by Paige Toon
‘I’m okay,’ I say gently, going to sit on the bed. I look up at him. ‘Did you know that Phoebe knew I was in love with you?’
His expression changes only a little. He nods and kneels down at my feet so now he’s the one staring up at me. He places his hands on my thighs. ‘And she knew that I had feelings for you, too,’ he says.
I cover his hands with mine. Neither of us breaks eye contact.
‘I read her diary.’ He’s admitting what I had just in this moment realised. ‘I had to know what was going through her mind,’ he says.
‘That’s how you found out about Remy?’ I ask.
He nods. ‘She’d told me about him on her year out, so I was shocked to see his name on the accident report. And then Phoebe’s things came back from Chamonix, including the notepad that she used to sometimes write in. I resisted reading it for a very long time, but it was always there, taunting me. Finally I couldn’t stand it any longer. Have you read it?’ he asks.
‘No.’ I shake my head. ‘Rose told me what it said.’ Whoops, I’ve just blown her cover. ‘She has it now,’ I confess.
‘I know,’ he replies with a wry smile. ‘I knew she’d taken it.’
‘You should have told her you knew. She was worried you were going to flip out.’
He tuts with mock despair before his expression grows serious again. ‘Are you alright?’ he asks me.
‘Yes.’ I nod, surprised at how alright I am.
‘Are you still okay to go on our date?’
‘Definitely.’ I smile at him and then turn to look at the mess on the bed. ‘Let’s get these things packed away neatly first, though.’
‘Okay,’ he agrees, standing up.
I shed a few more tears as we unpack and fold up Phoebe’s clothes, but Angus lets me be, and I feel a welcome sense of relief once it’s done. We leave the boxes in the left-hand wardrobe. If I do move in with him, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, but for now, I’m at peace.
As soon as I see the picnic hamper, I know where we’re going. It’s late afternoon by the time we arrive, and the sun is casting long shadows across the hills of the Peak District. We park up in our usual secluded spot on a grassy verge, and Angus swings open the back door of the Land Rover. His music wafts out of the car as we set up our picnic on the rug, but the volume is low enough to not drown out the sound of the nearby stream or the birds chirping as they fly overhead.
‘Did you and Phoebe ever come here?’ I ask, and immediately wish that question hadn’t come to mind.
‘No.’ He shakes his head, and I feel a swell of relief. There’s something so lovely about this being our place. Just ours.
‘Show us your bits, then,’ I prompt, remembering what he said to me the first time we came here.
He grins and pulls out grapes, millionaire shortbread and salt and vinegar crisps.
‘You’ve even got the same food!’ I exclaim, sitting up straighter.
He laughs and pulls out a bottle of sparkling wine. ‘And this is for you. I’m driving so I won’t drink.’
‘Aw.’ I lean across and give him a chaste kiss before taking the bottle and putting it back in the bag. ‘I don’t want to drink alone, and anyway, remember what we said about being sober tonight.’ I say it flippantly, but my face betrays me.
He raises one eyebrow and then crawls over in my direction. He kisses me on my lips softly, but deepens it after a moment, so I fall back against the rug, pulling him with me.
We’re secluded from view here, and I don’t think the sheep in a nearby field count. As he unbuttons my jeans, I hazard a guess that we’re not waiting until tonight...
I cry out as he takes me, but then he stills, and it’s so intense, being this close to him, this connected. It’s almost unbearable.
‘I love you,’ he says against my lips.
I clasp his face in my hands and stare into his eyes, which are brimming with emotion, just like mine. ‘I love you, too, Angus Templeton. I’ll love you for the rest of my life.’
Chapter 42
Rose
I’m standing on a balcony of a chalet in Argentière, staring up at the nearby mountains soaring into the crystalline blue sky. I take a deep breath and slowly exhale.
This is the exact same chalet where Phoebe and Josie stayed on their hen trip and tonight I will be sleeping in Phoebe’s bed. Josie was worried when I asked for every minute detail, but I tried to reassure her that I’m not losing my mind. I just want to feel close to my sister.
Right now, though, I feel cold.
I shiver and go back inside, sliding the door shut behind me before crawling onto the sofa and pulling a thick, woolly blanket up to my neck.
But I know that nothing I do will make me warm.
It’s been a week since I left England. I stayed in Paris for a few days, trying to soak up the atmosphere and prepare myself for what lay ahead. Then I took a train down to Saint Gervais and caught the Mont Blanc Express up through the valley to Chamonix, staring out of the window at the imposing mountains growing gradually bigger with each mile, heightening the tension that I would soon arrive at the town where Phoebe felt so at home.
From my position on the sofa I stare up at the mountains again, scarcely able to believe that my dad and sister used to climb them. The melting ice cascading down the rocks looks like a white waterfall, as though God has upended a carton of milk on them. It is absolutely breathtaking. I feel a pang of homesickness and wish Mum, Eliza or Angus were here with me to share this experience. Or Toby...
Reaching over to the coffee table, I pick up Phoebe’s purple diary and her iPhone with the headphones still attached. I plug in the earpieces and press play, listening as the dreamy strains of a song by an artist called Greta Svabo Bech waft out. Then I open the diary and begin to read. I want Phoebe’s experiences to be fresh in my mind when I go to the top of the Aiguille du Midi tomorrow.
It’s early September, and around 20 degrees in Chamonix town centre and partly sunny. I’m wearing Phoebe’s grey hoodie and I feel snug as I stand on a bridge, looking down at the milky green river rushing noisily below, before striding uphill to the main part of the town. Chamonix is pretty and it has a nice vibe, with people sitting on the pavement outside restaurants and cafés. I walk down a shopping street and through a square, gazing up at the surrounding mountains. They start off green near the bottom and grow increasingly white as they project into the sky. In places the slopes are banded with dark green pine trees, in others they’re striped with cables that carry the ski lifts, not that anyone will be skiing for a while. Far over my head, brilliantly coloured parachutes float this way and that, attached to the nutcases who deem it a good idea to jump off a mountain.
My sister was one of those nutcases, I muse with admiration tinged with sadness. Remy took her paragliding on their first proper date.
I’m intrigued to meet this man, after everything I’ve read about him, but I’ll have to wait a few days. He’s currently with a group of mountaineers on Mont Blanc, but he has promised to text me on his return. I hope he wasn’t too shocked to receive my email. He didn’t let on if he was.
I’ve already bought my extortionately priced Aiguille du Midi ticket – thank goodness for Mum because I never would have been able to afford to do everything I’m doing with my meagre bakery earnings – so after a while I head back down the hill to the cable car entrance and join the queue winding inside.
When I’m standing inside a cabin packed with people, the door whooshes shut and we begin our flight away from Chamonix. I emit a squeal along with most of the other passengers as we sail up and over the pylons, and I remember Phoebe saying that she’d never tire of the sound.
I turn to look at the girl who’s manning the car: she’s young and pretty with chocolate-brown eyes, and her straight, dark hair is partly tied back from her oval-shaped face. For a moment I picture Phoebe in her place, with blonde hair instead of brown and wearing the same dark uniform and I have to fight back tea
rs. I look down to see us clear the tree line, and then we’re passing over rocks and grass and disembarking to switch cable cars at the middle station.
On the next car, I manage to secure a spot near the front and grip the handrail for support as crisp mountain air streams in through a crack in the window. Very soon the rocks below us are covered with snow, and in the distance I can make out tiny red and orange tents on an enormous white expanse. What did Phoebe write when Dad came over and climbed Mont Blanc with her? They weren’t dwarfed by the mountain, they were microscopisized by it. I don’t think it’s even a word in the English language, but it should be. I can see what she meant.
The cable car breaks through the clouds to cheers of delight and I look in dazed awe at the mountain peaks protruding through the fluffy whiteness. It’s almost otherworldly – the sun is bright and the sky is as blue as blue can be.
Our ascent becomes almost vertical and only a metre or so in front of me is a sheer rock face, too steep for even snow to cling on to, although a multitude of icicles manage it. I suddenly feel quite dizzy with vertigo. A small group of climbers to my left are walking along a steep, narrow ridge and I can barely believe my eyes. It looks so dangerous – and Phoebe and Dad used to do that sort of thing often!
The dizziness I’m feeling worsens as I step out of the car and follow the crowd down the stairs. I feel distinctly unsteady as I walk onto a wide metal footbridge, astonished at the low height of the handrails on either side. Cloud hovers only ten metres below, so I have no idea how far the drop would be if I were to topple over the railings. Around me, majestic brown and grey snow-splatted mountaintops pierce the sky, but I feel too giddy and short of breath to appreciate the view. Is this what altitude does to you? I honestly had no idea. I’ve never been this high before in my life.
Feeling rigid with fear, I force myself to turn and study the building wrapped around one jagged peak. I find it astonishing that people managed to build up here. Who clung to the mountaintop and hammered in that nail? Are they absolutely mental?
It occurs to me that somewhere inside that mass of man-made material is the staff apartment, and then I realise that I’m standing on the footbridge where Remy and Phoebe shared their first kiss. I’m amazed that she felt relaxed enough to smile, let alone kiss anyone up here or stay overnight with only one colleague for company. I’d be far too scared to do that, yet she was only eighteen and stayed up here on a fairly regular basis.
The panoramic viewing platform is at the top of the building, past the café and shop, I recall from Phoebe’s diary, but I feel too shaky to climb any higher right now. I decide to go and take a look at the ice cave instead.
Once over the footbridge and into the tunnel, I feel slightly safer. I pause for a moment to try to compose myself, standing clear of the melting ice dripping from the ceiling. Most of the people passing by are climbers, wearing backpacks adorned with ice axes and ropes, and harnesses around their waists, jangling with carabiners, slings, camming devices and other essential climbing gear. Harnesses have always reminded me of oversized charm bracelets and I have a flashback to Phoebe and Dad, fully geared-up as they set off early from a campsite in Wales. Mum, Eliza and I were huddling miserably around the campfire in the drizzle, trying to keep warm, but Dad and Phoebe were buzzing with excitement about their imminent climb. Nothing seemed to scare Phoebe. Nothing except for falling hopelessly and uncontrollably in love with Remy.
When I read about her fears in her diary, I couldn’t believe she chose to leave him behind, that she chose home and safety instead of the rollercoaster of emotions she experienced with him. But maybe she regretted it. Maybe that was why she was willing to risk her life to spend one more day with him.
Again, I’m curious to meet this man.
I move on from where I’m standing, and it’s not long before I reach the ice cave and beyond it the ridge where Remy and his cousin Amelie came in off the mountain.
Carved out scallop shapes give the walls around me the appearance of whipped egg white, and ahead the light is blinding as it reflects off the snowy slopes. This is the same ridge that I saw earlier from the cable car and it looks just as steep. I feel nervous at the sight of some approaching climbers. They’re tethered together by rope, but still... It seems like it would be so easy to lose their footing and slip, pulling down others with them.
The horror of Phoebe’s death hits me with the impact of a punch to the stomach and my heart starts to beat faster. The feeling intensifies, and suddenly it seems like a very real possibility that I’m going to faint.
‘Are you okay?’ I’m vaguely aware of a young climber asking this question. I try to be brave and nod my head, but he isn’t buying it. ‘It’s the altitude,’ he says in an American accent. ‘You should think about going back down.’
I nod again and stumble away from him, slipping on the slushy ice and snow under my feet.
‘Do you need some help?’ he calls after me.
I shake my head and feel my way out of the ice cave.
I’m still in a state of vertiginous terror as I climb back onto the cable car. I feel like I’m at the top of a very, very tall ladder and have to turn around and climb down the first rung without losing my footing.
The cable car sets off slowly, and as we come back through the cloud, the grey rocks emerge and the air is dark and gloomy. But I feel a wave of relief that I’m on my way back down again. I was thinking about getting off at the intermediate stop, but right now I just want to put my feet down on flat ground.
Chamonix is not particularly pretty from this height – a grey, dull stretch of buildings running all the way down the valley – but it’s a welcome sight to me.
That evening, I sit out on the balcony and try to make sense of the day I’ve had. I feel very low, like I’ve let Phoebe down by not appreciating what she loved. Her diary descriptions are completely alien compared to my experience. The top of the Aiguille was stunning, yes, but how could I admire its beauty when my heart was in my throat and I found it difficult to breathe?
I can see how Phoebe felt inspired here, and I understand how she wanted to be up there on top of the world, but I can’t imagine actually going through with what she did. She was adventurous, brave and self-assured.
We couldn’t be more different.
I don’t feel as close to her tonight. And it makes me feel sad.
The valley before me is shrouded in darkness and the pine trees look black, not green. But beyond the trees, the mountains are still light in colour, the sky above blue as it fades into night.
The reality of Phoebe dying up there suddenly hits me again, and I have to hurry back inside before I lose it.
I sob my heart out that night. At one point, Eliza’s name pops up on my Caller ID and I feel unbearably alone as I let the phone ring. She wouldn’t know how to handle me like this. I cry myself to sleep soon afterwards.
The next morning, when I wake up, I lie there for a long time wondering if I’ve been very stupid by thinking that I could – should – do this. I feel like I dreamt my trip up the mountain yesterday. I don’t want my stay to be plagued by grief and despair, so eventually I get up and resolve to pull myself together.
When I made the decision to go travelling by myself, I felt liberated. Not exactly free – the thought of what awaited me here gave me a knot in my stomach that feels a long way from unravelling – but I knew it would do me good to go out on my own. The last time I felt like that was when I went to university, but between then and now I’ve lost some of my confidence and independence. I’d like to get it back.
The purpose of this trip is to honour Phoebe, to try to keep her memory alive. I don’t want to crumble every time I visit one of her old haunts. I want to appreciate the things she saw and respect the things that she did.
I reach for her diary and have a flick through before making a decision. Today I’m going to go on the Montenvers train to visit the grotto.
The little red train departs from Cha
monix and I smile at the young family sitting opposite before turning to stare out of the window at the ferns nestled in amongst the rocks as we chug steeply up the mountain.
Mer du Glace, France’s largest glacier, is 7km long and 200m deep, and its name translates to Sea of Ice. The grotto is dug out every summer because the glacier moves about 70m a year, and there are hundreds of steps to walk down before you reach it. Eventually I make it into the huge, cold tunnel of ice. It’s lit by colourful lights and I take photos of the various ‘rooms’ that I pass along the way. Phoebe was right: this is totally up my street. I try not to think about how she wanted to bring both Eliza and me back here with her.
Later I head to the restaurant in the Grand Hotel for lunch. It’s an imposing rectangular granite-stone building several storeys high, but is cosy inside, with wooden-panelled interiors. I order the tartiflette – a traditional Savoyard dish made with potatoes, reblochon cheese, lardons and onions. The calories are sky high, but I need comfort food right now. I’m battling loneliness – and grief.
I wish I could have persuaded Eliza to come. I remember that she called me last night and I send her a quick, breezy text to tell her what I’m up to. I’d love to talk to her, but politeness gets the better of me – I’d feel too rude having a conversation on my phone in the middle of a restaurant.
We do talk to each other that night, while I’m sitting outside on the balcony with a glass of wine in my hand.
‘It’s stunning here,’ I tell her. ‘I can see why Phoebe was so drawn to the mountains.’
‘You’re not planning on moving, are you?’ she asks with alarm.
I laugh. ‘No. This is her place, not mine, but it is beautiful.’
‘Is it hard?’ she asks quietly.
‘A little,’ I admit.
We both fall silent. She doesn’t want me to elaborate, and I don’t want to burden her with my tales of woe.
‘I wish you were here,’ I say.
‘I’m glad I’m not,’ she replies indignantly, making me smile again. ‘Where are you at the moment?’ she asks.