Read Online Weak at the Knees by Jo Kessel - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Jo Kessel
Tags: Fiction, Contemporary Women
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cruises, ski holidays etc), how overpriced they are and some of the companies who run them. The name SFS, Ski for Schools, jumps out at me. That’s who my school trip was with when I was fourteen. It’s a surprise even to me, because I was singularly ungifted at skiing even then, and ever since, when it’s come to holidays, I’ve chosen sun over snow, but I find myself googling for their phone number all the same.
Amber used to ski every year with her Mum and also waxed lyrical about how sensationally fresh the air was in the mountains and I should really give it another try. So, as I dial the number for SFS, it does feel like there is some strange method in my madness. The only way I can move on is to move away from Hugo and from London, from the pain. Seeing as Amber never got to live her dream of life abroad, life down under, life in fresher air, perhaps I can live it for her. We both got too sidetracked, so busy living life that we forgot to live our dreams. It might be too late for Amber, but it’s not too late for me. If I wait much longer it might be though.
Whilst calling SFS on impulse, to see if they can employ me to do a job abroad in the freshest of air doing a sport that Amber loved, might make perfect sense on an emotional level, on a practical level it’s faintly ridiculous. By this time of year, early November, they’re unlikely to still be recruiting for this imminent winter season.
*****
I get put through to Lorraine, head of operations, and try to sell myself. I explain that I speak fluent French and have always wanted to be a ski rep (well, when I was fourteen the girl doing it looked like she was having fun) and also have plenty of experience working with children.
“You’ll never believe it,” she interrupts, “but one of my France reps has just pulled out. Are you by any chance able to come to meet me today?”
“No problem,” I reply, stunned. I’m a firm believer that timing is everything.
I take down the address, get Mum’s permission to borrow her car and head straight off. After a twenty minute interview conducted in French, about my year abroad in Paris, my work experience with kids, my love of skiing (minor fib) and my having been skiing four times (major fib), Lorraine unbelievably offers me a job as a rep in a ski resort called Montgenèvre, which is in a pocket of the French Alps so close to the border with Italy that you can ski two countries in one day.
I thank her for the opportunity, uplifted by the whiff of a new beginning and fresh alpine air lease of life. She tells me there’s a training weekend nearby in a fortnight and a training week for the whole team in my resort two weeks later. A week after that the season would begin.
I leave the office gainfully employed, marvelling at the ease of it all. Over the next four weeks I get on better than ever with my parents, especially with my mother, because my sojourn in their place is now only short-term. Over the next four weeks, twice a week, I take myself to the nearest dry ski slope in Hemel Hempstead to brush up on my skiing technique. Over the next four weeks I don’t for one minute regret leaving Hugo and wouldn’t trade in this blissful, newfound feeling of freedom for the world. Over the next four weeks I sporadically wonder how I could feel so much for eleven years and now feel so little. Over the next four weeks I’m constantly looking up at the sky, which is where I imagine Amber to be, floating above a big puffy white cloud, chatting to her about my new job. Over the next four weeks I keep asking her a rhetorical question. I am doing the right thing, aren’t I? Each time she tells me she’s exceptionally proud of me.
Chapter Nine
It’s the beginning of December and an Australian, a fellow rep called Rod, is picking me up to take me to the French Alps for our training week. I’d clocked his accent and fair hair straight away at the training
Amber used to ski every year with her Mum and also waxed lyrical about how sensationally fresh the air was in the mountains and I should really give it another try. So, as I dial the number for SFS, it does feel like there is some strange method in my madness. The only way I can move on is to move away from Hugo and from London, from the pain. Seeing as Amber never got to live her dream of life abroad, life down under, life in fresher air, perhaps I can live it for her. We both got too sidetracked, so busy living life that we forgot to live our dreams. It might be too late for Amber, but it’s not too late for me. If I wait much longer it might be though.
Whilst calling SFS on impulse, to see if they can employ me to do a job abroad in the freshest of air doing a sport that Amber loved, might make perfect sense on an emotional level, on a practical level it’s faintly ridiculous. By this time of year, early November, they’re unlikely to still be recruiting for this imminent winter season.
*****
I get put through to Lorraine, head of operations, and try to sell myself. I explain that I speak fluent French and have always wanted to be a ski rep (well, when I was fourteen the girl doing it looked like she was having fun) and also have plenty of experience working with children.
“You’ll never believe it,” she interrupts, “but one of my France reps has just pulled out. Are you by any chance able to come to meet me today?”
“No problem,” I reply, stunned. I’m a firm believer that timing is everything.
I take down the address, get Mum’s permission to borrow her car and head straight off. After a twenty minute interview conducted in French, about my year abroad in Paris, my work experience with kids, my love of skiing (minor fib) and my having been skiing four times (major fib), Lorraine unbelievably offers me a job as a rep in a ski resort called Montgenèvre, which is in a pocket of the French Alps so close to the border with Italy that you can ski two countries in one day.
I thank her for the opportunity, uplifted by the whiff of a new beginning and fresh alpine air lease of life. She tells me there’s a training weekend nearby in a fortnight and a training week for the whole team in my resort two weeks later. A week after that the season would begin.
I leave the office gainfully employed, marvelling at the ease of it all. Over the next four weeks I get on better than ever with my parents, especially with my mother, because my sojourn in their place is now only short-term. Over the next four weeks, twice a week, I take myself to the nearest dry ski slope in Hemel Hempstead to brush up on my skiing technique. Over the next four weeks I don’t for one minute regret leaving Hugo and wouldn’t trade in this blissful, newfound feeling of freedom for the world. Over the next four weeks I sporadically wonder how I could feel so much for eleven years and now feel so little. Over the next four weeks I’m constantly looking up at the sky, which is where I imagine Amber to be, floating above a big puffy white cloud, chatting to her about my new job. Over the next four weeks I keep asking her a rhetorical question. I am doing the right thing, aren’t I? Each time she tells me she’s exceptionally proud of me.
Chapter Nine
It’s the beginning of December and an Australian, a fellow rep called Rod, is picking me up to take me to the French Alps for our training week. I’d clocked his accent and fair hair straight away at the training
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