Winter Fire Read online

  I shrugged. “School? I want to get into a good college. I’ve been working my butt off all this time and I’m not going to let some guy come along and ruin it.” It was something my father would say. Did say, in fact, every time I mentioned a boy. How ironic that he was the one who ruined things for me and my mother.

  Brianna stared at me for a few seconds, then reached out with both hands and shook my shoulders. “We have to loosen you up, girl.”

  I glanced over at Laura. She laughed, but she was rocking her skis back and forth and bouncing on her heels as she threw glances out over the mountain.

  “You guys had better go,” I said. “I don’t want to hold you up.”

  “Meet us in the lodge later?” Laura asked.

  “Sure. Just text me when you’re coming in.”

  “I still think you should get a lesson,” Brianna called over her shoulder as they plodded back across the deck.

  I smiled and waved, then turned back toward the bunny hill. Bren was gone, a shadowy curve in a patch of sunlight marking the snow where he had knelt.

  Two hours later, Brianna texted that they were coming in for a break. I crunched over to the lodge in my snow boots and heavy jacket, hugging myself against the chill. Yew Dales turned glacial at night, the wind hardening the snow to an icy grain and stinging any inch of exposed skin. I huffed out a sigh of relief when the lodge door closed behind me.

  They were all huddled around the big stone fireplace in the middle of the room - Brianna, Laura, Dillon, Tyler, Brian, Matt, and a few kids I didn’t recognize.

  “The soccer girls don’t do ski club?” I asked Brianna, realizing too late that I probably shouldn’t have called them that.

  “They do,” she said, “but there was a lacrosse meeting today so they had to miss.” She settled back into one of the chairs across from the fire and laced her hands across her stomach.

  “They all do lacrosse?”

  She rolled her eyes. I was becoming accustomed to the expression. “They’re like a cult,” she said.

  “What about us?” Tyler called from the hearth. He flattened his wet gloves in front of the fire before he turned to her. “Is the football team a cult, too?”

  “More like a herd,” she said.

  He threw his hat at her and it landed in her lap.

  “Ew, Tyler this is soaked.” She tossed it back at him, then looked at me. “Unfortunately for you, Tyler is always here. He’s on the racing team. But don’t worry, their run is on the other side of the mountain where he can’t harass you.”

  A moment later, a twenty-something man wearing an employee tag with the name ‘Ryan’ on it brought Brianna a cup of hot chocolate with a huge dollop of whipped cream.

  “Thanks Ryan.” Her voice was dramatically sweet.

  “Slave.” Tyler muttered as Ryan walked away.

  Brianna fluttered her lashes and smiled around her first sip, then frowned as Tyler pointed at her, grinned, and peered around at his friends. “Rudolph.” He said.

  I glanced at Brianna. She was swiping white foam from the tip of her nose.

  “Rudolph has a red nose, dumbass,” she said.

  When they all left again, I sat by the fire for a moment, the quiet ringing in my ears. The crowds tended to roll in and out of the lodge in waves, everybody seeming to take breaks and return to the slopes at once. I promised them that I would go out onto the deck in a few minutes to watch them come down. They were determined to show me how positively amusing it could be to clamp your feet onto waxed, sharpened boards and propel yourself down icy crags.

  Though I was nearly on top of the fire, I felt a chill. I pulled my jacket tighter around me and pivoted toward the flame. A chunk had fallen from a piece of wood and lay to one side, glowing red-gold in the ash. I stared.

  A moment later I stood up, zipped my jacket, and went out into the cold. The air stung when it hit my face, but as I walked out to the far rail of the deck and gazed up at Mount Lenape, bejeweled all the way to the top with those diamond lights, the chill seemed to fade.

  It was only a moment before they came speeding down, Laura first on her skis, then Brian and Matt on theirs, and finally Tyler, Brianna, and Dillon on their boards. Laura raised a pole and waved it at me about halfway down the final hill. I waved back and watched them gather at the lift, one after the other.

  “Come on Jenna, you can’t just sit there all night,” Brianna yelled.

  “You’re right,” I yelled back. “I’m going in soon.”

  They called to me for a little while as they filed into the lift line. Once they had settled into their chairs and started up, Brianna and Laura waved over their shoulders a final time and I waved back again.

  As they disappeared over the crest, things seemed to darken a bit in the space around me. I let the smile fall from my face and plunked down on the end of a picnic table bench. A remake of an eighties song I didn’t know the name of straggled through the speakers. A couple with a little boy between them slid by, the mom singing along. A moment later, they reached the top of the bunny hill and dropped out of sight.

  I pushed at a pile of snow with one gray, furry boot. Then I heard a crunch, saw a shadow in my peripheral vision and he was there, leaning on the railing as he surveyed the mountain. I didn’t turn my head, just watched him from the corner of my eye. He was only a few feet from me. I could have reached out and touched him.

  First, just a flake or two tumbled through the space between us. One landed on the knee of my jeans and I stared, momentarily awed by that impossible combination of sharp and soft that belongs exclusively to winter, and by the time I raised my head again, the world was a slow, shifting tide of white confetti. I watched it settle in the back of his hair.

  His broad shoulders rose, then fell heavily beneath his jacket.

  “Are you going to learn?” He said, his voice almost too soft to hear.

  I jumped, mostly inside. My body felt like it had no bones.

  “What?” I cleared my throat.

  “You spend a lot of time watching,” he said, staring ahead. “Are you going to learn?”

  I coughed again. “Uh, no. I don’t think so.” My heart was beating fast and shallow in my chest so I took a deep breath. I looked up into the sky to orient myself, the way my father had taught me to do when I was little, but there were no constellations, only white, blinding snow.

  “Why not?”

  “It’s just not my thing.” I shrugged even though he wasn’t looking.

  “How do you know?”

  “I just know.” But I didn’t want him to think I was afraid, so I added, “I’ve tried it.”

  “Oh,” he said, finally turning toward me. His face didn’t look real. The angles were perfect and symmetrical, every feature – his mouth, his eyes, his cheekbones - slightly exaggerated, as if he had strolled out of a comic book. “So you’ve put on a board, or skis maybe, and ridden the lift, and made it all the way down the hill, and you hated it?”

  I had the urge to roll my eyes and stopped myself. I didn’t want to be anything like Brianna now.

  “Not exactly,” I said. “But I’ve been on a board, and believe me, the only way I can control one is by throwing myself to the ground.”

  “That’s letting it control you,” he said. He tilted his head and a chunk of hair fell into his eyes – a perfectly chopped anime tuft. The snow fell faster between us, but his eyes were bright through the blur. They had the clear amber gleam of maple syrup.

  “I didn’t have much of a choice.”

  He laughed. It was a deep, hollow sound. Everything about him seemed young when he was still, but when he moved or spoke a strange maturity broke through. “That’s a lie people like to tell themselves.” He said. “A safety net.”

  Annoyed by the condescension, I gave him a sarcastic half-smile. “A safety net isn’t a bad thing.”

  “Not if you’re doing something that warrants it,” he said.

  “Maybe I’m enjoying just sitting here.”
I heard the anger rising in my voice and turned back to the mountain to avoid his stare. “Or at least I was. Maybe I just don’t want to learn.”

  “Doesn’t look that way to me,” he said.

  After a long pause, I felt him walk away. I sensed when he was gone, and hated that he was gone. And then I hated that I hated it.

  Chapter 5

  “Your friends seem very nice,” my mother said from behind the reception desk. The snow had already thrown down a couple of inches on the roads and Sydney was late.

  “Yeah,” I said, wondering how she'd gotten a glimpse of everyone without my noticing.

  “I don’t suppose you’ve changed your mind about taking lessons?”

  “Can I just not hear any more about it?” The irritation in my voice surprised both of us. My mother jerked her head up.

  I glanced down at the counter.

  “Sorry,” I said. “It’s just that everybody’s really on me about it, and I feel stupid enough that they were all out there having a good time and I was just sitting there.”

  “Well, you have a choice to make then, don’t you?” Her tone was gentle, but she sounded more like my father than herself. “It’s alright if you don’t want to, as long as you’re not letting anything stop you.”

  I shrugged one shoulder, my classic stonewall, and she smiled and turned back to her paperwork.

  It was employee night again, but there were fewer of them on the slopes than usual. The snow had sent the townies home early, and that left the mountain to the live-ins. I brought a cup of steaming tea onto the deck to watch them for a while. I didn’t see Bren or any of the others at first, but just as I was about to go in, I saw the girl with the copper braids and her boyfriend walking hand in hand toward the lift. She was smiling, peering up at the falling snow, but he had the same intense look on his face, his eyes dark and far away. I glanced behind them as far as I could see. They were the only two. They settled into a lift chair, their boards dangling as they started up. She rested her head on his shoulder.

  It hurt in a way I could not quite understand, watching them. It was like knowing you had lost or forgotten something, and not remembering what it was. I was suddenly sad that I could not ride to the very top of a mountain, look down on the whole world as if it was a small and insignificant dream, and then, at my whim, descend upon it until it rushed back into reality around me. That I could not rest my head on someone’s shoulder.

  I made a decision then. It changed everything.

  I slid the board back and forth with one foot at the top of the bunny hill. The employees pretty much had run of the rental shop on these nights - ‘unless the privilege is abused,’ the sign behind the counter read – and I had managed for the second time to find some boots that fit and a board that looked right. Now all I had to do was clamp my other foot in and find some courage. I limped-slid to the top of the hill and plopped down on my butt. Neither my snow pants, nor the freshly fallen flakes, provided much cushioning.

  I made sure before I went to the rental shop that the lift was running and that the booth was unoccupied. It was ‘strictly forbidden’ to run the lifts without an operator, but none of the employees wanted to miss out on skiing and riding, and as far as I could gather, no one ever checked. I knew it was stupid, what I was doing, and that I would have no excuse if I got badly hurt, especially on the lift, but I thought the embarrassment of someone watching me kill myself would be worse than if I was just found that way after the fact.

  I bent my knees and let the board’s back edge dig into the snow. Then I buckled my other foot in and scanned the hill. It was empty. Everybody was on the big mountain, which was exactly how I wanted it.

  A few flakes settled on my pants. White on white. Then one on my eyelashes. I’d thought the snow had let up a little. Maybe this was a bad idea. No Jenna, I told myself, you’re just looking for an excuse. Then I remembered the chant I used to use when my father was teaching me to do something new. To dive into the deep end of a pool or freeclimb rocks on a difficult hiking trail. No fear. No fear. I didn’t know if it denied fear or banished it, but it always got me moving. I said it under my breath now until it changed from a hysterical plea to a focused demand, then planted my hands behind me and pushed as hard as I could. I rose a foot or two off the ground and fell back down. I shimmed downhill a few feet and tried again, this time pulling my arms closer to my body, and managed to hoist myself all the way up. Teetering on my back edge, I bent my knees to keep my balance, and raised my arms out to the sides. The board started to scrape down the hill in little stutters…stop, go, stop, go… then began a smoother glide down to the right. As I picked up speed, I looked down, watching the board teeter in the snow. My legs shook and I had an urge to relax them in some way, straighten them out or let the muscles soften. When I glanced up again, I was heading fast toward the trees at the edge of the hill. Panicking, I threw my hands behind me and reclined until I skidded onto my back. My head bounced off the packed powder, and a pile of snow plowed underneath my shirt between my pants and jacket. I didn’t even sit up to scoop it out. I just stared up at the charcoal sky, swirling with ashy flakes. There were stars now, but not the real kind. My head ached. I closed my eyes.

  A moment later, I heard a scrape just above me.

  No, I thought. That one word like a desperate prayer.

  “So you’re ready now?” He said.

  Desperate prayer unanswered.

  “Clearly not,” I said, my eyes still closed.

  “Now you need a safety net.” I heard a thunk by my head.

  “What’s that?”

  “My helmet. You’re crazy not to have one.”

  “I’m not doing this again.”

  “You have to get down to get back up.”

  “I’ll walk.”

  “Quitter.”

  I opened my eyes. He could see me either way, it seemed.

  He slid down a few feet and sat next to me, rested his forearms on his knees. His cheeks were flushed from the cold and he wasn’t wearing a jacket, just his snow pants and a hoodie, red this time.

  I sat up and looked at him. “Why do you care if I learn to ride, anyway?”

  He shrugged. “You live here.”

  “So?”

  “So you shouldn’t take it for granted.”

  Here was that condescension again.

  “Take it for granted?” I raised my eyebrows and stared at him. “I am not here by choice.”

  “I know that. But you know what? You could have said that as soon as you were born. Why don’t you take advantage of what you have?”

  “I’m sorry, did I pay for a counseling session?”

  He smiled while I fumed, and then I thought of something else. “And what do you mean, ‘I know that.’ How do you know why I’m here?”

  “Small place,” he said.

  “Nice.” I shook my head, imagining strangers talking about my mother and me, wondering how much they knew.

  “So do you want to sit here and argue with me, or do you want to get down the hill?” He said, staring ahead.

  Frankly, I didn’t know. I suspected that I was arguing with him to avoid moving. But he was right. I had to get down. Walking back up would have been twice as humiliating now.

  “Good,” he said, even though I hadn’t answered him. He handed me the helmet. “So you need to get back up onto your edge like you were before.”

  Great. He had seen it all. He pushed himself up first, put his hands on his hips like he could have teetered there for years, and waited.

  Reluctantly, I put on the helmet, glad I couldn’t see how ridiculous I looked with red bolts attacking my head. I sucked in a big gulp of air and one snowflake, planted my hands behind me, and pushed off as hard as I could. I made it up, nearly toppled forward, and felt his hand on my arm. His grip was strong and warm.

  “I’m okay,” I lied.

  He let go and hopped back until he was a few feet away from me.

  “Now don’t lea
n forward,” he said, “just bend your knees and look where you want to go.”

  “I can’t see my bed from here,” I said. My voice was shaky. He laughed, and I felt myself relax a little.

  “Just let the board slide,” he said, “and when you feel like you’re going too far in one direction, turn your waist and kind of point with the opposite arm in the direction you want to go. Like this.”

  He slid down ahead of me and let his board follow a wide curve up to the right, then pivoted left at the waist, his arms like those on a weathervane, and curved the other way. Then he stopped, nearly vertical against the hill, and looked up at me.

  When I tried it, I forgot his instructions for a minute and went a little further to the right than I wanted, but then I turned at the last second and the board started the other way underneath me. It was working. I was so shocked that I nearly fell on my face.

  “Now when you get a little further this way,” he called, “turn again and your board will go back.”

  I didn’t dare look at him, just kept my eyes in the right direction and my body turning, and my board kept swinging back and forth across the hill - just like a falling leaf. I didn’t know how long it was before I lost momentum, but eventually, my back edge cut firmly into the snow and I stopped. Caught off guard, I fell backward and sat down hard. When I looked up, I saw that I was at the bottom of the hill.

  “I did it,” I whispered to myself, a white puff rising from my lips. “I did it,” I said again, not quite believing it.

  Bren came skidding up beside me.

  “See?” He said. “You made it. You can quit now, if you want to.”

  But I didn’t want to. I had made it down. A few minutes before, I couldn’t do it, and now I could. It felt like a bolt sliding open on a heavy door.

  “I didn’t even fall,” I said.

  “You will.” He said this as if it was something to look forward to.

  “Or not,” I said with a nervous laugh.

  He smiled. “Time for the lift.”