[First Draft]
Winter in the Sawtooth Mountains hits heavy. Short days and freezing nights keep many people away. In the 1970s, almost no one lived north of Ketchum, Idaho, where my sister spent 15 years after college enjoying the Sun Valley resort. She and her fiancé, Stephen, invited me up for a weekend of skiing, with a side trip to Robinson Bar Ranch, 80 miles north over Galena summit, after passing through the hamlet of Stanley.
I arrived during a break between medical school clinical rotations. My life was filled with frequent night call and long hours running menial errands for the resident physicians who were our instructors. “See one, do one, teach one…” was the mantra at LA County – USC Medical Center. Leigh had promised a night at Robinson Bar’s hot springs uphill from the wild Salmon River.
“Oh, and a friend from college is coming through as well. From my sorority, Delta Gamma. She’s a field agent for them now, visiting all the chapters, making sure they have what they need from the national.” I can’t remember her name, so let’s call her “Jenna”.
Getting to Robinson Bar required not only a risky drive over the pass and along snow-packed US 93 in Stephen’s BMW 2002, but also a one-mile hike carrying our suitcases up the winding unpaved road through ruts made by the Ranch’s jeeps in the 18 inch snow cover. We arrived just in time for the family style dinner of elk and tubers, fortified by the wine Leigh insisted on ordering.
I was still a neophyte at drinking, having evaded that activity while at college, and then being indoctrinated in mind-altering vaporous refreshment once I got to Los Angeles. So only one glass of the red was enough to loosen the constraints 18 years of schooling had instilled. Seated around a rough-hewn picnic table on backless benches, I began feeling a little light-headed.
But the wine did little to loosen my inhibitions. When my sister pointed out that the hot springs were au natural, I hesitated, not sure I wanted to expose myself in front of my sister, her worldly boyfriend, and Jenna.
“Why don’t you have another glass?” Leigh suggested. “The cold walk there won’t bother you so much, and it’ll feel all the better when you get in!”
I took her advice, and by the time we got up from the table, my head was swimming as if I’d spun on a kids’ merry-go-round.
We all headed back to the rooms to get the towels and robes provided by the Ranch. I sat down on the edge of my bed, hoping to re-group a bit before facing the hot springs. I had my shirt, pants, shoes and socks off when the dizziness hit again. I fell back on the unmade bed, trying to capture the room before it spun out of my control. The walls were dark honey pine, varnished smooth. The bed was a freestanding frame of aspen logs with a rickety headboard below a velvet-Elvis style painting of Redfish Lake in the fall, leaves flying off the trees, landing amidst the pine duff on the shore. The ribs of the rough white cotton duvet provided a stabilizing center as I lay back and drifted away.
The bed bounced roughly, and I jerked awake. Jenna, in her fluffy white cotton robe, sat next to me, shaking my shoulder.
“Leigh sent me back to see if you were coming,” she said. “You OK?”
I had my glasses off, and could only see the vague outline of her features as she pressed closer as if to assess my condition. Before I could answer or move to get up, she pivoted over me, siting on my thighs. Her robe fell open as she pulled at my underwear.
“Well, what were you dreaming about?” she asked as she pulled some sort of wrestling move, ending up on her back with me on top.
Wide awake by now, and fully armed, I understood what was really meant to happen that evening, why Leigh had brought us out here. I could feel the wings of Jenna’s hips pushing against me, a fevered motion which only grew firmer, faster. As we sped up, the bed began to shake and creak as the weakened springs tried to handle to quickening waves of our joining.
And then… WHOOMP! The bed collapsed, its undercarriage giving way to our combined weight. The mattrass hit the floor, the headboard sagged forward and dropped down, threatening to pin us.
As the shock wore off, we began laughing. My instant thought was, We’ve got to get this bed back together right away! I didn’t want my sister to know, what I’m not quite sure. Did I want to hide what Jenna and I had been up to, or did I not want to face the others with an unexplained broken bed.
We began assessing the damage, Jenna in her unopened robe, and me still naked. I pulled away the bedclothes, and shifted the mattrass. We put the cross beams into the grooves along the frame, pushed the headboard back up, and struggled to hoist the heavy mattrass onto the superstructure. We almost had the sheets back in place when we heard Leigh and Stephen coming up the hall.
“Jenna? Al? You guys coming?” Leigh asked as they turned the corner into my room.
“What happened here?” Stephen asked, watching us tuck the bottom sheet in place.
“Uh, the bed broke…” I started.
“What…how?” Stephen sputtered.
We stood there dumbly, obviously in flagrante delicto.
“Oh…” observed Leigh.