"Jeff Long - Angels of Light" - читать интересную книгу автора (Long Jeff)

fissure. The way it felt, the movement it invited, the very smellтАФall were echoes of a
thousand similar cracks. There were other echoes, too, other dimensions as he pulled
higher and edged the inner toe of each worn rubber sole against new crystals. Not all
were as immediate as the bite of stone against his fist or the urgency rearing high in
the cloudbank. Some of the resonance was so old and persistent that it was next to
silence. There was, for instance, no ignoring the Chiricahua advice that no one is
your friend, not even your brother or father or mother; only your legs are your
friends, only your brain, your eyesight, your hair, and your hands. My son, echoed
the void gaping under each of John's heels, you must do something with those things.
He fell.
It was that sudden.
As if skinning off a glove, John felt his hand slide from the crack. His toes lost their
granite purchase. He gave a reflexive slap to the rock. Then he was off, flying toward
the ground far below. Again the wall's exaggerated angle was a blessing, allowing him
to drift mute and free, full of fear. He hit nothing. The air was clear. The emptiness
seemed to buoy him up. I'm falling, he registered. It was a soft moment, which
allowed him thoughts.

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Jeff Long - Angels of Light


Climbers call long falls screamers, but rarely scream when they fall. Their lives don't
flash before them. They have no special grip on their fear, no mystical insights into
self-control. They drop like quiet ripe fruit, which is not to say they aren't terrified.
Their rib cages vapor-lock. Their eyes see. And they hear a voice. Not always, but
sometimes. Even among the hard-core, fat-free warrior setтАФthe 5.11 boys with their
streamlined lats flaring like vestigial wings, nineteen and twenty years old with
tendonitis in their overtaxed knucklesтАФeven among the fanatics, the voice is usually
nothing more than adrenaline babble. It's easy for climbers to confuse the wild surge
of biochemicals, tape-deck tunes, and naked risk with the song of being. When the
abyss sweeps up to devour them they vainly believe themselves tagged by the hand of
God, when in fact "flushed" is more like it. But sometimes, rarely, a falling climber
really does hear the voice.
He listened. This is what he heard.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing. It said nothing. It sounded like nothing, which, unless
you're there dying, may sound like the proverbial one-handed Zen cow patty.
Twisting sideways, then backward, John glimpsed the cadaverous moon rocking all
out of kilter. This shoulder, he predicted without question, this hip. They'll hit first.
Shit, John, you've done it now. Even so, he wasn't particularly concerned. For one
thing, his arms instantly felt as if he'd gone to Cancun on vacation. The lactic acid let
go. His lungs quit laboring. He felt great. All his heroic struggling to be elsewhere
was suddenly a moot point. Cascading past the glowing stone, John felt like Zeno's
arrow, the one forever caught between source and end point. He was at peace.
And then he heard a thin, metallic pop. It was an inconsequential noise, a mere
kernel of popcorn exploding. But it was followed by a second pop, and the bottom
dropped out of his gallows. John gritted his teeth. Dread deepening, he realized he
was unzipping. He had time to think, shit the pins. And then his brain mainlined the
fear because he understood his wings had truly been clipped. One by one, the rusting
old pitons, the pins that he'd clipped into, were failing. Every time a climber