LITMIR.BIZ

CHAPTER FIVE:

       GRAND CANYON

      Greta and I are having a farting contest in the tent. There are awards for loudest and stinkiest. She’s winning both.

      “Damn,” I say to her. “You need to cut back on the black beans.”

      “Need I remind you of the year I lived with your mom and dad?” she says. “I changed an indeterminate number of stinky diapers. Yours, I might add, thank you very much.”

      “Baby poop isn’t that stinky,” I tell her.

      “Are you insane? It’s horrendous.”

      Greta has issues around pooping, always has. She worries about things like when she will have to go, where she’ll be, if there will be people nearby, etc. To use her own word, she is loath to poop in a public restroom, but if she has to, she finds airports the easiest of all public facilities. When asked why they are easier, she says something about the transience. People moving through. It’s not like you’ll meet up again with the woman who was in the stall next to you. She’s long gone, you’re long gone; you’ve each headed in different directions. She has a fondness for pit toilets at campgrounds because they are always off by themselves, remote and private, but she can’t stand the smell. It takes her a while to do the deed. I’m so fast, I can pretty much go in, hold my breath, and get out of there before having to inhale. She envies my efficient pooping skills. I tell her it’s the new vegan diet and she should try it.

      I call it “snapping a deuce.” Number Two—get it?

      She calls it “dropping the kids off at the pool.”

      She says she could hardly call what she does “snapping” as that connotes something quick, as in a snap of the fingers. Dropping off kids has a lingering connotation more accurate for her. My ex-boyfriend Jasper—he and his guy friends called it “pinching a loaf” but Greta and I have ruled that one out as too disgusting—referencing poop as food—conjuring up in your head a loaf of bread, or a meat loaf, or those nasty cheese and nut loaves people have at Christmas. For that matter, fruit cake.

      I remind Greta that her favorite saying for this equates fecal matter with offspring. She thinks, since she isn’t a mom, this is okay.

      “You’d be a good mom, though,” I say.

      She says thanks and tells me to go to sleep. We have a long hike tomorrow.

      I used to sleep soundly when camping. I always liked the feeling of being cocooned inside a sleeping bag, and I don’t mind the hard ground. I have one of those inflatable Therm-a-Rest pads and it works fine. But now, on the first camping trip since the incident, there are things to worry about after dark. I don’t say anything to Greta, don’t know if she’s awake too, worried too, wondering like me if the man who killed my mother might be at this very campground, eager to bludgeon again. I even talk myself into thinking it makes sense—someone running from a crime would go to the nearest national park, crowded with a constantly changing cast of characters, total anonymity. Between me and Greta and a lunatic, there is nothing but this tent—ripstop, thin fabric. I cannot stop myself from thinking of things with which one might bludgeon. A club, a bat, a log, an axe, a boulder. The bench from the picnic table. I lie and listen, ready to leap up at the first sound of trouble.

      Neither of my parents were campers or outdoor enthusiasts. But Greta took me all over. The Grand Canyon is one of the places we like to return to—this is our third time. We’ve done the North Rim, Havasupai Canyon, and now we’re doing what most tourists do—the South Rim. We’ll hike down as far as Phantom Ranch tomorrow and then back out to this same campsite the next night. I’ll have to imagine this all over again, the possibility of a murderer on the loose. Sounds silly, but no one ever would’ve expected one in our Austin neighborhood, either. I’m ready for morning. Everything’s manageable in daylight. Eventually, finally, I sleep.

      Yesterday we did the quick rim trails, the little quarter-mile nature walks and vista points and visitors’ center. We bought our postcards and watched the film.

      Now, before heading out on the real hike, we sit in on an info session for backpackers. We learn that people hiking into the canyon in the summer need to carry a gallon of water per person per day. The ranger tells stories about people not taking this seriously. The descent is so easy, they think it won’t be that bad coming back out—but it’s hard and it’s hot and you sweat a lot and lose water and this is the desert, for God’s sake, and you need to hydrate constantly even when you’re not doing rigorous exercise. We listen. Greta is the type to do whatever they recommend.

      The ranger covers all the other dangers, like heat stroke and rattlesnake bites, like falling into the canyon. He says, “Now who do you think falls over the edge most often?” Nobody says anything. “Do you think it’s children? NO, it’s not children. Do you think it’s elderly people? NO, the elderly follow the rules. The people who fall to their death in the Grand Canyon are typically young men, from the age of eighteen to twenty-six.” One guy who fits into that age range lets out a little laugh. “WHY do they fall in?” the ranger asks. He points to that one guy, challenging him to come up with an answer. “Goofing around?” the guy says. “Exactly,” says the park ranger. He explains that they are the ones most likely to go past a sign that says to stay back. They want to scramble a little on the edges; they want to lean far out there and get a better photograph; they want to impress their friends and girlfriends (Ranger Rick emphasizes this) by not being afraid, not heeding the silly warning signs. And the next thing you know, they’re overboard. “Do NOT take these risks!” he says. “I would rather not carry you out of here in a body bag.” I roll my eyes to Greta, like this guy is a real drama queen, is he not?

      Greta answers my eye roll with a poke in the side—uses her elbow.

      “Ow,” I say. “What?”

      “Pay attention to Yogi Bear.”

      “Yogi Bear? What are you talking about?”

      “I mean Smokey the Bear. Listen to what he has to say.”

      Smokey opens it up to Q and A, and someone asks about rattlesnake bites.

      “Slice it and suck out the venom,” whispers Greta. She makes a face.

      “Ick,” I say.

      “Not really. Don’t listen to me. I have no idea.”

      Turns out the most likely group to get bitten by a rattlesnake is, you guessed it, young men between eighteen and twenty-four. Apparently, between twenty-four and twenty-six, some guys wise up, at least where serpents are concerned.

      We leave the info session, and head back to our tent to get geared up for the hike down. Every walkway is crowded with tourists and the parking lots are filled with tour buses. People of every nationality wield cameras and water bottles. It’s only nine a.m. and it’s hot.

      “Why are guys so stupid?” I say to Greta.

      “They’re just being macho. It’s like birds when they plump

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