Dan sees his stepfather’s face in El Capitan, his jaw outlined in the crag. Though it’s been two decades since the day he made Dan follow him miles down the trail, Dan has, until now, avoided parks. Dan has pictured this moment—crossing into Yosemite—so many times, but it’s nothing like he’d imagined. He had wanted to fall on his knees, weeping before granite.

Dan tries to steady himself, gripping the plaque that reads, A Journey Through Time. His wife, Laurel, eight months pregnant and exhausted from two days in the car, wipes juice from Krista’s cheek in between squalls. He wasn’t afraid when Krista was born, but this time, it’s a boy. Contrary to any evidence, he’s terrified he’ll hurt his son on purpose. You are here, he tells himself. Still, in the red flame of rock: His stepfather’s sunburned cheeks when he decided they’d veer off trail, travel cross-country.

By the way Laurel sets Krista on the ground and stretches, he can tell she’s determined to enjoy the sunset. She spent so many hours managing Krista while he drove, the endless snacks and crying and adjusting of the car seat. She takes Dan’s hand, kisses his knuckles. This trip was his idea—he’ll never go back to Florida, but he thinks he might find something ecstatic in mountains. And he sees how much she wants this for him, so he squeezes back.

Besides, there’s no need to rehash—she already knows about how his stepfather made the kids call him Captain, about the diamondback rattler sleeping in the grass. He’d handed Dan a stick, said, Go ahead.

Dan unzips his day pack, readies his camera. He focuses the lens on his wife catching her hair in the wind; his daughter, patting the rock fence.

Across from El Capitan, Bridalveil Fall reminds him of the rattle, just before.

Laurel, lifting Krista into the air. Krista, waving at a scrub jay. Behind them, shadows move across the rock face.

In the last of the light, he captures the fullness of Laurel’s belly, the ripples the breeze makes in the fabric of her dress. The darkness as it passes through the valley.

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Elissa Cahn completed her MFA at Western Michigan University, where she served as the nonfiction editor for Third Coast. Her work has appeared in Witness, Harpur Palate, Hobart, PANK, Sou’wester, and SmokeLong Quarterly, and she teaches creative writing at the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts.