Left Hanging

Accent: Australian

At three that afternoon, the mountain looked harmless.

Anna and Ben had spent the day skiing and were tired, cold and ready for a hot meal. At the cable-car station, light snow had begun to fall.

“Last car down,” the operator called.

They climbed in with four strangers: Leo, a university student travelling alone; Marta and David, a couple who had hardly spoken since entering the station; and Frank, a grey-haired man with an expensive camera.

The doors closed.

“Forty euros for this ride,” Frank complained.

Leo smiled. “The view is included.”

“Not for long,” said Marta, looking at the clouds.

Ten minutes later, she was right. Snow covered the windows and the mountains vanished behind a wall of white.

Then the cable car stopped. The lights went out. For a second, there was complete silence.

“Okay,” Leo said. “That’s slightly worrying.”

The emergency light came on.

“Probably a power cut,” Ben said.

“You work with cable cars?” David asked.

“No.”

“Then you don’t know.”

Ben looked at him. “I was trying to help.”

“Well, don’t.”

Marta turned sharply. “David, can you manage five minutes without being unpleasant?”

Frank laughed.

David glared at him. “Something funny?”

“Yes. You.”

“Great,” Anna said. “Trapped above a mountain with six people and we’re already fighting.”

That stopped them.

Outside, the wind was growing stronger. Snow hit the windows like handfuls of sand.

Frank tried his phone.

“No signal.”

“Mine neither,” Anna said.

Leo pointed at a red button near the door. “Emergency radio?”

He pressed it.

Static. Then a broken voice.

“Car… seventeen… stay… seated… storm…”

The message disappeared.

“Did he say storm?” Marta asked.

As if answering her, the wind slammed into the cabin. It swung violently. Marta screamed and grabbed David.

Then came a metallic crack from above. Everyone looked up.

“What was that?” Anna whispered.

Nobody answered.

Snow was now sticking to the windows. Within minutes, they could see almost nothing outside.

Frank suddenly stood.

“I’m opening the emergency panel.”

“Sit down,” Ben said.

“There may be instructions.”

“There may also be a door release.”

Frank ignored him.

Leo caught his arm. “Maybe we shouldn’t touch things we don’t understand.”

Frank pulled away. “I’m sixty-two years old. Don’t tell me what to do.”

“And I’m a mechanical engineer,” Leo replied.

Everyone stared at him.

“You could have mentioned that earlier,” David said.

“You didn’t ask.”

Despite everything, Anna laughed.

Then the cabin dropped. Not far. Perhaps a metre.

But it was enough to throw Frank to the floor. Marta screamed.

“Don’t move!” Leo shouted.

Frank sat up, blood running from a cut above his eye.

Ben took off his scarf and pressed it against the wound.

“I thought you two were going to fight,” Frank said weakly.

“So did I,” Ben replied.

The radio crackled again.

“Car seventeen, can you hear us?”

“Yes!” six voices shouted.

“Blizzard has stopped the main motor. Emergency system is frozen. Rescue team is moving towards Tower Six.”

“How long?” David asked.

A pause.

“Forty minutes. Possibly longer.”

The radio died.

“Wonderful,” Frank muttered.

For the next hour, they talked because silence was worse.

Marta admitted that she and David were on their honeymoon.

“Honeymoon?” Frank said. “You look ready for divorce.”

Marta burst out laughing. Even David smiled.

Leo told them he was travelling alone because his girlfriend had left him two weeks earlier.

“So this holiday is going well,” he said.

Then another crack sounded above them.

Nobody laughed now. The car tilted. A bag slid across the floor.

Leo looked through the icy window.

“We have a problem.”

“What?”

“I think ice is building up on the cable.”

Suddenly, there was a loud snap. The cabin dropped again and stopped at a sharp angle.

Anna’s feet slipped. David caught her.

Outside, through a small clear patch in the window, a light appeared in the blizzard.

Then another.

“Rescuers!” Marta shouted.

Four figures were moving slowly along the maintenance cable.

Nobody cheered yet. They simply watched the lights getting closer.

Frank looked around at the others.

“Drinks are on me when we get down.”

“If we get down,” David said.

Marta hit his arm.

“When,” she corrected.

This time, nobody argued.

📒 Key vocabulary

• harmless – not dangerous or likely to cause damage
• cable car – a vehicle that carries people up or down a mountain using a strong wire
• vanished (vanish, vanished, vanished) – disappear from sight
• power cut – a period when the electricity suddenly stops working
• glared (glare, glared, glared) – look at someone in an angry way
• handfuls – amounts that can be held in one hand
• slammed (slam, slammed, slammed) – hit something suddenly and with great force
• crack – a sudden, sharp breaking sound
• panel – a flat section that covers or controls part of a machine
• release – a device or control that allows something to open or become free
• wound – an injury where the skin or body has been damaged
• weakly – without much strength or energy
• crackled (crackle, crackled, crackled) – make a series of short, sharp noises
• blizzard – a very strong snowstorm with powerful winds
• frozen – covered with ice or made extremely cold
• tilted (tilt, tilted, tilted) – move into a position where one side is higher than the other
• slid (slide, slid, slid) – move smoothly across a surface
• cable – a very strong wire or rope used to hold, pull, or support something
• snap – a sudden, sharp sound made when something breaks
• angle – a position where something is not straight or level
• slipped (slip, slipped, slipped) – lose balance because your feet move unexpectedly

🤔 Comprehension quiz

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