Chapter Twenty-Four
January 2017
After visiting Theo, Lydia returned to Bath and immediately blocked Anita’s number on her phone. She needed some time to think, to breathe, to be away from everything. She even unplugged her home phone, deciding no contact with his family was the best thing for her right now.
Following New Year, Lydia’s work holiday to Andorra soon came around, and arriving in another country felt like a step in the right direction.
She boarded the tourist coach from the airport, and as they made their way through the mountainous terrain, with the scenery turning more white than green she felt a wave of excitement.
The coach disgorged passengers at various intervals until the accommodation in La Massana where Lydia would be staying. It was perfectly situated for the gondola lift to take tourists to the ski resorts, and the minute the doors to the bus opened she felt the rush of winter air, of snow sports and après-ski, of holidays and fun. And although she’d never be a true skier, she was excited. She’d stick to the baby slopes for sure and after that it’d be on to her research for all the other attractions of this kind of holiday, information to guide those who were dragged along skiing when they didn’t want to go, and give them what they needed.
She checked in, found her room and immediately connected to the free Wi-Fi. She sent a text to her boss and asked him if he’d treated her to a nice hotel because he felt sorry for her. He’d replied within seconds to say of course not and if she didn’t deliver a bloody good article, she was fired! She sent a collection of emojis back: ski boots, a girl on skis, two pints of beer coupled together and a character swimming.
She pulled back the net curtain and took a photo of the view. The area she was in seemed to be surrounded by miles of varied ski slopes with figures in the distance gliding this way and that. She sent the photo to Connor and he replied to say ‘hard life’.
The hotel room was filled with brochures about things to do but Lydia wasn’t intending to work just yet. She had a ski lesson booked in the morning as a refresher, then she’d do a green run or two. She would use tomorrow to remind herself of what it felt like to be surrounded by skiers, to be going so fast you wondered whether you’d ever be able to stop, what it was like to feel the icy rush of air against your face as you made your way down a run, and, more than likely, exactly what it felt like to fall in a heap when you lost your balance. Lydia was a great believer that the best form of research was to do something yourself, but she had her limits, and after tomorrow she could move on to alternative activities.
She had dinner in the restaurant downstairs that night, dining out on a lobster bisque with crusty French bread on the side, then a salade niçoise topped with extra anchovies. She allowed herself one glass of white wine, and then back in her room she flicked on the television to settle back and watchThe Holiday.
*
The alarm the next morning was a rude awakening and the comfy warm bed wasn’t something Lydia really wanted to part with, but she eventually dragged herself out of bed and made her way to the hire place in town to collect her skis, poles and boots.
Part of the throng of people at the gondola station, she slowly got used to the funny feel of the unfamiliar footwear with their ker-klunk as you walked, and she joined the already busy queue next to the buzzing machinery operating to take hundreds if not thousands of hopeful skiers up to the snow. She was in the Vallnord domain and heading for the Pal resort where she’d have her lesson and get a feel for the place, the atmosphere, the start of her lengthy write-up. Ian wanted this to be a huge feature and so she planned to write a bit each day, making it far easier a task when she returned to the office. Doing it that way also meant she’d have lots more information than she really needed and it was how she worked best – over-research and cut it down later.
The gondola moved round slowly and Lydia rested her skis on her shoulders, boarding and taking a seat so she was facing forward. She looked down as they soared higher and higher up the mountains, the white layers beneath already littered with tracks from skis or snowboards that had left their mark. The landscape stretched for miles in every direction and trees sprinkled with frost glistened beneath the sun.
Three hours later and Lydia had had her refresher course and with a few of the other participants, elected to do the green run one more time before the end of the session. Some were already talking about tackling something a little more challenging tomorrow, but for Lydia this was as far as she’d come. She took the chair lift to the top of the run, legs weighted with skis and dangling down helplessly. She only got nervous as they reached the end of the journey and the two other skiers she was sharing a chair lift with lifted the safety bar a little too early, in her opinion, ready to glide away. She wobbled but thanks to a reasonably strong core from all her dancing, she managed to right herself and was able to glide across to where they’d start the run.
She began her descent in snowplough, and after a few turns to get a feeling for the slope she moved her skis so they were more parallel, but not too straight as she didn’t want to go so fast that she started to panic. She concentrated hard as the wind rustled past and her shadow kept her company all the way. The other two ladies from her lesson were already starting to leave her behind and she waved them off, happy to glide down by herself. As long as a snowboarder or a more confident skier didn’t cut across her then she’d be just fine.
Her legs were beginning to ache and already she was thinking about the corner bath back at the hotel. She’d brought with her some of her favourite Jo Malone bath oil and she intended to have a thorough soak later, wrap herself in the fluffy bathrobe and write up the notes that were multiplying in her mind.
Lydia was so busy thinking about the bath, her write-up and taking in the beauty of the surrounding Alpine scenery that when her skis hit an uneven patch of snow she wasn’t prepared. Her arms flung out to the side, her legs went from beneath her and the cold, hard surface below made contact with her bum with a smack. She groaned. One pole was still in her hand, the other a few metres away and she lay there for a second. Thank goodness for helmets as she knew she’d hit her head as she lay looking up at the sun, a fierce pearl-like ball in the sky.
She tried but failed to push herself upright and while a snowboarder yelled obscenities for her to get her arse out the way, another skier took pity and as he asked her whether she was all right, he put his hands under her arms from behind and hoisted her upright. All she wanted right now was to get these skis off her feet, rip off these boots, goggles and helmet and relax into a nice hot bath.
‘You were going pretty fast,’ said the man, who skied to retrieve her other pole and then side-stepped up to meet her again.
‘I hardly think so. I’m not good enough to do that.’ As he got closer she realised why his voice had sounded so familiar. She lifted her goggles. ‘Jonathan?’
A huge grin spread across his face when he saw her face unmasked. He lifted his own goggles. ‘Lydia? I didn’t recognise you. It’s great to see you.’
At that moment another skier came so close he ran over the back of Jonathan’s skis. Jonathan yelled after him but Lydia doubted his language would’ve been so tame had she not been with him.
‘Come on.’ Jonathan handed Lydia her missing pole. ‘If you’re ready, we should get out of the way.’
They both positioned their goggles and Lydia started off first, only too aware Jonathan was close behind. Her heart thumped but she didn’t know whether it was because he was watching her every move or because she was terrified of falling again.
Civilisation rather than nothing but snow and mountains came into view and Lydia relaxed but not too much. She still needed to make it to the end of the run and when she did, Jonathan skilfully skied to a stop next to her and shuffling, the only way you could move on flat ground when you had skis strapped to your feet, they made their way over to a place that served, Lydia hoped, hot chocolates with all the trimmings. She was tired, starting to feel a chill, and she was well and truly over it.
She used the bottom of one ski to tread on the back of the other and release the hold on her boot, and when she struggled with the remaining ski, Jonathan helped her wrestle her remaining boot from the bindings. She pulled off her helmet and took her sunglasses from the inside pocket of her jacket where thankfully they’d remained safe, even though she’d fallen three times today in total, all of them on her behind.
‘What were you doing on the green run?’ she asked Jonathan as they made their way inside to order drinks. She was flustered and had no idea what to say, so small talk it would have to be.
‘I’ve been teaching this morning and I was going up there with some of the less confident of my students. On the last run up they’d already waved goodbye before I’d got off the chairlift.’ He grinned. ‘I didn’t see them in a heap on the way down so I assume they’re either here somewhere, or they’ve already gone back up to tackle it again.’
With a hot chocolate and a bacon roll each, they went outside.
