Into Nothing

It was a solemn winter night, a steady stream of snow laying a fresh blanket on the ground, turning the earth into a giant frosty pop. At the Beech Mountain Resort, the soft glow of the lights around the ski slopes revealed a snowboarder’s paradise in which a handful of patrons took advantage of. However, this wasn’t the case for Nick Riley.
Despite his love for the North Carolina winters, he was comfy where he was; sprawled out next to the fireplace in the main lodge. Exhausted from a day of blue and green courses, Nick’s only desire was to take a nap before he headed home.
As the warm and glowing embers from the flames lulled him to sleep, Nick caught a quick glimpse of a figure walking towards him.

Mark Tannyhill, Nick’s best friend, took a seat by the fire and began to warm his hands. “Hey Nick, what are you doing?”
“I’m trying to sleep,” said Nick in a groggy voice.
“Sleeping? But why? There’s hardly anyone out on the slopes and the weather’s great.”
“I don’t care; I did all the courses that I wanted to do.”
Mark grinned, “I bet you never did the ‘White Lightning’ run.” Nick slowly sat up, laughing as he stared at his friend with a confused look on his face.
“Why on earth would I do that one? It’s a black diamond and you know this is the second time I’ve ever been snowboarding.” Mark wasn’t convinced, “Why does that matter? You were doing great earlier! Besides, didn’t you say that you wanted to push your limits today? You’ve been talking about it the entire way up here.”
Nick laughed again as he stood up and took a sip of his hot chocolate. “I did several blue courses dude; I totally had my fill of pushing limits today. Look, I know where this conversation is going and you’re not making me do the black diamond.”
Mark grinned, “Oh really now?”

At the base station of the chair lift, Nick gave Mark a dirty look as the chair scooped him off his feet. “Have fun! See you at the bottom!” shouted Mark with a smug look on his face. Nick didn’t respond; his entire attention was focused on seeing just how high he was going. Oh man, how did I get talked into this, he thought as the chair lift continued to ascend into the heavens.
The scenery around him was beautiful, yet strange. The slopes, which were normally covered with the usual crowds, were mostly empty. They glowed an eerie yellow from the frozen light posts as the snow continued to drift to the ground like a sea of cotton.
Out of the haze, the dark outline of the base station appeared and Nick prepared himself for departure. As the opening rapidly advanced, he jumped out and glided towards an ice covered sign that read “White Lightning Run.”
It was a lonely sight, the run was empty, not a single living thing in sight aside from a pine tree or two. The only thing acknowledging Nick’s presence was the far off groaning of the artificial snow machines, their morbid wail echoing through the mountainside. In the valley below, a city glimmered like a distant galaxy in the darkness. He didn’t want to do this; as he strapped on his boots to the snowboard, he began to have second thoughts. Standing on the edge of the world, Nick eventually succumbed to the elements and began is decent into nothing.

It wasn’t until the earth took a steeper angle that Nick began to panic. He was speeding past the point of simply slowing down or braking and it only seemed to get worse. Narrowly avoiding patches of ice and various rocks, he only had split seconds to think and act.
WHACK! An ice rut slammed into the board, causing Nick to fall on his face and roll out of control. All he could do was curl up and hope for the best; this was beyond his control. After what seemed like minutes, he finally came to a stop and sprawled out on the snow. It was about a minute before he got on his feet, but only seconds later, Mark was running towards him from the side.
“Dude, are you alright? That was a nasty wipeout!” Nick shook his head, brushing off the snow. “Don’t worry; I’m ok, just a little shaken up but nothing wrong.” Nick got up on his feet and unstrapped himself from the board. “I can’t believe I just did that.” Mark smiled, “Yeah, I feel a little bad for making you do something that you weren’t ready for.”
Nick chuckled, “Well, I can at least say I did it for once. I feel into nothing and survived.” He picked up his snowboard and the two of them headed out to the car, toward the city that glowed like a distant galaxy in the winter night.