They’re a reminder of him. Of us. Of what I did.
I get up and push the windows open. The lake is quiet, the air cool in a way it never gets during the day. A smattering of glittering lights across the water mark the village where Sylvie lives.
I look to the left. It’s hard to make out her small balcony in the darkness, the twin to mine. But it’s there.
She better not have heard anything. I’ve been told in thepast that I scream, when the nightmare gets bad, but she’s the last person who can know about this.
I close my eyes and let the cool air wash over me, much like the snow didn’t. It wasn’t pleasantly cool and it wasn’t gentle.
The wall of snow came suddenly. Around us, the mountain was serene until it suddenly wasn’t, until a deep crack rang out across the white and changed everything.
Snow looks soft.
It’s not. Not at that speed, not when the ground shakes beneath you. Etienne must have realized what was coming before I did. He was higher up the slope, following me and my impulsive decision.
I heard him yell.Bouge! Va à côté!
But no one can outski an avalanche, and no one can outrun their fate. Or their mistakes. We were above the tree line and there was nowhere to go but down. Nowhere to run but forward.
And it caught up with us.
The river of snow swept me away, and beneath its surface, it crushed me. It felt like being ripped apart. Grated against the mountainside by a force greater than any I’ve known.
And then the snow settled like a blanket, a giant rearranging himself, the mountain once again quiet. Except for the two teenage boys tossed and buried beneath it.
There are rules on what to do in an avalanche. Create an air pocket. Move toward the surface. Don’t expend too much energy.
Etienne knew them better than I did. He was the one who had painstakingly taught them to me before I started joining him on off-piste runs. He knew how to test a mountain for snow safety before a run. He was in charge of choosing which slopes we went down.
What you should do is hard to remember, though, whenyour mouth is full of snow and there’s nothing but a suffocating, tight blanket around every limb. I panicked and flailed.
Make spacepulsed through my mind. So I pushed with all my might against the crushing weight until the pocket grew. I spit out snow and took deep breaths to fill my lungs.
It was pitch dark and crushingly cold. Something hurt like hell against my side and my leg.Air.That was the next step. I needed air.
When I turned with a painful groan, the snow shifted above my hip. That way had to be toward the surface. It was a meager hope, but I listened to it and started burrowing my hand in that direction.
The snow coverage could be twice the length of my arm.
If it was, I was likely dead. The terror was overwhelming. Without air, you die in less than half an hour beneath the blanket of snow. Without air, your only hope is a quick rescue.
Tunneling was hard work. The snow was packed thick. I made it through to my elbow, and then a little bit farther. I tore off my glove to use my short nails to better dig, ignoring the biting cold. The thick snow gave way to the soft, powdery substance I knew so well.
A perfect slope.
My hand was out. Light streamed into the small pocket, and the relief was so strong that I nearly passed out. My skis were long gone. One pole remained, and I could tell that it was lodged deep, my left wrist bent at an unnatural angle.
The burning across my side intensified. I’d later learn that the snow had pushed me against rocks or ice and torn me up from my hip to my upper ribs, and blood was pulsing out of me. Only the tightness of my ski clothes and the cold helped slow the blood loss.
Biting against the searing pain, I slowly managed to take my wrist out of the wrap of the pole and lodge it out of the deep snow by my knee. It took time. It hurt. Painstakinglyslow movements. And then, when I had it, I threaded it through the hole I’d created to the surface.
A signal.
For the rescuers, whoalwayscome.
I knew these mountains intimately. They’re our mountains. Near the chalet I’d spent most holidays in, in the beautiful Swiss valley where I’d first learned to ski. Avalanches happen and a rescue team is on standby all through the winter.
But Etienne would probably find me first. Most people are helped by members of their own party, after all, and he was a better skier than me. Always quicker in the turns, with three years on me, much longer legs.
