Chapter 9
Hinterstoder Ghosts
Playlist:
Aaron Pierre, Tiffany Boom: Tell Me It’s You
Idina Menzel: Let It Go
Hinterstoder, Austria, January 2
NIKO
The Hannes-Trinkl Strecke looks harmless from the bottom.
From up here, it looks like a bad idea carved into a mountain.
I shuffle my skis to the edge of the start pitch, jacket zipped to my chin.
Thomas poles to a stop above the compression. "This one'll eat you if you're not careful," he says, nodding at the narrow dip. "Drop the hip too soon and it folds you."
"Right," I say. "Respect the monster. Got it."
He glances at me, one corner of his mouth lifting. "Respecting the slope. Nico's all grown up since I left."
The words land harder than the joke they're pretending to be.
I shrug. "Had to. Someone needed to keep your seat warm."
"Warm?" Thomas snorts. "You set it on fire and left me the ashes."
It’s weird, skiing inspection beside him.
He’s been out with a torn ACL for most of this season. Now he's back, ready to take his leadership, as if he never left.
For a year, he’s been a ghost in my head—the guy they kept comparing me to, his horrific crash replaying whenever I closed my eyes. Now he’s flesh and breath next to me, boots clunking, voice low, talking about lines like it’s any other day at work.
Admiration sits warm in my chest. He made it back to his hill.
Right beside it, a smaller, meaner thought whispers: You only got to be king because he was gone.
I kick that one into the netting and focus on the snow.
***
Later, near the start hut, the vibe is different.
The athletes’ area buzzes with a different kind of noise now: fewer jokes, more throat-clearing, the clack of bindings, and the squeak of boots in the cold.
I peel off my warm layers, the air biting at the thin Lycra over my skin. The suit snaps back when I pull the zipper up, red and white and plastered with logos. Someone hands me my bib. Seven, crisp and staring.
Seven’s good. Not too early, not too late. The first guys will carve the line, show where the traps are. The ruts won’t be knee-deep yet when I get there.
If I’m fast, my time will sit on the board long enough to matter.
Left boot first, then right. Always. Two clicks on each buckle, top to bottom, never the other way. I tug the suit down over my shins.
Headphones on. Same songs. Tap poles together—one, two, three—until the sting in my palms drowns out the jitter in my gut.
Around me, Martin is arguing with Lukas about wax, someone’s cursing in Italian, and an American laughs too loud. It all feels a little distant, like sound underwater.
“Bib seven to the start tent,” a volunteer calls.
I duck inside the start tunnel, away from the wind. It smells like rubber matting, menthol, and nerves. A clock on the wall blinks the time to go.
I roll my neck, shake my arms out, and bounce twice on my feet. I run the course in my head—roll, blind crest, traverse, compression, bottom pitch—until I can almost feel each turn in my thighs.
When the starter sticks his head in and says, “Seven, to the wand,” my hands are steady.
I plant my skis on the start ramp, poles on either side of the wand. The valley stretches below, loud and distant, full of cowbells and red-white flags.
Goggles down. The world narrows to the fall line and the clock.
Downhill is where legends are made.
Don’t fuck it up.
The wand snaps back against my shins, and the hill drops under my skis.
The first pitch of Hannes Trinkl is always steeper than I remember it. The snow grabs my edges, my thighs light up, wind slaps my face. I fold into the tuck, chest over my knees, the hill coming at me like it’s on fast-forward.
First roll. My stomach drops as the ground disappears for a heartbeat, then punches back into my feet. Skis bite, chatter, find the groove others carved. I feel every rut through my shins.
Blind crest.
For a second, all I see is blue sky. I trust the inspection, the muscle memory gained through visualization, the way the track hums under my feet. Don’t look for the gate. It’ll be there. Hold. Don’t stand up. Let the skis run.
The blue flag pops into view exactly where it should, and I tip my whole body into it, inside hand brushing the snow. The netting flashes in my peripheral vision, orange and hungry.
Middle section. The course opens and screams at me to tuck and pray.
Earlier this season, I would have. Point them straight, close my eyes, hope my legs don’t explode.
I take a breath I don’t have time for and choose the slightly rounder line we talked about, one more tiny adjustment before I lock back into the fall line. It costs me a couple of inches of snow. Saves me a couple of months in rehab.
The next compression comes up like a fist. I stay a hair taller going in, just enough so it doesn’t fold me. The G-force slams into my thighs, my stomach tries to escape out my spine, then I’m spitting out of it, skis free, the finish in the distance.
Last gates. Legs burning, lungs on fire. There’s a final little bump that always feels too small and too big at the same time. I let it pop me, keep the skis flat when I land.
Then my skis cross the blue line in the finish, and it’s over.
I slam on the brakes, spray exploding around me, heart hammering against my ribs like it’s trying to rip the suit open. For a second, I hear nothing but my own breath in my helmet.
Then the time comes over the speakers.
I don’t catch the number, just the tone, the roar from the crowd.
First.
I stare up at it anyway, just to make sure. My name. My flag. Bib seven. Rank one. 1,2 seconds ahead.
Holy shit.
A laugh tears out of me, part victory, part disbelief. I glide past the line, bleed off speed, then pop my bindings and step out. The corral is just noise and flags as I shove my skis toward control and walk toward the team zone.
***
By the time I drop into the red chair, my legs are still buzzing, and my heart hasn’t figured out we’re done.
The leader’s chair is bright red and shaped like a luxury car seat, wrapping around me while the cameras close in. I flop into it like I don’t care, legs sprawled, hands laced behind my head, pretending my heart isn’t still doing Super-G in my chest.
Cameras shove in, lenses inches from my face. I flash the grin they all expect, shrug like this is normal.
Inside, I’m still on the hill.
I know who’s coming. Bellini from Italy, the living legend, Ryan Cole from the US, with glide like he’s got a motor hidden somewhere. The Swiss duo, Meier and Frei, one smooth, one pure chaos on skis.
Bib ten. The German guy. Fast at the top, bleeds time in the middle. I watch the splits on the screen, numbers flipping green, then red, then redder. He slots in behind me.
Bellini is bib twelve.
He blasts out of the start like his ass is on fire. First split, green. Second split, greener.
“Shit,” I breathe, too quiet for the TV mics.
He comes over the blind crest ragged but hanging on, dives into the compression lower than I dared. For a second, it looks genius.
Then the track spits him wide. He fights, recovers, but you can see the speed bleed out of him like air from a tire. By the time he hits the finish, the clock’s gone red. Fourth.
I exhale so hard my vision fuzzes for a moment.
Ryan Cole gets closer. Meier skis clean but safe, not enough. Frei nearly blows out and somehow stays upright, ends up somewhere around sixth, pounding his fist into his thigh at the finish.
Martin and Lukas show up in the start list, and I’m on my feet before I realize it, yelling “Go, go, go!” at the screen like they can hear me through the mountain.
Martin has a solid run, finishing in the top fifteen.
Lukas makes a big mistake but saves it, skis into the finish, shaking his head and still grinning.
In the middle of all this, my jacket buzzes.
I fish my phone out, half hidden from the cameras, thumb swiping the screen.
ELISE: You flew. Proud of you. Try not to break the podium this time.
No emojis. Just that. It still hits like a warm hand on the back of my neck.
I bite down on a smile, type nothing, and stuff the phone away again.
Later. Field first.
Then: Thomas.
Seeing his name on the start list does something strange to my chest. So it does to the crowd that starts chanting his name.
He pushes out of the gate, and the camera catches his first turns, compact, precise, nothing wild. He skis like a man who’s already met the helicopter and doesn’t intend to see it again.
I watch every frame, eyes glued to his line. Admiration and fear in the same breath.
He respects the roll, nails the blind crest like he’s got X-ray vision, sits a touch higher in the compression than he used to. The splits are decent. Not winning, but there.
“Come on,” I mutter. “Just bring it down.”
He does. Crosses the line, time pops: top ten. The crowd goes crazy anyway because it’s Thomas, because he’s here, because he made it back in one piece. Because this is something he can build on.
I sit back in the red chair when the last serious contender crosses the line, and the number next to my name doesn’t change.
Noise swells around me again—coaches, techs, media people converging. I barely hear them.
It settles slowly, like snow after a slide.
This is it.
Not almost. Not “good experience.” Not second by a breath.
First. In downhill.
On the Hannes Trinkl Strecke.
My fingers curl around the armrests of the cushioned chair. For a moment, I don’t smile at all. I just look up at my name on the board and let it sink all the way down.
This one’s mine.
***
Champagne tastes like victory and bad ideas.
It's everywhere. In my hair, on my eyelashes, down the inside of my collar where it's already turning cold. Matteo just dumped half a bottle over my head while laughing like we're at a wedding instead of a World Cup podium with cameras everywhere.