Eli's List

Iria Cabral-Macedo opened her eyes and rolled her head lazily to her left. The sight of her little sister sleeping caused her breathing to increase rapidly. Same as always. Her heart threatened to explode from her chest as she made her way over to Eli’s bed.

She slid her hand under her sister’s nose. Warm air blew steadily onto it and Iria let out a sigh of relief. Eli had acute lymphoblastic leukemia, A.L.L. for short, and Iria feared that one day she'd awake to find her sister had died.

Eli opened her dark brown eyes and stared sleepily at Iria.

"Good morning, Eli," Iria said.

Eli gave a brief smile, then dragged herself over to her dresser. She exchanged her nightcap for her Botafogo snowcap. This was the only time of day Iria saw Eli's head bare, and it always upset her that while she, herself, had long, wavy black hair, Eli had none.

After the young girls had finished dressing, they made their way to the kitchen for breakfast, which consisted of a ham and cheese sandwich, a banana and juice.

Carlota greeted each of her daughters with a kiss then took the seat across from them. “Eliana, have you chosen something to do today?”

Iria scrunched up her face. Eli’s list was a pessimistic resignation to death and it sickened Iria to her stomach that she was such an integral part of it.

“This is the last one on the list,” Eli replied. “It could take a while, so I was hoping Iria and I could start it right after breakfast.”

“That’s fine,” Carlota said. “What is it?”

“Um… it’s a secret between me and Iria.”

“Sisters should have their secrets. I’ll do the dishes so you two can get started right away.”


The two girls went outside, and walked up the streets of Penha, Rio de Janeiro. Iria was curious about the last item on Eli’s list. Whatever it was, Iria thought, its completion would be bittersweet. She always feared that Eli would either die before she got to finish her list or immediately afterwards.

About a block away from their house, Iria opened her mouth to speak, but Eli interrupted before she could form a syllable.

“I want to climb Corcovado.”

“Don’t you mean take the train?” Iria asked.

Eli shook her head. “That’s no fun. Besides, you’re a fantastic climber.”

This was true. Iria and her father had climbed a few mountains together, all of them were bigger than Corcovado of course, but Iria had never scaled a mountain without him.

Eli unzipped her backpack. “I already packed everything.”

“I don’t know…” Iria said.

“Come on, Iria. This is the last thing on my list.” Eli pushed out her lip and widened her eyes. She was so adorable, yet pitiful looking, that against her better judgment, Iria just had to say yes.

“Thank you, Iria!” Eli enveloped her sister in a hug and planted a kiss on her cheek.


The bike ride to Tijuca took nearly forty-five minutes. Eli’s lungs were working triple overtime and she flopped herself onto a nearby lawn.

“We could always do something else.” Iria opened her backpack and fished out a water bottle. “Or we could just take the train.”

Eli reached her hand up slowly to take the water bottle. She squirted some into her mouth, but most of it hit her face. She licked some of the excess water off her face and stood up. “We’re climbing Corcovado.”

“Mountain climbing is hard and you…” Iria trailed off.

“I what? Have A.L.L?”

“I wasn’t going to say that!”

“Were you going to say I’m too weak and tired to climb a mountain?”

“Well…” Iria looked down at her feet.

Eli mounted her bicycle. “I can do everything you can do.” She started pedaling, leaning forward to go as fast as the bike could take her. Iria hopped onto her bike and had to pedal hard just to keep her sister in sight.

Eli raced through the city, making dangerous and unnecessary turns around buildings. Iria followed her erratic path closely, although she took the turns with more caution.

Iria could feel her lungs bursting as she kept Eli in her line of vision. Determined not to let her sister beat her to the Tijuca Forest, Iria cranked her bike into top gear and leaned forward, matching her speed with Eli.

It simply wasn’t going to work. She took hard turns around the buildings, hardly losing any speed or balance. She may have been trying to beat Eli, but she still felt compelled to travel the same path as her.

Taking her game to an even higher level, Iria turned closer to the buildings, scraping her handlebars against the sides. She was fast approaching Eli, but they had almost arrived at the forest. Was there enough time to catch her?

Eli bumped into one of the buildings and had to take a wider turn. Iria zipped around the library and angled herself towards the road; there were just a few feet separating the library and the building in front of it.

The angle Iria had chosen was perfect. She was two centimeters away from the building and if she had wobbled slightly she would have crashed. Iria was now two buildings behind Eli, but the forest was coming into her vision.

Eli was rebuilding her speed and Iria was continuing to make precise and close turns around the buildings.

Iria was bearing down on Eli. She was just one building behind her with four until the forest.

Eli and Iria were going at the same speed again. Half a building behind Eli with two to go.

Iria rounded the penultimate building and barreled towards the last. She was on Eli’s heels as the girls exploded from around the last building and towards the forest.

Side-by-side, the sisters exchanged fierce glances, both trying to gain the edge down the final stretch. They passed the first tree of the Tijuca Forest, the imaginary finish line, as they both skidded to a halt.

“Ha! I beat you!” they yelled in unison. They were both dead tired, but too hopped up on adrenaline to do anything about it.

“What are you talking about?” Eli yelled. “You were all the way back there. There’s no way you caught me!”

“I did too catch you! Didn’t you see those awesome turns I was taking?”

As they started to walk through the forest, the girls continued to argue about how each was clearly the winner. By the time they reached Mount Corcovado, however, they had agreed to call it a draw.

“Corcovado is a traverse mountain with a D+ grade,” said Iria. Looking at the befuddled look on her sister’s face, she added, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

Eli stuffed her hat into her backpack and exchanged it with a helmet. “I’m sure.”

“Well, okay,” said Iria, as she helped Eli into her harness. As she pulled on her own harness, Iria gave Eli a brief explanation of all the equipment they would be using.

She surveyed the base of the mountain. “We’ll mostly be climbing sideways.”

“We will?”

“That’s what traverse means,” explained Iria. "Are you positive you want to do this?”

“Yes! Now stop asking.” Eli picked up her backpack. “Can we please go?”

Iria attached a rope to her harness and fastened a belay device onto Eli’s harness. She folded the rope in half and then pushed the loop through the hole of the belay device. She clipped a karabiner to the loop and Eli’s harness.

She handed Eli one end of the rope and positioned her hands on it properly.

“The hand further up the rope is your guide hand. Use that to pull the rope towards me as I climb okay?”

Eli nodded slowly.

“Not too much, okay? Don’t start until I tell you either.”

Iria moved Eli’s left hand closer to the belay device. “This is your brake hand. If I fall, bring it down to your thigh. Don’t ever take your brake hand off the rope.”

Iria kissed Eli on the forehead. “Calm down. You’re going to do fine.”

She walked over to Corcovado and started to climb. As she moved upwards, she easily found handholds and footholds.

Eli watched as her sister carefully installed a piton into the mountain. Iria strung the rope through it and then tested it. She yelled down to Eli, “Climbing!”

“Climb on!” Eli replied, and Iria moved upward two inches before feeling a tug.

“Eli!” Iria yelled. “You have to pull the rope toward me!”

Eli tugged the top of the rope slowly, freeing more rope for Iria, who climbed higher and higher, installing a piton every few feet. She finally reached a ledge several hundred feet above the ground.

As Eli looked up at her sister, who now appeared so tiny, she thought it must be an exhilarating feeling to be so high. After resting for several minutes, Iria attached an anchor and then, to Eli’s surprise, climbed all the way back to the bottom.

"Why did you come back?" Eli asked.

"Because I'm lead climbing," Iria explained. "Now you climb up, and remove all the pitons on the way up, and stop at the anchor, okay?"

Eli looked up; the target seemed perilous and unreachable, although Iria had made it seem like a walk in the park.

"Last chance to take the train."

Eli glared at her. Iria sighed and switched the belay device to her own harness. "Be careful."

"I will," Eli said, taking a few tentative steps forward. She put a shaking hand on Corcovado and then placed her foot onto it. She reached for a higher crevice with her other hand, and then her other foot came off the ground. Eli laughed. She was climbing! This wasn't so hard; climbing Corcovado was going to be a snap.

Eli wasted no time getting to the first piton. She hit it a few times until it became loose enough to pull out. She put it onto her equipment sash and continued up the mountain.

After removing a few pitons, Eli could hear her own loud breathing. Her feet were shaking and her hands felt arthritic. She wanted nothing more, and nothing less, than to fall.

She grabbed the top of a rock and pulled herself up. Her arms were trembling but she found the strength to pull herself higher. She looked up and saw that the anchor was twenty thousand feet away. In the moment she faltered, she lost her grip on the rock.

Eli screamed as she plummeted towards the ground. She hit the side of the mountain and then bounced away from it. She swung back and forth like a pendulum. Her falling suddenly slowed to a stop and the world appeared upside down and one hundred feet below her.

The rope spun around, making Eli feel sick. She tried to right herself, but the extra motion made her sicker. She turned her face down and vomited into the treetops. She closed her eyes in effort to block out the fact that she was dangling one hundred feet in the air.

“Are you okay, Eli?” Iria yelled.

Did Iria think she was okay?

“Listen to me, Eli. You need to swing back to the mountain and grab it, okay?”

Eli didn’t want to get back on the mountain; she wanted to get on the ground. “Can’t you lower me to the ground?”

“I could…” Iria said, “but I thought you wanted to climb to the top.”

“It’s too hard and I’m hurt.”

Although Iria wanted to lower her sister safely back to the ground, she knew how much Eli had wanted to climb Corcovado, and falls like this were obstacles she would have to overcome.

“I’m not lowering you.” Iria called. “Climbers fall all the time and you have to get back on your feet.”

“Why the sudden change of heart?”

“I could ask you the same thing.”

Eli hung there, motionless and silent.

“Come on Eli, you can do this!”

“No I can’t! I’m too tired and too weak.”

Iria let out a deep sigh. “You have to have faith in yourself. When we first came, I didn’t think you could belay me but I put my faith in you and you did it fantastically. I didn’t think you could climb the mountain but I saw you on it and now I know I’m wrong. You can climb Corcovado, Eli.”

Eli opened her eyes and after a few moments, she swung herself back onto the mountain. Looking up at the anchor, she saw that it was only a few hundred feet away. Summoning an inner reserve of strength, she found every crack and crevice and grabbed every rock, and although she was beyond tired, she didn’t stop until she reached the anchor.

She scooted as far back on the ledge as she could, which wasn’t very far, and her feet hung over the edge. She had a great deal of difficulty opening her water bottle, but when she finally got it open, she drank nearly half of its contents.

“I knew you could do it,” Iria said triumphantly as she joined her on the ledge. She herself had already climbed up twice before, although she used the rope this time, but seemed barely tired at all.

Eli smiled, but was too much out of breath to say anything.

After resting, the girls prepared to climb to the second pitch. There was a bit more vertical climbing, but first they had to climb down the mountain before reaching a perilous looking ledge, which would require traversing.

"It's easier than climbing upwards," Iria reassured Eli as she tied a rope around each of their waists. "Stay close, but not too close, okay?"

"Don't we have protection?" Eli asked.

Iria shook the rope. She placed her foot on the ledge and then grabbed hold of the overhang. She brought her other foot up onto the ledge and started sidestepping. Once she was a few feet in, Eli pulled herself onto the ledge.

Eli started shuffling her feet. She wondered why people did this. Was it the challenge? Was it the eluding death part? Either way, Eli thought, they belonged in straitjackets.

Eli looked to her left and noticed Iria was getting pretty far ahead. She obviously needed to move faster. She watched as Iria stretched her arms and legs as far as they would go and mimicked her movements. Iria turned to observe her sister, and slowed down a little.

Eli’s hands felt ready to turn to dust and every step sent pain through her arms. Her feet trembled like an earthquake, and she wondered if she could make it. The last time she had fallen, Iria had saved her. If she fell this time, she’d probably kill the pair of them.

She almost looked to the left but stopped herself. I’m almost there, she reassured herself, just a few more steps and I’m there. The pain in her hands progressed from pins to daggers to hot knives. But she was almost there. She had to be.

Her left foot slipped and her heart jumped. Her body slid down the ledge and the task of supporting her weight fell on her hands. Her grip on the overhang loosened and Eli tried desperately to bring her left foot up.

She lost her grip and her right foot slipped off the mountain. She screamed, but fell only for three seconds before swinging into the mountain. She could feel herself being reeled up by the rope and, once near the top, Iria grabbed hold of her hand and pulled her to safety.

They stood on a long, flat overhang. Iria lifted up Eli’s shirt and saw several cuts and bruises from having hit the side of the mountain. There were also some A.L.L. bruises that had burst from the impact. Iria took out the first aid kit and cleaned the injuries as best as she could.

“I’m such an idiot,” Eli said. “I don’t know why I thought I could climb a mountain without killing myself.”

Iria opened her backpack and produced lunch. “You aren’t going to kill yourself climbing this mountain.”

“Only if my A.L.L. takes me now.”

Iria closed her eyes tight and scrunched up her face.

Eli bit into her food and took a sip of water. “Could you go to the top and get a helicopter to airlift me?”

Iria sighed and knelt next to Eli. “Mountain climbing is tough and dangerous, but it’s also a battle to be won, an adrenaline rush to be felt and it’s a triumph of the will.”

“Doesn’t it bother you that you keep having to give speeches just to keep me doing an activity that you didn’t want me to do in the first place?”

Iria laughed. “We both agreed with the other person. The only problem is, we no longer agree with ourselves!”

Eli smiled. “So how do we decide what to do next?”

“Well it’s your list. So I think it’s only fair that you decide.”

Eli looked up the mountain. They were halfway to the top, so close that she could make out the statue of Christ the Redeemer. She’d love to make it to the top, but she knew she probably couldn’t climb the rest of the way there.

“Okay,” Eli said. “I climbed halfway up a mountain and almost fell twice. I’m very tired and I feel like I have frostbite. But hey, climbing halfway up Corcovado with A.L.L. ain’t bad, right?”

Iria nodded. “This is the last item on your list,” she said. “What are you going to do from now on?”

Eli hadn’t thought about that. She was used to waking up every morning and selecting an item from her list. But now that it was finished…

“Beat A.L.L.” Eli said. “Because I still have tons more things I want to do.”

Word count: 3000

Impressum

Texte: Me
Bildmaterialien: Public domain
Lektorat: Valerie Byron (gooduklady)
Tag der Veröffentlichung: 01.06.2012

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