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six

MOLLIE

It’s my Waterloo. My Rubicon. The ruin of me. My point of no return.

My stomach is rejecting the muffin I bought at the coffee shop this morning—blueberry and lemon curd, it was amazing— and I might cry.

The bike between my legs feels totally unnatural. It has huge tires and a bunch of levers I don’t understand on the handlebars. This bike means business. I have no business being on it.

“This is called sessioning,” Hunter is saying. He’s standing with his own bike in front of the group, gesturing out at the trail in front of us. “It means repeating something over and over until you master it. Trying again and again until you have a good feel for how to handle a feature or a problem. There is no shame in not being able to execute something the first time you try it. Sessioning is how you get better.”

I need to session getting on this bike a few times more. Maybe for the rest of this class.

“We’re going to ride a little way down this trail, which is completely flat, to a clearing and then we’re going to practice some techniques.”

My legs are shaking. They’re just trembling, Mollie, don’t be dramatic! I’m going to embarrass myself in front of everyone, including Hunter.

Checking in on the phone last night, my mom told me I have to take some risks to “reach for your dreams.” But what dream am I reaching for? I don’t remember wanting to climb on a borrowed bike and risk life and limb on a trail covered with rocks the size of my head. Do I even have any dreams? At the moment, my mind is blank. This helmet is so heavy. I want to lay down in the dirt and pretend I’m not here.

Beside me, Nora and Sophie are setting up a group selfie and gesturing for me to join in. They look cute and adventurous in their helmets, in contrast to my hard-topped mushroom. Beneath it, my head itches.

Scott, the guide that I swear Nora has a crush on, wanders over and offers to take our picture.

“Get the bikes in!” Nora insists, handing him the camera. “Make us look hardcore.”

“I don’t have to try for that,” Scott says with a flirty grin.

She laughs and swats his arm.

It’s possible I’m dissociating. I can’t feel my feet as Sophie and Nora wrap their arms around me and grin for the camera. Somehow, I ended up in the middle of the picture, like this is my idea.

“Does anybody have any questions before we head out?” Hunter calls to the group.

I should have questions. My brain is filled with shrieking instead. Am I going to die out here? Don’t ask that.

OK, at the most you’ll break a leg. Let’s not jump to catastrophe, Mollie. The voice in my head sounds like my mother. Calm and rational. That voice is overruled by my terror over what I’m about to do.

My vision is like a tunnel as I watch my hands clasp my bike handles and throw a leg over the bike. Scott came over and bounced my bike up and down a few times earlier—a preview for what’s going to happen when I go over those giant rocks, I guess. Nothing fell off or apart, so he called it good. What about me? Doesn’t someone need to bounce me up and down a few times?

That’s what she said. Even in my hyper state, I can’t help giggling to myself silently. It has an edge of hysteria to it, even inside my head. My brain wants to veer off into any other topic besides the one at hand as I stare at what looks like a sharp drop-off to the side of this tiny little trail in front of me.

“Keep it loose,” Scott says to me. I blink at him. He’s sitting on his bike between me and Nora. I didn’t even notice him there.

“What?”

“Don’t lock your muscles. You want to move with the bike a little bit. We’ll talk about when you move the bike under you versus moving with the bike, but for now, focus on not tensing up. You OK?”

No. Definitely not. Omigod, can I say I’m sick and get out of this? I swallow. I need to face my fear. So I have terrible balance and no mind-body control, or whatever it was Hunter called it. Half the time, my body does whatever it wants without checking in with my brain. That’s the problem.

“I’m OK,” I say faintly.

“Feel free to walk your bike at any point if you’re uncomfortable trying something,” he says. He looks serious, not realizing this sounds like permission to never get on my bike again. “And if you’re not sure, ask me or Hunter to help you out.”

“OK,” I repeat, bobbing my head. Nora says something to Scott and he turns away from me. I’m like a child. What do I want, training wheels? I need to toughen up. I’m a city girl. I walk down streets every day more dangerous than this silly little trail.

And I hate every second of my morning commute in the city, too—dodging people on the walk from the parking complex to the office, waiting at street lights in a crowd of other miserable office workers, the women wearing shoes they clearly plan to change and the men looking at their watches every few seconds.

Closing my eyes, I take a deep breath. At least I don’t smell car exhaust and perfume. We’re out in another picture-perfect location, the trees blocking us from a view of the town that had taken my breath away on the way up. Telluride is gorgeous, nestled in a valley with a waterfall visible on one end.

When I open my eyes again, they land on Hunter. Standing at the front of the group demonstrating something on his bike, he’s wearing funny padded shorts that make his butt look big and a zippered shirt that shows some chest hair. He’s probably never worn dress shoes in his life. I’m jealous of that.

“Everybody ready?” he calls out. “OK, follow me! Scott will follow behind the group.” And then he pedals his bike over the small ridge and disappears down the trail.

“This is going to be so fun!” Sophie squeals, following him.

“See you in a bit,” Scott says to Nora, who follows Sophie.

Not letting myself stop to doubt more, I sit on my bike seat and follow. It’s just like riding a bike! So far so good. I hold my breath when I go over the ridge, and then I don’t even notice a drop. It was smaller than it looked. Maybe this is going to be OK.

An hour later, I’m staring at a sheer rock listening to Hunter describe how to ride up it. This is not OK.

They lulled me into complacency until now, with the riding in circles and along pretend switchbacks. All “only use one finger on the brake” and “put the pedal under the ball of your foot.” Easy. We’d practiced body positioning, which I still don’t quite get—“if the bike were to disappear, you should be standing on the ground” did not compute for me—and I managed to fake it well enough.

But I can’t do this. I can’t ride a bike up a rock.

I’ve already watched Nora and Sophie succeed on their first try. They make it look easy, even with the grunting (Nora) and squealing (Sophie) involved.

The words are on the tip of my tongue: “I’m going to walk it.” They won’t come out. I’m the last person in the group to go and no one else walked their bike. Hunter is standing uphill waiting and Scott is watching me from halfway up the slope.

“You good?” one of them calls to me. My throat is too tight to answer, so I answer with a thumbs up. My thumb is such a liar.

Between the sun beating down on me and the pressure of expectation on my back, my shoulders are hunched. My whole body is a knot of tension. I’m going to have to try to do this, no matter how scared I am that I’m going to screw it up. Nora and Sophie think I need to try new things to break out of the rut I’m in. Well, now I’m going to ride right up a rut and show it who’s boss.

I repeat the instructions over and over in my head: Lift the front wheel when you’re about to hit the rock. Pedal through it. When you’re about to leave the rock, shove the bike in front of you.

Wait, how do I know I’m not lifting too early? And was I supposed to lean backward or forward?

It’s too late to ask them to repeat the lesson. I pedal forward. When I’m about to hit the rock, I panic and hit the brakes. I guess I’m a little late on the timing because my front wheel sticks while my back wheel keeps going, and the bike tips over. I shriek even before I hit the ground and feel pain in my hands and knees. The bike falls on top of me, an afterthought since I wasn’t going very fast.

My first reaction is embarrassment. Nobody else fell trying to do this. When I start to push myself to my feet, Scott stops me. “Lay there for a minute. Let it settle.” He lifts the bike off my body, untangling it gently from my legs.

Hunter arrives next, having run down the hill I guess, and squats down next to me. “What are you feeling?” he asks.

“Dumb, mostly,” I reply, squinting up at him in the sun.

He smiles a little. “I meant in your body. Where are you hurt?”

“Oh.” I lift a hand and see it’s bloody. “My hands. And my knees.”

“Yeah, you’ve got some scrapes. Anywhere else?”

“Um, I don’t think so.” I carefully sit up. Hunter helps me examine my arms and legs for any other scrapes. Nothing seems broken.

Scott gives me a thumbs up and calls up to the rest of the group looking over the top of the hill, “We’ve got first blood!”

“I’ll get you patched up,” Hunter assures me. He’s already pulled out a first aid kit. “You can take the rest of the group to the next feature,” he tells Scott. “We’ll catch up.”

“OK, you got it,” Scott says affably. “Hang in there, Mollie. It’s all part of the action.”

I mumble a curse under my breath and they both laugh at me.

“Mollie, do you want us to stay?” Nora calls down to me. She’s holding onto her bike and looking worriedly back at Sophie.

“No, go ahead!” I call back. “I’m OK!” I throw a thumbs up their way for good measure, even though my eyes are filling with delayed tears. This sucks . I’m sick of faking it for my friends and everyone else, like I’m somehow enjoying being bad at things.

“OK, we’ll see you in a little bit! Take good care of her, Hunter!” Sophie calls.

Hunter gives them another thumbs up before he goes back to unwrapping an antibacterial wipe. So many lying thumbs-ups.

Like a child waiting for their mother to make it better, I hold my hands out to him.

“I don’t have any gloves,” he tells me, offering me the wipe. “It might be better if you…”

“Oh, right,” I say, taking the wipe and dabbing at my other hand with it. What must he think of me? Probably that only an idiot would get hurt on such a small—what did he call it? A “feature”? I prefer my ride flat and featureless, thank you.

“You didn’t really want to go up that rock, did you,” he says quietly, handing me another wipe when I need it for my knees.

Blinking to try to get rid of the moisture in my eyes, I avoid his eyes. “I guess not.”

“Why didn’t you walk it?”

“Nobody else did.”

“Hm.”

We’re silent for a few moments while I finish cleaning the blood off my wounds. Even though he’s quiet, I don’t think he’s judging me. He kind of acts like he’s beating himself up.

“I’m sorry I didn’t speak up,” I say finally. “I guess the worst accidents probably happen when people aren’t ready for something.”

He nods slowly, wrapping gauze around my knee. “Yeah, but that’s what we’re supposed to be here for. Preparing you for the next thing we ask of you. We’re not supposed to put you in a situation you’re not ready for.”

“It’s not your fault,” I say immediately. It isn’t. Everyone else did fine with that feature. Only I couldn’t wrap my head around it, much less my body. “I’m just slow.”

“You’re not slow,” he snaps. He glances up at me and smiles that small, sad smile again. “Maybe you’d benefit from more one-on-one instruction next time. I don’t want you going into it feeling unsupported.” He shrugs. “There’s this book I like about different learning styles. Everyone’s brain works differently and some people need to hear something several times. Other people need to read about it before they can repeat it. We need to figure out what works for you. We can do that.”

“You think so?” I look over at my bike, laying on the ground nearby. Getting back on it is daunting, but Hunter has given me hope. Maybe something will eventually click and I’ll actually enjoy this. As if it’s a test I’m taking, maybe there’s an answer.

“Definitely,” he says confidently. The memory of hitting that bullseye, after his ax throwing lesson, makes me want to believe him.

Still, I... “Maybe we should start with something that won’t leave me bleeding when I fail?”

“This is not a fail ,” Hunter says calmly, as he packs up the first aid supplies. “You fell down. That’s part of the process. You took a step toward experience.”

A step toward experience. I like the phrase, but my sore hands and knees don’t appreciate it.

“I’m not going to let you avoid getting back on the bike,” Hunter goes on. “We can definitely practice on something else to build up your confidence. I’ll give you some one-on-one lessons if it will help.”

“That would definitely help,” I blurt. There I go again—brain and body disconnection. Or maybe it’s a brain and heart disconnection, in this case. I want to spend more time with Hunter. The act of being around him makes me more confident. “I mean. You’re a good teacher.”

He smiles, and instead of standing up, he sits down on the ground beside me. “We can try axe throwing,” he suggests. “It’s nothing like riding a bike, but it’s something you could get good at if you practice.”

I’m not so sure about that. There are times when, no matter how much advice I hear about a topic, I still can’t quite repeat the actions that would lead to success. I have this problem dating, too. My mom is always telling me that repeating something over and over while expecting a different outcome is the definition of insanity. She’s usually referring to using Tinder.

“What if we start with something that doesn’t involve sharp edges?” I suggest, timidly. “Like…skipping a rock!”

He laughs, putting a knee in the dirt beside me. “You want to learn how to skip a rock?”

“It’s something I’ve never done before,” I defend myself. “I tried the other day at the lake and my rock sank right away.”

“OK,” Hunter nods. “I can show you that. And we can paddleboard again. I guess the drawback of this adventure tour is we only give you shallow experiences. You don’t have a chance to become an expert at anything.” He pauses, like he’s considering this.

The way his forehead wrinkles when he’s thinking is so sweet. I watch a bead of sweat trace down his exposed chest and think about how he’d taste salty. Hunter is a sensuous experience. Being around him is like what I imagine the best camping trip would be: full of adventurous days and soothing nights. Like looking up at the stars in an endless night sky or standing perfectly balanced on the edge of a rock ledge.

I want to touch him. The way he touched me, so gently, winding the gauze around my knees and hands, made me wonder how he’d touch me without an injury as an excuse. Would he throw me around, using those muscles I can see in his arms and thighs? No. Hunter would be as gentle as he is when he’s teaching me something. He would ask me questions and guide me to…well, to wherever we are going in this hypothetical fantasy.

And I wouldn’t be scared, either. Not in the world I’m inventing in my head. Because Hunter would be there to give me one-on-one training and speak to me in the calm, confident voice he uses every time he teaches me something. I wonder if he uses that voice in bed, too?

“Maybe we should strip out some of the options so we can do activities more than once.” Hunter is still musing out loud about the tour trips. It’s clear he takes his job seriously.

It’s hard not to chuckle.

“What?” he asks, already smiling back at me.

“I was just thinking about you kissing me and you’re preoccupied with your work.” Oh shit! Yes, I said that. Mind-body disconnect again .

Hunter is staring at me, unblinking. “You were thinking about kissing me? Right now? Why?”

This is such a bizarre question—it’s so obvious!—it distracts me from my embarrassment. “Because you’re…you. You’re so kind and thoughtful. And you’re sitting there with those huge calves and you look hot despite your pillow pants.”

He tilts his head. “Despite them? I thought girls liked bike kits.”

“I don’t know what girls you are talking about, but you look very silly.” And then I lean toward him. Not much, because I don’t want to put my weight on my hand and he’s too far away from me to reach without leverage. Still, I lean enough that he knows I wasn’t joking about wanting to kiss him.

Because I’m trying new things and reaching for my dreams. I might fail a lot, but I keep going. You have to have something to be proud of yourself for when you’re as bad at as many things as I am.

The only problem is, he’s not leaning back.