Page 19 of Head Over Skis

‘Meghan?’ I ask, dreading where this is going.

She places both of her skis in front of her and takes a step backwards before she speaks. ‘Um, yeah about that… I may have already texted Lucas.’

For a moment, they are both silent, with Meghan barely visible behind the ski-shield she’s constructed. Then I’m lunging towards her, the skis doing nothing to protect her from my flailing arms as I reach towards her pocket.

‘Give me the phone!’

‘Ouch, get off me!’

‘Calm down, Lottie, this will all be fine…’

We stop when we hear someone pointedly cough behind us. I freeze, one hand still prising open the zip of Meghan’s coat, the other barely holding my skis upright.

‘Ready to start your first lesson, ladies?’

None of us say anything in response to what I take as a rhetorical question from Rory. Instead, we silently rearrange ourselves back into a line and I keep my head down, concentrating firmly on the snow by my feet, feeling like I’ve been told off for fighting on the school playground.

‘I’ve deleted the message,’ Meghan whispers a few seconds later. ‘It was on WhatsApp and it was unread so you should be in the clear.’

I sigh with relief, whispering a thank you back, glad that I can avoid at least some of the teasing this situation is bringing. But something tells me I won’t get a break from it from the two girls behind me.

Rory stands in front of us with his arms folded, trying to appear stern, but his pursed lips are a dead giveaway that he’s trying really hard not to smile. I swear I don’t have a kink for the whole teacher-student thing, but with Rory standing in front of me now, I could convince myself I do.

I spend the next ten minutes trying to focus as Rory instructs us on how to position ourselves and our skis to make it down the hill without dying, laughing whenever Penny pokes her husband with one of her poles and tells him to cheer up. While he talks, Rory takes care to address each of us individually, but pays me no more attention than any of his other students. If I needed confirmation on how unaffected he is by this whole situation, I have it.

Am I offended at his obvious indifference? Maybe a little. Will I now make it my mission to play it equally as cool? Absolutely.

Not that there’s anything going on anyway. It was one inconsequential night, and now I’m here to learn how to ski.

That’s all there is to it, so I finally start paying attention.

8

‘Okay, we’re all going to make our way down to the bottom of this slope in one long line. Try to follow the person in front of you and make slow controlled turns all the way to the bottom.

‘Keep the tops of your skis pointing towards each other in your snow plough and keep your arms out to the sides to help with your balance. Everyone show me that position now so I can check we all know what we’re doing.’

I was almost enjoying the lesson up until this point, but that’s probably because we’re yet to do any skiing. Standing here, getting to listen to Rory and act like I haven’t seen everything that’s underneath that ski suit has been oddly thrilling. But now that it seems like I’m about to be forced to face what’s considered the baby slope (but still seems pretty steep to me), I’m enjoying this a lot less.

Everyone shuffles their feet so we’re standing in our ‘snow plough’ position, which I now know is what David was manically trying to get me to do when he was shouting ‘pizza’ as I slid to a snowy death earlier. Rory walks in a slow semicircle around us, starting with Stephen, who he tries to get to relax more into his posture.

When he reaches me he inspects my body from my head down to where my feet sit inside my ski boots. It would feel intimate if he was looking over my body to admire it, but he lingers nowhere and it’s clear he’s merely assessing my positioning. Plus, he’s frowning, something I hope wouldn’t be the case in the first instance.

‘Are your shins touching the front of your boots?’

‘Uh, maybe?’ I say, not really sure what it would feel like if they weren’t. At my answer he bends down so he’s crouched at my feet, one of his hands reaching down the front of my boot before he shakes his head.

‘You need to lean forward on your feet so your shins are touching the front, here.’

My brain switches off for a second as his hand touches the back of my calf, guiding it forwards until my leg connects with the fabric of my boot.

‘There, you feel the difference?’

Yes, I feel the difference between having your fingers touching me and not.

Of course I don’t say that, and settle for nodding. He smiles, moving his hands away and standing up so his face hovers a few inches in front of mine.

‘Good,’ he says, and for a bizarre second, I imagine he’ll lean in to kiss me. But if his eyes did flick down to my lips, I must’ve imagined it, because before I’ve blinked he’s moved on to Tilly. He bends down to help tighten her boots and I catch her smiling teasingly at me over his head. I ignore her, turning my attention back to the training slope ahead of us and preparing myself to start skiing. Rory finishes checking through the group and moves back to the front.