by Mari Mancusi
But my life was definitely not a movie, and instead the real-life fear came rushing back like a hurricane wind, practically knocking me over with its force. As I stared down into the pipe, it was as if I could almost see my body sprawled out there, broken and bleeding. My pulse picked up, and my stomach swam. And even though I knew these were all just symptoms of another oncoming panic attack—that they had absolutely no hold on reality—I couldn’t manage to let go of either my fear or the horrific images it had chosen to evoke.
And, try as I might, I couldn’t bring myself to drop in.
I collapsed onto the snow, no longer able to hold back the tears that had threatened to consume me all day. It was too much. Coming back here to the scene of the crime, dealing with Olivia’s sneers, Becca’s betrayal, Cam’s new girlfriend, my dad’s false hope, and worst of all my complete inability to ride down the mountain without falling apart both mentally and physically.
Why had I even come back? There was no reason for me being here. Not when it was crystal clear that my dream had gone down the drain. And without it? I was no one. I had nothing. No hobbies, no sports, no interests, no career goals—my whole life had been consumed by snowboarding up until this point, and if that was really over for good, I had no idea what I was going to do with myself for the next seventy or eighty years.
I was crying so hard I didn’t hear anyone approach, until a voice cut through the darkness.
“Are you okay?”
Startled, I looked up with blurry, tear-soaked eyes. A dark, boy-shaped silhouette came into view over the side of the pipe. As he got closer, I saw that he was around my own age. Tall, skinny, with shaggy brown bangs hanging down into his face and a snowboard clutched in his gloved hands. He dropped to his knees in front of me, brushing away his hair and peering at me with concerned blue eyes. He looked weirdly familiar, though for the life of me, I couldn’t place him.
“Did you hurt yourself?” he asked, his hands wrapping around my ankles and squeezing lightly. His touch was soft, gentle, and I found myself taking a much-needed breath.
“Thanks, but I’m fine,” I assured him, hoping the darkness would hide my tears. I swiped my sleeve across my cheeks just in case.
He gave me a skeptical look, as if he didn’t quite believe me, but pulled his hands away. I guess that wasn’t surprising, considering most people who are “fine” aren’t found sitting alone, crying their eyes out at the top of a half-pipe. The Boarder Barbies would have a field day if they could see me now.
At least this guy didn’t appear to be a Mountain Academy student, as far as I could tell by his ripped jacket and beaten-up board. Most of the kids here were rich as anything or at least sponsored by ski and snowboard companies that provided them with top-of-the-line gear every season. No one at Mountain Academy was stuck wearing duct-taped boots.
“Just a bad night?” he asked, looking me over carefully.
“You could say that.”
I waited for him to ask me what happened, wondering what I’d tell him when he did. It was bad enough he caught me crying up here to begin with. What kind of explanation could I give him without sounding like a total loser?
But, to my surprise, he didn’t ask. He simply held out his hand. “I’m Logan.” He introduced himself. “Logan Conrad.”
I stared at him, now realizing exactly why he looked so familiar. “You’re Mrs. Conrad’s son,” I exclaimed, my embarrassment forgotten. The cafeteria lady always kept photos of her two sons taped to the side of her station.
His eyes dropped to the snow. “Yeah,” he replied. “I guess you go to Mountain Academy then, huh?” His voice held a note of disappointment, and I wondered what kind of past run-ins he’d had with my fellow students. Sad to say, staff kids weren’t always treated like first-class citizens at my school.
I gave him a sheepish shrug, kind of wishing I didn’t have to admit it. “Yeah,” I said at last. “At least for now . . . I’m Lexi by the way.”
Logan drew in a slow breath. “Well, Lexi, you won’t tell anyone at your school I was up here, will you?” His eyes darted around the pipe, as if he half expected ski patrol to pop out from behind a tree and bust him.
I smiled. “Only if you don’t tell anyone I was . . . ,” I said teasingly.
“Oh. Right.” He gave me a shy grin, his shoulders relaxing.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “My friend and I used to sneak up here all the time at night. We never get caught.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve been caught before. And let me tell you, it isn’t fun,” Logan said, picking at a sticker glued to his board. “But it’s the only way I can get any time on the slopes. So I have to risk it.”
“What do you mean?”
He looked at me sharply. “I mean lift tickets are expensive,” he said, his voice sounding a little defensive.
“Oh. Right.” My face burned. Of course. Stupid me. Being a full-time student, it was easy to forget that regular people had to pay for every day they spent on the mountain. Like nearly a hundred dollars a day. Not exactly something a cafeteria lady’s kid could afford on a regular basis, I guessed.
An awkward silence fell over us. I felt bad, and I knew it was up to me to break it. So I tuned up my best cheesy-TV-announcer voice. The one I used to use to make Becca laugh back in the day.
“So instead you risk your life, sneaking out in the dead of night . . . knowing full well that any second you could be brought down. Tried and convicted of the ultimate crime”—I paused dramatically—“of snowboarding without a license!”
Logan laughed. “That sounds about right.”
“Well,” I pronounced. “I, personally, think that is made of awesome. Way to stick it to the man!”
“I’ll be happy if I can just stick my jumps, thank you very much.”
I giggled. “Don’t let me stop you.” I nodded toward the pipe. “She’s all yours.”
“Actually . . . ,” Logan said, his voice hesitant again. “I was on my way to a party tonight.” He paused, then added, “You don’t want to . . . come with me . . . do you? Unless you need to practice . . .”
“Oh, no, no,” I said quickly. Probably too quickly. “I’m, um, done here. Definitely done.” As if I’d even started.
“Well then do you want to go?”
My pulse kicked up a notch. Did I want to go to a party? The idea was tempting to say the least. To get away from Mountain Academy and spend time with strangers who had no idea who I was—or what had happened.
Still, it was one thing to sneak out here and take a few runs on the pipe after hours. Quite another to leave campus with a strange boy to attend a non-school-sanctioned party. If I got caught, I’d be in huge trouble. With the school itself and, even worse, my dad.
“You don’t have to,” Logan added, as if sensing my hesitation. “It’s really cool either way. But maybe,” he added with a twinkle in his eye, “it might just cheer you up.”
I nodded slowly. “Well, in that case,” I replied, taking his hand and allowing him to pull me to my feet. “How can I refuse?”
CHAPTER TEN
I followed Logan through the dark woods, lugging my board behind me as the snow crunched under my feet. Where was this party anyway? I’d assumed it’d be back down at the base of the mountain—maybe even in town. But we seemed to be walking straight up the mountain instead. Was the party in the woods somewhere, just off the trail? In an abandoned snowmaking shack? Weren’t they worried about ski patrol busting them? It was definitely against the rules for anyone but mountain personnel to be on the slopes after hours.
“Do you have parties up here often?” I asked curiously.
“Sure,” he said. “Pretty much every weekend.”
“Aren’t you afraid of getting caught by snowmakers?”
“Nah. Half the people we hang with are snowmakers,” Logan replied, turning to shoot me a grin. “We’ve even got some ski patrol friends. Not to mention lift operators, janitors, waiters. Half of Green Mountain’s staff
either comes to these things or has younger brothers and sisters who do.” He shrugged. “Sometimes we can even get one or two of the guys on duty to park their snowcats at the top of the park so we can get some light.”
“Wow,” I said, surprised and actually pretty impressed. After all, I’d lived half my life at Mountain Academy, and I had no idea that this secret after-hours staff-kid club even existed. And yet evidently we’d shared the same mountain, the same parks, the same trails for years. Me in the daylight, them after dark. It was kind of cool to think about.
“Of course, it’s still technically illegal,” Logan added. “If the guys got caught, they’d lose their jobs. But the bosses are snug and warm in their beds and there’s no one out to bust us.”
I nodded thoughtfully. It seemed like the perfect setup.
“Here we are!” Logan announced as we emerged from the woods. My eyes widened in surprise as I realized we were near the top of the Apocalypse itself. The very terrain park where I’d had my big fall earlier today. My stomach knotted a little at the thought of it, but then I reminded myself that no one here would have any clue as to my little misadventure. Or would even care if they did.
The partygoers had stuck small tiki torches along the edges of the park, casting long shadows across the trail. But the dim lighting didn’t seem to deter the half dozen or so snowboarders and skiers, hitting the features one by one, or the spectators who cheered them on from the sidelines. Nearby, in the woods, someone had built a small fire, and a few kids were sitting around it, roasting hot dogs and marshmallows over the flames.
I let out a small whistle. “This is pretty awesome,” I admitted.
Logan beamed. “Told you,” he replied. “I bet you’re feeling ten times better already.”
“Maybe even eleven,” I pronounced, wandering over to the fire and yanking off my gloves to warm my hands. Across from me, a blond-haired guy pulled a guitar from behind a log, while two girls around my age settled at his feet as he started strumming. As Logan joined me by the fire, a few others walked by, waving hello to him and demanding to know why he was so late to the party.
“Fashionably late,” he corrected, grabbing a hot dog from a nearby cooler and poking a stick through the center. He held it over the fire. “Unlike you slackers, some of us actually have to work for a living.”
Everyone laughed appreciatively, and Logan turned to me. “This is Lexi.” He introduced me around. “She’ll be slumming it with us tonight.” Then he grinned. “Lexi, that’s Roland, over there on the guitar. And those are his two bandmates—Scarlet and Lulu.”
I waved as the two girls—one with fire-engine red hair and the other with blue streaks woven into a pair of black braids—looked up and smiled. I smiled back, kind of loving the anonymity of it all. Here, I was just Lexi. Not Golden Girl. Not future Olympian. Not “poor girl who got into a horrific accident.” Just Lexi. Some random girl of no importance whatsoever.
I was already glad I’d decided to come.
After giving me a welcoming nod, Roland struck up an acoustic version of one of my favorite Lorde songs, and Scarlet and Lulu started singing along in voices that were as loud as they were out of tune. Logan pulled the now-blackened hot dog off the stick and stuck it in a bun, handing it to me with a smile. I took it gratefully, realizing for the first time that I hadn’t eaten since lunch—and even then not very much, having lost my appetite watching Becca and Olivia. I took a huge bite. Back in the day, before we’d gotten serious about my career, Dad had taken Mom and me camping in nearby New Hampshire’s North Conway area. He was a champion at roasting hot dogs over an open fire. Just a little burnt, he’d say. To help seal in the flavor. I’d eaten so many I’d gotten sick.
The hot dog Logan made me was just as good, if not better. Or maybe it was simply this place that had everything inside of me finally relaxing for the first time since I’d gotten back. The familiar music. The friendly people. The crisp night air. Everything seemed somehow better here. Simpler. Quieter, even with all the noise.
I kind of never wanted to leave.
“So did you want to take a run?” Logan asked, gesturing to the park. I turned, just in time to watch a skier effortlessly launch over the very jump I’d eaten it on earlier that day. Yeah. No thank you.
“Nah. I’m still winded from the walk up,” I replied, using the best excuse I could manage on the fly. “You go ahead though. I’ll be fine here.” I plopped down onto a nearby log and took another big bite of hot dog, praying he wouldn’t press me.
“That’s okay,” Logan said, surprising me as he sat down next to me on the log. “I’m actually pretty beat from work.” He stuck another hot dog on his stick and pushed it into the fire. I gave him a sideways glance. He didn’t look tired. Was he just being nice? Or was he actually choosing me over snowboarding? My stomach tingled at the thought. Now that I had chilled out about everything that had happened, I found myself better able to focus on how kind of adorable he was. With his shaggy brown hair and sparkling blue eyes and a jacket that was two sizes too big, he was pretty much the anti–Mountain Academy guy. Which was admittedly part of the appeal.
“So what do you do?” I asked curiously. “I mean, aren’t you a little young to have a job?”
He grinned and waved a hand. “A simple technicality,” he declared. Then he shrugged. “Actually I just help out my uncle at his gas station,” he explained. “Pumping gas, changing oil, patching tires—whatever he needs. It’s not the most glamorous of jobs, but he pays me under the table. Gives me cash to enter snowboarding competitions from time to time.”
“That’s cool,” I said. “It must be nice to earn your own money.” I’d asked my father last year if I could help him out at the snowboard repair hut, but he’d turned me down flat. Snowboarding was my job, he reminded me, and a full-time one, at that. If I ever needed cash, he’d added, I should just ask him. Which sounded like a sweet deal, until you realized all the strings attached to other people’s money.
“What about you?” Logan asked. “How long have you gone to Mountain Academy?”
“Since third grade,” I admitted, not really wanting to talk about it.
“You must be good then.”
“I’m okay I guess.”
He stared at me hard, as if trying to place me, and I squirmed under his gaze. The last thing I wanted—I suddenly realized—was for him to recognize me. To realize I was the girl from that terrible accident last year. After all, his mother worked at the school. Of course she would have heard about it.
So when Roland struck up a new song—some grunge tune from the nineties that my mom used to drive my dad crazy with—I leaped from my seat and started singing along with Scarlet, channeling all those nights Mom and I had jammed to her karaoke machine last summer. I didn’t normally like singing in front of people—especially strangers—but desperate times and all that.
“Yeah!” Scarlet cried in delight at my unexpected move. “Sing it, sister!”
Soon Lulu joined in, and together we belted out the chorus at the top of our lungs, Logan watching us with obvious amusement from his spot on the log. I knew I was probably blushing hard-core but forced myself to continue singing until the very last verse. Hopefully by then he’d give up on trying to place me.
When the song ended, Scarlet and Lulu shrieked in unison, grabbing me and hugging me with unbridled enthusiasm. Laughing, I hugged them back, my heart still racing in my chest as adrenaline coursed through me.
“That was so awesome,” Lulu declared. “Where did you learn to sing like that?”
“Right?” Scarlet agreed, swiping a lock of red hair from her face. “Seriously, Lex, are you, like, in a band or something?”
“ ’Cause if not, you totally should be!” added Lulu, her eyes shining admiringly.
I chuckled. “Not exactly,” I said, trying to imagine fitting band practice into my already crazy schedule. Sadly, the whole Olympic training thing left little room for extracurriculars.
&
nbsp; “Do you live here?” Lulu asked. “Do you go to Littleton Junior High? I’ve never seen you before.”
“Lexi goes to Mountain Academy,” Logan informed the girls before I could reply. And while he made it sound like a good thing, an important thing even, I caught the girls exchanging knowing looks.
“Oh. That’s cool,” Lulu replied, with a little too much forced enthusiasm.
“Yeah, you must be super good,” added Scarlet encouragingly.
Now I knew I was blushing. It was funny. Before this moment, I’d always felt so proud, telling people where I went to school. As if it made me special somehow. But here it was actually kind of embarrassing.
“I had a friend who once dated a guy who went there. He was, like, always practicing. I’m talking twenty-four-seven.” Lulu shook her head pityingly, as if the guy had been stuck in 24-7 detention instead of tearing it up on the mountain every day. “Seriously, he barely ever had time to see her.”
“Oh the horror!” Logan broke in, rolling his eyes. “Someone with priorities and a work ethic! Alert the media.”
Lulu lobbed a hot dog bun in his direction. “We have priorities, Logan Conrad!” she shot back. “We’re going to make Manic Pixie Dream Girl the biggest, baddest band in the whole entire world!”
Logan caught the bun and took a big bite out of it. “Yeah, well, you’re going to need a singer who can actually sing, first.” He grinned wickedly. “No offense, Rol.” The guitar player smirked and kept playing.
“Well, maybe we’ll make Lexi our new singer!” cried Scarlet. She flopped an arm around me. “What do you say, Lexi? Want to give up your Olympic dreams for rock stardom? I promise it’ll be worth your while. Or, at the very least, warmer!”