The Snow (15 page)

Christina’s inner strength had deserted her the moment Blake appeared. And when he gave her a hug, she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him.

“You don’t want to go in yet, do you?” he said anxiously. “Ski with me, okay?”

“You’re too good for me,” said Christina. “I haven’t even tried Running Deer.”

“I’ll ski it with you. You can do it fine. I’ve been watching you. You have a real knack for this. I think skiing is going to be your sport.” He took her hand; or rather, his thick glove took her mitten. They seesawed across the snow toward the ski lift. “There was an English assignment; we had to describe something unusual. I wrote about your hair.”

Christina trembled. Blake said, “Anya told me the ski suit is yours. Tomorrow you wear it. She doesn’t really like skiing. It was sweet of you to give it to her, but I have to say that it hurts my feelings. You two thought I wouldn’t like her anymore if she wore old clothes. Clothes don’t have anything to do with it. Jeans aren’t warm enough, Chrissie.”

She fell even deeper in love, that Blake cared whether she was warm enough. She said, “If clothes don’t have anything to do with it, why do you care who wears what?”

He laughed. “Clothes have nothing to do with love, but a lot to do with skiing.”

They rode on the ski lift together. Where Dolly had taken up no more space than a straw, Blake filled most of the seat. His bulk was comforting. “I’m not scared now,” said Christina. He grinned at her and ruffled the hair that stuck out from under her raggedy cap.

For that ride, there was no age difference, she was not thirteen going on fourteen, and he was not eighteen. They were a handsome boy and a beautiful girl; there was no world but snow and speed and each other.

Jonah had a crush on her, tenth-grade skaters were tempted by her hair, and … Blake wanted somebody. And Anya had left; had she run away? Had she drifted into her lost soul so he couldn’t reach her?

“Let’s ski partners,” said Blake.

“How?”

“Like dancers. You stand at my side and I hold your left hand with my left hand, like this.” He held their hands in front and his right hand circled her back. “And I hold your right hand at your waist, like this.”

Perhaps that’s all there is to love, thought Christina. You both have to need it at the same time.

Blake wants to be in love.

Anya is not here.

I could have him.

S
HE AND BLAKE GLIDED
on and on, his hand steadying her waist, while her heart lost its balance. Over the cry of the wind and the pounding of her pulse, Christina heard a giggle.

An enormous man skied past at tremendous speed, his poles digging into the snow, his body low over his knees. His eyes were hidden by bulging goggles; the skin of his face was protected by a cap with holes, only his lips protruding from lumpy knitting. From the thick lips came a sound Christina knew only too well.

Christina lost her balance, but Blake caught her effortlessly and steered her like a little truck.

The creature of the wet suit and the crunching bleacher —
here
?

On Running Deer?

I am safe, thought Christina. But where is Dolly? Where is Anya? They went inside — but to what?

Blake glided to an easy stop and swung Christina around, their skis in a row, so they were looking up the mountains. “Don’t you think skiing is the prettiest sport on Earth?” said Blake. He was smiling at the view, not at Christina. “Mountains under snow. Evergreens against sky.” He pointed at the slopes, now nearly bare of people. The day’s skiers had left an enormous crisscross of slithery tracks, blue with shadow. Three chair lifts rocked in the wind, carrying almost nobody as the dark of evening settled in: the easy one at Gentle Deer, the medium one at Cardinal, and the incredibly high one — its cables silver thread in a blackening sky — that took advanced skiers to Suicide.

“Come on,” said Blake. “Let’s go down Cardinal.”

“Blake,” she protested, “I’ve only been skiing one day.”

“Coward.”

“I am not!”

“Yes, you are, Christina of the Isle. I’m going to ski with you, and you can do it. Unless you’re a scaredy-cat. Come on. Cardinal. With me.”

Laughing, he skied away from her. He looked over his shoulder once to make sure she was following. His long, experienced legs slid swiftly over the hard, rutted snow toward the lift for Cardinal. She was so much shorter and hardly knew how to make the skis walk. Slithering around, struggling, she tried to follow him. “Blake!” she called. “Drag me! Come on, be nice!”

The red suit with the silver blaze came to a halt. Giggling, Christina gripped the loose bottom of the jacket, and Blake skied forward, towing her. She had to concentrate just as hard, though, or the fronts of her skis would tangle with the backs of his. Studying the ground and the backs of his boots, she hung on.

They were in luck.

Only one pair ahead of them at the lift.

But then, it was getting dark. The snow fell even harder, like flecks of sand dashed off the beach in a hurricane. She protected her face with her elbow. I wonder how cold I am, thought Christina. I wonder if I have frostbite from wearing wet jeans.

She dropped into the seat next to Blake and leaned on him. He did not tell her to move over. Perhaps he doesn’t miss Anya at all, thought Christina, and at the same time her soul was glad, her guilt washed over her as cold as the wind. She had the strange thought that Blake did not smell right. The preppy leather and aftershave smell were not there. She frowned slightly, tilting her head up toward him. The snow flung itself in her face.

How high they were! No other skiers sat on the chairs around them.

Beyond him, she watched the other two chair lifts jerk toward their mountain tops. Both were on her left. But Cardinal was on the middle. She recognized the bunny slope, Gentle Deer, and Running Deer, way, way over there beyond Cardinal. “Blake!” she breathed. “Blake, we’re on Suicide! Why did you do that?”

He said nothing.

She looked up.

It was not Blake.

It was the creature of her nightmares: the wet suit, the smell of the sea crushing her behind bleachers.
It was him.

Christina screamed.

There was no place to go. Nothing protected her: no safety belts, no enclosures. The lift on Suicide jerked. Christina seemed closer to airplanes than Earth.

The thing began giggling, laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing. Christina screamed to match. “Don’t touch me! Don’t touch me!”

She looked down. This mountain was not Gentle Deer. It was fierce with weapons — rocks and trees, gullies and chasms. It was not called Suicide for nothing. Below her a cliff yawned, its rock face so sheer that no snow could collect on it.

She clawed at his face mask, trying to rip away the goggles, peel off the lumpy knitting, see who this was.

But it shoved her.

And at the same time, it released the metal bar.

Christina rolled off the narrow seat.

Her screams ran like a streamer into the sky. She went out frontwards, saw the snow coming toward her, heard his giggle, heard the chair lift snap forward, having dumped her, all unknowing. From the ground a chorus of screams from every skier sang.

My folder, thought Christina. It is closed forever now.

O
RANGE.

Everything was orange.

“It’s okay, honey,” orange people kept saying.

What did she own, who did she know who was bright neon-orange?

“You’re all right. It’s a miracle.” Even their heads were orange.

“We’re just going to strap you onto this sled, honey. Don’t be scared; we’re right with you.”

There seemed to be a vast crowd of people. Legs everywhere, bright-colored legs, not just orange, but all colors: blue, green, yellow, red —

Red
, thought Christina. The red suit I thought was Blake. It pushed me off the ski lift.

She tried to raise her head, but orange hands pressed her back down onto the sled. “Lie still, honey. You fell into soft snow. You didn’t break bones; you didn’t suffocate. That was a one in a million fall — we’re guessing just bruises, but you lie still until a doctor looks at you.”

They were a rescue crew. Over their ski clothes they wore plastic orange smocks like firemen or highway workers, so they would be visible in any weather. And the colored legs: it was a gathering crowd of skiers at eye level. They were making a great deal of noise. “Why is everybody shouting?” whispered Christina. She was no longer on the mountain. They had moved her off the treacherous ski slope to the cleared area in front of the lodge and were waiting for the ambulance.

“They’re pretty glad you’re okay,” said a rescue worker. “A lot of people saw you fall out of that chair lift. I guess it’s everybody’s nightmare.”

“I didn’t fall,” said Christina. “I was pushed.”

But the rescue worker just knelt beside her and patted her. “You’re still shaken up, sweetie,” said the woman in a motherly voice. “Nobody pushed you. The metal bar came undone somehow.”

“The man in the red suit,” protested Christina.

“There was somebody in the lift ahead of you,” agreed the rescue people, “but that skier may not even have seen what was happening. At any rate, whoever it was apparently reached the top and skied on down Suicide. We’re hoping he’ll get in touch with us and let us know what he saw, if anything.”

The Shevvingtons were pushing through the crowd to reach Christina.

Blake got there first. “I thought you were right behind me!” he said. “I looked around and no Christina!” He felt her, up and down her ski clothes, as if expecting to find and set any broken bones himself. His face was white as snow. “She was with me!” Blake said to the rescue squad. “I was going to take her down Cardinal, partners. And then she vanished.”

“Got on the wrong ski lift,” said one man. “We’ve got signs everywhere. I don’t know what else we can do to make it clear that Suicide is very advanced. Imagine a beginner getting on that lift! Didn’t you read any of those signs, honey?” he said, angry with Christina.

“I didn’t look up,” whispered Christina.

“Great,” said the rescue worker. “We have a dozen signs, and the kid doesn’t bother to read.”

“Blake, listen to me. It was that man. The wetsuit man. He’s here. In a snow suit. Red. Like yours. I thought he was you.”

“I guess she did hit her head,” said the woman rescue worker. “Listen to her babble. Let’s get her down the mountain right away. Is the ambulance here yet? Is the doctor here?”

Mrs. Shevvington arrived and flung herself down in the snow next to the sled stretcher. “Chrissie, darling,” she cried. “Thank goodness you are all right!” She gazed pleadingly up at the orange people. “It’s my fault,” she cried. “I didn’t watch her closely enough. I had no idea she would try anything like that!”

The rescue squad was absolutely shocked. “You mean you think she may have done it on purpose?” one whispered.

“No!” screamed Christina. “Don’t listen to her!”

“She is under psychiatric care right now,” said Mrs. Shevvington. “I think the name of the ski trail must have stimulated her.”

“It did not!” screamed Christina.

Mr. Shevvington stood over her, too. His ski suit looked black in the starlight. He had taken off his cap and goggles to show his distinguished hair. The crowd quieted a little, just as impressed with Mr. Shevvington as all adults always were. What did he have, that in moments he could make them admire him and believe his words? “We were so lucky,” he breathed.

The crowd echoed, “You were so lucky!”

Christina felt like biting his ankles. The straps on the stretcher were not fastened down yet, and she jumped up, ready to beat on the Shevvingtons. Blake caught her. “Don’t,” he whispered. “You’re playing into their hands! You have to act sane.”

I’m going to kick them until I have kicked them all the way to the cliff, and then I’ll kick them over! thought Christina.

Blake held her even tighter. “They want an excuse to lock you up,” he breathed in her ear. “Don’t give it to them! All these witnesses! Chrissie! Get a grip on yourself. Smile. Be a sweetie.”

Once more, thought Christina, they’ve won. I refuse to believe it. I refuse to believe that I could be shoved off a ski lift, and all these people saw it, and still they think
I’m
the demented one!

Blake hissed, “I love you, Christina. Now save yourself! Do you hear me?”

Christina turned to the rescue squad workers. “I cannot thank you enough,” she said courteously, her clear voice ringing like an island bell in the mountain air. “I can’t imagine how I could have been so dumb, getting on the wrong ski lift. I guess I just didn’t shut the metal bar all the way closed when I got on. Please forgive me for causing such a stir. I’m perfectly all right. I don’t need a doctor or an ambulance.”

The squad looked uncertain. Christina was clearly able to stand and walk, but what was this woman implying about Christina’s mental state?

But Christina was saved by Dolly, who hurtled through the crowd, her tiny emerald body like a bullet shot from a gun. “Chrissie, Chrissie!” shrieked Dolly. “Are you all right? I saw it from window! But I didn’t know it was you up there!”

Dolly flung herself on Christina, and the little girls hugged. The crowd murmured, “Aw, isn’t that sweet.”

Blake said, “Let’s go inside the lodge and get warm now. Chrissie’s jeans are soaked through.”

“Yes, she needs to get warm,” agreed the crowd, as a single person.

Blake half carried, half led Christina up the lodge steps. The Shevvingtons tagged along. Blake was so handsome and debonair; Dolly was so adorable and vividly red and green; Christina was so appealing with her strange hair in the moonlight — nobody saw the Shevvingtons again.

But the price! thought Christina. This was my chance to corner them with the truth!

As if reading her mind, Blake said grimly, “This was their chance to corner you, Chrissie. You nearly bought it. If you hadn’t been paralyzed for life breaking your spine, they’d have locked you up with Val for attempting suicide. On Suicide Trail. It’s pretty cute, when you think about it.”