It begins to snow a little before noon, and it’s almost time to break for lunch when we finally make it to where the West Leg Road intersects with the Stormin’ Norman chairlift that will take us further up the mountain. Jack insists there are spectacular views and a beginners’ run we can take all the way back to the lodge. Except there’s no way for us to make it back to the lodge by lunchtime. Jack sends a text in the family group chat to let them know to start eating without us. Timberline, thankfully, has good service.

“That cannot possibly be safe,” I say when I see the bench we’re going to ride up the mountain on.

“I assure you it is.”

Even though the chairlift is large enough for three, we sit pressed together, shoulders and thighs touching through our enormous layers. The world seems impossibly large from up here, a craggy ridge covered in snow in front of us, endless stretches of white all around us. Snowcapped trees and expansiveness and this undeniable feeling of magic. Of something so beyond the ordinary, the kind of beautiful, magical world I used to want to create with my art, back when I was a lonely kid escaping my life through the drawings in a sketchbook.

I think about Meredith, reminding me I once believed in magic. I think about the woman tucked against my side. “Jack,” I say, and she turns to face me. We’re inches apart, close enough that I can count the pale snowflakes as they land against her dark freckles. We’re close enough that I can taste the breakfast sandwich on her breath, close enough that I’m thinking about our bathroom kiss, the memory so fresh I lick my lips, hoping to taste her there.

“What?” she asks, just as the chairlift comes to a grinding halt, and we both jerk forward. We’re not too far from the top now, but we’ve come to a complete standstill.

“Someone must have fallen when getting on,” Jack says absently. “It happens all the time.”

I turn to face her. We’re stuck. On a chairlift. There are a thousand unspoken things hovering between us, and now we have a quiet, uninterrupted moment to say them before Jack starts ignoring me completely.

“Jack,” I try again.

“It’s Andrew,” Jack interrupts.

“I know you’re feeling guilty about—”

“No.” She points to a man in bright yellow snow pants standing about thirty feet away, where the chairlift terminates at the top. It’s obviously Andrew—those are very distinct pants, and he looks impossibly attractive even from a great distance.

He’s supposed to be at lunch with the family, but of course he’s here instead. Even now, during our epic stuck-on-a-chairlift moment, the specter of Andrew is haunting us.