Three Points

Dim flickering streetlights lit our way through the park as we trod through wet grass, unsure of where to go but up the gently sloping hill. The end of our path greeted us with steep concrete stairs shrouded in darkness. We stopped and looked at each other.

“Brian, we’re not going any farther.”

“What?! Why not? Trung, we’ve been driving around trying to find this hill for the last hour and now here it possibly is in front of us. We just have to go up these stairs.”

“Unlit stairs with a bunch of dark low-hanging trees tunneling over them. Do you not see the sign, Brian? I’ll read it again for you. ‘You are entering a natural area characterized by certain inherent dangers. These dangers include rattlesnakes, poison oak, BOBCATS, COYOTES, AND MOUNTAIN LIONS.’”

“I think if people have actually gotten eaten climbing up this hill, these stairs wouldn’t be here anymore.”

“No one’s gotten eaten before because no one goes hill-climbing at 1 AM in the morning.”

“Come on, we’re so close. We have to go all the way or else everything leading up to this will have been in vain.”

“Can’t you just appreciate the fact that you made it here? That you made it this far? Now is not the time to continue on, but later, you will be back here, preferably during the day or sunset. And that’s when you can go all the way.”

“No. How about we go all the way now?”

“Alright, but I’m going to make you hold my hand.”

Trung held out his hand, and I grasped it with both of mine. He placed his other hand on top, and step by step, we ascended the stairs. I didn’t want to mention it, but my heart beat as fast as Trung’s, and as much as I tried to suppress it, I couldn’t help but jerk my head toward every little snap of a twig or rustle of a bush that I thought I heard.

“So...”

“So what?”

“What were we talking about earlier?” Trung asked.

“Changing.”

“Oh yeah. So, if you don’t like the way your life is going, why can’t you change it?”

I shrugged. “I can’t just decide to change.”

“Why not?”

“Because I just can’t. Change has to happen subconsciously. If I’m consciously forcing myself to change, I’m not going to change. A huge part of me won’t allow it.”

“Knowing this though, can’t you prevent yourself from not allowing it?”

“No, it doesn’t work like that.”

“But a part of fixing a problem is acknowledging the problem, and you’re already acknowledging it.”

“Acknowledging the problem and trying to change it from there won’t work. That kind of change is artificial change. Deep down inside, I will still be the same person that I’ve always been. Something unplanned has to instigate the change.”

“Well, Brian, you have to do something eventually. You just can’t sit around all your life waiting for an epiphany, or to get hit by a truck.”

At the top of the stair case, our hands parted and we fell silent after realizing that we had to continue excavating the hill by climbing on rocks. Trung wasn’t happy, and I wished that I had dressed a little more appropriately. Nikes, skinny jeans and a white tank from The Hundreds didn’t make suitable outdoor adventure gear. We could see people roaming around the top of the hill, but from where we stood, they looked as tiny as the stars in the sky. Trung, once again, refused to continue on, but he finally gave in after I persisted. Trung fumed as we silently worked our way up the steep rocks.

“All right, we made it. We’re on top and we can see all of Orange County. Can you remind me why we did this Brian?”

I didn’t have to glance around for more than a few seconds to realize, “We’re not on the right hill.”

“What?”

“The one I wanted has a little bench on top. This one doesn’t have it. We need to go find it.”

“Wait, Brian! Look! Look all over there at the lights. We already have a nice view, so why do you need a fucking bench to sit down?”

I shrugged my shoulders.

“Oh, I know why,” Trung said. “The one with the bench, the one you saw in those photos, that was the mountain you wanted to take Ranier to, right?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“And why didn’t you take him?”

“Well, I was going to take him. When he first told me two months ago he was going to come to Irvine, I tried to find out where the hill was, but then he said he wasn’t going to come anymore and just stay in San Diego, so I gave up on finding the hill. Then, last weekend, the very night before he left for San Diego, he told me there was a change of plans and he wanted to come to Irvine again. I didn’t have time to go find the hill, and since I had to worry about Team Millenia auditions last weekend, I didn’t have time to go exploring with him. I wanted to take him to the hill, but when I was practicing with my groupmates in Fullerton, Ranier stayed in Irvine and hung out with another friend who beat me to it.”

“Well, since someone already beat you to it, and Ranier left like last Sunday night, why are we even here now a week later?”

“I wanted to find it so I could go on top of it and convince myself it was nothing more than a giant pile of dirt that happened to be higher than the rest of the city.”

“Oh. I see. You wanted to rationalize away every bit of emotion associated with it. Brian, I’m sure you didn’t even need me to tell you that and how unhealthy it is, so why are you still trying to do it?”

“Because it’s what I do.”

“Ok Brian, can you at least look out at the city and admit, it’s a nice view?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, great. Let’s enjoy it for a few more minutes and then head back to your place, and I’ll stick around there for like half an hour and drive back up to UCLA. Okay?”

“Yeah, okay.”

“And I’d suggest watching season six of The X-Files, but...”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I’ll get it back.”