Page 84 of Elijah

Elijah

aged 22

It had been almost two months since we’d lost the baby, and things were gradually getting back to normal.

Normal if you called the huge lump of grief sitting in your gut, normal.

Normal if listening to your wife cry while taking a bath, normal.

Normal if not seeing joy and laughter in her eyes any longer, normal.

Otherwise, we were getting on with life as usual. There was a little more urgency when we had sex; after having a six week check-up, Amy had become insatiable. At first, I wondered whether she was desperately trying to get pregnant again, but when I broached the subject, she was adamant that we waited for a couple of years before we tried again. Do the things we planned before our little surprise had come along.

Which was why we were at an indoor ski slope, getting some practice in for the skiing holiday that Amy and Rachel wanted to organise.

Rachel, Amy, and I had been skiing with the sixth form, when we were eighteen, but none of us had skied since. Adam, Rachel’s boyfriend, was pretty good, having been a few times, and I was okay. I wouldn’t be doing any black runs, but I was able to stay on my feet and get from the top to the bottom without too much trouble. Amy and Rachel, however, weren’t so good.

Amy had been on her backside far more often than she was on her feet, but she was handling it like a champ, unlike Rachel who was almost crying with the frustration of having not only a bruised arse, but bruised pride too.

“Don’t let her see you laughing,” Adam said, at the same time as he turned his head to laugh.

“Oh fuck,” I cried. “Move. Amy is coming straight for us.”

Adam and I jumped out of the way, just in time as Amy bowled through us and a group of kids, scattering us like a set of ten pins at a bowling alley.

“Oi,” one of the kids shouted. “You nearly killed us.”

Adam and I roared laughing, our eyes still on Amy, as she squealed before catching her skis together and flying arse over tit.

“Oh shit,” I groaned. “I’d better go and help her up.”

“Yeah and I’ll get mine.” Adam nodded to Rachel, who was rolling onto her side, desperately trying to untangle her legs and skis.

“You want to call it a day, Ames?” I asked, holding a hand out to my gorgeous, but totally uncoordinated, wife.

She blew up at the hair in her eyes and grinned.

“I think I’m actually improving.”

I looked behind me to see a couple of kids who were rubbing their arms or backs where they’d fallen and burst out laughing.

“What?” Amy asked.

“You nearly massacred a whole class of eleven year olds. I’m not sure that’s improving.”

“There you go,” she stated, taking my hand, allowing me to pull her up. “I only nearly killed them. An hour ago, I’m sure an ambulance would have been needed for at least one of them.”

As she got to her feet inches from me, I dropped a kiss to her nose.

“Even so, I think we’ve done enough for one day. We can come back again. Although,” I said pointing at Rachel who now had Adam pulled on top of her, “I’m not sure Rachel will have as much enthusiasm as she did for a skiing holiday. My guess is they’ll be suggesting a beach one instead.”

Amy looked over at her friend and started to giggle. “Hmm, you might be right. We could still go though, couldn’t we?”

I shrugged. “If you want to, but we can’t afford both.”

Amy thought about it for a couple of seconds, looked over to Rachel, down to her skis and then back to me.

“A beach holiday it is.”