Page 13 of First Echo
brOOKE
T he door clicked shut behind Madeline, and I released a breath I hadn't realized I was holding. The sudden silence in the room felt heavy, almost tangible. I sat on the edge of my bed, fingers absently tracing the pattern on the navy blue quilt, trying to make sense of what had just happened.
She actually showed me kindness . It was such a strange thought that my brain kept circling back to it, examining it from different angles like some rare specimen.
Madeline Hayes—queen of the social hierarchy, professional mean girl, my reluctant chemistry student—had voluntarily chosen to room with me.
She'd saved me from that fatally awkward situation of being the odd one out, the girl no one wanted to pair with.
I was grateful, there was no denying that.
The thought of standing alone in that lobby while everyone else paired off made my stomach clench with remembered humiliation.
But gratitude wasn't the only emotion swirling inside me.
There was suspicion too, a nagging sense that there was something Madeline wasn't telling me.
She has to get something out of this, right?
People like Madeline Hayes don't just do nice things without expecting something in return. That's not how their world works. Maybe she wanted me to do her homework, or maybe she was planning some elaborate prank. Or maybe—and this thought felt the most unsettling—she actually felt sorry for me.
I glanced at my already unpacked clothes in the small dresser beside my bed.
I'd arranged everything neatly while Madeline was getting ready for lunch—the methodical process of folding and sorting had helped calm my racing thoughts then.
I reached for the dog-eared paperback I'd placed on the nightstand.
It was one of those epic fantasy novels my mom used to love, the kind with maps at the beginning and a glossary at the end.
Reading it made me feel closer to her somehow.
"See you on the slopes." Madeline's parting words echoed in my mind as I stretched out on the bed, book in hand.
Who said I was already going to the slopes today?
My plan was to just unpack and get all my stuff in place and just relax a bit, since I was tired from the bus ride, and just go hit the slopes first thing tomorrow morning.
But now that idea felt... inadequate somehow. Like I was missing out.
I tried to focus on the book, but found myself reading the same paragraph three times without absorbing a single word. The text blurred before my eyes as my mind kept drifting back to Madeline's casual assumption.
See you on the slopes.
Did she just assume I would go? Or did she say it because she actually wanted to see me there?
Who am I kidding?
Madeline could not care less about that, right? She was probably out there with Sam and her other friends, completely forgetting I existed. But then again, she did save me from being left out, so she did feel something... right?
I closed the book with a frustrated sigh and stared up at the wooden beams crossing the ceiling.
This was ridiculous. I was overthinking things, as usual.
Madeline Hayes was not worth this much mental energy.
She had done one marginally decent thing, and here I was analyzing it like it was some complex mathematical equation.
But as much as I tried to dismiss the thought, I couldn't shake the memory of her face when she'd noticed me standing alone in that lobby.
There had been something there, a flicker of what looked almost like genuine concern.
It didn't fit with everything I thought I knew about her, and that discrepancy gnawed at me.
Before I fully realized what I was doing, I had put down my book and was reaching for my snowboard gear. Fine , I thought, I'll go to the slopes. Not because Madeline suggested it , but because I love snowboarding and the mountain is right there, practically begging to be conquered.
As I zipped up my jacket and grabbed my board, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror hanging on the closet door.
My cheeks were flushed with a mix of excitement and something else I couldn't quite name.
It's just the cold, I told myself, adjusting my beanie over my ears. Or maybe it's the altitude .
The resort was relatively quiet as I made my way through the lobby and out to the lifts.
Most people were probably having lunch, either at the resort restaurant or at one of the smaller cafes dotted around the base of the mountain.
The lift line was practically nonexistent, and within minutes I was seated, gliding upward through crisp, clean air.
As the chair lift carried me higher and higher, the ground falling away beneath my feet, a familiar sense of peace washed over me.
Up here, suspended between earth and sky, it was easier to think clearly.
The mountain stretched out before me, its pristine white slopes glittering in the sunlight.
This was what I had been looking forward to—this moment of perfect anticipation, the world spread out below me like a promise.
I wish Mom could see this view. The thought came unbidden, a bittersweet ache in my chest. She would have loved it here, would have been the first one on the lifts in the morning and the last one down at night. I could almost hear her laugh, see her eyes light up with the pure joy of the mountain.
I miss her so much .
Sometimes the absence felt like a physical thing, a hollow space inside me that nothing else could fill.
But up here, with the wind in my face and the endless horizon before me, I felt closer to her somehow.
Like maybe a part of her was still with me, riding these slopes, feeling this same wild freedom.
When I reached the top, I strapped on my board and took a moment to survey the runs spreading out below.
From this vantage point, the entire mountain was my playground.
I chose a blue run to start, wanting to warm up before tackling anything more challenging.
The snow was perfect—not too icy, not too soft, just the right consistency for carving smooth, clean turns.
As I pushed off, all my confused thoughts about Madeline and roommates and social hierarchies melted away.
There was only this: the rush of cold air against my face, the rhythmic sound of my board cutting through snow, the complete and total control over my own movement.
I leaned into turns, shifted my weight from heel to toe edge, found that perfect balance point where speed and control merge into something like flying.
I did a few runs, each time scanning the slopes and the lift lines for a glimpse of blonde hair or that expensive designer ski jacket.
I kept telling myself I was just curious, that it didn't matter if I saw her or not, but each time my eyes searched the crowd, I felt a twinge of.
.. something. Disappointment? Relief? I wasn't sure.
Why am I even looking for her? It was a question I didn't have a good answer for.
Maybe I wanted to show off a little, prove that I wasn't just some boring bookworm.
Maybe I wanted to see if she'd acknowledge me outside our room, in front of her friends.
Or maybe I was just curious about which version of Madeline I'd encounter on the slopes—the mean girl from school, or the slightly more complex person who'd chosen to save me from embarrassment.
But I never saw her. Maybe she was getting a drink somewhere, or maybe we just kept missing each other on different runs. Or maybe she'd never intended to ski at all, and "see you on the slopes" had just been a throw-away line, as meaningless as "see you later" often is.
I didn't mind being alone though. In fact, there was something wonderfully freeing about carving my own path down the mountain, answering to no one's schedule but my own.
I may be alone, but I'm not lonely . The words I'd said to Madeline earlier rang true up here, where solitude felt like a choice rather than a condition.
After a couple of hours, my legs began to burn with that pleasant fatigue that comes from good exercise. The sun was starting to dip toward the horizon, casting long shadows across the snow. I decided to call it a day and head back to the resort to clean up before dinner.
Back in our room, I peeled off my damp outer layers and hung them up to dry.
My hair was a mess from the helmet, and I desperately needed a hot shower to warm up my chilled bones.
I grabbed my toiletries and a change of clothes and headed for the bathroom, looking forward to the sting of hot water on my cold skin.
I was midway through my shower, hair full of shampoo, when I heard the door to our room open and close. Madeline was back. Through the sound of the water, I could hear her moving around, the thump of something heavy—probably her ski boots—being dropped on the floor.
"I'm in the shower!" I called out, though I wasn't sure why I felt the need to announce it. The running water and closed bathroom door probably made that obvious.
A muffled response came from the other side of the door. It sounded like "Take your time," but I couldn't be sure over the rush of the shower. I rinsed my hair and finished up quickly, not wanting to hog the bathroom in case she needed it too.
When I emerged, wrapped in a cloud of steam and wearing clean jeans and a sweater, I found Madeline sprawled across her bed, still in her ski clothes minus the jacket and helmet.
Her blonde hair was tangled and slightly damp, probably from snow, and her face was flushed from the cold.
Her eyes were closed, her breathing deep and even.