AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Jonah and I landed in Trapper’s Crossing early this afternoon. My truck was waiting for me where I left it, cold and buried under a foot of snow.
After a lengthy scalding shower to soothe my aching muscles and a touch-base call to Cory to learn all that I’d missed in my days away, I swung by my parents’ place, collected a dog and a plate of lasagna, and came back to my little cabin in the woods.
All day, I lectured myself about how I didn’t need to lose another moment of sleep over dogsled races and mushers, how I needed to get back to regular programming. And yet my carefully laid plan of passing out from exhaustion was foiled the moment I knew Tyler was going to win the Iditarod.
He took the lead after Unalakleet and has held it, growing it by the hour as he raced along the coast, whipped by high winds across Norton Bay near Shaktoolik and then narrowly escaping a snow squall before White Mountain that slowed several other mushers.
They’ve been preparing for his grand entrance for hours in Nome, and now, after nine days and ten hours of racing crossing the Alaskan wilderness, I’m watching Tyler cross the finish line.
I could lie and say my only interest is in the dogs—like it was when I stayed up to watch Harry cross last year—but I wouldn’t be fooling anyone, including myself.
Still, I let my attention shift to the dogs for as long as possible. There’s nothing in their gaits to suggest Tyler worked them too hard, but I already know he wouldn’t. The veterinarians handling the finish line won’t find anything worrisome with any of them.
The team passes under the mammoth carved wooden archway, and Tyler pushes back his hood. My excitement and disappointment war inside, constricting my chest. He’s achieved something no one has since 1975: he has won the Iditarod as a rookie.
And he did it with his entire team of dogs crossing the finish line. Another rarity.
Based on the GPS tracking, Harry will come in fourth, behind Skip and last year’s winner, Jessie Schwartz from Seward. But he’s a good seven hours behind. Tyler will be snoring in a warm bed by the time the next racers slide into town.
For a man who was so convinced this was his year to shine, Harry is going to be furious.
Reporters flock toward Tyler with their cameras and microphones angled as he throws a hand up to the crowd. The commentator, a man with a deep, buttery voice, interprets the scene—the chaos, the excitement, the adrenaline that must be coursing through Tyler’s veins.
Tyler looks rough. More than nine days without a shave or a decent sleep, beyond the one he had lying next to me. The ruff around his hood is iced over, his skin is wind-burned, his eyes red and drawn.
But a serene look passes over his features, overshadowing all those other details, and when he tips his head back toward the night sky, it’s as if I can feel his triumph radiating through the screen. It gives me a small reprieve from the awkward exchange at our parting, a moment where I can be happy for him and his accomplishment.
It doesn’t last long, though, as he flaunts that devastatingly handsome smile at the crowd and cameras flash, capturing the moment.
My stomach sinks with the bitter heaviness of regret. How did I misread everything so epically … again? I was so sure there was something more between us than friendly banter. But did I imagine everything? Was he leaning in to kiss me, or was it me, leaning into him? Was his comment about me being beautiful just innocent flattery? Jonah has told me I’m beautiful before, too, and look where that ended.
I’m thirty-eight years old. I can repair torn ACLs and clear blockages from intestines, reconnect nerve tissue, and, when necessary, amputate limbs, but I can’t accurately decipher when a man is flirting with me?
I didn’t understand how much I was hoping for this thing between us to be real until Tyler told me it wasn’t.
The rest of my time at the checkpoint was a blur. I threw myself into my task, focusing on the teams coming through to keep my mind from wandering, working until I slumped into my sleeping bag, my eyelids shutting almost instantly.
Tyler drops his snow hook and is off his sled, heading for the dogs with a bag of pork belly, their tails wagging. Meanwhile, the race officials rummage through his sled, ensuring he has all the mandatory gear as required by the rules, including the dog diary I signed, before they can officially declare him the winner.
It’s difficult to see through the crowd, but he pauses long enough to hug an older gentleman. No one I recognize. His father, maybe? I never asked Tyler if he had someone waiting for him at Nome, but it would make sense. Most mushers have a handler lined up for when they arrive in the city, so the dogs can be properly cared for while they rest.
