Was this really the USOF’s only option?
There has to be another coach somewhere. Pauline’s face appears in my mind, and I glance at Emma, but I tamp down the slow, crawling sense of resentment that’s taken up a corner of my mind. There’s no time for that, not when it feels like the world has turned upside down on me in the middle of a handstand and I’m digging my fingernails into the earth itself, just barely hanging on.
I follow Emma into one of the rooms. It has two queen-size beds, and the light blue walls and white fluffy duvets are soothing. My eyes start to droop. Emma drops her luggage next to one bed and then leaps into it with a bounce, settling up against the pillows.
“I need a nap.” I let go of my suitcases near the door, not even bothering to drag them all the way into the room before heading straight for the empty bed and falling on it with a heavy sigh. The clock on the table between us reads barely noon, but it feels like we’ve crammed a month into the last five hours.
“Do you think the beds at the Olympic Village will be this nice?” Emma asks.
“At this point I’d take a sleeping bag on the floor as long as we actually get to the Olympic Village,” I say, keeping my eyes firmly shut.
“You think we won’t?”
“It feels like the Olympics are years away. None of this feels real.”
“Not even Leo Adams?” she asks, but her words are starting to fade.
“Especially not him,” I murmur, not even sure if I really said it out loud before the world goes black.
“Rey, wake up,” Emma’s voice cuts straight through into my deep sleep, her hands shaking me awake.
“What?” I whine back at her, but shrieking from downstairs wakes me up fully.
There are curse combinations being thrown around that I’ve never heard before, and I leap up off the bed and follow Emma, who’s already hit a dead sprint ahead of me toward the stairs.
“You stupid bitch! How dare you show your face here after what you did!” Sierra screams as we reach the stairs. Mrs. Jackson stands behind her, holding her at the waist and keeping her from literally launching herself at Dani.
Holy crap.
It’s Dani. She’s near the doorway, like she’d barely gotten more than a few steps into the house before Sierra tried to attack her.
Emma and I finally make it down the stairs as Mrs. Jackson drags Sierra out of the room and outside onto the deck. We can still see them, but at least there’s a wall of thick plate glass between us.
A wan smile plays across Dani’s face as she says, “Hey, guys. I’m back.”
Emma hesitates, and so do I, but Chelsea doesn’t. She takes one step and then another toward her, and my stomach sinks when Dani flinches away, but then Chelsea finally closes the distance and envelops our teammate into a hug.
“I’m so glad you’re back, and I am so sorry about what he did to you,” Chelsea says.
There’s a moment when Dani is stiff, staring at me and Emma over Chelsea’s shoulder, and then the tension dissolves and she’s hugging back, her eyes screwing shut.
I don’t know what to do. Emma still hasn’t moved.
Dani’s back, and that feels right. We know she didn’t dope— despite Sierra’s delusions—and she’s back now, so maybe that means it’s all going to be okay. Maybe our team is finally whole again.
Then, as Chelsea pulls away, I look past them, out to where Sierra is still ranting, with both Jaime and Mrs. Jackson trying unsuccessfully to calm her down.
Then again, maybe not.
The hot July sun warms my skin as I stretch out on a lounge chair looking out at the San Diego Bay.Audrey Lee, when was the last time you were this lazy? Back when you were recovering from surgery maybe, but that was a forced laziness. You couldn’t physically train.
This? This feels wrong. Except I don’t really have a choice. We don’t have access to a gym right now. We might not ever have access to it, and by the end of the day we could be on another bus or airplane looking for a new home leading up to the Games.
We’re the best group of gymnasts in the world. It shouldn’t be this hard to find a place to train, and yet here we are. We deserve better than this. We need better than this if we’re going to succeed in Tokyo.
“So, do you think Sierra’s burst a blood vessel yet?” I ask Emma from my lounge chair. We’ve pulled our chairs into the shade under the patio awning. The last thing either of us needs is a sunburn. Gymnastics and fried skin are not a good combination.
“She’ll get over it,” Emma says, slathering on another layer of sunscreen. “She’s pissed that Dani’s back. I mean, I get it, but Dani’s been ahead of her all year. Sierra’s a pro; she’ll come around.”
