.  Anything Chase could do to make it more difficult was done.  They weren't scared, there were no ropes and it wasn't straight up, it was easy to slide down, and if you fell the biggest risk was a face full of snow and some looks from passers by.  They vowed one day they'd get to Everest.

Of course Chase never told their parents this.  Sure their mom and dad knew they were climbing snow piles, but they thought, " kids are gonna do what kids are gonna do." They didn't want to let anyone in on their dreams cause everyone else would be vividly reminded of one of the times they failed to be able to get down the wall without someone rescuing them.

It was like this for years.  Obviously they grew out of climbing zamboni piles, and slowly started to let go of their Everest dreams.  Who would understand an urge that strong for something Chase had never shown interest or aptitude in? But one evening the thought came to them to just bring it up and see.  Chase asked their dad if he'd want to go to a climbing gym on a day off school.  He agreed, exercise, time spent with his child, why not right?

And this is how Chase came to be halfway up a wall terrified again of coming down.  When they had got there, everything looked perfect, the walls were so tall.  Chase's heart swelled imagining the feeling of getting to the top of every route.  But the training wall, the one they use to teach how the auto belays work, was already to much for them.   Chase felt the regret bubbling up inside.  They could barely feel comfortable jumping off ten feet up the practice wall, how could they do the rest? It was a mistake asking their dad to bring them here.  Chase was really not having a good time.

But what else was there to do?  They kept going, starting small.  Taking a breath Chase let go of his holds on the wall and jumped back.  It was a little fast at first, but the belay kicked in and slowed them as they went down, kicking away from the wall. That was it.  Yeah Chase had only done it from less than half the wall but it was a step.  They did half then three quarters and eventually the whole wall.  It was breath taking, both cause it was tiring work, but also because Chase was so proud of themself.  They did wall after wall, climbing with ease, challenging themselves, and each time taking a breath before jumping back and letting the belay take them down. 

Maybe Chase would always be a bit afraid of coming down, but they would never let it stop them from reaching the top.