The chairlift stops again just as the lift station comes into sight. Someone has fallen over getting off and is for some reason taking forever to get themselves back upright, despite the lift guy hauling them up. There’s something purple in the snow by their feet – a hat or scarf. I watch as they bend to pick it up and drop their pole.
‘Hurry up!’ I mutter, through clenched teeth. My fingers hurt, they’re dug so far into my hands now. Andy looks at me sideways and says: ‘It’ll be OK. You need to calm down.’
‘I am calm!’ I snap, but I’m lying. I’m not. The lift finally starts moving again and we slide off onto the snow.
‘OK – I’ll take the left side, you take the right,’ I say. ‘We need to go down really slowly. Both of us,’ I emphasize. I feel like I’m going to be sick. The trail is narrow and what I want to say is, ‘We need to check over the edges too,’ but I can’t quite bring myself to. The weather is still closing in and it’s going to be impossible to see anything anyway. Andy nods solemnly. My unspoken words are hanging in the air.
I feel worse and worse as we ski down in near silence. I try to peer over the edges but it’s impossible. We call out periodically – ‘Hey! You there? You OK?’ but I can tell it’s pointless – I can’t even hear myself over the wind. We get to the bottom and look at each other.
I am so cold and stressed I can barely get my words out. ‘What do we do now?’
4
January 2020, La Madière, France
Ria
I didn’t want to come this week, for many reasons, but even so, it feels good to be in the mountains. The sun is out, the sky is blue and the air is clear. I went out this morning with every intention of playing the dutiful wife and skiing with Cass like Hugo wanted me to, but in the end I found that, after a few runs, I just couldn’t be bothered. Sorry, Hugo. Cass is young and boring and once I’ve asked about the baby which I’m not interested in and her former catering business (ditto) we don’t really have anything to say to each other.
I head back to the chalet hoping that no one will be there so I can spend some time in the hot tub on my own. But as soon as I open the door I can hear that someone else is here. Millie appears at the top of the stairs, straightens her logoed polo shirt and rearranges her face into its usual fixed smile.
‘Hello, Ria. I wasn’t expecting you back so early – I understood Simon had booked you an instructor for the whole day.’ Her forehead creases. ‘I hope everything’s OK?’
‘Yes, everything’s fine – just thought I’d spend some time in the hot tub.’ It comes out snappier than I’d intended, so I smile to try to soften it. Sometimes I forget how to play the part of the dutiful corporate wife. Or it’s not so much that I forget, it’s more that I simply don’t want to. ‘It’s a while since I’ve skied and my legs are already aching. Is it OK if I use the hot tub? I don’t want to get in your way.’
‘Yes of course!’ she gushes. ‘Whatever you like. I’ll go and take the cover off for you now if you want to go up and get changed? I’ve finished doing the rooms up here. Would you like me to bring you anything out there – a glass of bubbly maybe? Or some water?’
I shake my head. ‘No, that’s fine, thank you.’
Millie nods discreetly, comes down the stairs and goes out to the large terrace where I see steam rise from the hot tub as she pulls back the cover. After changing, I spend the afternoon alternating between the hot tub and the terrace, where Millie brings me a heated blanket for my lounger. I decide to take her up on her offer of a glass of champagne or two after all. It is blissful.
It’s amazing what a difference an afternoon all to myself makes to my mood – by the early evening I’m almost glad to be here. Almost. The fire is lit in the double-height living room, the stars are out, and the champagne is ice-cold. I guess things could be a lot worse.
‘Ria – may I introduce Matt please?’ Millie says as she offers me a tray of hors d’oeuvres. Matt is in the same polo shirt as Millie and very much in the same mould although older – immaculately groomed and with a fixed smile.
‘I’m the rep for Snow Snow within the resort,’ he says, shaking my hand. ‘We have five chalets here, as you may know, twenty throughout the Alps, but we like to pride ourselves on individual service. Is the chalet to your liking?’
‘Yes – it’s lovely,’ I say. ‘It’s even better in the flesh than in the pictures.’ I feel myself redden. I’m not sure why.
‘We’re particularly proud of this one – our most luxurious, even if it is one of the smaller ones,’ Matt says. ‘So how was your day today – did you get out on the slopes?’
‘I did for a while – it was very nice. And I enjoyed the hot tub too.’
His eyes almost imperceptibly flick up and down my body and I wonder if he is imagining me naked. Hugo comes over and puts his arm around my shoulders, but I shrug him off, pretending I’m reaching for a canapé.
‘Matt, this is Hugo,’ I say, deliberately not introducing him as my husband. Hugo shakes Matt’s hand and then starts boring on about the runs he and Simon did today, the specifications of his skis, the importance of various bits of kit and loads of other stuff that Matt no doubt has no desire to hear about.
I tune out for a while and when I turn my attention back to the conversation a few seconds (or minutes? Who knows?) later, the conversation has turned to how long Matt has worked in the resort and his plans for the future.
Eventually we sit down to dinner. I make sure I sit next to Matt – not because I particularly fancy him, but at least flirting with him will provide me with a distraction.
Dinner is amazing, again, and the wine is fabulous. I drink more than I should. Hugo won’t like me getting drunk, especially in front of a potential investor like Simon, but, well, whatever. I feel like drinking tonight and so I will. Getting drunk is the only way I’m going to get through the week, plus it’ll give me a good excuse to stay in bed tomorrow morning and not go to my boring ski lesson with boring Cass and listen to her bore on about her boring baby. Hugo is being pathetically sycophantic, laughing at Simon’s crap jokes in between glaring angrily at me when he thinks no one is looking.
Millie reappears at the table and Hugo puts his hand over my wine glass. ‘I think you’ve had enough, don’t you, darling?’ he says with a fake smile. He almost never does stuff like that – dares to tell me what to do. He’s obviously desperate to impress Simon.
But as far as I’m concerned, that doesn’t mean I can’t have a drink if I want to. ‘No, I don’t think I have,’ I say, flicking his hand off my glass and turning towards Millie. ‘More of the delicious red, please – thank you.’
Millie hesitates and then pours me a small glass. I feel a twinge of pity for her – it’s not fair to involve her in my rage towards Hugo. I resolve to leave her a huge tip when we leave. ‘In fact,’ I state, slurring slightly and, I admit, deliberately, riled by Hugo’s attempt to make me feel guilty, ‘I think we should play a drinking game. Who’s up for it?’