Free The Hollow Man by Dan Simmons Page B

in one another, Jeremy feels Gail’s enfolding orgasm and celebrates it as his own, even while Gail rises on the growing wave of his impending climax, so different from the seismic inward intensity of her own, yet hers now, too. They come together, Gail feeling, for a moment, the sensation of her body cradling itself in his body as he relaxes in her mind while her arms and legs hold him in place.
    When they roll apart on the flattened sleeping bags, the air in the nylon tent is almost foggy with the moisture of their exhalations and exertions. It is full dark out now as Gail undoes the tent flaps and they slide their upper bodies out into the soft drizzle, feeling the gentle spray on their faces and chests, breathing the cooling air, and opening their mouths to drink from the sky.
    They are not reading each other’s minds now, not visitingthe other’s mind. Each
is
the other, aware of each thought and sensation as soon as he or she feels it. No, that is not accurate: there is no he or she for a moment, and that gender consciousness returns only gradually, like a morning tide receding slowly to leave artifacts on a fresh-washed beach.
    Cooled and refreshed by the rain, they slip back inside, dry themselves with thick towels, and curl between the layers of goosedown. Jeremy’s hand finds a resting place on the small inward curve of Gail’s back as she rests her head on his shoulder. It is as if his hand has always known this place.
    They fit perfectly.
    The next day they have lunch in Utica and head north again, into the mountains. In Old Forge they rent a canoe and paddle up through the Chain of Lakes that Jeremy has read about. The lakes are more built up than he had imagined, the hiss and crackle of neurobabble is just audible from houses along the shores, but they find isolated islands and sandbars to camp on for the three days they are canoeing and portaging, until a two-day rainstorm and a two-and-a-half-mile portage drives them in from Long Lake on their fifth day.
    Gail and Jeremy find a pay phone and ride back to Old Forge with a bearded young man from the canoe-rental place. Back in the sputtering VW, they head deeper into the mountains, making the seventy-some-mile loop up through Saranac Lake and down into the village of Keene Valley. There Jeremy buys a trail guide, they hitch up their backpacks for the first time, and head off into the boonies toward something called Big Slide.
    The guidebook insists that the trip is only 3.85 miles via a moderate trail called the Brothers, but the word “moderate” is an obvious misnomer as the trail leadsstraight up rocks, past waterfalls, across ridges, and over minor peaks, while Jeremy is soon cursing that the “3.85 miles” was obviously measured by an aircraft, not a biped. Also he acknowledges that he may have overpacked. Gail suggests taking out the bag of charcoal or the second six-pack of beer, but Jeremy discards several bags of gorp and insists on keeping the essentials for a civilized trip.
    At 2.20 miles they pass through a beautiful stand of white birch and scramble onto the summit of the Third Brother, a low peak that just manages to get its rocky snout above the undulating ocean of leaves. From there they get a glimpse of their destination—Big Slide Mountain—and between gasps for air, Jeremy and Gail grin at each other.
    Big Slide Mountain is a smaller and much more secret version of Yosemite’s El Capitan. While one side rises in a gentle, wooded arc, the other drops off in a sheer rock wall to culminate in a tumble of house-sized boulders.
    “That’s our destination?” pants Gail.
    Jeremy nods, too winded to speak.
    “Can’t we just take a picture of it and say we were there?”
    Jeremy shakes his head and lifts his pack on with a groan. For half a mile they drop down into a col, the trail occasionally cutting back and forth in a gentle switchback, more frequently dropping straight down rock formations or steep slopes. Just below the Big Slide