Page 13 of The Mountain
Stephanie gives me a small, sad smile, brown eyes gentling with understanding. Something tightens behind my ribs, my throat suddenly thick, and I find my gaze dropping to my lap. To the helmet clutched against my stomach. To the snow melting off my boots and dampening the carpet under my feet.
“Someone slipped something in my drink the night before last.” It’s barely more than a whisper, but my words crackle likeelectricity in the air around us, dimming the buzz of the ancient computer. “I… I’m still not feeling very good.”
I lift my chin, forcing myself to meet Chris’s open-mouthed stare.Shoulders back. Look them in the eye.
Chris blinks in surprise, the color draining from his face. “Oh.” The one word catches in his throat.
“Yes. Oh.” Stephanie parrots dryly. She leans forward, her forearms resting on Chris’s desk, her hands folded together. “Now. I’d say those are the right circumstances for giving someone time off. Wouldn’t you agree, Chris?”
His lips thin, thick brows dipping as his gaze moves from Stephanie to me. “But how do we know she’s telling the truth?” Chris muses, and I feel like he’s talking to himself now more than to either of us. “Shouldn’t we ask for a doctor’s note or something?”
“Is that what you want to do?” Stephanie asks. “You want Lily to go to the doctor? Drive herself there, presumably, then come back to you with a little note?” Stephanie’s voice is thick with sarcasm, her distinctively East Coast accent sharpening as she lifts her wrist exaggeratedly, ski coat slipping back to reveal a very expensive-looking smart watch. “Let’s see. It’s 11 a.m. now. It’ll only be about an hour’s drive down the canyon to the nearest urgent doctor—at least, to the nearest one that isn’t dealing with life-threatening ski injuries—and then probably a four-hour wait. Maybe more. And then another hour’s drive back. So, she might get you your little note before the mountain closes for the day. Possibly.”
Chris huffs, opening his mouth to say something, but Stephanie powers on. “Or, you tell her she has to work. Put her out onthe snow with a bunch of newbies. A bunch of teenagers, likely. And just hope she doesn’t puke or pass out. Not a good look for the mountain if she does. Of course, if a student gets injured and they blame her—well, they blame the mountain—that could prove awkward. You know, if she has illicit drugs in her system. That she told you about.”
“Fuck.” Chris throws himself back in his chair, feet kicking out in front of him under the desk. He stares at Stephanie, a strange mixture of bemusement, respect, and irritation contorting his features. “You’re like a goddamn bulldog with a bone, you know that, Steph?” He shakes his head and attempts a smile. “You not getting enough time on the snow, is that what this is about?”
I think… I think he means it as a joke. As a way to inject some lightheartedness into the conversation.
It falls flat, landing like a wet glove on the desk between them.
Stephanie stiffens, her whole body stilling as she stares at Chris, reminding me for a brief moment of some sort of feline predator eyeing its prey.
“You think this is a joke.” Her voice is low, calm. In the way that the surface of the ocean is glassy beneath a rip.
Chris pales, his lips pressing together in a thin line. He shakes his head, a nearly imperceptible movement.
“You know where I was this morning?” Stephanie asks. She doesn’t give Chris a chance to answer. “The private lesson office. Listening to a customer complain that her daughter was given a male instructor. When she specifically asked for a female one.” Manicured fingernails tap on the cheap laminate wood. “Because—for some reason that is completely beyond logicand understanding—we don’t have enough female instructors rostered onto private lessons.”
Chris lifts one hand, bushy brows raising, lips curving with the confidence of someone who has suddenly found solid ground. “We have a merit-based rostering system this year,” he says loftily. “The highest-ranked instructors get the private lessons, the lower-ranked ones get the big groups. That’s how it works.” He smirks, then adds: “It’s not my fault we have more high-ranked male instructors than female.”
Stephanie gives a derisive snort. “You’re a bigger idiot than I thought. You know what that mom did when we couldn’t get her daughter the instructor she wanted? She went to the Canyons.The Canyons,” she repeats, saying that rival ski resort’s name like a whispered curse. “So, that’s what your new merit-based system is getting you. Lost profits. To the Canyons. What do you think our shareholders are going to think about that?”
Chris stares at her blankly for a long moment, like he’s processing the information she’s just given him, and not particularly liking it. I surreptitiously look between the pair of them, trying to keep as still as possible, feeling increasingly queasy under the buzzing florescent lights—and feeling like a forgotten spectator to a conversation that doesn’t involve me. A conversation that, in all likelihood, I’m not meant to be overhearing.
“Right,” Chris finally says, clearing his throat. “Well. That’s…”
“Why management is supposed to run these sorts of decisions past the board?” she suggests. “Why the mountain doesn’t let people like you make strategic decisions?”
Chris rubs the back of his neck with one hand. “I… I was going to say ‘unfortunate.’ That she wasn’t happy with what we had to offer…” His voice rises in pitch, tapering off with a faint crackling sound.
“You know what is unfortunate, Chris?” Stephanie asks. “I’m going to have to relay all this information to the board when I meet with them this afternoon.” She shakes her head in mock sympathy, the triumphant smile in her voice at odds with the sentiment. “The new rostering system…” She lifts one finger, counting off her concerns one by one. “The appallingly inflexible sick-leave policy. Your general disregard for student safety and staff safety.” She cocks her head to one side, considering, then adds: “Oh. And the fact that you don’t seem to understand that the entire point of this operation is to make money.”
Chris’s throat bobs, his face going so pale, I think he’s going to be sick. The sight has my own stomach tightening in sympathetic response, the walls and floor lilting precariously around me and I let out a stifled whimper.
Both Chris and Stephanie turn to look at me, almost in surprise, as if they’d forgotten I was here. And then Stephanie’s expression softens. She reaches out to gently clap me on the shoulder, her hand landing on the new instructor’s jacket that I’m now starting to sweat under.
“I think we can send Lily home for the day. Don’t you agree Chris?”
Chris nods, a slow, recalcitrant movement, his lips curving into a bitter frown. “I suppose…”
“And then tomorrow, assuming she’s fit for the snow, I want her and Tessa put on the private lesson roster. Vivian too.”
Chris opens his mouth, the protest nearly visible on his pale lips, but Stephanie lifts one hand, silencing him.
“They can go on group lessons if there aren’t requests for female instructors,” she continues. “But I want them available for private lessons. I won’t have us losing out on business, Chris, is that clear? I won’t stand for it, and I know the other shareholders won’t stand for it either.”
Chris closes his lips over a grimace, then gives a curt nod. “Understood.”
