Christina put it on. She said nothing. Her heart was too full for speech.
Dolly whispered, “Ooooh, Chrissie. Your hair glitters. It’s like you’re wearing new-fallen snow.”
Mrs. Bergeron led her upstairs to a full-length mirror, and Christina stared at herself, a daffodil in the snow.
“I look perfect in mine, too,” said Dolly. “Mine’s emerald green. It’s just right for my hair, too. My hair is red,” she added, as if Mrs. Bergeron could not see.
Mrs. Bergeron said, “Everything is easier to handle when you’re dressed just right and your hair is perfect.”
Christina wanted to hug Mrs. Bergeron and to be hugged: have her anxiety hugged away as this ski suit would take away the grief of having to wear old blue jeans. But she was too weary with fears to raise her arms.
Mrs. Bergeron hugged her anyway.
Mothers — the most wonderful people in the world. Christina pretended Mrs. Bergeron was her own mother. She sank into the hug. Jonah’s mother said, “When you reach the ski resort, why, you’ll slip into this and be the most beautiful girl on the slopes.” Folding the lemony snow puffs of jacket and pants, she tucked them into a dark brown shopping bag. It was hidden in there, a secret victory for Christina.
“Thank you,” Christina whispered.
Mrs. Bergeron said, “Nonsense. Now you two go out there and get some fresh air. You need a little color in your cheeks.”
Outside the snowball battles had reached war proportions. Teams were spread across the yards with snipers in trees, while officers built caches of snowballs to supply their soldiers with.
Christina ran to find Jonah. “You told your mother I didn’t have a ski suit,” she said.
“Are you mad?”
“No! It’s so beautiful!”
Jonah looked at her with that new intense heat that had shocked her before. But neither could act on it. They were pelted with snowballs as the opposite team caught them unaware.
The sun sank in the sky: ripples of pink and purple flung like ribbons into the snow-threatening distance. The children were incredibly beautiful against the snow. Scarlet, blue, green, and gold were their jackets and scarves. Like a medieval pageant, they trooped on a white world.
And Christina, when it was time to go home, held in a brown paper bag her second secret: clothes that would give her the strength to ski.
Chapter 19
THE GIRLS SHARED A bedroom. It had one bunk bed and one double bed on each side of an enormous diamond-shaped window that looked right out on the ski slopes. The bare wood floor was slippery and smelled of wax. On the bathroom door was a mirror panel, in front of which Dolly preened. She was a pixie. Anya had French-braided the gleaming red hair in a single tight row from her forehead back to the nape of her neck: Dolly’s lovely little head, slender neck, and tiny wrists were all that showed beneath the emerald green wrapper of ski suit. Dolly turned left and turned right, looked back over her shoulder and dipped.
“You’re perfect,” said Mrs. Shevvington, entering the room.
Dolly looked up shyly, as eager for Mrs. Shevvington’s compliments as Christina would have been for Blake’s. Dolly said, “I’m still afraid of falling.” She shivered, looking fragile as glass.
Mrs. Shevvington was already shaped like a refrigerator. In her padded ski suit she looked like a wicked, beardless Santa Claus. Next to her, Dolly was a miniature person, a pet, like a miniature poodle. Mrs. Shevvington patted Dolly like a dog, too.
Christina was undressed, but she had not taken the yellow ski suit out of its brown paper bag. The jeans she had peeled off lay in a messy inside-out pile on the floor. Anya had nothing to change into. The pitiful old ski jacket with its stains and tears hung loosely on her narrow shoulders.
Mrs. Shevvington’s eyes passed over Christina and Anya, and she was satisfied with what she saw. To Dolly she said, “Of course you’ll fall. Beginners always fall. But it’s just tipping over, and slithering on the snow for a few feet. The bunny slope is made for falling. And before you know it, you’ll be sailing down Gentle Deer, which is the advanced-beginner trail and then Running Deer, which is intermediate.”
Into Christina’s ear, Anya breathed, “What if he doesn’t come?” Her beauty was like a thread — anything could cut it through. He will, promised Christina soundlessly.
Dolly took Mrs. Shevvington’s hand. “Are you sure I won’t fall very hard?”
“Even if you do, look how padded you are. A baby doesn’t get hurt when it sits down because of its diapers. And you won’t either.”
Dolly beamed up at Mrs. Shevvington. “You always know what to say.”
“We decided,” Mrs. Shevvington added, “that it would be best to sign you all up for a beginner class. After all, we don’t want any broken bones in the first five minutes, do we?” She smiled, her little corn teeth the only color in her oatmeal face, as if she had scheduled the broken bones for later on. “So Anya, Christina, hurry and get ready. We’ll meet you at the bunny slope in a few moments.”
They had to cover their tracks, of course. Adoring school parents must be able to compliment the Shevvingtons no matter what happened to Dolly.
Dolly said to Christina, “And you didn’t trust the Shevvingtons to make this a perfect weekend.” She hugged Mrs. Shevvington. “You knew I needed beginner company to fall with, didn’t you?” she said lovingly. “Thank you for being nice to Christina even when she’s difficult.” Dolly and Mrs. Shevvington left the room without a backward glance.
Christina took her turn in front of the mirror. Slowly she slid her legs into the puffy, satiny folds of the ski pants. She fastened the suspenders and adjusted the high waist. Holding her turtleneck sleeves with her fingertips so they wouldn’t get caught in the jacket, she put on the daffodil-yellow top. Slowly she zipped it up, watching her reflection. She ran her ten fingers into her hair and fluffed it around the collar. I’m pretty, she thought. She wondered if Blake would tell her so, if he would grin when he saw her and yell, “Hey Chrissie, I’ve missed you!” If he would say, “Gosh, you look pretty; yellow is your color.”
Anya whispered, “Chrissie! Look out the window!”
Outdoors, the snow fell thickly and steadily in a harsh wind.
It was like seeing through a lace curtain. People were blurred and snow laden.
Like the Shevvingtons, most people on the slopes wore dark fashion colors: magenta, jade, or navy. When I am out there, Christina thought, I will blend with the weather and the mountains and the sky — lemon yellow with white. I will be beautiful. Different. Memorable.
Anya was pointing. Her thin, ringless finger was trembling.
Christina looked harder and saw Blake.
Blake! No cap, even in this cruel wind, just a scarlet headband that lifted his dark hair and protected his ears, and a high-necked scarlet jacket that snuggled under his chin. Across the ski suit was a silver metallic slash from chest to knee. He seemed taller to Christina, and he was certainly broader. He wore his ski boots and held his skis, which he was resting in the snow as he examined every person coming out the lodge doors. After a while he turned to look in other directions. The snow glittered white and furious, and he slid sunglasses onto the bridge of his nose.
He held the snow as an actor holds the stage. It was his.
People paused when they saw him, admired him for a moment, and gave him space: he was too impressive to shoulder out of the way.
Blake, I love you! Christina sent her message by heart. Then, guiltily, she turned to look at Anya, who loved him, too.
Anya’s hair had worked loose. Its dark tendrils curled around the ragged old hood. Her thin ivory face was as translucent as the sky at dawn. “He came,” she breathed. Tears filled her eyes, and she rested both palms on the icy window, staring down at Blake. The wind attacked Blake and lifted his hair but he did not move, surveying the skiers, looking for Anya.
Anya looked down at herself. At the ugly maroon jacket, the wrong length for her, not
quite warm enough, the rips she had not mended. Her cheeks stained red. She took a painful little breath, lifted her chin, and said, “I love him. Love doesn’t need perfect clothes.”
She kissed Christina. “Cancel me out of the beginner class,” she whispered. “Blake will teach me.”
Christina held her daydreams for another second: a wonderful instant of Blake’s love, Blake’s touch, Blake’s company. Then she said, “Quick. Switch clothes with me. You have to look perfect for Blake.”
“No,” said Anya. “Mrs. Bergeron gave them to you. So Gretch-and Vicki-types wouldn’t laugh at you.”
“I know how to laugh back,” said Christina. She was unzipped, she was unbuttoned, she was peeling it away. She was trying not to cry.
Anya bit her lips, staring not at Christina but at the lemony fluff piling by Christina’s feet. Then with desperate speed she ripped off her ugly old things and yanked on the yellow. They had been too big for Christina; they were slightly too snug for Anya: but it made her slim and fragile instead of the padded pillow so many skiers resembled. Christina teased Anya’s hair into tiny black curls beneath the daffodil trim.
Anya whispered, “Thank you, Chrissie,” and hugged her, and ran out of the room. Christina, slowly putting back on her own jeans and her regular old winter jacket and scarves, stood by the diamond window, watching Blake.
All her life she would remember Anya coming down the steps of the lodge — how Blake half knew her and half didn’t. How he suddenly flung back his head, and laughed, and tore off his sunglasses. How he strode forward, folded back the yellow hood and, with his bare hands in that terrible cold, held her face up to his. Tilted her head back, kissed her cold lips, and spoke to her and kissed her again.
Christina was a silly little seventh-grader, alone in a snow-cold world.
Blake loved Anya. Always had, always would.
The bunny slope was hardly even a bump. There was no chair lift to the top, but a rope, like a clothesline on a pulley. The class had all ages in it: nervous middle-aged women and fearless toddlers. Nobody else was wearing jeans. Dolly frowned. “I thought you said you had gotten good clothes somewhere,” she said. “Were you yarning again, Chrissie? You have to stop that. It’s a very bad habit.”
Mr. and Mrs. Shevvington said, “Now, Dolly. Be generous. Forgive Christina her lies.”
I’m the one who’s generous! thought Christina, yearning for credit.
But she could not tell them; they still didn’t know about Blake, and they certainly would not recognize Anya in her lemon yellow. The more time Anya had with Blake before the Shevvingtons knew, the more her strength would return.
The wind went through the denim fabric as if her legs were bare.
Skiing turned out to be like riding a bicycle: once you had it, you had it. The first time down Christina was fine; the second time she fell twice; the third time she fell once; the fourth time she was fine again. “This is fun!” she said to Dolly, and to her astonishment Dolly’s little cheeks were red with joy, and Dolly nodded. “I love it!” she cried against the wind. “I think I’m going to be good at it!”
The wind lifted Christina’s hair like banners of silver and gold. The instructor cried, “What beautiful hair! I’ve never seen hair like that. Is it real?”
Christina and Dolly laughed together.
The snow and the slopes had turned them back into friends: it was like the island: it pulled them together, it made them one.
The Shevvingtons had vanished. They were dressed in dark blue. The moment they skied away and got in line somewhere they became invisible. I will never know where they are, thought Christina Romney, and felt a chill that was not wind factor.
In only two hours they graduated. “Great work, girls,” said the instructor approvingly. “Now right over there are Gentle Deer and Running Deer. Use the ski lift. I’ll watch you the first time, and then you’re on your own because I’ll be starting another class. Don’t try Running Deer yet. It’s a little tricky for the first day.”
“Gentle Deer,” repeated Dolly. “Doesn’t it sound like an Indian mother, rocking her papoose?” The two girls got in line for their first chair lift. The brutal wind had kept many people indoors. Only a dozen skiers were in front of them: several adults wearing navy. Nobody looked thick enough to be Mrs. Shevvington, nor lean and elegant enough to be Mr. Shevvington.
The ski lift had a metal seat no wider and no more substantial than a backyard swing’s. The back was a wide metal bar, and in front a thin metal bar snapped in place. The wind rocked the chairs back and forth. Each time the lift stopped for the next passenger, the skiers higher up jerked. Their legs dangled above the open snow. They went higher and higher in the sky, until far up Gentle Deer they vanished in the swirling snow, eaten by the mountain.
“I can’t,” whimpered Dolly. “I’ll fall, Chrissie. I don’t want to do this, Chrissie, don’t make me, Chrissie, let’s go inside and get warm at the fire, Chrissie — “
An attendant plopped them backward onto the thin metal seat, swung the bar closed, and they were snatched up the mountain, two by two.
Christina was terrified. She had not known how high it would be. How flimsy. Gripping the bar in her mittens she choked back a sob of fear. When Dolly twisted around, the chair swung hideously. They both screamed. Behind them two kids about five years old called, “What are you so worried about? This is nothing. Don’t make a big deal over it.” Shamed, Christina and Dolly grit their teeth and prayed, teetering over the tops of the pointed firs. Every few yards the horrible little container jerked again, picking up more skiers.
At the top came the next terror — how to get off. They desperately studied the people ahead but couldn’t quite see how it was done. An attendant thrust open the bar and Christina lurched out, tumbling ingloriously and falling on her bottom. Dolly vaulted off, landing perfectly and then tipping over slowly. “We’re alive,” whispered Dolly, lying on her side, giggling like a maniac. The five-year-olds rolled their eyes and took off immediately, sailing on the snow as easily as island children sailed on the sea.
Bodies leaning left and leaning right, poles angled for balance, scarves flying out, skiers hurtled down the hill. Quite a few skied in pairs: an expert father held hands with his beginner child. Nobody fell.
Behind them towering evergreens blocked the sky. Every branch of every tree held its armload of snow, dumping one now and again with a smothering plop. The shadows of the great trees were black and blue, like bruises. The wind screamed. The ski lift clattered. Christina took a deep breath to steady herself, and the wind tore the air out of her lungs, leaving her gasping. The patch on her thigh, where she had fallen on the bunny slope had soaked through and was now ice.
“You go first,” said Dolly.
Gentle Deer seemed miles long. Bumps and dips made the skiers fly into the air. By the time they reached the bottom the skiers were as tiny and indistinguishable as little colored Legos. “I can’t,” said Christina. Her lips were chapped, and her hands ached.
“Sure you can,” said the attendant, and he gave first Dolly and then Christina a push.
Dolly screamed, knees bent not for style but folding up to stay alive. Christina knew the meaning of “heart in mouth.” Her whole insides lurched. The world seemed to slam into her face, speeding toward her as she rushed through it, but she hit nothing. She passed Dolly, she hurtled forward, thinking, How do I stop? I’ll go through the building; I’ll have a face full of logs.
She and Dolly were caught by their instructor. “Great work! You two are naturals. Not a twitch of nerves. Well, enjoy your day! Keep in touch.”
Gentle Deer was boring. Christina knew its rises and falls and was accustomed to the speed. She wanted to try Running Deer. She had become good in a short time, and she knew why: she had forced her mind and body to it because otherwise her mind would have been wrapped around Blake.
Blake and Anya had vanished. Christina’s heart ached. Her jeans were so cold! How she wished
she could be Anya! Or at least be wearing the yellow suit.
Hours had passed. The shadows of the pines and firs at the top of Gentle Deer stretched halfway down the mountain, and the snow no longer seemed white but blue.
Dolly said, “I’m cold, Chrissie. I’m going in.”
“Don’t you want to try Running Deer?”
“My feet are killing me,” said Dolly. “My ankles are killing me, my back is killing me, my hands are killing me.”
“That’s pretty bad,” said Blake, who was suddenly there, smiling down at them both.
But Dolly did not know Blake, because he had left for boarding school before Dolly arrived from Burning Fog Isle. She thought he was just a cheerful stranger, and she smiled without interest. She was too chilled for a real smile — the corners of her blue lips merely twitched. Taking off her skis, Dolly trudged toward the lodge.
Christina was inches away from him. She had not grown over the winter, but he had. And he was as handsome as she remembered. His cheeks were windburned, and around his eyes were white patches where his sunglasses protected him. “I’m glad to see you,” she said formally.
Blake grinned at her.
Christina felt as weak as Dolly. She wanted to fold against him like a baby blanket and be snuggled. “Where’s Anya?” she said.
“Same as Dolly. Wiped out. What’s the matter with you island girls? No inner strength?” He was laughing.
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.”
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