January 2007
Geneva
Geneva awakens in the backseat as the jeep hits a patch of ice, skids towards an eighteen-wheeler painted orange, mustard, teal, and green, hideous images of horned demons splashed on the front of the cab, its horn shrieking as if noise alone will prevent the collision. She gasps, the metallic taste of fear souring her mouth, her mind flashing to another time, another road, when deer, weather, and wine commingled, and during the span of one shallow breath, she chose to save the wrong life. The last thing Geneva sees before the jeep swerves, slams through a snowbank and hits the wall of rock that lines the highway, is the the truck’s rear bumper decorated with a lotus flower in full bloom, the words “Beep, please” emblazoned in red. She continues to stare in the direction of the lotus even after the truck’s taillights recede around a sharp bend, disappearing into the horizon, the faint pink glow of dawn hovering like a ghost behind an enormous silver Himalayan peak.
Neither the jeep’s driver nor its other passenger, her coworker Kailash, react with alarm. Kailash turns to Geneva and calmly asks if she’s okay, not bothering to await her response before climbing out of the jeep, lighting a cigarette, trudging to the front of the vehicle. Kailash shrugs and says something in Hindi to the driver. Geneva, shivering, rubs the back of her head, pulls a blanket tighter around herself as the jeep’s wheels spin and Kailash pushes against the front end, his cigarette dangling from his mouth. A wind gust topples Kailash backwards, landing him in the snow, limbs outstretched like a child making a snow angel. The tears choking Geneva’s throat and gritting her teeth turn to giggles. She drives the heel of her heavy boot into the toes of her other foot, using the pain to suppress her laughter. Kailash stands, spits out the cigarette, cursing, his voice rising in pitch as he tromps to the driver’s window and bangs on it, motioning for his phone.
Time passes, half an hour, maybe longer—Geneva has lost her bearings. She’s lost her ability to track time, to care about her predicament, to shake the image, from years ago, of the deer, the crash, the sirens on that other road. Finally, another vehicle traveling along the white capped river in the opposite direction stops, produces chains, drags the jeep out of the snowbank, minus its front grill and a headlight.
They continue up the Valley towards Manali, driving in silence into the unfurling light, Geneva watching mountaintops appear in the distance, one by one, like preternatural sentries. Whatever excitement she once felt for her new assignment is replaced with swirling thoughts, a creeping sense that the mountains have sent a warning. The project she is here to supervise—building the Himalaya’s first luxury ski resort in India—is rife with controversy. Locals, environmentalists, wildlife conservationists, and, if she is to believe the Indian press, the gods oppose it. Geneva startles as an avalanche sweeps down a nearby mountain, hears its roar rage through the stillness of the shadowy morning, wondering if everything she’s read is true, that the mountains themselves will crush anyone who tries to build on their sacred slopes here in the Valley that was once known as the End of the Habitable World.
