They are hand in hand, walking down Lombard Street, San Francisco. He says, “Annapurna? K2? Are you kidding?”<\/p>\n
She says, “They’re the toughest, right? You clearly like a challenge.”<\/p>\n
“K2, you’d need a team. Ice shelves, 50 below. And Annapurna, do you know how many people died trying. I’m not suicidal.” She does not get what he’s already been through.<\/p>\n
“You’re a natural climber. And skilled. You’ve climbed Everest, Denali. You’re in excellent shape.”<\/p>\n
Those were years ago. He regrets the brag. What a guy will say to win a smart beauty.<\/p>\n
“You’re very strong,” she says.<\/p>\n
“Not strong enough. And I am not being modest.”<\/p>\n
“Honestly?” She pauses. “Are you afraid?”<\/p>\n
He lets go of her hand, glances over at her long blond hair shading part of her finely sculpted cheek. Today, her chin seems hard as polished granite. “Not interested.”<\/p>\n
“Are you finished climbing then?”<\/p>\n
“Maybe,” he says, although he isn’t. Why this goading? Totally done if he doesn’t defy death, choose the most hazardous peak? He is tempted to say: you want me to do it so you<\/em> can say I did.<\/p>\n “You can accomplish whatever you tell yourself you can.”<\/p>\n “I tell myself I do not care to make the attempt.”<\/p>\n She shakes her head as if he’s merely being stubborn, then she smiles up at him. “You’ll think about it though.”<\/p>\n “How would you feel if I tried and discovered, right at the start, it’s impossible.”<\/p>\n She shrugs. “I can’t imagine that. So you are thinking about it. Good.” She takes his hand and squeezes it.<\/p>\n He will let her keep the ring, compensation for his failings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “K2, you’d need a team. Do you know how many people died trying. I’m not suicidal,” he says. “But you’ve climbed Everest, Denali,” she says. Those were years ago. He regrets the brag. What a guy will say to win a smart beauty.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":23338,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3530],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-flash-fiction","writer-lavina-blossom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22399"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23339,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22399\/revisions\/23339"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}