One by One(26)

“Okay,” Liz says, and she looks up at the mountain, but I can feel her doubt from here. “Will you be with us all day?”

“Just for the first couple of runs. I’ll show you the way back to the chalet, and then I’m afraid I’ve got to go and help Danny with lunch.”

Liz says nothing at that, but from the way she clutches her ski poles like grim death, I can tell she’s not keen on being abandoned.

“It’ll be fine,” I tell her, with more assurance than I actually feel. “You’re not the only beginner, Ani isn’t very good, nor is Carl. And even Miranda doesn’t look very confident.”

Liz says nothing. She just unclips her bindings and pulls off her skis. But the look on her face is anything but happy.





LIZ


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It is almost noon. We have been skiing all morning. The wind is mounting. Erin disappeared back to the chalet long ago, leaving me alone with Topher and Eva and the other adrenaline junkies. We have done the green run, Atchoum, back to the bottom of the bubble twice, and a long blue down into St. Antoine, then back up the funicular. My legs feel like jelly with being continually on edge. My face is stinging with cold, and my armpits are damp with sweat inside my many layers. My breath comes fast, misting my scarf with wetness, and I am simultaneously freezing and much too hot.

We gather, panting at the bottom of the Reine lift, and I can hear the relief in Ani’s voice when she whispers, “Yay! Lunch!”

And then Topher says, as I knew he would, “Come on, time for one more before we break for the afternoon. Let’s go up to the top of La Dame. Second stop on the bubble lift. Which of you pussies is with me?”

My heart begins thumping in my chest.

“Wouldn’t it be better to stop before we’re all too tired?” Miranda says. I can tell she does not want to do this, but she also doesn’t want to be the party pooper. “I mean, it’s the first day, and we’ve got all week to get skiing in.”

“I agree,” Ani says. She lifts her ski goggles. Beneath, her face is red and blotchy with a mixture of cold and exertion. She looks tired. “Plus, I just, like, really think it’s too big a run for me.”

“It’s a fucking blue,” Topher says dismissively. “Come on! It’ll be fun. There’s a black that peels off from the top, La Sorcière, and the blue is just the top section of that run we did before, Blanche-Neige. We can split into two groups and take whichever one you fancy. Blue for the babies, black for the big boys and girls.”

“Topher,” Eva says, wagging her finger, but her annoyance is pretend. She looks in her element, tall and slim on her improbably long skis. She is wearing a bright red ski jacket—scarlet silk that looks like a splash of blood against the white snow—and the sight gives me a weird pang, because I remember buying that jacket for her, back when I was her assistant. I got sent out to Harrods with her credit card and instructions to pick it up. I remember it so clearly, like it was yesterday.

I think, suddenly, of the fairy tale for which the blue run is named—Blanche Neige—Snow White. Skin as white as snow, lips as red as blood, hair as black as ebony. The hair is wrong. Eva’s hair is almost as white as snow too. But today it is tucked into a black beanie, making the comparison almost spookily accurate.

“Come on…,” Topher cajoles. “We can’t get back from here to the chalet anyway, it’s all uphill, so unless you want an hour of sidestepping, we might as well go to the middle station. Just a little bit farther doesn’t make much difference… does it?” He lifts his goggles and turns the full force of his charm on Ani. “Ani? Give this old man one last wish?”

Ani gives a little sigh. Then she caves like wet snow.

“Oh… okay. I suppose you only live once. You’ll make sure I get down in one piece, won’t you, Inigo?”

He smiles and nods.

“Miranda?” Topher says, smiling at her with all his considerable persuasive force. When he turns it on, it is not hard to understand how he got where he did. There’s something about Topher that is very, very hard to say no to. “Miraaaanda… ?”

“Fine,” Miranda says, rather grumpily. “If we’ve got to go up anyway, I suppose it won’t make much difference.”

And then Topher turns to me.

“Liz?”

So here it is, then. Why do I always seem to end up being this person—the person everyone else’s fun hinges on, the person who’s required to make a decision. I can feel myself shrinking beneath their gaze—but I have no choice.

“Fine,” I say, but my voice sounds strained and tense, even to me.

“Okay!” Eva says briskly. “Right, let’s regroup at the top, and if anyone gets lost, we’ll meet at the shortcut back to the chalet—does everyone remember where the path splits off? That big pine Erin showed us, the one with the fluorescent padding.”

There are nods and murmurs of assent.

And then it is happening. People are unclipping their bindings and shuffling forward in stiff heavy ski boots, clutching poles and skis, shoving through the turnstile barrier. There is no queue at all. The weather is too poor for that. All the sensible French are huddled in cafés having vin chaud and raclette, and we are the only people heading up the mountain, on this lift at least. I feel my heart do that sickening skipping rhythm as the bubble looms nearer and I shuffle ahead, pushing past Ani with an assertiveness that’s out of character for me. I cannot afford to get left behind.