A/N: Emptying my hard-drive of Chuck stuff and found this.
El Picacho vs. Chuck
Sarah Walker took a long sip from her water bottle, but not too long a sip. She pushed back her hair and wiped her forehead with her forearm, only transferring the sweat of one onto the other. She had driven north from Cabo in a rental car and into the Sierra de la Laguna mountains, to the hiking trail leading up El Picacho. It was a daunting hike — I5 miles, climbing to 7000 feet above sea level.
Her stomach was bothering her, tension and frustration making her feel as though her midsection caged some slow-moving but sharp-clawed reptile.
She had come to Cabo with her partner and her...what?...boyfriend? — No. No, even if she had been willing to call him that, he would not have been willing to be called that. Cabo might have clarified things between them, but then again, it might only have made them more cloudy. She liked him a lot — she would not be in Cabo with him if that weren't true — and for a while, early on in their partnership-plus, she thought that her liking him a lot might grow, intensify, into something she secretly longed for: love. It was not the best-kept of her secrets from herself. She kept many. But she did try hard not to let herself own it. Only misery lurked in ownership of that.
It had not taken long for Sarah to know that her partnership-plus with Bryce was not going to grow. He liked the thought of her being in love with him — he often bragged on having been the man to melt the Ice Queen — but he was more committed to being her partner, to being a CIA agent, than to being her plus. The one time she had hazarded a very brief, very tentative comment about how she felt and hoped to feel, he had given her a tense smile and patted her hand, as if he were at the bedside of a fever victim. As if she were the victim.
She had wanted to slap him. But his gesture had been eloquent about his commitment/non-commitment — his commitment ultimately to the Company, not to her company.
And now, in the middle of their vacation, he was gone. She woke up to find she had lost him. At first, she had not known he was lost, gone. Despite billing the trip as a romantic getaway, there had been little romance for Sarah, and Bryce had been the one who kept getting away. He had vanished from the beach briefly two days before without explanation, briefly from dinner last night and — not briefly — from the room this morning. The lack of romance hurt, but it was not unexpected even if it was disappointing. She had hoped Bryce might be serious about the romance but she became almost certain he was in Cabo mixing Company business with not-that-much pleasure. He was working, she was sure of it, but she had no idea of what the mission was. The single time she alluded to it, a hesitant, half-question, he denied it once, quickly. Too quickly. She knew him, knew his timing. Undercover, he was always a beat too fast: he confused alacrity with sincerity.
He always talked too fast to her.
Anyway, he was gone. She still had a couple of days off and she needed to do something about her tension and frustration. A long hike would get her out of the hotel, get her out of her head. The smooth, pampered days in the hotel were beginning to grate on her. She knew it was unlikely Bryce would be back. If that had been likely, he would not have simply vanished, and taken all his things. But he had. The message was clear. Don't find me; I'll find you. She put her water back in her backpack. A sandwich and a Snickers bar — the candy a rare treat in her steel-disciplined world — were in the backpack too. And a knife, a large one, she had picked up at a small roadside shop on the way into the mountains.
She bent down to tighten the lace on her boot, trying to figure out just why she wasn't more hurt by Bryce's vanishing. She wasn't sure. She was hurt, a little, but maybe the big hurt begun months ago and been delivered in small stages, in all the little things that did and did not happen between them, like his tense smile and hand-patting, like his leaving no note, vanishing into nothing. Big hurt by small cuts. Still, he had been the only man who had made her wonder if love was possible for her. The big hurt might be behind her but there would still be hurt ahead, a little. — No matter. She was an old hand at burying hurts. She had learned as a girl, her inner world dotted with small burial plots.
"Say, can you help me, please?" a male voice from behind her asked, politely. She started to sigh, fume, but then realized that the tone of voice was polite. It did not sound preludial to a pick-up line. She stood and turned, looking up and up...and up...until she found the face of the voice.
Her first impression was of dark wavy hair beneath an off-white, large-brimmed hat. One side of the hat was buttoned up, giving the tall man a safari-guide look. The impression was strengthened by the khaki shoulder bag he was carrying. It was small but seemed oddly full. Like her, he was wearing shorts and hiking boots over thick socks. But her eyes were drawn back to his face. He was handsome but it wasn't exactly his features or their collective attractiveness that called to her eyes: it was that he was present in his face. Just...there, right where his face was. His face was a picture of his soul.
Sarah had studied her face in the mirror often enough to know that she was rarely present in her face. Her mirror-image was soulless. Bryce certainly wasn't present in his face. He and she both managed their faces from behind the scenes, with pulleys, and wires. An old spy trick. An old con trick. Sarah almost always felt like a ghost inside the machine of her body, trapped inside it, haunting it, but living a life distinct from the life of her body, of her face.
The man was blinking at her as if he was looking into the sun, but the sun was behind him.
"Hi, I'm Chuck." She must have made a face. He hurried on. "No, really. I was planning on doing this hike but I'm not sure if that," — he pointed to a marked trailhead — "is the entrance or not."
Sarah instantly knew it was. The man was looking at it, then at her, then at his map, then at it, then...
"Yes, that's it. That's the trailhead. You're planning on going all the way?"
His eyes flashed and his face flushed. "Ha, um….yeah, I am. To the top. I promised myself I would not hide under umbrella drinks my entire time here. So, I set today aside for a serious hike." His quick grin was infectious and she felt her spirits lift as if she'd driven fast over a small bump in the road, — that momentary feeling of suspended weightlessness. It made her grin too.
Sarah glanced at him again, head to toe. "And your...sister...packed your suitcase? Because you look like a Safari Ken doll."
His flush became bright red, a train-crossing light. "Ouch, ouch! How…?"
"Your sister did pack your suitcase?" Her grin stretched her lips farther. He was flustered, stammering.
"Well...you see...um, yes...as it happens...my sister, Ellie, that's her name...she sorta raised me...and she did...pack my...no, repack...jeez, that makes it worse, not better...my bag...and added...a few items." He lifted his hand with the map and pushed his hat back on his head, exposing more of his curly hair. He shrugged. "But I guess you're used to making men speechless?"
For a moment, she worried he had produced a pick-up line after all, and she felt a twinge of disappointment, sank, and the small hurt, forgotten for a moment, threatened to return. But then she saw that his flush was still there and that he was staring at his own feet, not at her. He had embarrassed himself even more by what he had said.
Sarah laughed, surprising herself, the lift returned, the hurt forgotten again. She felt shy suddenly for some reason and she looked down at her own feet for a second. "I suppose I am, if I can say that...without sounding...conceited, but I don't know if I've ever made a man speechless by any speech of mine."
"Huh. Well, you did. Just did. That Waldorf word salad a moment ago, — that was me, speechless." He glanced up sheepishly. "And, you were right both times, I might as well admit it. I do look like a stretched version of Ken on Safari and it is because of my sister. She insisted that if I hiked I needed the right gear. I know this is supposed to be a challenging hike but I doubt we'll run into a herd of rhino…"
"A crash…"
"Huh?" The man, Chuck, looked lost.
"A bunch of rhinos. Not a herd, a crash."
"Seriously?"
"Seriously."
"That's cool. Like a murder of crows?"
"Yeah, that's the one everyone knows."
"I'm not everyone. I'm Chuck." He said it while standing straight and giving her a mock salute, his hand's edge to the brim of his cap. The effect was ludicrous and ingratiating all at once.
"You said already. — Well, I'm not everyone, either, I'm Sarah, sir." She imitated his gesture and smiled in wonder at herself. She was not funny. She never tried to be funny. Antics, banter, were, for her, verboten. She was all-serious, all-the-time. 24/7. Deathly serious, Deadly Sarah. Bubbly Sarah — had not existed until this moment. Not that Deadly Sarah knew of, anyway. She broke her wondering smile with a breathy giggle.
He giggled too with no trace of self-consciousness. "Nice to meet you, Sarah. Thanks for the help." He gave her a look as if he was trying to think of a way to prolong their conversation but could not. He started for the trail's entrance.
"Hey, Chuck," Sarah called as he walked away, acting on a whim before she knew she had it, "would you mind some company?" What am I saying? She wanted to regret the words; her habits told her to regret the words. But when he smiled beneath his slightly silly safari hat, she did not regret the words.
"Sure," he said, his smile large and pleased. Her heart, so often a blank spot in her chest, felt large and happy too. That was weird, in general, and in particular, — but she liked it.
When she smiled in return she felt herself in her face. Right there. It was like he called her to presence, made her present.
Chuck kept making himself count backward from one hundred. 99, 98, 97...He counted once for each step until he reached 0, then he started over.
He was trying to keep himself from breaking the spell. He had asked a woman for help and she stood and turned out to be the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. As if that were not enough to prove that the day was under a dwimmer, she had not only helped him, she had joked with him and then, strangest of all, she asked to hike with him.
But he knew he would ruin it all somehow. So he kept counting backward while trying to walk forward. She was silent too, but he could feel her gaze on him frequently. She seemed to be waiting for him to talk but he had no idea what to say. It did not help that she seemed to have some kind of second-sight. How did she guess about Ellie?
He knew the next words out of his mouth were fated for stupidity. So he kept counting. 90, 89, 88…
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. She was not just beautiful, she was fit. Her movements were controlled, economical. She was a dictionary picture of poised. He was a dictionary picture of awkwardness. Awkward Ken Doll goes on Safari, dressed by his sister. If I could make that rhyme right, it would be the initial line of a Suess book.
The trail was easy enough at the beginning. Chuck hoped he would be able to manage the harder parts. Long days of sitting behind the Nerd Herd desk were not the best training for serious hikes. They were much closer to training for slow death. Five years wasted in that Emerald City, in those green-tinted spectacles. All because he could not manage to kick his own ass into gear…to see the Wizard…If I only had a degree...
But right now, that did not matter. He was in Cabo, on a mountain trail, walking with a woman who would have made Helen of Troy a little envy-greenish. He thought of Oz, Princess Ozma: "Her eyes sparkled as two diamonds, and her lips were tinted like a tourmaline. All adown her back floated tresses of ruddy gold, with a slender jeweled circlet confining them at the brow." He glanced again. No jeweled circlet but that was just a detail, and not ruddy gold, just gold, and that was just another detail.
And, conversation or not, she seemed happy to be hiking alongside him. He glanced at her a third time and she saw. She gave him a quick smile.
He hazarded a word. "So…"
She raised an eyebrow expectantly.
"...And that's all I've got." Damn it, I should have kept counting.
She grinned though, a big, warm grin. "How far did you get?"
Chuck did not follow. "Huh?"
"Your counting. Backward, right?"
"How could you…?"
"Your lips were moving." She flashed him a kind smile.
"Oh, yeah, well not too far…"
"Is that some kind of self-hypnosis?"
Chuck blew out a breath. "I guess. I...um...I didn't want to say anything stupid, so I was trying to keep my mind occupied."
She stopped and he did too. She reached up and brushed a leaf off his shoulder. "If we're going to hike together…" she paused as if to allow him to extricate himself from the situation, then went on: "...then I need you to just say whatever comes into your mind. No counting."
Her blue eyes deepened as she said the words. Chuck nodded. "Okay...but you asked for it...But, if I am going to be under that rule, you have to be too. Just say whatever comes into your mind."
Her eyes deepened even more and he thought he saw traces both of terror and willingness. He caught his breath and, to his surprise, the willingness won out. She nodded and Chuck breathed and spoke: "So...I was thinking about you. You make me nervous."
She laughed softly. "Me too."
Chuck shook his head. "You mean that I make you nervous?"
She nodded, glancing away.
"That makes no sense, Sarah. I could understand if I made you laugh."
"You do." Chuck felt his involuntary frown and she saw it. "No, not in a bad way, Chuck. I just don't. Don't laugh. I don't laugh and it kinda makes me nervous that you can make me laugh."
Chuck had no idea how to respond to that. She was serious. He had an instant feeling that she could be deathly serious, scary. But she smiled and his feeling passed as instantly as it came.
"I can try to be serious," he offered, shrugging.
She laughed. "Don't. Be yourself. I'll try to do that too."
He narrowed his eyes theatrically. "That's the easiest thing in the world, being yourself."
A shadow passed over her face. She shook her head. "Is it?"
Chuck halted himself, his thoughts, his mouth. Had he been himself since Stanford? Was the Nerd Herder with untucked shirttails and a loose tie the man he thought he would be, the man he was? Was being yourself so easy?
"You know, now that you ask, maybe it's not. I'm not sure I've been myself for a long time. Maybe I was once, a long time ago, but not recently." He looked at her.
He was surprised by her smile. "I'll see you a long time ago and raise you to never," she commented.
Again, Chuck had no idea how to respond but then he had an inspiration. "Tell you what, on this hike, let's not just say whatever comes to mind, let's be ourselves. What do you say? What do we have to lose? We could always part company."
She grinned, the mixture of terror and willingness in her grin and not just her eyes. "What do I say? What do I say?" She looked up, as if thinking, then looked into Chuck's eyes. "I say okay. I'll try. Okay?" Her smile was brave and it cheered Chuck.
"Okay!"
They started walking again in silence. Chuck noticed that Sarah's walk had changed. She seemed looser-limbed and she was swinging her arms a little, gazing around her. Her controlled poise had been relaxed.
The silence continued for a while and the hike grew more demanding. Steep. They kept at it for a while, occasionally stopping to enjoy a view or to look more closely at a flower or a stone.
Nothing must have come to mind for either because they did not speak.
They pointed. Looked. Smiled, and smiled at each other.
They finally stopped for a while. The heat was rising but so were they, climbing, and so the heat was not unbearable — but it was more than noticeable.
Sarah stopped at a large rock and sat down. She reached into her bag and got her water. Chuck opened his shoulder bag. Sarah leaned toward him to glance inside it. He pushed back his hat and peered into the bag with her.
Sarah laughed as she looked. "It's like the Ark!"
"The ark?" Chuck took off his hat as he asked. His damp hair above his crooked smile pulled her, gravity. She decided right there, seated on the rock, that she liked Chuck.
"Yes, there are two of everything!"
He gave her a shame-faced nod. "Yeah, I...overpack. I hate not being prepared."
Sarah gave him a long look. "So, you're prepared for...whatever...might happen out here?"
He returned her long look with a longer one, unsure and trying to become sure. "Whatever?"
"Well, it looks like you packed for every eventuality. For me, for example?"
"Um…" He seemed to be choosing his words and then she saw him relax, "there's no such thing as being prepared for you, Sarah."
She gave him a mock pout, raised one eyebrow. "But then you might miss your chance."
The long unsure look returned. She was not entirely sure what she meant herself — but she was doing her best not to micromanage her words. She had spent her life thinking before she spoke and then speaking at variance with her thoughts. Not today; not on this hike.
"I'm really not sure what to say to that…"
Delighted by his modest honesty, she leaned over farther and kissed his cheek. "That's okay...I'm not really sure what I am saying."
He jerked when she kissed him and blushed as she made her comment. "Should we go on?" he asked.
She nodded her head decisively. She was sure about that. "Yes!"
"So, Chuck," Sarah asked after they had climbed for almost an hour and stopped again to rest, "why are you here?"
Chuck shrugged. "Here here or in Cabo?"
"Both. The last first, though."
He made himself fight through his reluctance to answer. "I won a contest. I work for this big box store, The Buy More, and I was an employee of the month. That made me eligible for a contest the company was running, company-wide. My name got chosen out of the hat and the prize was a week in Cabo. I've got a couple of days left before I go home and return to...reality. I'm here because I have been a bum the entire time and I figured I should get away from the hotel and be where I am. Most hotels are mostly ways of not being where you are, you know, mostly?"
Sarah nodded firmly, grinning at his repetitions. "I know. I've spent most of my life in hotels. A huge part of my life not being where I am…Mostly."
"...Or who you are?"
Sarah took a careful look at him but nodded. "Mostly. Yes."
Chuck wanted to ask about her work but he decided not to do it. He would take what she gave him. But she had asked about why he was there, he could ask her the same. "You?"
She stiffened for a moment. Then she stood up, facing away from him. They had been seated beside each other on the ground. Chuck started to get up but she turned to look down at him. "I came here on vacation. With a man."
"Oh." Chuck felt the ground open to swallow him.
"But it was a mistake," she added. The ground closed. "I thought...I don't know what I thought. I guess I thought this would be the beginning of a new chapter between us, but I think the story is over. But he left, just left, and I came out here...to…"
"To walk that man right out of your hair?" Chuck sang the question more than spoke it.
Her serious expression disappeared and she smiled at his sing-song. "Yeah...that. That's just what I did."
"Were you together long?"
Sarah shook her head. "Never. Not in the way you mean. Maybe we thought we were, maybe one or the other of us wanted us to be, but no. It started as a work thing and it...ended as a work thing."
Chuck patted the ground and she sat back down. "So, I'm your rebound hike?"
She laughed hard at that. "I suppose that's right. I hope you're not offended."
"I'm just happy to be getting to know you."
He saw her stiffen again and relax. "I'm happy you're getting to know me."
At lunchtime, Sarah stopped them. "Time for a real break, time to eat. I assume you packed a couple of sandwiches?"
He did the shame-faced nodding thing again. "Did you bring anything?"
"I did. One sandwich."
"I'm willing to share."
"No need." Sarah took a drink then unwrapped her sandwich. They sat in the shade on a long, low rock. Chuck took a drink from his water bottle and unwrapped his sandwich. "PB&J."
Sarah grinned. "In Cabo?"
"I made friends with one of the chefs at the restaurant. She made them for me."
"She?"
"...Is old enough to be my mother. But I ran into her in the hotel and we just started chatting…"
"Is that something you often do, start chatting?"
They each started eating. "I suppose," Chuck said after swallowing, "I'm...social...I guess. I enjoy people. Getting to know them." He glanced at Sarah. For some reason, that glance made Sarah much warmer than she already was.
"I'm not good...at people. At all." She took another bite.
"I think you're pretty amazing. To be honest, I've mostly been lonely and depressed on this trip. Until I asked you for help. The thought of going back to...my life…"
"Yeah…" Sarah agreed with what was unspoken.
They sat and finished in silence. Chuck wiped his hands with a napkin from his bag, then handed her one. After wiping her lips — knowing he was watching — she reached in her backpack and took out the Snickers. "Dessert?" she asked and could not keep herself from asking it in a particular tone.
Chuck blinked. "Please."
She put the candy bar on the napkin and opened the wrapper. It was badly melted; the heat had gotten to it. Sarah dug the knife out of her backpack and unsheathed it. Chuck stared at it with wide eyes but said nothing. She cut two bite-sized pieces off the bar and picked one up. Knowing what she was doing, she lifted it to Chuck's mouth and he opened it. She fed him the bite. He pincered the other and fed it to her. She was even warmer. She caught his wrist and licked the chocolate from his fingers, then licked it from her own. Chuck gulped, visibly and audibly.
Maybe it was the altitude. Maybe it was because she had come to Cabo hoping for romance but not finding it. Maybe it was because she had been saying whatever came to mind, trying to be herself. Maybe it was Chuck's peculiar magnetism — unlike any attraction to a man she had ever felt — rich and strong and sudden. Maybe it was the feeling of freedom, heady, infrequent in her life. Whatever it was, she grabbed Chuck with both hands and pulled him to her, into a deep, hot, chocolate-and-peanut kiss, no maybes about it.
After a moment, they tumbled together onto the ground. Chuck's hat fell off as he began to unbutton her shirt.
His eyes flicked up to hers and his hands stopped. "Are you sure?"
She dropped her head to kiss him again. His lips. Nothing in her life had tasted better. "I'm sure."