The unexpected realization hits me all at once and with full force, but I can’t deny the ice-cold stab of pain I feel move through my body. At this moment there is nothing I could wish for more than undoing the night at the movies. It complicated everything.
Confused, I bend back down over my wrap as a pickle falls out of Gwen’s mouth and she emits a surprised sound. “Take a look at this,” she says, laying her phone down on the table and pointing to an article inIce Today. I’d uninstalled the app when I turned my back on Minneapolis. “Ivan Petrov is presenting his new skater. He aims to take her to the Olympics.”
The ground beneath my feet begins to give way. A kind of tinnitus blocks out all the conversations going on around me. I no longer catch what Levi and Aaron are saying.
Ivan Petrov.
I feel sick. The name alone makes me dizzy and brings up images I’d rather not see. All of a sudden it’s like the pain never stopped. I can feel it throughout my entire body.
“Who?” It’s more of a gasp than a word but, all the same, getting it to cross my lips is incredibly tough. I spit it out.
Levi runs a hand across his beard and bends over the table in order to read the article better.
“Kaya Ericson. Hmm. Don’t know her.”
It’s like I’m frozen.
Kaya.MyKaya.
She was my best friend for over a decade, but apparently my disappearing act doesn’t bother her. The only thing that seems to matter to her is her success.
“I know her,” Gwen mutters. “A few years ago she got first place at Skate America. Figure skating.”
She did indeed. I remember the championships. It was rainy, and I cried and cried because I couldn’t compete. Because of him. He had been preparing for that day for a long time, had invested all of his strength into my performance only to break me and to rejoice in my pain. It was the worst form of psychological terror: at first building up my hopes to the skies only to then destroy them at the deepest level. I think that’s the year everything started. The hell on earth that crept into my life. Quietly and dimly, on black claws. Ready to dig into my insides and tear me apart.
“Ivan Petrov…” Levi murmurs before sticking the last bite of hamburger into his mouth and reflecting. “I haven’t heard anything about him in ages. And he used to be a real media whore.”
“Truth.” Aaron nods while rubbing the freckles on the bridge of his nose. “Back in the day he used to always get first place. Back when he used to skate. When I was a kid, I remember cheering him on whenever the championships were on TV.”
Gwen tilts her head. “I didn’t know he was a trainer now.”
Well, I did.
I’m ice cold, and I’ve only heard his name. I cannot manage to look at Gwen’s phone. I know why Ivan’s creeping back into the media. With Kaya of all people. He has no interest in making his new figure skater famous, but…
It’s got to do with me. Hewantedme to see this article. Even now, with over one thousand miles between us, he won’t give up. He simply won’t give up wanting to humiliate me—wherever I am. There is nothing I’d want more than to tell him it won’t work. That he lost. But that’s not the case. With nothing but a single act, he’s managed to tear back open the wound that had begun to heal so well over the last number of days. Ruthless and cold. A monster beneath his human mask.
I’m overcome by panic. What if he finds me? What if people find out I’m training at iSkate? It’s just a matter of time before that goes public. At the latest, with the first competition… Ivan, he…hecould wrest my new life away from me again with one clever chess move. And he knows it.
The first notes of a melody dance through the diner and pull me out of my state of shock. I blink and slowly things come back into focus. Levi appears and then Aaron’s profile begins to take on shape as he wipes ketchup and a lonely roast onion from his boyfriend’s mouth. Gwen is busy putting her phone away again.
The tune is coming from the jukebox, a song I know all too well. I know the lyrics by heart. Simon and Garfunkel’s “The Sound of Silence.”
My heart is pounding in my throat. I turn toward the jukebox and see Knox going back to his table. His eyes dig into mine. I am incapable of looking away, so it’s up to Knox to break eye contact first. He sits back down next to the woman who had whispered in his ear and yet: I can’t be angry at him anymore. Maybe he doesn’t know, but the simple thing of playing a song by my favorite band pulls me out of the darkness. I don’t know how long that darkness would’ve lasted otherwise.
14
Not Just the Chalet Girl to Me
Knox
My shoes leave deep prints in the fresh powdered snow as I make my way to the half-pipe on the slope behind our house, snowboard over my shoulder. Within minutes the sky is royal blue, the pink streaks that had followed the sunset gone. At this time of year, the darkness chases off the day so quickly; it’s like there’s some kind of light switch.
I shouldn’t be here. Not at this time of day when the slope is spookily empty. And especially after having downed countless shots with Wyatt and the girl his sister Camila brought along to the party. I have no idea where my own date is. I should probably go look for her, but…
I can’t help myself. I love the quiet that envelops me out on the slope at night. The cool air takes me in, as if greeting an old friend, and carries me along in a whisper, all the way up the mountainside. On top, I need to clear my head. I thought I could wipe Paisley’s face from my thoughts by getting hammered. Instead, it just got worse with every drink, her blue eyes more brilliant in my imagination with every shot.
Outside it’s no better. The color of the sky in its purity makesme think of her, which is driving me crazy, and Paisley… Whatever she is, she definitely isn’t pure. The way she acts, the wall she’s built around herself, and then the wounds on her face tell me that she’s probably just as broken as I am. Maybe even more. And that’s why I’ve got to stop thinking about her. I’ve got enough of my own shit to carry around. I can’t afford to lose my head over a girl. I want to hold no complications. Sex when I want it, no obligations and unnecessary headaches. One night, and the next day everything’s over. That’s always worked out well. Sure, there were a few tourists who were persistent and kept on bothering me. But after their departures and a few desperate Instagram messages, all that passed, too. Which is why it’s even more important to get Paisley out of my head once and for all.
