The adults in the room were roaring in laughter.
“Okay, okay. Mickey is justsofunny! Now, before we go out, since I’ve already made us late, let’s say a prayer together. Who wants to lead?”
We all joined hands as our teen Kianna led us in a beautiful moment.
“Dear Lord, We thank you for bringing us all together for such a special week over our Christmas break. We ask for your protection on the slopes, especially since Mickey is not as good as he thinks he is, and at his age, we are really worried he will get injured. Also, we think Claire’s new boyfriend is cool. We pray he is better than her last. In your name, Amen.”
Mickey and I stood in silence for a moment, staring at each other with a blank expression when Kianna’s mom, one of our other chaperones, stifling back her laughter, scolded her daughter. “Kianna, we don’t pray things like that!”
A group of boys started making an impression of Mickey on skis. It made me laugh so hard that I had tears rolling down my face. It wasn’t until Tara and two other instructors walked by that we knew we better get a move on. I was still giggling until I saw Tara’s face when she turned to greet us at the bottom of the bunny hill.
“Okay, gang. Let’s do a few more runs to perfect those ‘Pizza’ and ‘French Fries’ maneuvers. Claire, want to hold back for just a minute?”
I nodded and motioned for the teens to go to the magic carpet. “I’ll meet you guys back down here and do the next run with you.”
They were gone halfway through my sentence, eager to get back on the slopes. In light of an impending conversation with Tara, for once, there was nothing more I wanted to do than join them.
“I just wanted to ‘clear the air,’ so to speak.” Her implied use of air quotes made me smile since she was wearing mitten style gloves, and I couldn’t see her fingers. “I didn’t know Theo was your ex-boyfriend. I wouldn’t have let that interaction happen if I had. He told me how hard you took the breakup.”
I raised my eyebrows at that, but I supposed I wasn’t surprised. If Blake had asked about Theo, I would have told him anything he wanted to know as well. It was the same thing.
“Thanks, Tara. I think we were both blindsided by what just transpired. Don’t worry about it; let’s just move on.”
“Oh, that makes me so happy to hear you say that, Claire! I would love to just start over fresh with you. When I met Theo a few months ago, we had no idea that our friendship would grow into a romance. My point of all that was… I hope you don’t blame me for how things turned out, because I never intended to be a home wrecker.”
Her eyes were watering now, as if she was on the verge of tears, but she was smiling, as if her atonement was telling me. I hadn’t registered her words in my mind yet. My legs quivered as I slowly teetered back and forth on my skis. A fall was imminent, I could tell.
“A few months ago? How long have you been together?” Surely, I misheard Tara.
“Just a few weeks. Well, on my birthday, to be specific. December 13th.”
She smiled apologetically, as I took the information in. “Not to rub it in that it was so soon after your breakup, but when he said you’d parted ways, well, truthfully, I was expecting him to ask me out sooner.”
We broke up just three days before they got together. Was that not long enough? Or had Theo told her and me two different things? I was starting to wonder. A familiarfeeling took hold of my gut as Tara glided away on her skis. The wind had been knocked out of me. The last time this happened, I was roller skating in a friend’s garage when I was ten. I fell so hard on my rear-end, that I couldn’t breathe right for a few minutes. While I was still upright, I couldn’t see straight, my legs were weak, and if I hadn’t just found out my ex was courting another woman while we were still together, I would have surmised this to a stroke.
It was all I could do to excuse myself politely, telling Kianna’s mom I wasn’t feeling well suddenly, and needed to make it back into the lodge.
The first person I saw when I went inside was Tamara. She looked up at me expectantly.
“Claire! Are you okay? You don’t look well.” She got up and motioned to a chair for me to sit in. “What’s wrong?”
“Theo… was talking to another woman while we were still together. With my ski instructor. Tara.”
Tamara’s jaw dropped in disbelief. I may have been quickly moving past Theo, but the feelings of this fresh wound were just too much to bear. Before I knew it, I had told Tamara the entire story, including my reason for learning to ski, Theo’s supposed reason for dumping me, and then aboutgetting fired from my job. The more I told it, the more exhausting it felt.
“Oh, Claire. You’ve really been through it, haven’t you? I’m so sorry.”
She sat with me in silence as I let a few tears fall. But with each tear, the negativity was released from my heart.
“If there’s anything I’ve learned in life, it’s that ‘this too shall pass.’ There’s nothing in life that God can’t heal. He has a greater plan for you. And I believe it’s starting sooner than you think.”
I looked over at Tamara and hugged her. “Thank you for being such a good friend to me.”
She was looking at something behind me as she smiled.
“How’s my perfect and beautiful-in-every-way wife?” Mickey’s voice rang behind me.
“My blood sugar is good. No need to walk on eggshells, Mickey. Unless, of course, you want to.”
