Chapter 11

I took the Independence Day week off from my pursuits to spend it with Cole and Melissa, and the original plan had been to spend that time on Lake Melones, but Chris had been added to the mix and then, by the first of July, the plans had changed, and we were now camping and sailing on Pillsbury Lake, tucked into the northern California mountains of the Mendocino Range and in the middle of the Mendocino National Forest. It was much more secluded, and I assumed much easier for the hidden McKesson security types to make safe. The extra security was needed because Grandpa Andy and Grandma Cor were coming for the weekend as well. Not that they weren't both more than capable of protecting themselves. Not that I wasn't, for that matter.

Chris was not spending the entire week. He was coming in Friday night on the 1st of July and staying until the afternoon of Tuesday, the fifth. Cole and Grandpa seemed more interested in the fishing than anything else, which struck me as odd, given the kinds of places they could go fishing if they were of a mind to. Still, they spent the first few days fishing for largemouth bass and rainbow trout, both of which were plentiful here. For me, there were plenty of places for casual climbing — more vertical hiking that actual rock climbing, but very similar to what I had around Lake Melones. Their were some steeper sections at the south end of the lake where the Rice Fork and Eel Rivers were divided by McLeod Ridge. There were some nice climbs up to 2400 feet of vertical that didn't include any real sheer faces, but that was fine with me. I didn't want to scare anyone with the riskier stuff anyway.

I didn't know just how athletic Chris was, and I worried about that at first, but he proved to be up for anything I wanted to do, and went along with the more sedate stuff available on the lake, including kayaking, swimming and sailing in the little 20 foot Donetti Sunscape that we'd rented for the week. Donetti was a relatively new boat builder who had begun taking advantage of some of the newer materials available in the last 20 years or so. Their hulls were all made of a foamed nanopolymer that made for light and responsive sailboats, and their sails were made of the new self repairing nano-poly-fylene materials, what was marketed as NPF SteelSkin — patented, trademarked and manufactured exclusively by a McKesson subsidiary, of course. The boat was lively, quick and responsive. I liked her a lot.

Chris took to the hiking trails in around the lake with enthusiasm, and wasn't daunted at all by the steeper climbs I detoured us into. At the top of our third ridge, he laughed out loud as we stood looking back out over our route up and the slope below and the lake beyond.

"What?"

"I finally realized where your enthusiasm for programming emergency grav pods comes from. You like climbing up hills, but don't much care for climbing down them!"

I added my own laughter to his and gave him a hug. "You're right. That's exactly what got me thinking about it. That's not where the thinking ended, but its definitely where it began."

"So you seem pretty athletic, with all this climbing and hang gliding, and obviously you've done some sailing, and you said you were on the cross country team at your school..."

"Yeah, I guess you could say that."

"Have you thought about college, and what you'll want to do?"

"As in what am I going to do with my life?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"Yes, I know exactly what I'm going to do. College probably isn't going to be a part of it, except on a casual basis."

"Well?" He asked after a moment's silence.

"Nobody knows but me, and I have no intention of anyone finding out before its time," I said.

"That's kind of cold, isn't it? What about your friends. Will you just leave us wondering about you the rest of our lives?"

"Yeah, it is, but that's the way its got to be. You wouldn't understand. There are too many places to go to spend any time going back to places I've already been. Teddy said she would be okay with only having me until the time came, but its already tearing her apart."

"Teddy is a she? You have a girlfriend?"

"Had a girlfriend, I think. I don't think we can put our relationship back together when school starts in the fall. It'll be too hard on her."

"But not on you?"

"Not as hard," I offered a weak smile.

"Where does that leave me?" Chris asked with a hard edge in his voice.

"Chris, you're only the second male of the species I've found myself interested in. You can have as much of me as you want, but the deal is the same. Once high school is over, I'll be gone, and I won't be back."

"I'm a guy, so I'm supposed to be shallow enough to accept a deal like that, but damn, Skye! I'm not sure I could handle it any better than Teddy."