Chapter 1

January 2004

When a strong east wind carried snow off the lake, Randy and Nicole Clark's big, modern house felt cold. In spite of the big windows being triple-glazed, the mere sound of the howling through the shingles and the trees along the shoreline made the idea of getting up closer to the gas logs of the fireplace seem like a natural thing to do. Even for people as used to winter as they were, the mere thought of spring in the middle of January seemed hopeful yet almost too far away to contemplate.

"The weatherman says it's not going to be all that bad," Trey Hartwell remarked from the couch across from the chairs where Randy and Nicole sat.

"An east wind is never good around here," Randy offered, looking over at Trey and his wife, Myleigh, who was snuggled up against her husband, her legs folded up inside her long woolen dress. "Especially this time of year." There was a touch of superior experience in his voice; after all, he and Nicole had grown up around here, while Myleigh and Trey were relative newcomers – this was only their second full winter in Spearfish Lake.

Myleigh squirmed around just a little, trying to find that perfect spot to rest her head on Trey's shoulder. "I sometimes fear that spring shall never get here," she said absently. "I just hope our friends are not encountering any difficulties."

"They ought to be all right," Randy replied. "They've barely had time enough to get here, and the roads probably aren't perfect, anyway."

"I suppose it is the waiting that gives me a degree of anxiety," Myleigh commented. "After all, it has been so very long since we have seen them."

"A year ago Thanksgiving," Randy said a little unnecessarily. Everyone knew how long it had been since they'd seen Crystal and Preach. Randy, Myleigh and Crystal had been good friends – and more than that – while they'd been in college, but their lives had drifted apart as the years passed. Nicole was almost as close a friend, and Trey knew Crystal pretty well, too. Randy and Nicole's visit to Crystal and Preach in Flagstaff nearly fourteen months before had been a quick one that hardly gave justice to the quality of friendship they'd once had. Between Crystal's and Preach's jobs as boatmen running tours down the Grand Canyon, and all the other things in their lives, there just hadn't been the opportunity since. Now, they were going to have several leisurely, long-overdue days to renew their friendship.

"Anyone up for some coffee?" Nicole asked, as always playing the gracious hostess. "I have regular and decaf."

"Most certainly," Myleigh smiled. "The normal blend, if you will. It seems likely that we shall not retire early."

"Works for me," Trey agreed.

"Yeah, sure," Randy said, glancing at his wife, who didn't look six months pregnant in her loose, heavy sweater. "Whatever you're having," he added, trying to be supportive. He knew Nicole didn't care for decaffeinated coffee, and neither did he, but she was trying to be careful for the baby's sake.

"Might I be of assistance?" Myleigh asked as Nicole got to her feet. At six months she was not large, and being an athletic sort of person the pregnancy wasn't hampering her movements much.

"No, I can get it," Nicole smiled. Sometimes she thought that Myleigh was more concerned about her pregnancy than she was. Nicole had slowly come to realize that Myleigh had not spent much time around any pregnant women. She just didn't have the experience Nicole had gained with her two much-younger siblings. Close friend though Myleigh was – and Myleigh was one of Nicole's closest two friends anymore – Nicole knew that Myleigh had some holes in her life experience and world view. "You look pretty comfortable," she added as she saw how closely Myleigh was cuddled up to her husband. For a woman as independent and unique as Myleigh was, it was interesting to see just how close she'd gotten to Trey these last few years.

"Oh, I feel very comfortable indeed," Myleigh smiled as she snuggled a little closer to her husband. Nicole headed out to the kitchen and the coffeepots, where she poured a cup of decaf for herself and cups of regular for everyone else. She was aware that Randy was trying to be solicitous to her and appreciated it, but there was no reason to make him suffer either. She carried two cups of coffee in to the Hartwells, then returned for the other two, when through the kitchen window she saw lights pulling into the driveway. "I think they're here," she announced.

The announcement was all it took to break the lethargy of lying before the warmth of the fire. All four of them headed for the foyer on the backside of the house – Randy and Nicole were of the opinion that the front of the house faced the lake, not the road. Randy opened the door, and as Crystal and Preach got out of a minivan with Arizona plates, said, "Hey, welcome back to Spearfish Lake, strangers. Long time, no see."

"It's good to be back," Crystal said as she scurried around, heading for the already opened door, as Preach did the same on the far side. Both were dressed way too lightly for this January snowstorm, so that just added to their hurry. "Wonderful weather you're having," she added.

There was confusion for a few minutes as Preach and Crystal got inside with their suitcases, as there were hugs and a couple of kisses along with the general round of greetings, but soon the new arrivals had joined the others around the fire. "So, how was the show?" Randy asked.

"About the same as the others," Crystal replied. She and Preach were on their annual winter round of outdoor shows, trying to drum up business for Canyon Tours. Randy and the others knew that the two had just finished a show in Chicago, and had a few days break before the next one in St. Paul. The location and the timing made this the best opportunity to visit their friends in Spearfish Lake that they'd had in a while. "After you've been a booth bunny for a while it's all pretty much the same thing. We handed out a lot of brochures and sold a few trips, which is about all we expected to do."

"So," Nicole asked, "what are you going to be doing once you're done with the show in St. Paul?"

"Not a lot," Crystal shook her head. "Head back to Flag and watch the store for a bit while Mom and Dad take off. They're going to head out to some island way out in the Pacific that's supposed to have great diving. It'd be nice to go with them, but we got in our time in the tropics back when the season ended. So how was Chile?"

"It was a ball," Nicole smiled. "We decided that we didn't want to do anything too extreme, so we did a sea kayaking trip off a mother ship over the holidays. It was the only time we could get away together, as usual. There is some really fantastic scenery down there, and they sure fed us well. We've got a ton of pictures, we'll have to set up the projector some time."

"Probably not tonight, though," Randy added. "There's too much catching up we need to get done right now."

"Looking forward to seeing them," Crystal nodded. "I've always heard Patagonia is nice, but we haven't had the chance to get there yet. So how did the mother-ship business get along with morning sickness?"

"Not a problem" Nicole told her. "I was past that stage long before we headed down there, not that I had much trouble with it at all."

"Well, at least you two got to go somewhere," Crystal replied, knowing that she was getting near Randy's touchy spot. For years he'd held a quiet resentment at Crystal, Myleigh, and especially Nicole for their opportunity to get out and have some adventures, while he'd had to stay back in Spearfish Lake and work. It had eased somewhat in the last few years, when Nicole had literally pushed him out the door to have a few adventures of his own in the slow months of winter. The only time he and Nicole got to take long vacations together was over the Christmas holidays, which was fine but brought on stresses of their own. "Are you going to come run with us again sometime?"

"Not in the foreseeable future, unless you pull off another winter trip. That one we had last year was really something else."

"I'm afraid that's not very likely," Crystal replied. "We didn't know about that until just a few days before it happened." Due to a scheduling problem early in the summer, Canyon Tours had to cancel a trip, which left an unused trip on their Park Service allotment. After some negotiation they were allowed to use the slot on a deep-winter trip down the Canyon. The trip was made up mostly of boatmen and friends, and it had been considerably different from the normal customer trip. Randy and Trey had only about four days' notice of the trip, the third they'd made down the Canyon. "We still think it would be fun with customers sometime," Crystal elaborated, "but the customers would have to be people we knew were up for it, not just anyone."

"Let me know if you do," Randy told her. "But it's pretty clear that's going to be changing, too."

"You mean, with starting a family?"

"Yeah," Randy nodded. "We're not quite sure how it's going to change things, but it seems likely that they're going to be different."

"I'm sure they will," Preach commented. "Let's face it, a child would be a considerable change in our lives, too."

"You're thinking about it, then?" Nicole asked.

"Thought about it, discussed it, yes," Preach admitted. "Clear back to when I decided to come to the Canyon to be with Crystal. But a decision, well, that's another story."

"Let's face it," Crystal shook her head, "it's not an easy decision to make since it would be such a big change. It's not like my brother and his wife. The biggest change having a kid made for them was that they finally moved out of that tiny townhouse apartment and into a decent house. She didn't go to work for two months, but she worked from home for most of that. Preach and I couldn't be away from our kids as much as it would take to keep leading trips. On the other hand, if we're going to have kids we need to do it in the next few years or give up on the idea."

Nicole started to say something, stopped, and started again: "It wasn't an easy decision for us," she said finally. "Randy and I had always pretty well agreed we were going to have kids, but the issue was when. We finally decided that we didn't want to put it off any longer."

"How about you, Myleigh?" Crystal asked. "Have you been thinking about it?"

"The subject has come up on occasion," Myleigh replied offhandedly, feeling her husband's hand pull her a little more closely as she said it. "We have not entirely ruled it out, but we have not yet reached a decision, either. The issue hasn't seemed imperative as yet. Like you, a child would bring considerable changes to our lives, much more so than to Randy's and Nicole's."