Frank squinted at the screen.
‘I can’t see him, can you?’
The line of competitors were there out in the snow. The camera panned around to the organiser, who was presenting third place.
‘Congratulations again, Serena Valentino!’ Serena waved at the camera, her huge goggles obscuring most of her tiny frame.
‘Look at her. Tiny. She went like a rocket, but her legs are like toothpicks. It’s the aerodynamics you know.’
Marilyn sat on his bed, moving the pot of fresh flowers she’d brought in that morning so she could get a better look. She was knitting away, her eyes focused on the screen. Frank put his good arm around her, pulling her in to his side. She kissed him on the cheek.
‘Next time, do that with the other arm.’ He rolled his eyes at her, but nodded along.
‘I’ll do it for a bacon butty.’
‘In second place, with an impressive round, and all obstacles successfully navigated, Luke Sommersby!’
They both jumped up, bouncing up and down on the bed. Marilyn threw her knitting into the chair and shouted out to Dante, who was stood with the nurse at the medication trolley just outside.
‘Second place! He got second place! Fifteen thousand euros for this place!’
Dante whooped, hugging the nurse and totally taking her off her feet.
‘Yes! Hear that, Pam?’ Pam was twerking her head off.
‘I hear new equipment, Dante, and I like it!’
Marilyn left them boogying around the trolley and dashed back to Frank’s room. He was looking at the screen, watching his son take a trophy and a huge cheque. He’d looked so confident out there, Rebecca and Hans either had remote control skis, or Luke was a very fast learner. The whole time his son had been on that screen, Frank had waited for the usual constricting fear to take him over. The feeling he had had since the day he’d driven home from the hospital with a baby in the back of his car, and his life in tatters around him. He waited for it to kick in, but when Luke finally came to a stop and had crossed that finish line, all he could remember thinking the whole time was one word. WOW.
‘You okay?’ Marilyn asked him, a she dabbed at a tear he didn’t know he’d shed. Turning to look at her, he slowly manoeuvred his arm off the pillow it was resting on, and putting it around Marilyn’s middle, he gave her a tiny little squeeze.
‘Oh Frank!’ Marilyn looked at his arm as if it was made of solid gold, and to be honest, Frank felt like a millionaire at that moment. ‘You did it! I knew you could do it.’
He didn’t tell her he’d been practising extra hard. He’d had enough of waiting for life to end. That’s what he had been doing, really. Just waiting till it ended, and he’d done his job. Kept his son safe. Now, he was a man who wanted out of this bed. He was a man with plans too. He looked at his son on the screen again, Rebecca running into his arms the second he stood off the podium. He was safe, and happy.
‘I did, but my terms have changed.’
‘You don’t want my baps now?’ she quipped, and he laughed, concentrating hard on his arm around her waist as he moved her that bit closer. ‘Go on then, what’s the new deal?’
‘A bacon butty, and a date.’
Marilyn blushed.
‘Frank, I would love to, but I do have to say one thing.’ She brushed a bit of pillow-ruffled hair back behind his ear, and he waited. This was something that he’d been waiting a long time for. It’s just took a bit of drama to help him figure it out. Marilyn had always been the one he’d talk to, call when he was feeling blue. They’d put flowers down together for their lost loved ones, and she’d never once asked him for anything.
‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Be nice though, my courtship rituals are a bit rusty.’
‘I was just going to say, it’s about bloody time!’
His phone rang, and Luke’s name came up on the screen. They reached for it together.
*
This is it. This is it. Rebecca waited to head to the top, whilst Robbie stood at the bottom. The Alpine challenge was an obstacle course on the main slope that stood here. She’d been here before so many times, but this was her first time down it since the accident. The qualifiers had been different, on the lesser slopes. Alpine Gins wanted nothing to dull down the tension of the day to come. They wanted people to salivate for the event, and that they were. The stands were packed, the café full of people, so full they spilled out onto the street.
‘You okay?’ Hans stood beside her. He looked knackered.
‘I should be asking you that. Little Thor still not sleeping?’
‘No. He might as well have a hammer. It would be less annoying. I can hear him now.’ He shoved a gloved finger into his ear, waggling it.
‘I can’t believe Holly liked the name.’
‘Luke’s dead to me now. I’ve told him,’ Hans quipped.
She grinned, thinking of Luke who was basically like Tigger waiting for her to take her shot. Hans had physically restrained him, telling him to go watch in the café with Holly and Thor. They were in the flat so they didn’t scare the customers off. They all knew he wouldn’t.
‘He did well, didn’t he?’ She had felt the dread when Luke’s turn had come. She’d gripped Hans tight the whole time, not even minding when he squashed her to him. He’d looked amazing. Hans was right, he could do anything. ‘Don’t be too mad about the name.’
‘Wait until you have kids,’ he grumbled. ‘I’m going to pick the worst name ever.’
He nodded to someone behind her, and she heard the Tannoy of the announcer come to life.
‘It’s time, you can do this,’ he urged quickly. ‘You just need to beat him.’
Hans had bowed out of the competition with his baby coming a little bit early, but he’d dragged himself out to support her.
‘Thanks Hans, for everything.’
‘Please welcome our next and final Alpine Challenge Champion Slalom competitor, Rebecca Atkins. The Ice Rebel, with a time to beat from our current frontrunner, Robbie Goulding, of 1:42:46!’
Rebecca went through the motions, getting into position, readying herself. Alpe d’Huez stretched out beneath her, and she could feel the crisp air being sucked into her lungs. She nodded at the crew next to her, and the signal was sent that she was ready. She could hear the buzz in the crowd, see people with banners. They looked like ants waggling confetti. She always used to tell herself that, when she was up here, in this moment. They can’t see my fear up here. I look ready, coiled. Looking at the lights, she waited for the signal.
Ready …
She took a deep breath. She wanted this, but it didn’t define her anymore. She was a ski champion, and she would always love that, but she was more than that. She was a baker, and a lover. A daughter and a friend. An auntie to the future King of Asgard.
Set …
Another breath, and she focused on the poles laid out in front of her like a runway.
‘Come on Ice Rebel, let’s show them what we’ve got,’ she whispered to herself, and the light changed. Go …
She pushed off, her feet leaving the floor and her skis flying through the air, snow flicking off in all directions as she took flight. She listened to the wind, and her body, and braced, getting her feet and body into the perfect alignment to connect with the snow once more. She felt a flash of panic as she looked down at the people below her. She felt like she was soaring down the slope in slow motion, everything slowing down but her heartbeat.
‘Don’t panic, don’t panic, keep it together!’ she said out loud, her hands gripping the handles of her ski poles. ‘You are going to land. You are going to be fine.’
She got a flash of something, the memory of how she felt when she’d landed the last time. How her feet had fallen out from under her. Her ski had snapped, detaching the boot and sending her half cartwheeling and half crashing to the snow. The panic she’d felt when her body finally came to a stop was something that she would never forget. She wouldn’t survive that again.
‘So don’t fall,’ Luke’s voice came into her head. She thought of him down there, how scared he must feel too. It helped, to think of him, waiting for her. Win or lose, she’d be fine. She’d recover.
As she began the final descent to the slope, a calm washed over her with that new nugget of information, and she took a deep breath, dipped her knees and watched the ground come up to meet her. Contact. Her skis stood fast, and everything worked as it should.
‘Still on my feet!’ she crowed, taking a second to pump the air with a pole-clutching fist. She landed perfectly and headed towards the first set of poles. Traversing them easily, she ignored the crowd whizzing past, the cameras that would be focused on her determined face, the fact that the man she loved was down there watching. She just flew.
Before she had a chance to blink, she was at the bottom. The snow was spraying up from her feet, and she could feel the crowd erupt around her. Pulling off her goggles, she turned to look at the huge clock display, and saw her dad. He was waving at her like a maniac, dressed like a camping shop had exploded all over him. Her mother was standing next to him, waving a banner saying THAT’S OUR GIRL! GO BECKS! whilst drinking out of a pocket flask.
The announcer sprang to life, and Rebecca pushed her fingers to her lips quickly, putting it over her heart. Her mother burst into overwrought tears, and her dad blew her a big smacker back. I’m so glad they came. It’s how it always should have been.
‘The official time for Rebecca Atkins, The Ice Rebel, is …’
The Tannoy went all Charlie Brown in her head when the screen display sprang to life. Wuh-wuh-wuh-wuh.
1:37:18. Oh my God. That says 1:37:18.
The announcer popped back into her bubble of shock.
‘Alpine Gins has a new champion ladies and gentlemen! Rebecca Atkins, the Ice Rebel, and now, the Alpine Champion!’
‘Noooooooo!’ Robbie exploded behind her. His whiny voice was unmistakable. She watched as two women danced around him like little yappy chihuahuas in snow suits, trying to soothe his ego.
The place was going wild, and before she had much chance to process anything, she was in the thick of the crowd. She looked for her parents, but they were making out with each other against the barrier, so she gave them a moment. She wanted Luke. She kept scanning the crowd, talking to people, smiling for photos, letting the crew behind the scenes take her out of the ruckus, to get ready for the ceremony. Her poles were whisked off by a crew member, and she had autograph books and microphones shoved in her face. She saw a flash of something ginger and suddenly Luke was in front of her, basically being used as a shield by Hans, who was weaving through the crowd with surprising ease.
‘Hans! When I said get me to Rebecca, I didn’t mean as a battering ram!’
Hans ignored him, fist bumping Rebecca.
‘My friend, you were better than ever. Congratulations!’ He hugged her, pushing Luke’s face away with one hand as he tried to wiggle in.
‘Hans, bugger off!’
Hans gave him a dead arm, laughing hysterically as Luke span like a top.
‘Ha ha, that will cheer me up for a bit. You still owe me.’
‘Whatever Odin, let me kiss my girl.’
Hans formed a human shield for them to hide behind from the masses.
‘Bubble,’ they said together. Luke kissed her, pulling her tight to him.
‘Hey, do you think you could wear the skis later? That was HOT!’ He fanned himself theatrically. ‘You were amazing. I don’t think I took one breath or blinked the whole time. Your mother gave me a tot of whisky though, saw me through.’ He met her eye. ‘How do you feel?’
Looking around at the place she had called home for so long, feeling Luke wrapped around her, she smiled.
‘I feel like I’m still standing right there.’
She pointed to the tip of the slope.
‘In a good way?’ Luke frowned.
She looked at her parents, who were now standing next to Hans, pretending not to watch them. Hans looked like he was asleep. He kept wobbling a little, his eyes fluttering.
‘In the best way. I have all that.’ She nodded to the view. ‘But the best stuff is found right here, at the bottom.’
Luke pulled her to him and kissed her till they were pulled apart by the excited revellers.