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Outside Magazine February 2002

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End of the Run (Cont.)

The Deschutes River tumbles down from the high lava fields of central Oregon, through ranches and pine forests and over myriad whitewater rapids on its way to the city of Bend. It's a fisherman's paradise, and in October the returning steelhead are profuse if you know where to look. Creel took us a few miles outside Maupin to his favorite fishing hole, and we unloaded the rods and the beer. Gary Odam, the guy from the bar, arrived with a 12-pack of Hamm's.

Johnson threw a hook into the water and Creel, who stands six-foot-two and weighs 200 pounds, lingered on the bank, exuding the mangy power of an athlete just a few brewskis past his prime. He popped open a fresh beer, took a drag on his Marlboro, and began to describe his training plan for the upcoming winter.

"This year, we're just going to get our feet under us," he said. "It'll be about getting out there and skiing. We'll go poach a course now and then, and yeah, we're gonna play to win. It'll be extreme and it'll be flat-out because here's the deal: We can get back on the team. We just gotta pick the right courses. We don't want the turny ones. We want the ones where he can go 75, 80 miles an hour."

I figured Creel was rhapsodizing like this for Johnson's benefit, but I looked around and saw that Bill was well out of earshot. I can only conclude that the beer was working its magic, because a few days later, in sober reflection, Creel would shun all talk of a Johnson comeback. "Trying to make the team was hard enough for Bill the first and second times," he would say. "What person in their right mind would want to be involved with that scenario a third time?"

On the river, though, Creel envisioned great things. "We're going to the Olympics," he said. "The drill is, we're trying to light the torch."

Creel meant the Olympic torch. He and other Johnson friends had been lobbying the U.S. Olympic Committee since last May. There was, of course, a chance that their man would be chosen, but it was very slim. By the time of his accident America had largely forgotten Bill Johnson, and that hasn't changed, despite the made-for-TV drama of his recovery from a coma. Even in the ski world he's inspired only qualified sympathy. The U.S. Ski Team posts Johnson updates on its Web site, but has yet to sponsor any fund-raisers.

So Johnson was lucky to have someone like Creel. Here was a guy who truly believed in Johnson's greatness, even when doing so was absurd. Creel believed in the particulars—the torch, the fame that would have come after that dogleg turn at the nationals—and he did not regard this fishing trip as baby-sitting or an act of charity. He and Bill, he told me, were on a nonstop adventure.

We caught nothing all afternoon; we didn't even get a nibble. Everything was quiet and still until about four o'clock, when suddenly I heard something go splash. It was Johnson. He'd slipped and fallen into the river and now he was floating there, his head up and his eyes bulging.

Kakes got to him first. He anchored his powerful legs on the bank, pulled Johnson out of the water, and rushed him up to the picnic table.

"Take off your socks," advised Creel.

"Here, use this towel," said Kakes.

"Take off your shirt," said Creel.

"Aw, hell," said Odam, "why don't you just take it all off and give us a table dance?" Johnson threw his head back and laughed, and then we fished for a couple more hours.

DB picked us up near Kakes's house on Mount Hood that evening. She knew about Bill's fall in the river (he'd called her from Creel's), and she had the heat cranked up in the car for him. "We forgot to pack you an extra set of clothes," said DB. "Next time we'll just send them along whether you like it or not. Are you warm enough?"

It was 79 degrees in the car, according to the gauge on the dash, but he wanted it warmer. DB turned the heat up a touch and then smiled over at Bill. She was just recovering from abdominal surgery and yet here she was, driving an hour to get us.

DB told me she was prepared to care for Bill until infirmity stopped her, and I thought of what his doctor, Molly Hoeflich, had said about the importance of this kind of care and attention: "If you go into any city in the country, you see people with cognitive deficits who live on the streets because they can't function in the world; they have no one to take care of them. These people just spiral downward. They get in fights. Their brain damage gets worse. Bill is doing well largely because he's gotten tremendous love and support.

"But is this enough? I hear people say, 'I got better because I really wanted it, because my family really wanted it.' But there are people who really want it and don't get it. Bill's outcome," she concluded, "is becoming increasingly predictable. He will improve, but not drastically."

We drove on. Johnson told me he could hit a golf ball 300 yards. He reminded me, again, that he'd won the gold medal. Eventually his mother mentioned that the next morning she'd be taking him to a health club for his first visit.

"You can lift weights, Bill," she said.

"That's good," he said, "because all I want to do now, all I want to do now—" We reached the Johnsons' driveway and DB turned in as Bill groped for the words. "All I want to do now is be a weight holder."

"Oh, Bill," said DB. She turned off the car and patted him on the back, gently.

Johnson smiled at the gesture. Then he followed his mother across the driveway and into the house.

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