Falling again

By the time Paige reached the bottom, it was dark. She no longer felt cold.

Paige dropped her phone.

She watched it fall and imagined herself falling too. It spiraled into a tree, bounced off a branch, and onto a snowy ledge. It stood perfectly upright as if someone planted it there. The screen glowed faintly through the flutter of snowfall.

Paige gripped the safety bar and tried to memorize the spot. The crooked pine. The orange fence sagging between two posts. A narrow ledge below the cliff where the snow had gathered.

The chairlift whisked her farther away.

She twisted in her seat, watching until the tree shrank to a dark scratch in the white.

At the summit she traced the trail up along a map. She shuffled over to the trailhead. The sign read ‘World’s End’ followed by two black diamonds.

Darkness was closing in. She weighed the risks. How would she drive home? How long until her family panicked? She didn’t know a single number.

Her ski tips dangled over the edge of the trail. She had never imagined something so steep. The slope dragged her in.

In three seconds she slipped thirty feet downhill. She thought she might never stop. Her heart was pounding.

She looked down to where the fence curved around a turn. There was still so far to go. She wondered if she would die. She looked up at the wall of ice behind her and saw no one had followed.

She wanted help but she felt so embarrassed. She knew the patrol would tell her to leave it behind. They would laugh. She didn’t want to need it. She couldn’t explain herself to them.

The ice beneath her skis felt like glass. The edges scraped uselessly across it. She jabbed both poles into the snow. The tips rattled against the hardpack before finally biting. The sudden stop jerked her shoulders forward and she gasped.

For a moment she stayed there, frozen in place, afraid that any movement would start the slide again.

She slid five more feet. The wind burned her cheeks. She started again.

Descent was possible but she needed to cut back quickly. With each turn she risked losing control. Each time she skidded, she would freeze. She needed time to slow her breath, regain her nerve. However, her muscles were cramping. Their shaking would make her slide again.

She heard voices. From the chair lift a couple said something she could not understand. Below them was the orange fence. She cut right. Her left leg slipped. She panicked. Her right leg spun too soon and she shot down the mountain.

She tried to snowplow, caught an edge, and fell on her back. Her legs went wide. She spread her body, trying to slow herself. Her skis hopped and shuddered along the ice. They hit snow and bounced rapidly before they stuck in. She exhaled deeply.

Relief was fleeting—she couldn't stand back up. Her legs were cocked outward so that her knees were on the ice and her ski tips pressed together. With each movement, she risked sliding again.

Maybe she could unclip and walk the rest of the way down.

With her pole she managed the left clip. When she popped her right, the left ski slid away. Her body spun toward it. She careened head first down the mountain. She flailed her limbs, trying to spin around.

Her right boot dug into the snow and she spun back feet first. Her heels carved out shavings of ice that pummeled her face. There was laughing from above. A flash of orange on her left. She spun again. She tried to scream but instead swallowed snow. Then she crashed into a mogul and was sent flying through the air.

She was now ten feet from that first impact. The mogul still had her left glove, pole, and blood. Her skis would be somewhere nearby. In the distance someone asked if she was okay.

She signaled yes. She didn’t know why.

She retrieved her glove and pole and began to climb. There was better snow along the edge—her boots cut in well. Along the way she saw other trails light up. Someone would be along soon.

At the fence she rested. She looked over the edge of the cliff and saw trees rising from a ledge below. There was the crooked pine, a hole in the snow along its branches. She tracked it down to the ledge. The phone stood upright in a drift before the edge. Beyond that ledge was nothing.

She tied her poles together and then one to the fence. She yanked on it. Hopefully it would hold her. She imagined how much easier it would be if she could actually grab it. She thought about how she probably couldn’t afford another for a while.

The chair lift slowed to a stop above her and so she cried again.

On her stomach, she lowered herself over the first ledge, digging her boots into the wall. She shimmied down the poles. Halfway she dropped.

The snow below her shifted and tumbled. It carried her towards the edge but she wrapped her arms around a tree. When her boots dug into hard packed snow beneath, she felt a shooting pain from her ankle.

When the snow settled and the mountain went quiet, she heard a snowmobile on the trail. She wondered if she’d be in trouble.

She wished she had called out to them.

The phone was closer now. Close enough that she could see the cracked corner of the case. A faint notification blinked on the screen and vanished.

Paige stretched one arm forward. The snow beneath her elbow sagged slightly. She stiffened. Tears curled along her cheeks and froze along her chin. Tiny grains of powder trickled past her wrist and disappeared over the edge.

She let go of the tree and crept closer. She pictured herself on whatever edge lay below this one. From above she would look just like her phone.

She inched closer. The snow below her grumbled. It could not hold. She extended her body outward. The drift crunched and groaned. She lunged.

Her fingers seized the phone. The snow gave away. Paige dropped into the dark below.