My room was tiny and crowded, with a small bed and dresser that I’d had to work to get all my stuff in. It was clear that when the building had been designed, the goal had been to cram as many athletes into as small a place as possible. When mixed with the fact that we were in an incredibly densely populated city, I shouldn’t have been surprised at just how little room I’d had. My paranoia about underpacking had come back to bite me in the ass.
Since there wasn’t much time left before our agreed-upon meeting time, I only took the time to change into more appropriate sightseeing clothing before heading out. With my small crossbody purse slung over my shoulder, I hurried down the stairs to meet Dom.
He was waiting just inside the entrance to the building, preoccupied by something on his phone. He was out of both his official and unofficial uniform as well, wearing a deep blue sweater and jeans. Unlike me, he wasn’t bringing anything else.
The unrelenting noise kept him from noticing my approach. “Let’s get going,” I said. I barely stopped beside him before opening the building’s front door.
Dom caught up to me in seconds, his long strides taking up more ground than mine. “We should text them to let them know we’re on the way.”
“I guess,” I said. We were only feet away from the door and the crowd already felt like it was pressing in on me. I did not want to look down at my phone in this. I’d probably walk into somebody before I’d finished typing. “Can you do it, since you already have your phone out?”
He didn’t protest. Neither did our families when we showed up where we had agreed to meet, slightly behind schedule again, even though we had done our best to hurry through the crowds. It was hard not to be understanding about unexpected delays in a place like this. Even if it hadn’t been the most crowded place we had ever gone to for a competition, there were things to grab your eye wherever you looked. The area had been designed to use every possible square foot to advertise or try to pull you into the building. Often both, since there were glowing screens lining the walls of the tall buildings that surrounded us on all sides.
Levi reached over and gave me a one-armed hug. “This is so cool,” he said. “It’s even worth all the attention we had to give you over the years.”
“Levi,” our mother said sternly.
“Mom, he has to say that,” I said. “He’s my brother.”
She pressed her lips into a firm line but decided that if I wasn’t bothered by his comment, she shouldn’t be either. When she led the way into the building, I looked at Levi and rolled my eyes. It was sweet that she wanted to protect my feelings, but I had grown up as the middle child with two brothers. This was nothing.
Chapter 30
Chapter 30
DomandIhada week after the team event to get ready for the pairs event. Seven days had never felt so long and so short at the same time. We knew we were unlikely to come back here, so we had come up with a list of everything we wanted to check out before we went home. Our families had done the same, but we had an excuse nobody could argue with to get out of the ones we didn’t want to do. We were only days away from the biggest skates of our careers. Whether we wanted to or not, we had to put a lot of effort into preparing. And between all that, we did our best to support our friends and teammates at their competitions. There was absolutely no down time in my schedule. Every evening, I was physically and mentally exhausted by the time I fell into bed. Even with the noise of Athlete’s Village, I had started falling asleep as soon as I had pulled up the covers.
On one of the few free hours in our tightly scheduled days, Dom and I had plans to ditch everyone else for a bit. The closer we got to our events, the more people stared at us with concern in their eyes, like they were concerned we were going to snapunder the pressure. I didn't know how to tell them that if I did lose it, it was going to be because they were all staring at me non-stop. I was starting to feel like I was some creature behind the glass at a zoo.
After an especially strenuous morning workout, followed by an afternoon of trying to stretch out my tense muscles, I couldn’t resist the urge to slow down to read the list of menu items that was displayed on a stand near the door of a shop that seemed to serve nothing but sweets. The scent of brownies and hot caramel had me second-guessing just how much I needed to stick to my approved diet. I’d had to walk by the shop every time I went to practice and, no matter the time of day, there were always dozens of people there. It was hard not to stare at whoever was eating a ridiculously decadent dessert at one of the tiny, cramped tables just in front of the shop's front window.
Dom’s fingers looped around my wrist, stopping me mid-stride. “Let’s go grab something,” he said, gesturing with his head toward the door.
My eyebrows furrowed. “Now? We only have two days until our short program.” Well, two days and three hours. Not that I had been obsessively counting since we hit the ninety-six hour mark.
“And that’s exactly why we should do it now,” he said. He walked over so he was standing against the wall of the building, pulling me with him. “We have been following all the rules and doing everything we were supposed to do for so long.”
“It’s worked, though,” I said. “We’re here.”
“We’re here and we’re kicking ass. We are gold medalists who were told that we shouldn’t join the never-ending parties around us. Not even after we won, for God’s sake. Yes, we have only done half the things we came here to do. But shouldn’t we celebrate what we’ve already achieved?”
“I guess,” I said. I looked longingly at the whipped cream covered milkshake a young girl was holding. When was the last time I’d been able to have something like that? “One won’t hurt.”
Dom grinned and my stomach flipped. “We can afford to be a little bad.”
He didn’t need to tell me again. Trying to keep the qualifier that it was only supposed to be a small indulgence in mind, I resisted the urge to order the triple scoop of ice cream prominently displayed on the menu. I settled for a more reasonable single scoop. Dom followed in my footsteps before offering payment for both of our cones.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I told him as we moved over to make room for the next customers at the till.
“I wanted to,” Dom replied. His dark eyes met mine. I had the feeling that there was something more he wanted to say, but the extra words never came.
By the time we left to head back to our rooms, I was devouring the last few bites of my cone. My stomach was full and the dripping ice cream left my fingers sticky. The paper napkin I had been given with it had done nothing more than spread the sugary drops around my hands. Dom, on the other hand, had eaten his entire cone before it had time to make a mess.
We walked in companionable silence, listening to the bustle that never seemed to stop as the sun set behind the buildings far off in the distance. I started to reach for the door of our building but thought better of it. “Do you mind? I’m all sticky. I should wash my hands before I make everything gross.”
Dom opened the door and let me walk through before following me inside. As we took the stairs to the fourth floor, he asked, “Do you want me to open your door? Or are you okay covering that in ice cream because you won’t be contaminating something that hundreds of people are touching?”
I glared at him. “I have to get my key out of my front pocket anyway,” I said as we finished climbing. Dom stopped beside the fire door suddenly. I hadn’t been expecting it, so I ran into his back. “Ow.”
