I try even Flashier flash fiction: 250 words

Just submitted!

GENRE: Action and/or Adventure
ACTION: Icing an injury
WORD: half

Knife’s  Edge

Jim chips up a handful of snow and wraps it in his hankie to make an ice pack for my wrist. We always planned to do this peak together, but his chemo set us back. Now Jim is the strong one and I’m in trouble. So, a new plan: get us up Capitol Peak, our last fourteener, before this disease kills that dream, too.

We made camp last night and tried to sleep. I took my stupid tumble at dawn just after we’d set out again. My wrist throbs and my knee’s bandaged, but I’m strong enough. 

The scramble up to “Knife Edge” was treacherous. The warm morning sun had slightly melted the snow so it was slick, and without crampons, we both had to be extra careful with our steps.

Exhausted, we breath a moment, the jagged ridge confronting us. Beyond looms the summit, still another hour of difficult hiking after we cross. Jim scans the horizon where a line of dark grey hovers. I know what he is going to say. If we go, we might have to make camp again before the weather hits and it gets dark. We’re not prepared for two nights.

“If we try, it might still be a halfway trip, anyway.” He holds my wrist with both hands, “You know we could get buried in this.”

“I don’t plan another trip, so there are no half-ways for me, now.”

We hold each other before moving on, carefully ducking beneath the sky’s heavy curtain.