Out of Your League

Chapter 19

With the term now over, it would be sensible to think that we would all leave each other behind to go to our own homes but that would be wrong. So very wrong.

In fact, despite having no compulsion whatsoever, the whole school was always in the same place for the first week of the Easter holidays every year – skiing. Like a train, we all followed each other to the ski resort that was considered fashionable that year. Every year, it was a different resort, but every year, it was the same people.

Skiing was fun – the outfits, the slopes, the chatting and speed, but the best thing? For me, the best thing was not skiing at all but the waffles and drinks you could find on the slopes whilst waiting for everyone else to come speeding down the mountain. Of course, my opinion was in the minority, most people actually came here to ski. Ed, for example, loved the speed, of course he did, it gave him a chance to be competitive and race others down the slopes. Even those who didn't consider skiing a favourite were very good – we had all been taken out to the Alpes since we were toddling around, hardly able to walk yet we were taught to ski and after 17 years of it, we had all reached an impressive standard.

One of the few people who didn't ski and spent the whole holiday relaxing in the jacuzzi's and spa's of the luxury hotels was Belle. She didn't like how the helmet made her hair frizzy, she didn't like all the food on the slopes which she claimed to be 'fattening' and she didn't like how the thick coats made her look fat. So, she always spent the majority of the holiday with a glass of champagne in her hand being given a massage by a skilled local.

On the second day of our skiing week, things were proceeding as usual – Belle was in the hotel, the boys were racing each other down the slopes and after a couple of races I had become bored and headed to a café that looked hopeful. I was happily sitting there working my way through an enormous waffle covered in Nutella and Chantilly, watching people I recognised from school heading down the slope at various speeds when someone approached me. I looked up with a mouthful of waffle and no doubt a few specks of Nutella on my clothes to see Ed's mother. Crap. I couldn't see her for the second time like this – but it was too late to move, she had nearly reached me so I swallowed my mouthful of waffle in an enormous gulp that I felt as it slowly passed down my throat.

'Colette,' she greeted me as she pulled out a chair without being invited to sit down. What was she here for? What? What? What? I wasn't easily intimidated but at that specific moment, I felt nervous as though I was two feet tall. She was my boyfriend's mother who disapproved of me, but Ed wasn't there to act as a buffer – that was a situation that no-one would want to be in.

As I was opening my mouth to issue a polite greeting, she interrupted me and began talking without looking at me. She was examining her nails as she told me, not even bothering to meet my eye,

'Look. I think that it is clear to everyone that you and Ed are a high school relationship. You will go your different ways at university once he becomes a lawyer and you, well...' she trailed off and looked at me with distain over my unplanned future. I couldn't believe she was saying this – she had always been gentle, and surely she more than anyone would understand not fitting in with the constraints placed on us? But now her gentle side had been washed away and a hard side was exposed. Except... this wasn't her speaking. This was his father, I could tell. Now I was pissed off, was he really not going to come and speak to me himself? But without me realising, she had been continuing with her clearly planned speech,

'about it and we think that it would be best if you could break up with him. He is falling further and further in love with you and it, you, are not suitable. It would be in the best interests of everyone for you to end it. Soon. You have to listen to me, just trust me.' No. People couldn't go around and tell me how to live my life. I didn't want to get on her bad side but they needed to know that this wasn't okay so I abruptly pushed my chair back, we both winced at the sound it made on the frozen wooden slats, then stood up and placed my hands on the table as I leaned towards her and said quietly but not weakly, almost hissing,