Page 46 of Just Like the Brontë Sisters

Chapter 25: Skylar

I was so consumed with training that I actually stopped worrying about Jo Beth for a while. One afternoon I completed a run in record time, going straight down and only extending my limbs when airborne. Once finished I removed my goggles and my helmet to face my new coach, Ellen. She was usually all business, with the look of someone who’s spent thousands of days out in the cold and sun. I was hoping she’d praise me, but her words froze like watery snowflakes against a frigid surface.

“You have great speed,” she said. “But I’m worried about your form. I don’t want to push you along too soon.”

“What are you talking about?” I demanded. “Now is the time. In another four years, I’ll be pushing twenty-five. That’s ancient for an athlete!”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Ellen’s leathery face turned contemptuous. “You’ll be twenty-three, several years away from peaking. Take care of yourself, don’t be reckless, and four years from now will be the perfect time to try again for the Olympics.”

I had been at camp for two weeks. It was the end of my trial period, time for them to decide if I had Olympic team potential or not. Well, I guess I had my answer. As the realization sunk in, I was faced with a choice. I could be calm, gather up my skis, return to the red barn lodge, and soak in the hot tub with the other losers. Then, possibly, I could get drunk with Cody, a freestyler from Utah, who was super-cute but also a Mormon, which meant he was even less experienced than me. Most likely I’d wake the next morning with a hangover, but no serious regrets. But that’s not what I did. Instead I left the race-lane arena and took the lift up the mountain to the private slopes, to the highest point I could reach. Ellen had told me not to be reckless so I would be reckless. I would make it from the tip top of the slopes to the very bottom in less time than anyone ever had, and I wouldn’t let moguls, dry patches, jumps, or extremely narrow paths detour me. I’d be equal opportunity and slow down for nothing.

Olympic races aren’t won on form, I muttered to myself. The winner is simply the fastest skier in the race. That’s it. Ellen doesn’t know what she’s talking about.

I decided that my entire life amounted to a series of attempts by the universe to hold me back. Nobody was on my side. I’d show them; I’d show the world. In my twisted, self-pitying state, I figured that my only chance for redemption was to conquer the slopes in front of me, to set both a personal and world record at once.

Halfway down the mountain I snagged my ski on a patch of ice and fell. I went tumbling at a pretty high velocity, but the real problem was my left knee. It twisted like an awkward middle-schooler at her very first boy/girl dance. The result was hot, stabbing agony. When I finally stopped rolling, bouncing off rocks and bruising every soft spot on my body, somebody from the ski patrol came. It was the calendar boy, Frank. (Seriously. The ski patrol really did have a calendar and Frank really was on the cover, shirtless, in tight black ski pants and suspenders.) Even though I was ready to pass out from the pain, I recognized him instantly as he climbed off his emergency snowmobile: muscled limbs, dreamy blue eyes, toothpaste ad smile.

“What’s the problem?” He asked in a light voice. “Are you hurt?”