Characters in Real Life, Estes Park

Real People I Met in Estes:

A romantic hike-master who falls head-over-heels for a beautiful and waif blonde that works behind the front desk and likes to read Guns, Germs, and Steel on her down time. Ultimately, she will leave for a teaching position in Burma.

A dark-haired, barefoot boy that works the empty museum on Thursdays and Sundays. He pronounces the state like Coal-or-add-o and wears plaid shirts, which are always untucked and pushed up to his elbows. He carries a rusted tin bucket over his hooked arm and futilely attempts to wash the yellow pollen off the wooden deck as hummingbirds dive-bomb his head.

A Jewish girl that hides her identity behind aviator glasses and a corporate pleasantries. She buys the same sunglasses every year from the same Shell gas station because she always loses the previous pair before she arrives in Estes Park.

Her unofficial nickname is "Bangs" for her mousy brown hair that reaches her lower back. She's subdued and introverted until the music comes on. It's always alternative--Avett Brothers and Regina Spektor are the closest to well-known--and she will sings like there's no tomorrow.

A 22-year-old lab tech, who gestures like a theatre major and plays guitar as if it were the most beautiful thing he'd ever held in his hands. He'd rather drift to Portland than finish his major.  You can hardly make out his mumbled words over the engine of his beat-down car. He's a chronic mumbler in a flat cap but budding renaissance man.