The wobble of the homemade raft and the pain of bare knees on plywood set my teeth on edge. Seeking stability, I looked at the water in front of us. The lake was turning to river, and the whisper of the water morphed into muttering as it started to weave through protruding rocks. We accelerated, generating a frigid wind. Goosebumps peppered my skin. What am I doing?!

 

". . . Sarah . . . SARAH, paddle right!!" Joseph's voice jolted me out of my stupor. I leaned out with my paddle to meet the rapids of the Chilkoot River. This isn't like summer camp!!

 

I screamed as we narrowly avoided the first boulder, fear shutting me down, but I had to look ahead. "So many rocks!" I exclaimed. Joseph laughed, already enjoying this. I whipped around. "This isn't funny!"

We rounded a bend in the river, and the mother of all monoliths rose out of the water: Death pointing a scraggly sickle of a tree right at us. I was mute with horror. Joseph yelled, "We gotta paddle!! Left, left!"

We drove our paddles into roiling whitewater. Mine was fueled by terror as surely as I know Joseph's was driven by mad happiness. Fifty feet, forty, thirty – my heart dropped into my bruised knees as the sinister crag filled my vision. The sound of water meeting stone grew in a crescendo of rhythmic frenzy. One moment, bracing – the next, swoosh, BAM – the raft spun and flipped, gravity reorienting towards the horizon. The river's onslaught pinned the raft against that impervious rock.

I sprang like a frightened rabbit to the scraggly little sapling atop the boulder. Joseph reached out and hoisted himself up to sit beside me, surveying the situation with a calm eye. The tree, small as it was, stood firm and resolute. Looking at it, I grew roots too. There was no way off this thing. I felt hot tears mingle with the spray of the river on my cheeks. The taste of salt and stone lingered in my mouth.

"Give me a hand!" Joseph shouted over the chaos of crashing water. My eyes met his in disbelief. "We're getting back on that thing?"

"Well, yeah! We have to finish the race!"

Somehow we dragged the raft around. I shifted a toe onto it, and the raft sagged deep into the water. I shrank from the renewed shock of the icy water. "Joseph?!" I cried. "How's it gonna make it?" Instead of answering, Joseph leaned onto it experimentally. The boards oscillated beneath the waves. "Screw it, we're getting off," he yelled. Without hesitation, he stepped out towards shore. My eyes lifted from him to the spruce and alder on the shoreline. It looked like it was miles away.

There's a town nearby named Whitehorse for its rushing rapids, and in this moment, the alabaster fury surrounding me looked like a cavalry I didn't want to face. "We're going to die!" I sobbed. "We can't get over there!"

Joseph looked at me, steady. "It'll be okay. Follow me, it's shallow here."  I looked down at my rock, then at land. Help wouldn't come. I needed to help myself. I edged into the water, waded, swam. The cold water and rough stone hurt badly, but I forced myself to keep gasping for air, to keep floundering through the current. I wondered if it would ever end.

 

Magically, I reached the shallows, then the wooded edge. I crawled and clambered from the grip of the river. Then – the absence of cold, the stillness of earth! I stood up and laughed in disbelief, looking back at the boulder. I'm alive! I turned and followed Joseph through the trees. The alder shrubs brushed my calves like silk, and the pine needles felt like goose down. Relief pounded through me in a physical sensation, thanks pouring out of me through my deep sigh, through my fingers brushing the familiar bark and bough of spruce. The river behind me fell back into a whisper, saying:  face your fears and courage you'll reap.