Heath starts to shake his head. “No—I don’t know. It’s always about him.” He shifts his gaze from me. “My mom asked me where I was going when I left, and I said work. I lied right to her face. She even kissed me on the cheek after I said it, since I help out with the bills. So I’m driving over here—” he points to where our vehicles are parked, one behind the other, and his voice picks up in volume “—in Cal’s truck, and my mom thinks I’m sacrificing all my free time to make money for the family when in reality...in reality...” He falls quiet.
In reality he’s meeting the sister of his brother’s murderer. I can’t help but cringe.
“No,” Heath says. “Don’t do that. It isn’t about you. I just don’t know how I can ever explain it to her. I’m stuck with lying to her, and I’ll never feel good about that.”
I understand that. I didn’t have to lie to my mom about where I was going today, but that was only because she was still in bed with a headache from crying all night. Just because I didn’t speak the lie aloud about who I was meeting didn’t make it any less of a one.
“Look,” I say, watching Heath walk over to the tree and lean against the trunk. “Maybe we should just stop—”
“No.” He makes sure to hold my gaze when he repeats the word. “No. That’s not what I’m saying. I don’t like lying to my mom because she wouldn’t understand, not because I’m doing anything wrong with you. You aren’t either. I just have to figure out how to not be a dick about it to you.”
I exhale half a laugh. “Yeah, that’d be good.”
“I am sorry.”
“I’m sorry we have to lie to our families.”
“Yeah.” He pushes off from the tree and walks up to me, stopping maybe a foot away. “So how is this practice thing going to work?”
That is a very good question, and I’m grateful for the subject change even though I don’t exactly have an answer.
“Well,” I take a deep breath. “For my audition, I need to demonstrate certain skills, mostly solo stuff, but showing at least a little bit of partner work and a few lifts will give me a real advantage over some of the other people auditioning.”
“Does that mean you’re going to send it in?”
I look away. I haven’t explained the mental gymnastics I’ve done to get to rationalize this stage let alone the rest. “It means I’m going to film the best audition video I can.”
After a moment, Heath says, “All right.”
Relieved that he’s not going to press the issue, I keep talking. “Since I’ve always been a singles skater, this is going to be a lot of trial and error. I have some ideas of the kind of lifts I want to incorporate, but it’ll really come down to the ones I can do with a reasonable level of proficiency before I have to film.”
“And you have a friend to do that with you on the ice. I can stick to grass?”
“Right,” I say. “But Anton, my friend who actually knows how to pair skate, lives in Houston. Between college and his own skating, he doesn’t have time to drive out and rehearse with me. I need to be able to go over the parts of the routine I need him for and then pretty much film it right after. He can only give me a day, and I need to know what I’m doing before then.”
“I guess that’s the plan then.”
I frown at Heath, but the expression is directed at myself. “Not really, no. I have to teach us both how to do something I’ve never done before, and I basically have a month and a half to do it.”
Heath takes a slow step toward me, holding my gaze. “Then we better get started.”
I decide to start easy and go with a simple half press lift. I reach for both of Heath’s hands and step into him once they are clasped in mine. I make a point of staring directly ahead at his neck while I explain what I want him to do. It’s an easy lift; in fact it’s typically the first one they teach little kids when they are learning to pair skate. The guy bends his knees and elbows while the girl locks hers, and then he powers up, keeping his elbows bent while she extends her legs apart. Easy, except, not at all.
The actual mechanics of the lift are straightforward enough, and Heath lifts me without any obvious effort, but once he’s holding me in the air with our joined hands at his shoulders and his chin resting low against my stomach, it feels anything but simple.
“Now what?” Heath asks, his breath warm against my belly even through the fabric of my fitted blue tank. It causes a tremor to pulse through my body that I know he can feel.
“Now nothing. This is the lift.”
“That’s it?” Another tremor.
“You can turn in a circle if you feel—yeah, slow like that. That’s what we’d do if we were on the ice.”
“Shouldn’t I be pushing you up higher? Like a barbell?” He’s already extending his arms as he speaks, lifting me above his head.
I squeak and my elbows buckle, sending my weight crashing onto his face and then both of us tumbling to the ground.
Heath lets out anoofas his back hits the grass and I make a similar sound when I slam into him. His hands fly to my thighs on either side of his as he lifts his head.
