River Rat Chapter 59
| River Rat | |
|---|---|
| Chapter 59 of 63 | |
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| Time frame | August 5 - September 15, 2001 |
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Location
- Phantom Ranch, at the bottom of the Grand Canyon (at mile 88.1 from the Lee's Ferry put-in)
Characters
- Kevin Haynes
- Phil and Becky Osborne
Summary
A couple of days later, Scooter and Nicole talk about Randy's obvious frustration about her coming on a second trip when he couldn't possibly get away and his hurt at her fear on the first part of the wedding trip, and then her asking him to let her come on another run. The sailing trip that they had arranged for him for the coming winter helped, but didn't erase the hurt. She is realizing that to even things up, she may have to give up the girl scout camp (Mosquito Valley) that summer if the sailing trip doesn't work out well for Randy. Scooter suggests that maybe she and Jim can get to Spearfish Lake sometime in the winter and go snowboarding with Randy, or that Crystal and Noah could do the same thing.
Scooter tells Nicole "Nothing stays the same, Nicole, not even this Canyon. Things change, and you never know when something really unexpected is going to happen to you."
Five weeks later, she remembered those words when they came in to the beach at Phantom Ranch and they were surprised to find Michelle waiting for them with a tortured look on her face. She tells them that 4 days ago 4 airplanes were hijacked, with two flying into the World Trade Center, one into the Pentagon, and one crashing in Pennsylvania. She had called all the contact numbers of the passengers and everyone she was able to reach told them that everyone was OK, but she could not reach the Osborne's son in Boston. Noah comforts them and tells Crystal to get the satellite phone; Phil calls his daughter-in-law's family and gets the bad news that his son was indeed on one of the planes.
Noah tells them to get ready to hike out and that he will drive them to their home in Connecticut; Michelle will take over for him as soon as she gets back from the Phantom Ranch canteen where she went to stock up on bubblegum.
When she gets back, they head off. Michelle puts on her teenybopper act with the bubblegum, assisted by Scooter, which helps break the gloom for a while. A couple on her raft can't believe that this teenager is a boatman; Crystal and Scooter tell everyone that she has more experience on the river than anyone else on the trip, and that she's "strong as a mule, has a black belt in karate and can drink any two boatmen on the river combined under the table. Meet Michelle, legend-in-her-own-time, Rawson, the wild woman of the Canyon."
