The Cabin in the Dolomites – Part 1: Altitude

"I can't feel my legs," said Katarina, at the fourth switchback.

"That's the altitude."

"It's the fourteen years of sitting."

"It's both," said Luca, cheerfully, and offered his hand.

They were climbing a stony trail in the Dolomites, among limestone towers that glowed rose and gold in the afternoon sun. She was thirty-nine, a graphic designer from Trieste, with sunburn on her nose and a rucksack too large for her. He was forty-two, an architect, in a battered cap, with cheerful dark eyes and a thermos he refused to put down.

They had not taken a weekend away since their daughter was born, eight years ago. This one had been his idea. Just us. A hut. A hill. No emails.

The rifugio perched on a grassy ledge beneath a sheer wall of rock, a stone-and-timber building with flower-boxes and a view that took her breath away. A plump woman in an apron greeted them with a bowl of barley soup and showed them to a tiny room with a window like a picture frame.

"One bed," said Katarina.

"Cosy," said Luca.

They ate dinner with a dozen other hikers around a long wooden table, sharing bread and wine and mountain tall tales. Afterwards, they stepped out onto the terrace, where the whole sky blazed with stars. The peaks stood black against it, enormous, silent.

"Can I ask you something?" said Luca.

"Yes."

"Do you remember the first time we did this?"

"Sardinia. The tent. The rain."

"You laughed the whole night."

"You stayed dry. I didn't."

He laughed, softly, and put his arm round her. She leaned against him, warm in the thin cold air.

"Green?" she murmured, the old word.

"Green," said Luca. "Very green. Look. A shooting star."

Continue the story: Part 2 – Summit Morning.