Sam thought he was going down the hill at a fairly good clip when his ski broke. Luckily, he wasn’t going as fast as he imagined, and so when he tumbled head over heels into the snow, it wasn’t catastrophic, just unpleasant. Equally lucky, he was already at the back, so there wasn’t a pile-up of young skiers behind or on top of him.
It meant, however, that when he had pulled himself together, he was alone on the trail. He knew he wasn’t very far from the main lodge, but he felt like he was all by himself in the middle of nowhere. There were buildings and cars close by, but all he could see was pine forest, snow, and the cross-country ski trail winding down the hill in front of him. It was the end of the day, and it was starting to get dark. He knew he only had an hour or so to get back to the cars before the sun went down.
After a little bit of searching around in the snow, he was able to find the end of the ski that had broken off. Most cross-country skis were made of fibreglass, but there were still a few pair of wooden ones around, which is what Sam had. They were quite new, but obviously, they weren’t up to even the little bit of wear that Sam had already put them through. Sam hadn’t really been fond of the wooden skis, and, while he obviously wasn’t too happy about the break, he was still kind of looking forward to being able to get new ones.
After he had found the broken end of the ski, he started back along the trail toward the lodge. He had almost made his way back when he saw the lynx. At least, it looked like a lynx. He only saw it for a second. It was on the move, so he didn’t get a good look before it disappeared into the underbrush.
It had big, furry feet and tufts of hair sticking out from the tops of its ears. It was about the size of Sabre – his friend John’s mutt – though it was a great deal more graceful. Sam thought there might be some sound as the cat’s feet touched the ground, but it made almost no noise, and he couldn’t be sure that what he heard wasn’t just a little wind in the pines, rather than the cat. After a few moments of wonder, he remembered to start feeling nervous and then relieved. He’d heard that lynx could be mean, and he wouldn’t put it past the cat to go after him.
He decided not to stick around any longer than he had to, so he started jogging along the ski trail. Cross-country trails are like railroad tracks pressed into the snow, and the skis fit inside the groomed depressions. He’d been trying to be careful and not wreck the tracks, but by then he was feeling fairly upset, and he stopped worrying about avoiding them.
All he really wanted to do was get back to the lodge and the parking lot. It was getting dark, and he knew that his parents would be there by now. Soon they would probably start wondering where he was, and then when they found out that it was the cheap wooden skis that they’d bought him that were at fault, they’d feel terrible.
Sam was a kindly person, but he was actually kind of happy that they’d feel that way. However, by the time the headlights came into view, he’d decided that he would just tell his parents about the broken ski, not the lynx. They’d feel bad enough to buy him good skis anyway, so there didn’t seem much point in making it worse by telling them that he could have been mauled.
Besides, a part of him felt that it would be wrong to use the cat to manipulate his parents. The skis breaking seemed like a pretty minor thing. The lynx sighting didn’t seem like a minor thing, and it didn’t seem like it should have to serve his need for more expensive skis.
Most of the time, he liked when he saw animals, and even though he’d been scared, that also included seeing the lynx. He was generally satisfied even when all he saw was a weird looking bird. The first time he’d seen a hummingbird was a revelation. And even just a household cat when it did something cool.
But most of the animals he saw didn’t have claws. He actually liked the dangerous ones better, but he knew that his parents didn’t. He knew that his parents would rather keep him inside than risk him getting mauled, and so they might decide that he just shouldn’t risk skiing at all.
And as he walked, he decided that the lynx was just his. It wasn’t completely even about skiing anymore. It was about his lynx, and his experience. So, if he told them, they not only might try to cut him off from skiing altogether, but the lynx would be theirs as well as his.
That wasn’t something he was okay with. So, he decided that he’d better keep his mouth shut about the lynx.