Chapter 23 Mile Twenty-Three #2
“Boo!” With a mock pout, I turn down the dirt path leading toward a series of trails within the park. “But it’s so warm!”
Southern California may be known for its sunny weather, but May is gray. It makes it ideal for Palm Springs getaways before it gets so hot that you could fry an egg on the sidewalk. It’s still warmer than Seal Beach, especially if you’re going to do a five-mile desert hike.
“You love the heat,” he teases.
“In blankets and beverages, not while exercising,” I groan.
“It’s not that warm. It will only be eighty-six today, and it’s barely eight-thirty. You’ll be fine. Five miles is nothing. We’ll be done well before noon.”
He’s right, of course. With the half-marathon at the end of the month, we’ve been doing a combo of ten miles of a jog/power walk twice a week to work our way up to 13.
1, so this is more than doable. Not to mention I’m in the best physical shape of my life between my solo treadmill runs and conditioning exercises the rest of the week.
Since we’re on a mini getaway, we’re giving ourselves the weekend off from training, but still built in some exercise between sightseeing, meals, and claiming each other on just about every surface at the condo Garrett borrowed for the weekend from a fellow doctor at the hospital.
I have a moderate level of guilt for our antics, but not enough to not jump Garrett as soon as we’re back.
Yesterday we took the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway and did a low-intensity hike on one of the trails at the top followed by lunch at a café at the overlook before a night in where we cooked dinner together and played Uno with my braille cards.
Today is a more rigorous desert trail at the zoo.
On top of the animals and other attractions, the Living Desert offers a few hiking trails within the park to simulate the full desert experience.
“It says it’s this way,” Garrett mutters as we stop.
“What’s wrong?” Tilting my head, I tap my cane against the rocks stacked up on the path.
We’re only a mile into the hike and it’s been easy.
The trail is flat, outside of loose stones and pebbles, with a defined edge, allowing me to mostly use my cane and Garrett’s verbal directions to navigate.
Between visually scanning and my cane, I deduce that there’s a rock pile made up of large misshapen stones and small rocks in the middle of the trail.
I scrunch my nose. “Are we supposed to climb it?”
“According to the map, it’s this way.” He looks around. “There’s no sign saying it’s closed, and there are people down the trail, so I think the rocks are part of it.”
“Just part of the experience.” I make jazz hands, causing him to snort.
“Maybe we just do the one-mile trail that led us here? We could do a few laps, and then head back to get your latte and giraffe.”
“Embracing a world without binaries?” I wink.
“More like a world with you smiling like that?” With a soft kiss, he takes my hand. “Come on, let’s just do a few laps.”
“But you wanted to do this…” I tug him to a stop.
Even if I whine a bit about this hike, it does sound cool.
According to the website, the trail offers lovely desert landscape views and vegetation.
It’s like a mini escape in the middle of the park, simulating what it might be like to do some of the trails in nearby Joshua Tree.
Plus, Garrett geeked out just a bit while planning this.
It’s cute to see his excitement, even if it’s more understated than mine about getting to feed baby giraffes.
I don’t want him to miss out because of me.
“It’s not a big deal.” He shrugs. “We can just—"
“No, we should do it.” Head shaking, I wrinkle my face. “It’s just a few rocks”—I tap my cane on top to gauge the height—“it’s doable. What’s the trail’s intensity level ranking, again?”
“It’s low to moderate for beginners.”
“Which we can handle?” I don’t intend it to sound like a question, but it does anyway.
“We can.” He brushes his palm against my bare arm.
It’s not needed, but his confirmation is reassuring, nonetheless. Even if I know his hesitation is a mixture of his default mode about my safety and comfort, I’m happy to hear the certainty in his voice in my ability to handle this.
“Especially if you give me a piggyback ride over these rocks.” I flash a saucy expression.
“I’m tempted.” He rubs his nape. “But I’m concerned I’ll not have my bearings with the rocks and accidentally drop you.”
“Anker would be pissed if you killed me on a hike.”
He loops his arm around my waist. “I would also be very pissed about that.”
I tip my head back and coo, “Because you’d be so sad without me.”
“Yeah… Also, I’d prefer not to be featured on a Dateline special. Man goes hiking with girlfriend, and returns without her…”
I elbow his ribs. “Jerk.”
He laughs. “Let’s do human guide over the rocks.”
“Good idea.” I fold my cane and slip it into his backpack with our two bottles of water.
Just like running, the cane isn’t ideal for something like this.
There isn’t a clear barrier to trail along the path to keep you on it.
After we climb down from the rocks, the trail is a mixture of loose pebbles, stones, and rocks.
It’s more intense than I expected with the many obstacles and steady inclines between short plateaus.
Something like this doesn’t just test my physical endurance and strength, but my emotional bandwidth.
With this hike—just like marathon training—I went into it thinking about how I’d physically do this.
If the last six months have taught me anything, it’s that this is a mental game.
I need to stay tapped into not just my surroundings and body, but Garrett’s to navigate the path safely.
Unexpected drop-offs, ruts, rogue branches, and whatever I just heard rustle in the distance all keep me on edge.
They keep him on edge as well. It’s the same when we run.
We trust each other and work together, but there’s always a level of hypervigilance for both of us.
I feel the way his muscles tighten, and his posture stiffens at different portions of the hike.
Unlike with the rope, where we just have verbal communication and tugs connecting us when we run, human guide allows me to take in everything his body telegraphs.
The same is likely true for him with my death grip as we traverse several large, uneven rocks with our upward climb.
Even if the hike is more challenging than I expected, it’s exhilarating. Besides some tame beach paths, I’ve never done real hiking. Yesterday’s hike wasn’t this intense, which is strange because according to the map, they’re both the same intensity level.
Accomplishment surges within me as the fitness tracker on my wrist pings with another mile completed. We’re four miles into this hike, and I’m doing this. I kind of feel like a badass.
“Narrow path,” he calls out, sliding his hand fully behind his back.
I trail my hand down to his wrist and position myself behind him. “Can you see the zoo from here?”
He slows to a stop. “Strangely no. If I didn’t know we were at the zoo, I’d think we were in the middle of nowhere.”
“Maybe it’s a portal like the Bermuda Triangle… The Palm Springs Triangle.” I laugh. “Describe the view. Like what do you see?”
“Lots of rocks.”
“You should be a poet,” I deadpan.
“I read books, not write them. I’ll leave that to Catherine.
There’s a reason I went into medicine,” he says with a playful lilt.
“The rocks have this sandy gray color like the beach on a cloudy day. There are no trees. A small mountain range or hills—not sure which—are in the distance. The sky is a pale blue that makes me think of that dress you wore when I picked you up from brunch with the girls last week.”
“Thank you.” I lean in, pressing my lips against his shoulder—his body relaxes with my kiss.
The long, narrow stretch starts to decline.
We stay tucked close until it flattens at the bottom, allowing us to go back to a person and a half formation.
My skin hums with the sunshine’s hot breath against it.
It may only be in the seventies, but the cloudless sky and treeless terrain offer no shade.
Our only reprieve is the soft breeze whispering through the mini hill or mountain range—like Garrett, I’m not entirely sure what this is.
What I do know is there is a mixture of steady and sharp inclines and declines along this path.
“Shouldn’t we be done?” I ask, my brow creased.
It’s been at least fifteen minutes since my fitness tracker pinged with the five-mile mark. I imagined the end would be soon, but it doesn’t appear to be coming, or at least Garrett hasn’t said anything.
“Yeah…” He stops, his body twisting left and right as if looking for any sign of the trail’s end. “Let me check the map.”
While Garrett reviews the map, I drink some of our water. It’s strange how an almost six-mile hike can feel more rigorous than our ten-mile jog/power walks.
“Shit,” Garrett mutters.
“What?”
“I misread the map. We’re on the wrong trail.”
My lips purse. “Which trail are we on?”
“The ten mile one.”
“Ten miles!”
Somehow, I’m ten again and finding out there’s no Easter Bunny, which was weirdly more tragic than the No Santa revelation. It shouldn’t be a big deal to find out there’s about four miles left in this hike, but every muscle aches with the fever of a whiny child.
Shaking his head, he looks back at the map in his hands. “Shit… I’m sorry. I don’t know how I fucked this up.”
“Hey—” I step into him, wrapping my arms around his waist. “You didn’t fuck anything up.”
“This isn’t what we planned,” he murmurs, folding his arms around me, the map still clutched in his hand.
Head pressed against his chest, I can’t miss the heavy thud of his heart. “It’s okay, we can adjust our plans.”
“This trail is harder.”
I tip my head up. “Yeah… And we’re over halfway through. We’ve got this.”