Some combination of the time difference and excitement had me up before dawn. By six thirty, I had already showered, dressed, and was ready to start training.
After I had pulled my hair into a sleek ponytail and dressed in leggings and a long-sleeved exercise shirt, I knocked on the door next to mine. I was starting to think that he was still asleep and I would have to knock again by the time Dom answered the door. I heard the chain slide a moment before it cracked open. Dom was standing in a pair of jeans and no shirt, his wet hair standing up in all directions and dripping water onto his shoulders. “Hazel?” he asked. Even after his shower, he was still bleary-eyed.
I pressed my lips together, doing my best to avoid looking at his shirtless torso. I already knew that he was in fantastic shape. It would be unprofessional to let my eyes roam his muscled chest, especially because this wasn't while we were working on skating. The fact that he was fresh out of bed and the shower made it feel different. More intimate. “You’re not ready to go yet,” I said, disappointed. It took a lot of effort to keep myself from staring at his abs. His perfectly defined, rippled abs that were still glistening after his shower.
Why was I tempted to run my hands over them? I needed to remember what he said about being professional.
He ran a hand through his hair, smoothing it out. “I hit snooze too many times,” he admitted, leaning against the door. He stifled a yawn. “Have you eaten?”
“Not yet,” I replied. “I figured we could have something quick together before going to the arena.” Once he had a shirt on.Because him standing there so casually was causing a tension to build in my lower abdomen.
“Okay, just give me a minute,” Dom said, shutting the door behind him. A minute later, he was out wearing a rumpled t-shirt.
I punched the button for the elevator as Dom muffled another yawn. His shirt rode up as he covered his mouth. My eyes locked on the bare strip of skin. I bit the inside of my lip to hold back a comment I would regret. I shuffled from foot to foot and watched as the number on the elevator slowly climbed to our floor, stopping at every other floor on the way up. “How are so many people up already?” I asked.
“Old people. People who have to work,” Dom said. He ticked the groups off on his fingers. “Parents telling their kids that they need to get up so they can make the most out of vacation.”
“You can stop now,” I said, shaking my head. “It was a rhetorical question.”
The hotel lobby was bustling with people, most of whom were in business clothes. Considering it was a Tuesday morning, it was the safest of Dom’s guesses of early risers. I walked over to the buffet while Dom dragged his feet behind me. He made a beeline for the coffee, filling up a plain white ceramic mug nearly to the brim.
I took my time filling a plate with fruit, eggs, and yogurt before finding Dom at a table next to one with a pile of dishes. He had both his hands cradled his mug of coffee protectively, as though he worried somebody would try to take it away while bussing the other tables. The mug was still steaming, but he’d already drunk half. “Are you not getting food?” I asked as I pulled out the chair opposite him.
He shook his head. “Coffee first, then food. Probably with another cup or two. I don’t know why hotels always insist on having the smallest mugs known to man.”
"That’s probably what a serving of coffee actually looks like." I retorted, gesturing to the mug with a strawberry stabbed on my fork.
“Anybody who considers this enough coffee is out of their damn mind,” Dom argued. “I need to fuel up. How are the eggs?”
“Powdered,” I said, wrinkling my nose. “I should’ve gone for an omelette.” I’d considered it briefly, but the line had driven me to the scrambled eggs. It was a rookie mistake. I knew better than to go for scrambled eggs, but every time we went somewhere new, I always held out hope that this hotel would use actual eggs.
Dom placed his empty mug down with a thud. “Omelettes are a good idea,” he said, standing up from the table. “Be back in a minute.”
After he came back, he inhaled his food and another coffee. I had finished, but I waited for him to be done. It made more sense to go up to our rooms and grab our things together before we headed to the gym to kick off the morning. We’d be glued to each other’s sides for the next few days. Our schedule was jam-packed. We had something scheduled for every waking hour until our short program. We would spend the next few days stretching, skating, rehearsing, having last-minute costume adjustments, and being checked over by a physiotherapist. If we were lucky, we would have some time to squeeze in some touristy things after the competition. Before we skated, everything was about maximizing our chances of winning.
So close to a competition, it would have been nice to have Mark and Olga with us whenever we were working. Unfortunately, they had to split their time between us and their other skaters. We had a couple of hours we would get to see both of them in the late morning, but after lunch we wouldn’t see them again for the rest of the day. We didn’t really need them at this point. If we weren’t ready now, there was no waywe would be in a few days. They couldn't work miracles. We had also been to enough of these competitions that we didn’t need them to hold our hands and talk us through everything. Sure, the location of the competitions was ever-changing, but the general idea was the same. At this level, even the faces around us were the same. It was always the same small group rotating between the Grand Prix competitions. Seohyun would be one of the familiar faces. She was also scheduled to kick off her season here in Vancouver. We were both closer to Elodie than to each other, but it would be nice to have somebody to talk to. The fact that we weren’t competing against each other, since she was a singles skater, was a bonus.
Dom and I shared a ride to the rink after breakfast, getting in far earlier than we needed to be there for our meeting with Mark and Olga. We had competed here once before. It had been years ago, while we were trying to win the national championships as juniors, but it all came flooding back once we were on our way to the locker rooms. The pale blue cinderblock walls curved around the rink. There were dozens of other people hurrying around, but nobody looked at us twice. Everyone was under a time crunch this close to a competition. It didn't matter if they were skaters, choreographers, coaches, or people who worked at the arena. We all had only a couple of days left until the eyes of skating fans were on us. There was no time to get distracted.
The hallway straightened out as we came to the locker rooms. Dom and I slowed as we approached the first one. There was a white paper taped to the door that read "ladies." I hitched my bag up on my shoulder, fingers tightening around the strap. I looked up at Dom and asked, “Where do you want to meet back up?”
“Near the entrance to the ice,” he said. He pointed over his shoulder with his thumb unnecessarily. “I want to get a look at it before we start.”
I was happy to oblige. There was something special about standing at the edge of the boards, looking out over an empty arena that would be filled with fans in a few days. At this point, everything was still up in the air. Nobody had skated yet, so all the highs and lows of the competition were still to come. Not knowing what was ahead of us, whether it be a personal best or a series of falls, always left me feeling a special sort of wonder about it all. I knew it wouldn't last long. Once we started running through things repeatedly, we could occasionally get a glimpse of our competitors and what they had up their sleeves. The closer it got to go time, the more the pressure would build and my determination would grow alongside it. But for now, when everything was yet to come, there was nothing quite like looking out at a glassy sheet of ice, just waiting for the competitors.
The ice was a blank slate. It was almost time for us to make our mark on it.
I kept that sense of peace until Mark pulled us aside the day before the competition started. “Remember that we want to get people talking about your skate tomorrow,” he said in hushed tones. He clearly did not want any of our competitors to overhear him. “We need to have people talking about you two and your chemistry for this to work. So if anybody asks questions, you don’t want to talk about your personal lives.”
I chewed on the inside of my lip. My stomach twisted at the realization that we were so close to showing the world the skate. I had known it logically, but I had done a remarkably good job of keeping it compartmentalized for the last couple of weeks. “Everyone knows what we have said in the past. If we don’t–”
“No arguing!” Mark said firmly. His voice was stern enough that I didn’t know how to respond. “Be friendly with each other and with people, but no denials for the time being.” Before we could say anything, he was walking away.
Dom and I exchanged a glance. “Maybe nobody will ask us,” he said.
“At least try to sound like you believe what you're saying,” I said with a sigh. “But we try not to comment until the end of competitions, so maybe all the questions we get will be professional.”
“Oh, I don’t doubt that the reporters will be professional,” Dom said. “The internet, on the other hand…”
