The idea of attending a conference in Colorado in the fall didn’t excite me at first. I guess I would have preferred the warm sun of Florida or southern California. But, my boss convinced me it would be fun and different and promised me a Florida trip later in the winter.
I teach computer classes to adults at a training center in Michigan. One of the advantages of the job is that most of my fellow instructors are female. So, that makes conferences a little more bearable…especially in the warmer climates where beaches and swimming pools are in use. Would I be stuck this time with women wrapped in five layers of ski apparel?
The reception on the evening of the day I arrived was in the lobby of the ski resort lodge we’d be using for the conference. Normally, I hate these things. The refreshments are always the same and, being a better listener than talker, I rarely initiate a conversation with anyone.
Luck was on my side tonight. About fifteen minutes into the reception, after nearly completing my first beer, a really cute brunette said “Hi” to me at the cheese tray. Now, I put attractive women into two main groups—babes and really cute. Not being the Tom Cruise type myself, babes are considered pretty much unattainable. Nice to look at, but not something I’m liable to wake up next to. Really cute, on the other hand, includes women that I’m attracted to that, under the right circumstances, might even talk to me.
I was looking at one at the moment.
“Hi,” I said back. She was about 5’6”, maybe 32 or 33, with short brown hair, highlighted with streaks of lighter brown and tan. She wore a v-neck shirt and business casual pants. Her light gray eyes shined as she looked up at me and smiled.
“Where you from, John?” she asked, looking briefly at the Hello, My Name Is tag stuck crookedly on my shirt.
“Michigan. Outside of Lansing. How about you?” Her name was Cindy, evident from the tag placed strategically above one of the ample breasts pushing against her shirt.
“Chicago. I guess we’re both used to this cold, then,” she smiled.
“Yeah. I hear we’re supposed to get a bunch of snow tonight. Do you ski?” I asked, filling my plate and following her to the end of the table.
“Nope. Never tried it. How about you?”
“Never. I’d rather be snorkeling,” I said.
She laughed, while I pictured her in my mind floating on top of blueish green water in an orange bikini.
“Me too, I guess. But here we are,” she said. “We’ll have to make do.”
I drank the last of my beer and asked her if she wanted a drink. She asked for a glass of wine and I returned from the bar to find her sitting on the end of a couch near the fireplace in the center of the lobby.
“Are you here with coworkers?” I asked her.
“Nope. Just me. Which means I’ll probably spend most of the time in the room. If no one’s here to organize the social events for me, I end up doing nothing,” she said.
“Well, I’m the same,” I said. “So if they mention something tomorrow in the meeting that you might want to do later, let me know and I’ll go with you.”
“I will. Thanks,” she said.
We talked for about half an hour before leaving for our rooms. As she got off the elevator on the floor below mine, I watched her small ass move down the hall until the elevator doors closed. The next time I pictured her in my mind, she wasn’t wearing a bikini.
It snowed heavily during the night. When I opened the drapes in my room and looked out upon the mountains surrounding the lodge, it almost made me forget the warmer climates I had thought of the day before. The pure whiteness covering the ground and trees and the new snow continuing to fall was truly beautiful.
I finished breakfast and moved into the conference room for the first session. Seated alone near the back was Cindy, dressed in a satiny pink blouse tucked into a red skirt that stopped well above the knees of her crossed legs. She was reading the paper and I didn’t intend to bother her…yet. But, she looked up and waved for me to come over.
“Good morning,” I said as I approached.
“Hi. Do you have a seat, yet?” she asked.
“No.”
“Sit here,” she motioned to the spot next to her.
“Thanks. Do you need coffee or anything?” I asked her.
“No. I’m fine. Thanks.”
When I was settled in, she said, “Isn’t the snow great? I think they expect a bunch more today. I’m glad I don’t have to drive in it.”
“Yeah. I might go out later, but I’m still not sold on the skiing thing,” I said. “I’m too old for that stuff.”
“Oh, come on,” she smiled. “You’re about my age and I don’t consider myself a fossil yet.”
“Let’s just say I’m in my thirties and would like to live to see forty,” I replied.
The morning session dragged along. It was highlighted mainly by the break, during which Cindy walked out to the restroom. This allowed me a better look at her long, well-toned legs. And her shirt did little to hide the tops of her breasts or her lacy pink bra. It was going to be a long three days, I thought.
It was around 11 a.m. when my stomach, still on Eastern Time, wanted lunch. The speaker was putting me to sleep and I needed food. I looked at the table and realized the best I could do at the moment was a lot of water. I reached for the pitcher and stopped, my arm frozen in mid air.
The ice cubes in the pitcher were shaking gently as if we were riding in a car on a rough road. Then small “waves” formed on the surface of the water.
I turned to look at Cindy, who had already watched my hand stop just short of the pitcher’s handle.
“Quit kicking the table,” I whispered to her jokingly.
“I’m not,” she said.
I grabbed the pitcher and began to pour a glass of water. Then we heard it. Actually, we might have felt it before we heard it. It was a rumble that seemed to emanate through the floor and into the seats and into our bodies. But, soon it was a definite, discernable sound. A train approaching, or maybe the sound they use in movies when a herd of something is running toward you.
I put the water down, which now shook almost violently on the table. A rustle of voices filled the room, and heads turned in random directions as the yet undefined noise seemed to come from everywhere. I saw people around me getting up while someone standing at the windows pulled back the curtains. More people began to look out and a woman’s scream echoed inside the room.
“It’s an avalanche!” The words didn’t register at first when a man at the window first yelled them. But when people began to run, instinct took over. In the Midwest, everyone knows what to do when a tornado is spotted. There is very little training offered in surviving avalanches.
Running seemed like a logical start.
“Come on,” I said to Cindy as I rose from my chair. She had already started to stand and we headed for the exit at the back left of the room. We were only three rows of tables from the back to begin with, so it just took seconds to get to the door. Luckily, only a handful of people were blocking the escape and we quickly got through the narrow exit into a hallway leading to the lobby.
The first explosive sound of the wall of snow hitting the lodge came as I looked over my shoulder for Cindy, who was right behind me. The entire building shook and the lights flickered once, then went out. I was thrown against the wall while people ahead of me stumbled and fell over chairs and tables.
So far I hadn’t had a particular goal in mind during our flight. Now, I realized we needed a safe place to take cover for what seemed like the inevitable collapse of the building. When I looked behind me again I saw the walls of the room we were in fall outward, towards us. I turned to run some more, Cindy close behind.
Magically, at that instant an elevator door five feet ahead of me opened. We were on the bottom floor, I quickly thought. It can’t fall far. I stopped and looked for Cindy.
“In here,” I yelled over the roar. Behind her, a wall of whiteness steamrolled down the hallway with debris and bodies pushed in front of it.
I jumped into the empty elevator and was horrified to see the doors begin to close. I reached out and grabbed Cindy’s hand just at the snow and debris caught up to her. I yanked her toward me as her legs disappeared in snow. The doors of the elevator hit the outside of her thighs as I pulled her in and she screamed.
