She kisses both my cheeks in greeting and then gestures to the bearded man coming up behind her. “This is my husband, Ollie. Ollie, this is Rachel Kim.”

“So thrilled to be working with you, Rachel,” Ollie says with a slight Swedish accent, shaking my hand warmly. “I’ve heard such great things about you.”

“Nice to meet you, too,” I say. I wonder what he’s heard about me. Has Alex mentioned anything? Where is he anyway? I glance around the chalet just as he enters through the doors.

“Good morning, everyone,” he says. If I have black bags under my eyes, Alex looks like a literal raccoon. I guess he didn’t sleep too well either. He smiles at me briefly, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes, and there’s definitely no dimple poking through. Before I can cross the room to talk to him, he walks away to greet Jongseok and some of the Discipline staff who are here for the shoot. I feel a knot of anxiety in my stomach. Did something happen? Another Reveal article?

I walk toward Alex, rolling the hem of my parka nervously between my fingers. He’s finished his conversation with the staff, but now he seems engrossed in his phone. I linger back, not wanting to interrupt in case he’s reading something important for work, but then he pockets his phone and slips out of the chalet. Before I can chase after him, the photographer calls out to me. “Ready to go, Rachel?”

“Totally!” my voice says, as if it came from a robot programmed to sound like me.

But as much as Robot Rachel tries to focus on finding her light and showing off her cute cropped parka and thermal leggings, Actual-Disaster Me keeps getting distracted. Carly, I can’t help but notice with jealous admiration, is all dynamic motion, lunging and kicking up snow with her boots, but I’m stiff as a, well, robot, next to her.

“Ladies, let’s get a little more action. Can we try the skis on now?” the photographer says. He takes a quick break while we gear up, leaving Alex and a couple of the execs somewhere back inside the hotel, and soon, we’re all on the slopes, posing at the top of what is in actuality a small practice hill covered in fake snow, but it’s steep enough to look like we’re on the actual ski trail down the mountain.