Page 56 of Chasing Gold, Catching Her

Tora stayed behind, silent, watching her vanish. After a moment, she pulled out her phone and typed a message:

Tora: I’m at the same hotel as you are, 7th floor, room 7010. If you want to talk normally, come in.

Tora finally allowed herself to relax, returning to her own room. Gold medal gleamed on her neck, their team had claimed all three quotas for the country. But the image of Alisa, broken and distant, haunted her.

She couldn’t stop wondering: would they ever see each other again? Or never?

Chapter 11

Alisa wandered off; she didn’t even change out of the costume she was wearing, only threw a sports jacket over it and walked out of the TD Garden arena where they had performed only a couple of minutes earlier.

After an hour of walking back and forth between the skyscrapers along the street, she came across a bar — The Hill Tavern. Everything inside was dimly lit and the music was playing loudly, the place almost packed because today there was a hockey match: the Snow Leopards, where her friend Hermann played, against the White Panthers, and everyone had gathered to watch the battle between the Canadians and the Russians, two winter worlds colliding once again in what was supposed to be a legendary match.

Alisa immediately noticed a familiar face on the screen. The man looked serious; his blond hair could barely be seen beneath his helmet, but his bright gray eyes assessed the situation around him in an instant, while his hands carried the puck with the same impossible speed with which he skated, like lightning on the ice… the fastest striker on the team.

Alisa sat down at the bar and waited for the bartender to serve the others first; he was busy making another cocktail, and there was only one person working in the entire crowded bar. It had to be rough.

Alisa felt heartbroken, to be honest.

Her dream seemed to have just shattered — her partner was in the hospital with a fucking knee injury, they had lost the medal, lost the quota for the country… it was humiliating, maybe even the end of her career as a figure skater. She didn’t know what to do. Alisa desperately propped her head up with both hands, trying to stifle her own thoughts that were hurling insults and curses at her, but whose voices were they? Did she really hate herself that much?

Worthless.

Nothingness.

Pathetic.

Jerk.

Loser.

Nobody.

Amateur.

No, no, these were not her own voices, but the voices of her parents and coaches who had always been unhappy with her, mixed together with other unknown voices that were impossible to make out in that endless noise of insults.

She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to push them away.

And then a voice cut through both the music in the bar and the noise in her head.

“What will you order, miss?”

Alisa raised her eyes and looked wearily at the bartender. He was an adult man, around thirty-five years old, his beard clean-shaven and perfectly, almost geometrically trimmed, the dark hairs seeming as though they had been drawn into place one by one. He blinked at her with blue eyes and raised his eyebrows, waiting for an answer.

“Oh, I… I’m sorry, I haven’t chosen yet. Can you recommend something to numb the pain and despair in my soul?”

“Oh, it’s a shitty day, isn’t it?”

“Yeah…” Alisa only nodded sadly, glancing toward the TV where Hermann had just scored a goal and the audience was anything but thrilled; everyone here was rooting for the Canadians, apparently.

“I can recommend a ‘Strawberry Panic’ cocktail.”

“It sounds… interesting… but if there are strawberries in it, then go ahead. Sweetness won’t hurt.”

The bartender winked at her, but there was no flirtation in it, and Alisa immediately understood that he was gay; something about his aura simply said safe, everything is fine, he is good. How would I even know it? Did I acquire some sort of a gay radar now and can determine people in this community?

So Alisa exhaled and turned her attention back to the match. When the Canadians scored and the score became even, everyone cheered and jumped from their seats as though they were dancing the same dance of support. Alisa didn’t move from her chair, only sat there and waited for her cocktail.