‘AS IF THAT’S GOING TO HELP!’ I thought to myself. I quickly turned my head back around to face the terrified looks of my friends and loved one. That hurt the most. Seeing Alfie go pure white and sitting with his head in his hands, looking absolutely petrified. I just wanted to be strong although I felt as if my life was about to flash before my eyes. I was trying my hardest to keep my eyes dry but it wasn’t quite working. I then felt a soft trickle of my teardrop running down my left cheek.
‘I don’t believe it!’ Ben said.
‘What?’ Reece and Sam queried within a millisecond.
‘Its only Mr Crossely…coming to save us’. I must admit, although the torture I was going through of thinking I was going to fall to my death, I did crack a smile and a tiny giggle to go with it. What we all alter found out was that the ski lift company did in fact have a rescue system in place which involved them climbing into a swing type bungee and gild down the wire that is connected to the gondolas. The technician had asked Mr crossely who had already reached the top to come with him encase we needed comforting by someone we knew. We all seemed to be okay. We kept each other strong and once we reached the top we just wanted to forget about it and carry on skiing. I’m was just so happy when I realised that me and my friends were safe that I do not remember much because it seemed such a blur, but one thing I do recollect is when my feet touched the hard and firm surface of the top gondola station. I remember just standing there, with my eyes shut and took a huge sigh of relief. Unknown to me, this was just the beginning…
…After the big ordeal on the gondola all eight of us just wanted to get in with our day. I would guess that we were about an hour and half into our 2 hour descending skiing back down to our hotel. Our ski instructors were called Alex and Alex, which you would think would be hard to tell them apart but in fact it wasn’t. There was quiet Alex who never spoke and loud Alex who told us what to do. Quiet Alex always wore a bandana and loud Alex always were a full in woolly hat. The only things that they had in common were that they were both fantastic skiers who I felt in safe hands with. Anyway, loud Alex told us that we were going to be trying the red slope. So as were all standing at the top, just about to go down, I got a waft of the smell coming from the trees. It’s hard to explain the smell but it was like a rather rich, marmite smell. You either love it or hate it. I hated it. As I nervously slid the first inch or two off my ski over the edge of the slope I whispered to myself
‘Come on Zoe, you can do this, you can do anything, you are on top of the world’. These words were just to calm me slightly and as I took a deep breathe of the fresh mountain air; I plummeted over the edge of the slope with no thought about what I were doing. I quickly gained control of my skis and as I took my first parallel turn (which I had only just been taught, the day before by quiet Alex). I then noticed that I was at the back and that the rest of my group were ahead of me. I tried to catch up but I was too busy trying to keep in control of my skis to worry about the speed I was going. As we reached half way down the slope, I made a steep parallel turn to the right. The powdery snow, which was kicked up by this move, fund its way up my sallopettes and made my legs absolutely freezing. This move also meant that I had caught up with the rest of my group although I was trailing at the back.
What is aw next was most probably the most amazing thing I’ve seen in my whole entire life. The speed at which our group were travelling down the slope would mean that it would be hard to stop. But that’s what happened. I was lucky because I was skiing at the back and only saw the incident. What happened was, everyone was skiing in a line and them Adam who was at the front decided he was going to be a clever sod and stop. It seemed to all happen in slow motion and I saw every little detail that occurred. The other 6 were not expecting to stop and then
‘Crash’. Alfie went into Adam, Tom went into Alfie, Reece Went into Tom, Sam went into Reece and Hayley and me had just enough time to realize what was going on and stop. Although Hayley very nearly went into the back of Sam but just skimmed her with a millimetre of space between them. As a result of all this all 5 of them that were in the pile up fell over but in, what I can only describe as a dominos form. One after another each one of them fell to the floor, leaving a pile of bodies just lying on the floor. All of this happened in a few milliseconds but I remember it so vivid that it seemed as if it took ten minutes. My immediate reaction to this was to laugh. But as I laughed I quickly stopped myself because I noticed the gaze of disgrace from my friends who were in the heap. It was if there were 5 devils all starring at me and giving me an evil look. I was just so pleased that I wasn’t involved because everyone skiing past was stopping to have a good look and laugh at our expense. I can just remember thinking to myself
‘How embarrassing’. I then come to my senses and the manners in me came out. I quickly undone my skis and rushed over to help get them up and back onto their skis. After it happened we all laughed about it but it wasn’t a very enjoyable time for them. We then just skied back down (without any more hiccups) back to the hotel to relax and get ready for the valentines disco at a bar across the road from our hotel.
It was 7 ‘o’ clock and we had just come back up to our room form dinner. Me, Sam and Hayley shared a room so we were all just touching up our make up before we went back down to meet the rest of the group.
‘Have you gave Alfie his valentines present yet Zo?’ Hayley asked
‘Yeah, I went down to his room when you was in the shower earlier’ I replied
‘Did you get anything?’ she queried again
‘Yeah a lousy box of chocolates is what she got for all the hard work she put into his present’ Sam butted in and answered.
‘Oh, don’t be like that, he’s a boy, what do you expect’ Hayley said to make us laugh
‘Yeah and besides I appreciate anything he gets me just because its form him and I love him so much’. But meanwhile as I was saying this I seemed to have this thought run through my mind that I had never thought before.
‘Does he really love me or is he just too scared of breaking up with me?’ I questioned myself but then thought I was just being stupid so ignored my instinct and carried on with the night.
It was now 9 ‘o’ clock and we had been at the disco for and hour and half. Id been having a whale of a time with the girls, boogying on down. I hadn’t even seen Alfie and it was meant to be valentines night by I didn’t really care. I see valentines as a normal day just with a special name. I and Hayley went to sit down why Sam went to get our drinks when I saw Tom Potter come strolling towards me. The feeling that I had felt that morning suddenly came over me again and I knew something bad was about to happen.
‘Zoe, Alfie wants to speak to you outside on your own for a minute’ He told me
‘Why?’ I asked
‘Its valentines duh, he probably wants to see you alone for a little while’ Hayley quickly replied before Tom.
‘Uh no, I think you better go outside Zo’. He told Hayley and me
I stood up hastily and as I started to walk I turned around to Hayley and mouthed
‘I know what he’s going to say’. The fact is, before today everything had been going just fine in our relationship but today there seemed to be a misty cloud over our heads, which was just raining down onto our relationship making it dull and damp. As I reached the door, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath through my mouth and prepared myself for the worst, which was to come. I stepped outside and saw him sitting around the corner on the bench. I acted like I didn’t suspect a thing, and just acted as if it were a normal day.
‘Hey babe’ I said
‘Hey’ he replied
‘Happy Valentines Day by the way, I haven’t had a chance to tell you all day, you know with the whole gondola thing.’
‘Yeah’. I noticed he was being a bit short with me and then when I looked into his eyes just about to tell him the three words, he turned away and said
‘Look, Zo, there’s something I’ve got to tell you’. I knew this was going to be bad. ‘Oh no’ I thought as my stomach rose into my throat.
‘Well, I love you... Did love you’ he said
‘What do you mean did?’
‘I just don’t feel the same way about you anymore’. I was now just waiting for those words to come.
‘I don’t think we can be together anymore’. And there they were. The words I had been waiting for. And there it was again, the second time in one day. The soft trickle of my teardrop, but this time it was down both cheeks and it wasn’t just one. They just kept coming and coming.
‘I’m so sorry’ He said just because he saw me crying.
‘Why... Why today...What have I done?’ I said trying to console myself
‘I couldn’t wait no longer, everyday seemed like a lie and lets face it we never were really good together were we’ he said to me. It was the completely wrong thing to say.
‘So is that what you think? I thought we were in love’ and here come that question that I thought of earlier in the evening.
‘Did you ever love me?’ He didn’t answer. I waited and waited. He didn’t answer. Just a blank look on his face as he took my hand and just looked at me. I pulled my hand away and got up. I walked back to the door. As I walked through the door I heard miss greaves (the nutty teacher who took us skiing) up on the microphone saying
‘Because it’s valentines day, a slow song for all you lovers and especially our zoe and Alfie’. Everyone turned and looked at me, my eyes were red roar and I had tears streaming down my face. In the midst of the moment I turned and ran back to the hotel where I locked myself in my room. The emotions I was feeling within that hour were just too horrific to relive so here is a diary entry from the moment I got back to the room:
‘I don’t believe it! How could he do that to me! I feel someone has got a kitchen knife, followed me around telling me they were my loving boyfriend then stabbed me and twisted my heart into a swirl then ripped it straight out of my chest. That’s how he just made me feel. Like I was nothing. Like this whole past year has been a lie. And to do it on Valentines Day, what a cheek, doesn’t he have any feelings for me at all? Well obviously not. Why didn’t he answer my question? I think that answer spoke for itself. How stupid could I have been to stick up for him earlier? Just to think this morning I was thinking that I was the luckiest girl on earth going out with him because he is perfect, kind, loving. Gorgeous and just what I look for. Now he has turned into someone I despise but yet still feel unconditional love for. I feel like just jumping from my balcony now because all I had in life has just been taken from under my feet. I guess he will never know just how much I love him. I have officially had the worst day in the history of the world…EVER!’
My resolution to that day came about the next morning when I woke up. Well not really because I had been awake all night thinking about my broken heart. My way of dealing with all the commotion of 14th February 2007 was to just delete the day out of my life. And now on 28th October 2008 I am sitting here still in the dark loneliness of my room thinking about that day. Yes I still think about Alfie, I haven’t really got a choice. He goes to my school and I have to see him every day. But the hardest thing, you know, is having to pass him in the corridor and see him in class and then when we accidentally catch each others eye, its breaks my heart all over again. I can’t let him go. I don’t think I ever will. But ill have to try. They say that first love dies. Well it hasn’t and I can’t shake him off of my heart. It’s as if he’s got a giant stamp and prodded it all over my precious and delicate heart. But as I said. I have now deleted that day out of my life and now when I see Alfie, yes I do feel heartbroken, but just for a second or two and then I say to myself
‘He’s just a friend, it never happened’ and everything seems to just go away. It’s as if I put a brick wall around my heart and now no one will ever break it again because my heart is too strong now. IN some ways I have some things to thank Alfie for. He made me stronger. So, Thanks Alfie.
