“Over what?”
I can’t tell her. I would like to just to be able to talk to someone about it all, but this isn’t the right time.
“His future.”
We circle around Aaron and Levi who are practicing a death spiral. Aaron is almost touching the ice, his arms outstretched, and is being held by his hands while they spin around their own axis.
“You are alwayssocryptic when you’re in a bad mood. I never get even a snippet of information out of you.”
Before I can answer, Polina’s voice echoes through the hall. “Paisley, what is that? The axel won’t thank you for walking across the ice!”
I sigh, cast Gwen an apologetic glance, and make a mohawk turn, a foot change from forward outside edge to backward outside edge to skate in backward for the axel. I succeed twice, but Polina seems anything but content, and I know that she has every reason not to be. Skate America is just a few days away and we’d made itsofar, I could actually land my triple axel, wobbling a bit maybe, but land it. But now I feel that the thing with Knox has thrown me offby weeks.
I try again. And again, and again, and again, but it just doesn’t want to work out today to the degree that I—and Polina—would like it to. After another failed attempt, her forehead is a sea of wrinkles. She pushes off the side and calls out, “Okay, Paisley. That’s enough. Let’s go through your program.”
Harper zooms past me from behind Gwen to continue training on the other side of the rink, so that I have room for my program. Maybe I’m imagining things, but I swear I caught a sympathetic smile on her face.
I get into position, one leg straight ahead, the other bent and my arms stretched out so that my crossed hands touch the tip of my skate. It’s not long before Polina reaches the rink and Ed Sheeran’s “I See Fire” begins to ring out through the hall. I set myself in motion, stretch my arms into the air, and begin with elegant changes ofdirection and big loops. As the notes of the first verse fade, I shift my weight to my left leg, lunge with my right, hit the ice with my skate blade and do a double axel. I land on my right and use the momentum of my left to push the edge into the ice again. My left arm and bent right leg follow before I jump off from my left foot and do a triple counterclockwise turn—a triple toe loop.
The instrumental sounds of the song begin, and I move fluidly, dancing—the ice and I in perfect symbiosis. I glide backward across the surface, shift my weight to my left leg and plunge into the ice with my right, jumping off the left at the same time. I manage to pull my arms up quickly and get enough height—a successful triple Lutz. The melody leads into the chorus. I slow down, move along a low edge, lower my body, and shift onto my knees. My legs tremble with strain as I push my back parallel to the ice so that, during the deep turn, the back of my head almost touches the ice. Every muscle in my body is on fire, but I manage to straighten up and continue skating on steady legs. Sweat is pouring down my neck while, with a mohawk step, I switch from forward inward to backward inward on my other leg and am now standing on the inside edge of my skate. In a big lunge, I pull my right leg around, making a half turn on the ice, before jumping off for the triple Salchow, followed by a triple flip turn on the left foot, jumping off on the right. The song’s bridge begins, and I begin the dance I showed off at the Christmas party at Silver Lake. I repeat the Lutz and the toe loop, turn in a spread eagle—arms and legs outstretched—and transition into an Ina Bauer by placing one foot on the forward edge and the other backward on a different parallel edge while bending backward.
And now for the climax: an explosive chorus right as I stretch out my right leg, jab the edge into the ice, and jump off—the triple axel, one turn, two, three, and there, the half, oh my God, I land it!Holy shit, I think the whole time, the whole jump, in fact, and am still thinking it when I land on my right leg. A bit wobbly, like a small foal, but I land it.
My heart is racing and the muscles in my legs are trembling as I continue to skate in circles, smaller and smaller until I reach the center of the ice for my Biellmann spin. I lift my right leg back, bend back over my shoulders, grab the skate, and turn around, facing the ceiling. The last notes sound. A dramatic bass blows across the ice, and I drop into a sitting spin with my leg outstretched, spinning around myself twice, three times, before the song begins to fade and I straighten up in an elegant, fluid movement to finish in a flying camel spin: right leg straight on the ice, left leg lifted back, righthand fingers clutching the blade and pulling to the right, parallel to my upper body as it, too, bends to the right. I spin, spin, spin, breathing in the cold air, feeling freedom in my lungs, in my soul, feeling everything,everything, life and love and joy in every breath.
I stop and shift into the final position. I stretch my left leg backward, pitch the point of my skate into the ice, right leg bent forward, head thrown back, hands in my hair. The song ends. My pulse is thundering, and I can feel my heart banging against my ribs over and over. I let out a gasp and open my eyes to look at Polina.
She is smiling. And nods. And right then, with the Olympic medalist staring at me with that look on her face, that you-got-what-it-takes-girl look, it becomes clear.
Paisley Harris, trailer-park roach from Minneapolis, daughter of a crack whore, take a look at yourself,take a look at yourself!You can do it, damn it, you canreallydo it, this whole Olympics thing.
During the break I am up in the lounge with Aaron, Levi, and Gwen, nibbling an avocado sandwich.
“The problem is that you don’t build up enough tension in your back,” Levi tells Aaron. “If you could bend more, I could spin us more quickly.”
“Nonsense.” Aaron lifts his forkful of salad to his mouth. “You don’t switch blades quickly enough. My tension istutti-frutti.”
Levi wants to reply, but Gwen puts her hand across his mouth. “Stop! If you say one more word about your death spiral, I’m going to lose it. My feet are throbbing, my legs hurt, and my thighs desperately need a seed pillow. Can we let our break be abreakfor once?”
Levi pushes her hand away and leans back in his chair. “Gwen, you’re aware of the fact that Skate America’s just around the corner, right?”
Gwen groans, throws her arm over her head, and undoes her bun. “Yeah, I’m aware of that. My Lutz still isn’t clean, Paisley’s triple axel is the living image of ‘London Bridge Is Falling Down,’ and all the same I’m sure we can find other things to talk about. So, please, boys,pleasetalk about how awesome your salad tastes or something.”
Aaron stares at Gwen while he chews. He swallows. “That little piece of cucumber was amazing. Velvety going down. Clean in consistency.”
Levi rolls his eyes with pleasure. “You should’vetastedmy tomatoes. A moist and spicy explosion of flavor.”
They manage to bring a smile to my face. All these little stupid conversations with Gwen and these two mean so much to me Iswearevery word has helped to stitch my soul back together. Piece by piece, piece of tape by piece of tape.
The rest of the day I manage the axel more and more often than I’d thought possible and listening to 80s love songs during fitness class following the end of training that are full of unconditional love, of sticking together and doing it all together, my anger toward Knox vanishes. Hard to believe that he has that effect on me, but I still want to go back to the resort and take him in my arms, tell him that I understand and am there for him. Tell him that he can count on me, just like I can count on him.
Gwen frowns as she watches me stuff my things into my bag and gather up my things in record time. “Was there speed in your avocado sandwich?”
I pull up the legs of my skinny jeans until my feet poke out the bottom. “Just say no.”
My sleeves land in Gwen’s face. She swerves and rubs her eye. “Seriously, what did you take? Does that help you land a triple Lutz? If that’s the case, then later on I’m going to break into the lounge and steal every single avocado sandwich there is. Please imagine me in Donatello’s purpleNinja Turtlesoutfit. Or, well, in reality, Michelangelo because he’s the party turtle and all, but, anyway, orange doesn’t suit me atall. So, purple bandana, a bag full of avocados, and…”
“Sorry, gotta go. You’ll be anamazingDonatello. See you tomorrow!”
