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The snow had fallen cleanly enough overnight that the first person onto the trail would write on it. Riri liked that about mornings after heavy snow. Roads and yards became briefly unreadable, yesterday's tire marks and boot prints filled in, every habitual route covered by a surface that looked unused even when everyone knew exactly where it led. The school outing began before the day warmed enough to soften anything. Students gathered near the trailhead in mismatched layers, skis knocking together, poles crossing, mittens appearing and disappearing from pockets. Somebody had brought a thermos with a lid that would not seal. Somebody else had forgotten wax. Sister Mary-Agnes moved through the disorder with a clipboard tucked under one arm and the air of a woman who had expected every small problem and therefore saw no reason to become excited by any of them.
Riri had been cross-country skiing with her before, but usually in smaller arrangements known to Evelyn in detail. This was different. The group included students of uneven ability, two teachers besides Mary-Agnes and several adults from families who had volunteered to help. Some of the First Nations girls had grown up skiing on trails and frozen surfaces with relatives and were better than nearly everyone present. Others had little interest in proving anything to a school programme and regarded the morning as tolerable mainly because it replaced classes. Mary-Agnes did not romanticize either group. She did not speak as though every Indigenous student possessed inherited knowledge of snow, nor did she behave as though a school outing had introduced anybody to the land for the first time. Riri noticed these things because she had begun noticing the places where adults made assumptions even while trying to be kind.
Mary-Agnes divided the students according to pace rather than age or status. Riri was placed with the stronger group and immediately felt a childish disappointment because Mary-Agnes would spend the first section with the beginners. She disliked herself for it. The outing existed for everyone, not for Riri's access to one teacher. She pushed off with the faster students and concentrated on technique.
The fresh track rewarded attention. Snow whispered beneath the skis where the surface remained powdery and scraped faintly where wind had hardened it. Riri's body had changed over the previous year, stronger through the hips and shoulders, more efficient after months of learning that endurance did not mean spending everything at once. Running with Mary-Agnes had taught her to stop treating every stretch of ground as a contest. Hockey still brought out the explosive part of her, but on skis she had learned to hold something back. She settled behind an older student named Nora James, who had an economical stride Riri admired, and resisted the impulse to pass merely because she could.
At the first junction the faster group stopped as instructed. Breath rose visibly around them. Riri planted her poles and looked back down the trail. The beginners appeared in fragments between trees, bright coats moving slowly. Mary-Agnes came among them without hovering at the front or pushing from behind. She was skiing beside a girl named Alice Charlie, who was irritated enough to show it in every movement. Alice could skate well and hated discovering that skill did not transfer automatically to narrow skis. Twice she had crossed the tips and nearly gone down. Mary-Agnes said something Riri could not hear. Alice replied sharply. Mary-Agnes did not react to the tone. A moment later she demonstrated the movement again, then let Alice try without touching her.
Riri watched too long. Nora tapped one pole lightly against Riri's boot. "You'll turn to ice standing there." Riri looked forward. She felt the familiar embarrassment of having her attention made visible, even if Nora had no idea what she was really watching.
When the groups joined, Alice was still angry but upright. Another teacher suggested that she could ride back with one of the adults if she was not enjoying herself. Alice's face changed in the way people did when an offer of relief felt like confirmation of failure. Mary-Agnes said there was no need to decide yet. She asked Alice whether her feet hurt, adjusted one binding, and told the group they were stopping for ten minutes anyway. The solution allowed Alice to rest without becoming the reason everybody had stopped.
Riri loved Mary-Agnes most fiercely in moments like that. The feeling had outgrown simple admiration by then. She could name it privately as a crush and sometimes, when alone, as love, though the word felt almost too large and too embarrassing to survive daylight. She wanted Mary-Agnes. She also wanted to be like her in ways desire could not explain. Watching her preserve a girl's dignity with one practical decision produced a deeper ache than watching her run.
During the break, Riri unscrewed her thermos and discovered that the tea was still too hot to drink comfortably. Tessa Bell came over and leaned one hip against the snowbank beside her. Their almost-flirtation from the school dance had not turned into a relationship, but neither had it vanished. Tessa took Riri's thermos without asking, blew across the lid-cup and handed it back. "You're incapable of waiting for beverages," she said. Riri told her waiting for tea was not a character virtue. Tessa said Sister Mary-Agnes would probably disagree if patience had been assigned for marks. Riri almost choked on the first sip.
Tessa knew. Of course she knew. Riri had never formally confessed the crush to anyone her age, but adolescents did not need confessions when staring, sudden silences and excessive memory provided enough evidence. Riri looked at Tessa, preparing for teasing. Tessa only smiled slightly and asked whether the tea was still too hot. The mercy of it made Riri like her more.
The second leg of the trail narrowed and climbed. Mary-Agnes moved to the stronger group for part of it while another adult stayed with the beginners. Riri told herself not to change her pace. She immediately changed her pace. Not dramatically. She simply became more precise, more aware of where her poles planted and how cleanly she shifted weight. It was ridiculous, and she knew it was ridiculous, but the desire to look competent in front of Mary-Agnes remained one of the strongest automatic instincts in her body.
Mary-Agnes caught up beside her and said nothing for several minutes. Riri felt every metre of the silence. Eventually Mary-Agnes remarked that Riri was no longer attacking the first hill as though it had insulted her family. Riri said she had learned. Mary-Agnes replied that learning was useful when it survived beyond the lesson. The praise was indirect enough that Riri could accept it without becoming visibly helpless.
They skied side by side until the trail opened. Riri asked whether Mary-Agnes had always liked winter. Mary-Agnes said no; liking winter was easier after learning how not to be miserable in it. Riri asked whether that counted as liking it or merely managing it. Mary-Agnes considered this seriously and said perhaps most adult preferences contained more management than children realized. Riri laughed. The conversation moved to school, then hockey, then an argument Riri had heard at home about whether a nearby road project would actually improve travel or simply move problems elsewhere. Mary-Agnes asked who benefited from the new route. Riri answered, then stopped and reconsidered. She had learned to recognize the shape of Mary-Agnes's questions.
A kilometre later they found another skier ahead, an older man moving at a competent pace. Riri noticed Mary-Agnes notice him. Memory of the red-hatted woman from the previous winter returned instantly. Riri said nothing, but anticipation made her grin. Mary-Agnes glanced sideways. "What?" Riri shook her head. Mary-Agnes narrowed her eyes. The man remained ahead for another five minutes, then the trail steepened. Mary-Agnes increased her pace with such plausible gradualness that Riri nearly admired the deception.
Riri stayed beside her. They passed him near the top. Mary-Agnes greeted him. He nodded pleasantly, unaware that he had participated in anything. Riri waited until they were well ahead before saying, "Useful pace?" Mary-Agnes told her to watch the trail. Riri's grin widened.
The great relief of that year was discovering how much affection could tolerate imperfection. Riri no longer needed Mary-Agnes to be an immaculate figure of wisdom. She knew her teacher could be stubborn, quietly competitive and sometimes impatient with excuses she had heard too many times. She had seen Mary-Agnes misplace a set of papers and spend ten irritated minutes searching for them before discovering they were beneath her own attendance book. She had seen her apologize to a student after making an assumption about why homework was late. Each flaw made the love less dreamlike and more grounded, even though the relationship itself remained impossible.
At lunch the groups gathered near a simple shelter where benches had been cleared of snow. The students ate sandwiches and drank from thermoses. Alice sat beside her cousin, boots stretched toward the packed path. She had stayed. More importantly, nobody was congratulating her for staying as though she had completed a moral trial. Mary-Agnes spoke with one of the parent volunteers about the return route and left Alice alone to enjoy the fact that she was no longer struggling visibly.
Riri sat with Tessa and Nora. Tessa stole one of Riri's biscuits. Riri took it back, broke it in half and returned the smaller piece. Tessa called her mean. Riri said fairness did not guarantee equal biscuit distribution when theft was involved. Nora asked whether Sister Mary-Agnes had been teaching her economics. Riri threw a small ball of packed snow at her boot.
The afternoon brought wind. Fresh snow lifted in fine sheets across exposed sections, erasing their earlier tracks at the edges. The school group stretched out. Mary-Agnes moved constantly between clusters, not because she distrusted the other adults but because she seemed unable to stop noticing where things might go wrong. At one point she gave her spare outer mittens to a student whose gloves had soaked through. Riri saw it happen and immediately became aware that Mary-Agnes's own hands were now less protected.
She fought the urge to intervene for several minutes. Concern could become another disguise for hovering. Then she saw Mary-Agnes flex her fingers twice and made a decision. Riri had an extra pair of wool liners in her pack because Evelyn had insisted. She took them out and offered them without explanation. Mary-Agnes looked at the liners, then at Riri. There was a second in which Riri feared the offer would be refused because accepting it might feel too personal. Instead Mary-Agnes asked whether Riri still had enough protection for herself. Riri showed her own gloves. Mary-Agnes accepted the liners and thanked her.
That small act affected Riri more than the compliment at the dance had. She had been allowed to care in a way that remained practical and proportionate. Mary-Agnes did not become emotionally indebted. Riri did not become her protector. A pair of cold hands required gloves; Riri had spare gloves. Care could be that simple.
On the final descent, Alice passed Riri unexpectedly. Her technique remained untidy, but confidence had made it faster. Riri could have overtaken her within seconds. Instead she let Alice keep the space and watched her reach the flatter ground ahead with an expression of startled triumph. Mary-Agnes was several metres behind and saw the choice. She did not praise Riri for it. She only met her eyes briefly.
That was enough. Riri had once needed comments in red ink to carry through an afternoon. Now a look could do it, not because Mary-Agnes had become more intimate with her but because Riri had learned what sort of conduct the woman respected. Restraint. Judgement. Strength that did not require proving itself every time an opportunity appeared.
The trailhead came back into sight as the light began thinning. Adults counted students, skis were scraped, gear redistributed. Riri collected her pack and saw Mary-Agnes returning the wool liners, folded together. They were slightly damp from use. Riri took them and shoved them into an outer pocket.
Mary-Agnes said, "Your mother was right to make you carry spares." Riri told her not to mention that to Evelyn. Mary-Agnes said she made no promises. Riri laughed and went to help load skis. Behind her, the fresh morning track had become a broad, complicated record of the day: parallel grooves, pole marks, crossings, falls, places where somebody had stepped out of the track and climbed back in. Wind was already softening it. Nothing about the trail remained untouched. Riri preferred it that way now. A clean surface was beautiful, but a used one showed who had actually travelled it.