9
All the muscles in my legs ache as I walk up the hill that takes us from our chalet to the main part of the town. After a fairly full-on first day on the slopes, we all got back, showered, relaxed for an hour and then decided to explore the nearby village.
I’m thankful to be back in normal shoes and not those torturous boots.
They felt fine when I was skiing but the awkward clunky steps I had to take when the skis were off were not enjoyable.
And don’t even get me started on trying to walk downstairs in them to get to the toilet at lunch.
I had one slip and I thought I was a goner.
Death by ski boot would not be a good way to go.
Walking in my baby-blue Moon Boots by comparison is heavenly, and the climb is well worth it once we reach the top and I see the town for the first time.
The narrow street we’ve been following widens into a square, and at the centre sits a carved wooden snowman draped in warm white lights.
That’s not the only Christmassy decoration in sight, and anywhere else it would feel wrong given that it’s late January, but not here.
Here it makes sense. Cloudlike flakes of snow start to fall from the pure white sky and I couldn’t feel more like I’ve stepped into the pages of a festive children’s picture book if I tried.
‘Wow,’ I whisper on an exhale, my breath forming a temporary cloud in front of me.
‘I feel like I’m in a fairy tale. Or a Disney village,’ Meghan adds, unknowingly echoing my thoughts, whilst lifting a gloved hand to catch a falling flake.
‘It reminds me of that market we went to, the one in Germany,’ Adam leans down to say to me.
He’s been trying to start little conversations with me since we reunited at lunch, and although I was wary of them at first, slipping into our usual chats has felt like putting on your favourite pair of jeans.
Maybe it’s the change of pace here, the peace of it compared with the bustle of London. Maybe this is what we needed.
‘Goslar,’ I reply. ‘That was a good trip.’
One of my favourites of ours. He was only able to get two days off work before Christmas, but it was enough.
We spent them wandering the medieval German streets on the surprise getaway he’d planned.
The cobblestones and the twinkly lights are similar here, stretching across the square, criss-crossing in the middle as they’re strung from building to building.
Meghan whips her phone out of her pocket and starts taking photos, panning around to get some with the full group in shot, as well as a candid one of Adam and me.
He’s then called away by the guys, who are further ahead, scraping together snowballs from the piles ploughed to the sides of the road for a fight.
He flashes me a small smile before he joins them, while I stay with Tilly and Meghan.
The snowball fight escalates, and the gap between them and us widens, but we don’t call them back.
They came into town in pursuit of a sports bar to watch the football, while we have a different agenda: souvenir hunting.
Tilly links her arm through mine as we walk, and I lean in to rest my head on her shoulder. When I do, I get hit with a passing note of floral perfume.
I squeeze her arm, the question I was so eager to ask last night now coming back to mind.
‘You have some explaining to do,’ I start, curious to see if she guesses what I’m talking about.
Tilly’s face is totally blank, and when she does reply, it’s bland. Non-committal. ‘About what?’
Weird, I think. The way she’s fishing for a hint makes me wonder if that aftershave isn’t the only thing she’s keeping to herself. It’s not like Tilly to keep something bottled up, even things I sometimes wish she would.
‘The men’s aftershave.’ I cut to the chase. ‘I meant to ask you about it earlier, but last night I accidentally knocked over your bag and it fell out. Spill, girl! Who’s the mystery guy?’
Her eyebrows knit together, lips pinched and drawn to one side like she has no idea what I’m talking about. But then something clicks, and her mouth drops open into a small circle.
‘Oh, the aftershave! That’s…’ She trails off, looking around us like the answer is plastered on a shop sign. Meghan walks a few paces in front, oblivious to our conversation. ‘You know, it’s that guy. It belongs to… Jason,’ she finishes.
I blink. ‘Jason.’
She has most definitely never mentioned a Jason to me before.
‘Mhm.’ Her head bobs frantically. ‘I met him in the club and then went back to his. I guess it must have fallen in when I was gathering my stuff to leave. Funny, that.’
There’s a slight pause between each of her sentences.
‘And you didn’t mention this before because…’ I wait, letting her fill the gap.
The last time she slept with someone I was sent no less than six voice notes totalling nearly twenty minutes. And now all I’m getting is a name that sounds like she can’t remember, and a summary of her night reduced to a couple of sentences.
‘There!’ Meghan’s voice shouts out from ahead of us, her finger pointing at a shop window that’s full of all kinds of trinkets.
Tilly’s attention darts towards where she’s pointing, and before I can question her more, she’s following Meghan across the road.
I can’t shake that sixth sense that her story is off.
Why would she lie about something like aftershave, or having a one-night stand?
It wouldn’t have been a first for her, and certainly not something she’s ever been private about before.
I brush it off for now, deciding to bring it up again when her brain isn’t scrambled from a full day of skiing, and catch up with them both.
Hanging next to the door of the shop is a slab of oakwood with La Maison des Cadeaux painted in white cursive letters, confirming we’re in the right place.
As we head closer, the door swings open, setting off a small bell that hangs over the top, and we’re greeted by two familiar faces.
‘Hello, girls! Are you doing some shopping too? Oh, you’ll love what I bought in there!’
Penny’s wearing the same patchwork jacket she sported on the slopes, but even without it I would’ve recognised her. Bill’s there too, standing stoically at her side as she pries a little brown paper bag from his hand, which he seems reluctant to part with.
‘They really don’t need to see—’
He stops when it’s too late and Penny’s already secured the bag and revealed her souvenir to us. In her hand rests a little fridge magnet with the name of the resort at the top, and a woman skiing in the foreground.
Totally topless.
Penny chuckles and she puts the magnet away and catches Bill’s disapproving expression.
‘Lighten up, dear. Ridiculous fridge magnets are our tradition, and it was between this one or the one of the man skiing with no trousers on, so count yourself lucky. Anyway, enjoy your afternoon, girls. We’ll see you tomorrow! ’
She loops her arm through Bill’s and he places his hand over hers, giving a long-suffering sigh that can’t hide how clearly he loves her silly ways. Together they amble off in the direction we came from while we head into the shop.
‘Ooh, fur headbands,’ Meghan exclaims the moment we step inside, and the three of us naturally spread out to explore different corners of the shop.
Unsurprisingly, I’m drawn straight to a section with a selection of paintings and art prints.
There are little postcards and graphic prints but what catches my attention most is a painting of a chairlift cutting through the trees.
The paint is thickly layered, and I admire the impasto technique which makes the falling snow come alive on the canvas.
It’s messy and real, and it’s like I’m right there being carried through the snow. I love it.
It brings to mind the one that was above Rory’s bed, which had none of the authenticity of this piece.
Rory.
I’d planned on spending this week figuring out my feelings for Adam, yet since seeing Rory today I find myself thinking more frequently about him instead.
Silly things, like with this painting and how I’m considering taking a photo of it to show him.
I drop the thought though, deeming it too inappropriate.
Instead, I weave my way towards a wall covered in fabric sew-on patches. There’s a section of ski school related ones, and I find several that match the logo of our beginner’s class. I reach out to peel one off the wall when I’m stopped by a voice.
‘Typically, you wait until after you’ve finished ski school to buy the patch. Otherwise, it’s bad luck.’
I jolt, nearly knocking some of the display down with my shoulder as I turn towards the voice that came from the back of the shop.
I have to do a double take to be sure I’m not hallucinating Rory standing there. He’s still there, his large frame out of place in the cramped gift shop.
He’s holding a mug of something hot, steam twirling up from the surface as he lifts the edge to his lips and takes a sip before setting the mug down on a side table.
‘Do you work here?’ I ask, trying to figure out the when, how and why of him being here. Is this what he does when he’s not teaching?
He shakes his head before I start believing he’s a part-time gift shop owner. ‘No. But the owner, Claudia, is a family friend and she likes me to pop by when I can. I reckon it’s less for a chat and more so she can take a break, like she is right now.’
He tuts, then adjusts a Christmas ornament that’s spun to face the wrong way.
‘Sounds like you’ve spent quite a lot of time here if you’re friends with the shop owners,’ I comment.
He shrugs. ‘Something like that.’
He doesn’t elaborate and switches the conversation by walking over to me and pointing at the patch I was mid-removing. ‘Orange. Is that your favourite colour?’
It’s not, and that’s the first time I notice the one I’ve picked out is that colour.
I like it, but I couldn’t say it’s my favourite.
I don’t have one; my favourite colour shifts depending on whatever I’m painting.
When I’m back home in the woods near my parents’ house on the outskirts of London it’s green.
Green like the leaves, the clusters of trees or the moss.
When I’m in the city, sometimes it’s red.
Like buses, postboxes and the circle of the tube station signs.
‘I don’t really have a favourite,’ I admit.
‘In that case…’ He reaches over my shoulder to pluck a badge which has a midnight-blue background and white thread for the letters. ‘Get this one.’
His fingers gently circle my wrist and he turns it so my palm is facing upwards before pressing the patch into it. Examining it more closely, I’ll admit it has a lovely design. The background appears to be speckled with little white dots like falling snow.
‘Why this one?’
‘Because blue is my favourite.’
It’s only a mundane fact, the most generic of them all, but I still squirrel it away. I think about buying it because it’s pretty, definitely not due to the fact that it’s his favourite, but then I remember what he said when he first saw me.
‘What about it being bad luck?’
He seems to have quickly changed his mind as he bats his hand through the air between us. ‘It’s bad luck for most people, but I’ve heard that you have a pretty great instructor so…’
He might be cocky, but his confidence is annoyingly attractive.
His expression changes to one more serious before he next speaks. ‘Lottie, I’m really glad I bumped into you, because I wanted to say—’
‘I found the other magnet Penny was talking about and look at the size of this guy’s knob!’
Tilly bursts into the moment from one of the hidden parts of the shop, thrusting a magnet in my face that indeed features a disproportionately large penis for the small ceramic man it’s moulded onto.
‘Ah, that’s one of Claudia’s favourites. I’m not sure she’d actually let you buy it.’
It’s then that Tilly notices Rory, her head swivelling like a meerkat between the two of us. ‘Oh! Sorry, was I interrupting something? Ignore me! Nothing to see here except a concerningly inaccurate depiction of male anatomy.’
She starts to back away, walking on her tiptoes like she’ll become invisible if she’s quiet enough. Rory lifts his chin in greeting at someone behind me, and when I turn there’s a lady who’s crossing the road and heading towards the shop. I guess she must be Claudia.
‘It’s fine, I actually better be going. I have some prep to do for the quiz tonight.’
‘Quiz?’ Tilly’s head reappears from behind a spinning postcard display she tried hiding behind. ‘We’re going to be there too!’
Rory turns to me for confirmation, and I nod.
‘Still brainstorming our team name, but yeah, we’ll be there.’
He’s still for a moment, considering this information before the bell dings again above the door.
The owner returns and immediately spots Rory’s discarded mug, which earns him a chiding glare.
He picks it up and moves to take it into a back room, pausing before he disappears, turning back towards me. ‘I’ll see you tonight then, Lottie.’
He’s gone around the corner before I can reply, and I realise he didn’t continue whatever it was he’d started to say. I’m left alone, my thumb stroking idly across the patch still sitting in my palm.
Without overthinking it, I head to the counter, pay, and leave the shop before he reappears.