Page 15 of The Season
We’re nearing the top, and my smile falters at the sight of Akiva’s eyes narrowed on me and Matty as we approach the group. I hold Akiva’s stare for a long moment, silently challenging him to say something. To do something. He gives me a disgusted look, then turns away.
“Um… so what did you decide?” Matty asks, slowing his pace. “About moving in, I mean.”
For some reason, my gaze drifts to Coach Liam. He’s looking between me and Akiva, the traces of his earlier smile gone.
I wonder idly whathethinks about me moving in. I guess it’s not that weird—he’s only our coach for the next couple of weeks, and then he’ll just be another instructor. A guy I work with, assuming I pass. Besides, it’s not like I’d be sharing a room with him. Just a condo. Well, with him and five other guys…
“Yah.” I swallow, my throat suddenly dry, my stomach tightening with nerves. “I’ll move in.”
It’s either that or sleep in my car—I can’t afford another night in a resort-town hotel.
“Awesome.” I can hear the relief in Matty’s voice, and I look up in time to see him flash me a broad smile.
I do my best to return it, but it’s hard to share his enthusiasm about moving into a three-bedroom place with six guys I don’t know.
He claps me on the shoulder with one mittened hand. “You won’t regret it. I promise.”
I hope he’s right.
Chapter5
Eddie
I stare at my phone, and pick another strip of label off the shitty low-alcohol beer gathering condensation on the table in front of me. It’s the third one I’ve had, and I don’t even feel buzzed yet. Just bloated.
Fucking Utah and its ridiculous drinking laws.
The screen on my phone glares back at me, taunting me. It’s only 2 p.m. here, which means it’s 8 a.m. in New Zealand. Not too early to call, technically, but I’m pretty sure Mum said she’s on night shift at the hospital at the moment. Which means she will have only just gone to sleep.
I take another drink, and struggle to swallow the taste of bland malt around the lump in my throat.
What would I tell her anyway? That I’ve only been away from home for a week and already I’ve fucked up?
I squeeze my eyes shut, as the images from hours ago play on repeat in my mind. Two little kids on the chair lift in front of me, laughing away as the other little kid chatted nonstop from her spot at my side. I don’t even know what she’d been talking about now—some kids’ TV show I’d never heard of, I think.
I can remember the sound of her screams though. The piercing cries of terror as she watched the two kids in front of us fall, one after the other off the chairlift, plummeting in slow motion down to the hardpack snow meters below.
“They’re going to be okay. They’re fine. They’re going to be fine.” I had chanted the words like a prayer, like a mantra. Like if I said them enough times, I could make the lie a truth.
The moments after that are a blur. Time sped up, the other skiers and even the snow itself fading around me. As soon as we reached the top, I picked my student up, tucked her under one arm like she was one of the lambs on my cousin’s farm, and hightailed it down to where the two kids had fallen.
They were motionless. Silent. And so small. I was terrified of touching them—terrified that I’d make whatever injuries they had worse.
All the while, the girl in my arms cried and cried and cried.
I’d never felt so helpless in my entire life.
I take another swig of beer, and push down the rising nausea.
The door to the condo swings open, a gust of icy air penetrating my haze of self-pity, and I blink, turning just in time to see Antoine kicking snow off his boots at the threshold. The second I meet his eyes, I know he knows.
Fuck.
I quickly look away and stare at the beer in front of me.
“Merde,” he murmurs, his voice heavy with sympathy as he slides into the rickety seat beside me. “So, it’s true then. Those two kids that fell off the lift this morning—that was your class?”
I swallow, tightening my grip on the bottle in front of me. Like this shitty beer will ground me somehow, keep me from floating away. “Yah,” I croak out.
