Author's Note:

So, this is my first (real) attempt at writing fanfiction. We'll see how it goes. The story is completely AU – I wanted to write a fic that took place in a ski resort, and since I'm european I felt like it had to take place in Europe. I don't know any NA ski resorts well enough to use them as a scenery for my story. Originally, this story took place in a real ski resort in France, but I've decided to change it to a fictional one, loaning bits and pieces from all the places I've visited over the years. If you've read the original version (as written before january 2014) the only thing changed is some details about the resort, names of slopes and mountains and so on. The actual story is unaltered. And I will finish it, some day.

I have no idea how long this story will be in the end, it spanned two winters in the beginning already so it might be long. Time will tell.

I do not own Glee, any of the characters or something like that. But I do own a lot of ski gear.

Prologue:

[November 23:rd, 2011]

It felt like I'd never left. Within hours everything would be back to normal. My third of the closet a complete mess above Quinn's perfectly organized part. Sam's poster of Sean Pettit still blu-tacked onto the bathroom door as the pale november light sifted through the dirty window. The christmas lights we'd stolen off a tree outside the church one heavily inebriated night were hanging around the mirror between the bunk beds and a stack of last winter's piste maps laid forgotten in the bookshelf.
Hadn't it been for the stale air not yet smelling of ski boots and shampoo, and the thin layer of dust it all would be the same.
I climbed up my bunk and laid face down on the naked mattress. It almost smelled homely.
Had I left it here, or did I lose it when I left in late april? I dug my hand between the mattress and the wall, feeling along the thin wooden ledge. Came across something paper-y and grabbed it.

I still had the picture on my computer, but it wasn't the same thing. The small paper copy was printed out in the shop at the mall further down the street and a few words were scribbled on the back of it. "I've been run into by far worse things than you." I stared down at the slanted, untidy handwriting and tried to ignore the empty hole inside of me.
I'd kept the photograph carefully hidden in my diary for the remainder of last winter, it must've fallen out when I packed last spring. Two girls - one blonde, dressed head-to-toe in blue and one dark haired wearing green, red and black, smiling at the camera in front of a scenic background.
I jumped off the bed and lifted Sam's battered boombox to its designated place in the bookshelf. Plugged it in and connected my iPod.
Soon the familiar tune of Roxette's "Spending My Time" sounded through the basement as my thoughts went back to last february..

1: On A Mountain

[Nine months earlier, February 17:th, 2011]

"Oh shit, no", I thought to myself.

The few minutes we had spent taking pictures at the view point had been too many. The clouds that were scenic and far away just a while ago were now surrounding us. Visibility was, without over-exaggerating, zero.
I bent down and tightened the buckles on my boots a bit more, cursing myself for choosing my dark-lensed goggles and forced a smile before I addressed the people surrounding me.
"Alright everybody," I begun, trying to sound as optimistic as possible.

"This is far from ideal conditions, but it's not dangerous as long as you go slow, and stay behind me. I will stop next to the markings on the right side of the slope every time the direction might become unclear. When I stop, please stop below me. Sam will go last to make sure no one's left behind and Lucy will keep in the middle."
I nodded at my colleagues who were leaning casually on their poles a few meters above me.

Then I turned right, facing down the mountain, and started to pick up speed. The mist didn't frighten me, I knew this slope like the back of my hand by now, but my clients didn't, and it was a long way to go before they'd be back in the village. With that in mind, I tried to keep my speed down, and stayed on the right side like I said I would instead of arcing the wide turns I wanted to.
"This is work," I reminded myself.
As the slope grew steeper and the bumps caused by inexperienced skiers became bigger and harder to evade I stopped, and waited for my panting clients.

Within minutes the group was complete, and I let Sam go first this time. Neither of us liked being the tail, a task that forced one person to stay behind the slowest rider of the group, and I didn't envy Quinn who was the one lagging now. Knowing I was up for tail duty within minutes, I allowed myself to have a bit of fun while there was time.
Keeping my knees soft and body relaxed I used the piles of snow as jumps, enjoying every second spent off the ground. A person clad in blue slowed down ahead of me in the mist, and smiling to myself I flung my body around 180 degrees and landed backwards next to Sam, not-so-accidentally spraying him with snow.
"Heeey!" he shouted, mock-offended, but at the same time I lost my balance and almost as if in slow motion fell backwards and ended up a human jack-straws in the snow.

"And that's what happens when you try to show-off in front of the guests," a calm voice stated.
"Oh Lucy, always so cheerful," Sam beamed at our colleague, knowing her aloof manners were more of an act than anything else.
"Someone has to be the mature one, and with you two kids," she looked intently at Sam who had just dropped a handful of snow on me, and then at me who just laughed at him, "..that someone is me."

A few of our clients smiled at the playful banter and all three of us felt relieved, knowing that if the guests became frustrated with the weather and difficulties, the task of going back to the village would become much more difficult.
As Quinn helped me get up she spoke quietly to me.
"The snowboarder girl, Lopez, is struggling. I think she's more afraid than she wants to let on. Just so you know."

I nodded and glanced over at a girl my own age with raven-black hair peaking out from under a neon green helmet. Despite her baggy clothes she looked small, intimidated almost. Probably due to the non-visibility, I thought.
"Everybody ready?" Quinn asked out loud. People nodded and Quinn continued.
"There's a 90 degree bend right ahead of us now, we can't see it right now because of the fog, but let's go really slow until we're past that point. It's a narrow junction, so please keep to the right the whole time, it's really easy to end up going the wrong way."
"To the left is a shorter, but much steeper way back to the village, and we do not advise you to take that one in this weather," Sam added.

I didn't think it was possible, but the mist got even thicker as we approached the junction. I only saw one marking ahead, keeping one eye on the right edge of the slope and one on the frustrated snowboarder in front of me.
The light was totally flat – all contrasts were eliminated making it near impossible to see the bumps and piles of loose snow on the slope. No one, not even I who love skiing in pretty much every weather, could possibly find pleasure in the current conditions.

"GODDAMMIT!"
A loud yell tore my attention from the slope markings and onto the girl lying belly down in the snow.
"You alright Miss Lopez?" I asked when I stopped next to her.
"Skip the Miss-thing, it's Santana," the girl snapped.
I knew that, I'd seen it in the bookings, but also knew my manager disliked us being on first-name-basis with our clients. But right now I decided company ethics were unimportant.

"Okay, Santana. Are you hurt or just stuck face-down in the snow?"
"Stuck," the other girl grumbled reluctantly, but she really was. She was lying straight in the fall-line, her board and feet highest and trying to push herself back up only resulted in digging her upper body deeper into the snow.
"Let me help you take your board off," I offered before unbuckling it from Santana's feet and shoving it upside down in the snow to keep it from gliding away.
Santana crawled around until her feet were back under her and started brushing snow off her face and body.
"Thanks," she mumbled.
"No problem," I replied.
"You know what," I continued "..I'm gonna call Quinn and tell them we're behind and that we'll head back on our own so we don't have to stress."
"Quinn?" Santana asked with a confused tone.
"Oh, right, Lucy. Quinn is her middle name, she prefers it, but at work she's Lucy. Dunno why really.." I stopped mid-sentence realizing I was rambling and quickly proceeded to pick up my phone.

"Hi Q, yeah it's me.. oh, no, nothing bad. Santana, eh.. Miss Lopez fell and I.. mhm. Yeah. Sure, great! See you back at aprés then. Bye!"
"So we got rid of them?" Santana asked.
"Huh?"
"The rest? My papi and the other middle-aged bores."
"Well, I wouldn't say "got rid of" but they're gonna go ahead, yeah." I tried my best to stay professional even though I kind of agreed with Santana.
"Only because you're not allowed to phrase it that way doesn't mean you don't agree with me," Santana smirked as if she'd read my thoughts.
"Nevermind."

I gave up and was thankful for the mist and my goggles hiding my blushing cheeks. To be honest I did prefer my diminished company – I'd been watching Santana all week and as long as she could see more than a few meters ahead I had to admit the girl was a decent boarder. Perhaps not good enough to venture away on her own as she and her parents had joined the group skiing all days but one, but then again, a lot of the guests preferred skiing with us reps to avoid getting lost in the huge ski area.
Santana put her board back on and jumped to her feet, slowly gliding away in the mist with me following close behind. Not a minute later the dark-haired girl was cursing again.

"Stupid FUCKING FOG. This is impossible!" Santana raged.
Luckily, she wasn't upside down in the snow this time, and got back on her feet on her own.
"Hey, hey, it's not impossible," I tried.
"Easy for you to say. How many times have you done this?"
"Many," I admitted, "..but I've also seen people with less than half of your riding ability going down so I know for a fact that it's not impossible."
"It's just that I can't see anything," Santana sighed, switching from angry to exhausted in two seconds.
"I mean, I can see all the grey fluff, but no contours, no height differences, nothing. I feel car-sick," she continued, her voice laced with frustration.
"It can happen. Your brain gets like super-confused when it can feel but doesn't see that you're moving. You wanna try a thing?"
Santana nodded.

"Alright, here's what we do. I'mma go first, but real slow and try to find good places to turn, and you go after and follow my tracks. Ignore the surroundings, just look at me 'cause then you'll see the bumps through me, plus your brain will realize you are in fact moving."
"Okay.."
"If you want me to go faster, slower or stop, just tell me. And don't worry about being close behind, I've been run into by far worse things than you in case that should happen," I laughed.
Then I started yelling to myself inside my head. Was that inappropriate to say? I had no idea. It felt kind of inappropriate. The lines between personal and professional, and so on were really confusing sometimes. I couldn't be expected to behave the same around a girl my own age as around people in their fifties, could I? That would just be.. weird. Almost as weird as the fact that we encouraged our clients to call us our first names but were told of by management if we did the same to them. Ugh.. manners. Manners above normal polite behavior confuses me, period.

Slowly I made my way down the mountain, listening carefully and looking around my shoulder to make sure Santana was following. As we approached the bottom of the valley I stopped.
"You alright?"
"Sure," Santana nodded.
"From here we've got to gain some speed 'cause the slope flattens out and I don't know about you but I don't feel like walking back to the lifts."
Confident all of a sudden, Santana shouted "Race ya!" before straight-lining down through the fog.
I grinned and didn't hesitate to follow.

As the slope smoothed out, the white-greyish fog surrounding us became lighter and thinner. I could see Santana's green helmet glowing ahead of me, and all of a sudden everything went had reached the end of the cloud and all that remained was an empty slope under a glistening blue sky. Determined to catch up with the snowboarder I crouched deeper down and tucked my arms in front of my body like competitive downhillers do.
I could se the lift station further ahead and knew I'd beat Santana to it. After all, skiers are superior to snowboarders when it comes to aerodynamics.
I sped past Santana just as we reached a small hump on the slope. Without really thinking about it, I stomped off and moved like in slow-motion a meter or so above the ground. It wasn't a high jump, but the combination of perfect flow and the fact that the sun was behind me so that I could see my own shadow made it feel perfect.

I braked only inches away from the lift gate, my legs exhausted from standing in the tuck too long.
A spray of snow hit me straight in the face and I wiped it off only to find Santana smirking at me.

"Look at that!"

We sat in a chair twenty or so meters above the ground and Santana pointed a the mountain we'd just descended. It's peak was clearly visible but the rest of it, and the entire same half of the valley were enveloped in a thick, grey cloud with very sharp edges.
"Yeah, that was pretty messed up," I admitted. I'd dropped the whole overly-positive-resort-rep act completely now. Not that I'm not a cheerful person, but I wasn't forcing it with Santana anymore.
"Disgusting," Santana stated and glared at the cloud to their right.
"But not impossible."
"Guess not," the dark-haired girl shrugged.

Both of us leaned back in the chair, enjoying the warm february sun we'd missed so badly minutes ago. Santana had her eyes shut to protect them from the sun since she'd put her goggles up.
"You're gonna look like a racoon," she told me, who kept mine on.
"I already do, can't avoid it. Plus, I rather look at the view than keeping my eyes closed."
"Mhm, the view is pretty cool," Santana admitted lazily, not opening her eyes, which made me laugh silently.
"Are you laughing at me?" Santana asked.
"Not at all," I giggled, only to be met with a huff and stubborn silence.

"Do you know your way back," I asked when we'd disembarked the lift.
"I think so. Why? You're gonna abandon me now?" Santana replied, making me flinch guiltily.
"Well.. since the weather cleared up and I don't have to be back until four, I thought I'd go for a couple more runs.." I admitted.
"I could come with you.. if that's okay," Santana hesitated.
"Do you want to? I thought you had had enough of boarding for today."
"Nah, only blind-boarding."
"In that case.. you know what, if we go over there," I pointed to the sunny, northernmost part of the valley "..I'll show you one of my favorite runs. I never go there with the groups," I added mischievously.
"I won't tell," Santana said, with a dead serious tone.

Two lifts later we stood on another mountain top.
"Alright, listen up everybody," I addressed my one-person group cheerfully. Santana just smirked and smacked her mitten-clad hand to the front of her helmet before I continued.
"Right now we're on Mont de Chaton, 2800-something meters above the sea. To our left is the Chanson valley, which is awesome, and to the right is the Avoin valley which is almost as awesome. The really high mountain on the horizon is Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in Western Europe with an altitude of 4810 meters. On the opposite side we have the Écrin Massif which is another bunch of really high mountains, and in front of those there's this really annoying cloud," I finished, rather pleased with my imitation of myself.
Santana couldn't help but giggle.

"Wait a second Brittany. I just have to take a picture of the cloud," Santana said as she walked over to a fence to the south.
"You want me to take one with you in it," I asked.
"Sure," Santana said and handed me her iPhone.
"Say cheese!"
Two thumbs up and a big smile showed up in front of the cloud on the camera.
"Wait, one more. I gotta do a jump-photo!"
After the jump Santana kept posing, each picture goofier than the previous.
"Can I take one of you?" she asked when I had snapped about 20 photos.
"Umm, yeah," I agreed, feeling slightly uncomfortable for some reason, and swapped places with Santana. I leaned against the fence as Santana took a picture, then gave me thumbs up when finished. Walking over to my skis I heard Santana speak again.

"Hey, excuse me sir, could you take a picture of me and my friend?"
A familiar voice answered her and my stomach sank a few inches.
"Getting friendly with the clients are we, Pierce?"
I turned around and faced the young man holding Santana's cellphone.
"Sobered up enough to wake up before sunset, have you Puck?" I snapped.
"Ouch, that hurt," he said, clutching the left side of his chest.
"Ignore him," I told Santana who looked between us, confused.
Santana simply shrugged and reached for my hand instead, before walking over to the fence.
"Okay ladies, sweet smiles!" Puck demanded.
Suddenly, Santana snaked her right arm around my waist which made me twitch.
"Ehm, ticklish," I lied and at the same time felt my cheeks starting to blush.
Ticklish? Through like four layers of clothing, and because someone half-embraced you? Amazing, Pierce, just.. amazing, I scolded myself while trying to ignore the buzzing feeling in my body. Oh no. No. That feeling. This is not good. My brain was leaping amok until the cause of it all interrupted me again.

"Sorry, I should have warned you then," Santana said before putting her hand back in the same place. Hesitantly I placed my left arm around the shorter girl's shoulders and waited for Puck to snap a picture.
"Great, thanks," Santana said to him when receiving her phone.
"We can look at the photos later, I wants to get my ride on now," she continued, turning to me with a cheeky smile that made me blush once more.

The slope seemed to go on forever, in the good way. A winding blue, arcing its way down the mountain, never too steep and yet never boring. I dug the edges of my skis down the soft snow, pushing them into smooth turns, leaving a perfect railroad track. Santana was just behind me as we raced down the mountain, using small bumps to get air-time and (in my case) occasionally squealing with joy.
We were both panting from exhaustion when we reached the bottom of the valley.

"That.. was.. amazing!" Santana exclaimed.
"I know, right."
"Thank's for showing me. I get why you don't wanna bring all the airheads there."
"Mhm," I nodded, feeling a bit guilty but mostly ecstatic.
"One more time?"

[November 23:rd, 2011]

I held my hand against the ice-cold window. The familiar view was as beautiful as ever, sharp mountain ridges blackening against the evening sky. I had finished unpacking, made my bed and tried to make the place a little cosier. A small potted plant was put on the still tidy desk by the window. I had gotten it on a trip to IKEA in Geneva last winter and asked one of the local guys to take care of it for me over the summer. I hadn't expected it, but it was actually still alive.
The picture of Santana and I was pinned to the wall next to my bed. I still missed her, I couldn't help it. We hardly knew each other but I was unable to forget her.
17:28. I sighed. Quinn and Sam wouldn't be here for at least another three hours.
Grabbing the blue company jacket and putting on my old ugg's I locked the door behind me. A trip to the supermarket and maybe the hole-in-the-wall pizzeria was in order.