Head Over Heels

by Hannah Orenstein

  After Hallie has left for the night, I wait for Ryan. I sit on the stairs in the lobby that lead up to the second floor, which positions me with the best view: from here, I can see half the lobby, the door to the gym, the door to the office, the door to the bathrooms, and the exit. No matter where Ryan is, I’ll be able to catch him. Sure enough, two minutes later, he rounds the corner from the office.

  “Wait!” I call, springing up from my seat on the stairs.

  “Hey,” he says. “What’s up?”

  “I need to talk to you,” I say.

  He looks surprised. “Oh! Believe it or not, I was actually coming to find you.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  He tilts his head. “There’s something I’m hoping to get your opinion on. If you’re open to talking to me about it.”

  This is practically the most communication we’ve had all day.

  “What’s going on?” I ask.

  He’s piqued my curiosity.

  “You first,” he says. “Let’s sit in the office?”

  We sit down. I gear up to tell him what’s on my mind, but my thoughts get tangled—I don’t know where to start. So much has changed since our breakup: my renewed friendship with Jasmine, her separation from Dimitri, what I can only imagine is Ryan drawing further into Dimitri’s inner circle.

  “So, you might know that Jasmine and I are close again?” I start.

  “I’ve heard,” he says, nodding.

  “We’ve been talking a lot about how the culture of gymnastics at this level is just totally messed up, particularly for girls,” I explain. “I mean, even injuries aside, there are the issues with food and body image, mental health, sexual assault… and we want to do something about it.”

  “That’s great,” he says.

  “We’re launching a support network,” I continue. “We’re calling it the Elite Gymnastics Foundation. We’ll connect gymnasts to mental health professionals.”

  “Impressive,” he says. “You’re the perfect people to make that happen.”

  His compliment warms me, but I can’t let it soften me toward him.

  “Well, you might want to wait before you start saying nice things to me,” I warn. This is my last-ditch attempt to get him to listen to me: “I need you to turn down the Powerhouse job.”

  He looks surprised.

  “So, that’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about. I went to Powerhouse on my lunch break today. It was… intense.”

  I purse my lips. “I’m sure it was.”

  “I’ve heard your stories about what it was like to have him as your coach, but seeing it firsthand felt different,” he explains. “I didn’t like the way he treated his gymnasts. He made fun of them for getting winded during conditioning; he called them ‘sloppy,’ ‘lazy,’ ‘useless.’ He came up with these absurd punishments, like running laps for falling off beam during just a regular practice.”

  “I don’t want to say I told you so, but… Ryan, come on, what did you expect?” I ask.

  “It made me have serious doubts about taking the job,” he admits.

  I’m shocked but hopeful.

  “Well, obviously, you know what I think,” I say.

  “I guess I just wanted to confirm with you—do you think what I saw today was a one-off, bad day? Or is that who he really is?” he asks, squinting like he already knows the answer.

  “That’s just him,” I say.

  Ryan leans his elbows onto the desk and presses his fingers to his temples. He exhales a ragged sigh.

  “Okay, then,” he says, more to himself than to me, with a small shake of his head. He looks up at me with a resigned expression. “Then that’s that.”

  There’s too much at stake for me to jump to conclusions.

  “That’s… what?” I clarify.

  “I can’t take the job,” he says.

  I’m reeling at how quickly he changed his mind. I can’t wait to tell Jasmine. I almost can’t quite believe that I’m hearing him correctly. Despite how much I hoped Ryan would come around, deep down, I don’t know if I ever really believed he would.

  “It’s not the dream job I thought it was—not if he’s like this,” he explains.

  My heart races as I tell him emphatically, “It’s not. You’re right.”

  “I’ll talk to the Conways and tell Dimitri I won’t be working for him,” he says.

  That’s the next step that will make all of this feel real.

  “I can’t promise the Conways will accept my decision, though,” he warns. “If they got excited about Powerhouse, they might choose to transfer there, anyway.”

  That makes my stomach flip—not only would Hallie still work with Dimitri, but if she leaves, Summit may not have much use for me anymore.

  “If they still want Dimitri, they can go see his gym for themselves,” I suggest.

  “Right,” he says. He pauses and bites his lip, then continues in a soft, serious tone. “I’m sorry it took me so long to listen to you. I should have trusted your opinion of him from the start. This isn’t an excuse at all, but I had a hard time wrapping my head around exactly how abusive he really was. I knew he wasn’t an easy coach, but everything you’ve told me is so different from the way I was trained—I just didn’t get it at first. And maybe I was starstruck by him. But I understand now, and I apologize for taking so long to get here. I understand if this isn’t possible, but I hope you can forgive me.”

  He looks somber but heartfelt. When he offers up a hopeful smile, his dimple flashes beneath his tender, dark eyes.

  “Thank you for saying that,” I manage. “It means a lot—it really does. Apology accepted.”

  He ruffles a hand through his hair in relief and shoots me a grateful look. “I’m really glad to hear that.”

  If Ryan and I broke up because he wouldn’t listen to the truth about Dimitri’s abuse, and now he’s come around and apologized, where does that leave us? I can’t help but wonder if the same question is on his mind. But even if we are on the same page, I’m not ready for us to move forward together again. All those months of hurt and distrust can’t dissolve in an instant. A single apology doesn’t reverse the pain I felt because of him.

  And yet… I can’t lie to myself: my feelings for Ryan never went away. I shoved them down so I could stomach working with him day in and day out, and I tried to distract myself with Jasmine, with Sara, with cooking elaborate meals. Even still, I crave the easy way we used to joke around; I miss his secretly romantic side; I can’t forget how everything else melted away when he touched me. When we were together, he made me feel seen and understood—and I’ve spent enough time in the wrong relationship to grasp how special and rare that is.

  I stand up to give him a hug. He holds me close to his chest. We fit together like we always did, with his chin resting on top of my head and my cheek nuzzled against his shoulder. It strikes me as unfair that love isn’t like a switch you can flip on and off at will; despite the storm of conflicted emotions I have over Ryan right now, he’s the one person in the world whose hug will make me feel better.

  I pull back just enough to look up at him. He meets my gaze, and there’s a heaviness to his expression that I can’t quite read. Is it regret? Or longing? Either way, it makes my heart ache. For a split second, I feel his body tense beneath my arms, like he’s about to steel himself to kiss me. But then, just as quickly as it arrived, the moment disappears.

  Ryan backs away, digging in his pockets for his car keys, furtively looking over my shoulder to the door.

  “I should get going,” he says stiffly. “I’m glad we had this conversation.”

  I nod. “Same—me, too.”

  We exit through the lobby. He holds the door open for me.

  In the parking lot, we walk in opposite directions to our cars, but I hear him call my name before I get inside.

  “Yeah?” I say.

  “Thank you. I mean it.”

  He drives away, and I watch his headlights vanish around the c
orner. I shouldn’t miss him already, but I do.

  • CHAPTER 28 •

  Ryan invites me and the Conways in for a meeting before practice the next morning. Kim, Todd, and Hallie look anxious when they arrive. I’m secretly glad Ryan included me in negotiations about Hallie’s career this time around.

  “Thanks for coming in on such short notice,” he says as we take seats in Summit’s office.

  “It sounded important,” Todd says.

  Kim frowns. “And vague.”

  “Is everything okay?” Hallie asks.

  Her parents dart confused glances from me to Ryan. I bet they’re surprised to see me here.

  “Things are fine, but there’s something I wanted to discuss with you,” Ryan says.

  He comes around the desk to lean against it, hesitating like he’s trying to find the right words to explain his mistake. This can’t be easy for him, even if he understands now how crucial it is to turn down Dimitri’s job offer. Thick tension fills the room.

  “Avery and I have been debating the pros and cons of moving to Powerhouse for months,” he begins. “She knows Dimitri better than any of us. And from what she’s told me about her experiences with him and having seen him interact with his gymnasts, I can’t recommend that Hallie trains at his gym.”

  Kim and Todd look surprised; Hallie looks deflated.

  “What does that mean?” Kim asks.

  “You told us he was the best,” Todd says, narrowing his eyes. “I mean, his track record speaks for itself.”

  “It does,” Ryan hedges.

  He looks at me for backup. I appreciate that he doesn’t take the liberty of revealing uncomfortably personal details to the Conways without my permission.

  “He’s emotionally abusive,” I confirm. “Bullying, name-calling, fits of rage… He lashes out when girls get sick or don’t perform up to his standards. He might be responsible for a lot of gold medals, but he’s not a good coach. He’s toxic.”

  Hallie’s jaw drops. “Whoa.”

  “You’re sure about this?” Todd asks.

  “Believe me, I trained with him for five years,” I say. “I know what he’s really like. And I didn’t even get the worst of it.”

  “Oh my god,” Kim says, appalled.

  “Well, Hallie’s not going there,” Todd says flatly.

  “Yeah, no, he sounds horrible,” Hallie says. She gives me a sympathetic look.

  “I’m glad you understand,” I say. “Thank you for listening.”

  For so many months now, I’ve felt powerless to stop Hallie from getting hurt. To see how quickly and effectively I could change her fate is mind-blowing. I’m so grateful that the Conway family came around to my side immediately.

  “It was my mistake to recommend a move to Powerhouse earlier,” Ryan says. “I really do apologize for that, and I hope you can trust my judgment going forward.”

  Hallie nods in approval, but Kim and Todd exchange worried glances.

  “You have to understand—we’ve put Hallie’s career, our family’s lives, in your hands,” Kim says. “We’ve always trusted that you know what’s in her best interests.”

  “I… I understand that,” Ryan says, faltering.

  Todd piles on. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I have to ask: can we trust you?”

  “Dad,” Hallie says, slinking down in her seat and covering her face with her hands. “Don’t be so dramatic.”

  “This is important, Hallie,” Kim says.

  Ryan straightens up. “You can trust me. You can trust both of us,” he says, nodding at me. “I couldn’t do this without Avery.”

  I watch Kim and Todd chew that over for a few moments. She sighs heavily.

  “All right,” she says. “All right.”

  Todd gives me a small smile. “Thanks for everything you do,” he says.

  “Of course, you’re welcome,” I say.

  “So I’m going to tell Dimitri we’re both staying put—you and me,” Ryan says to Hallie, who appears to be recovering from the humiliation of her parents having an opinion about her well-being. “That is, if you still want to keep training.”

  “Yeah,” she says. “The more I think about it, the more I really do want to train for 2024. No matter what happens this summer, I’ve worked too hard to retire at sixteen, you know?”

  Ryan grins. “That’s what I like to hear.”

  JUNE 2020

  • CHAPTER 29 •

  Then, bam, it’s June. While the rest of the country starts to slow down for summer vacation, time speeds up for us. The Olympic Trials take place on Saturday, June 27, and the Olympics begin less than a month after that, on Friday, July 24—soon enough that I have a running countdown in my head that tracks how many days we have left. I don’t need to check a calendar; the days tick down automatically for me. It’s twenty-five, then twenty-two, and now we’re in the teens. This is what I’ve been preparing for since last October, and what Hallie has been looking forward to for quite literally her entire life.

  The Olympics are just close enough now that regular people are getting excited. On one lunch break, Hallie squeezes in a phone interview with Kiss 108, the local Top 40 radio station; on another, she takes a call from a People reporter. A whole crew from the Boston Globe arrived during practice one afternoon to take pictures and interview her for a front-page story. Ryan shooed the journalist and photographer away after forty-five minutes, insisting that Hallie’s energy was best spent on training at the moment. As the reporters packed up their camera equipment, her face fell just a little bit. I don’t blame her.

  Competitive gymnastics isn’t like football or baseball in the sense that the general public will tune in for a big game or even be aware when the sport is in season—it gets one blip of fandom every four years. So, even though throwing a new responsibility on top of preparing Hallie for the Olympics seems like pure lunacy right now, Jasmine insists that we have to capitalize on this moment in order to gain media attention. She wants to launch the Elite Gymnastics Foundation publicly now, before the Olympics kick off, while elite gymnastics is having its moment in the sun. If we wait until after Tokyo, the public’s interest in whatever we have to say may be lost. People will only see Hallie and her Olympic cohort as buff Miss America stand-ins—shiny, patriotic trophies—not flesh-and-blood young women battling real systemic issues. And then, well before the first crisp day of fall, gymnastics will have fallen off most people’s radars.

  So, while Hallie has been slipping out of the gym for interviews and heading home early to rest up as much as possible, I’ve been working alongside Jasmine to transform the foundation from a hazy idea into a solid reality. I text and email as much as I can during the day, and on nights and weekends we hole up in my living room to get work done. Maybe it’s because we trained alongside each other for years, but we’re a strong team now, too. Within a week, we’ve contacted a slew of former gymnasts to get them on board with publicly supporting this initiative and to collect donations. We’ve used that money to hire a web designer to create a site. And most important, we’ve started to assemble a team of mental health professionals, including therapists who have worked with athletes and sexual assault support group leaders. They’ll provide services either in person or remotely, depending on where the gymnasts live. We’ve gotten them to agree to working pro bono up front, and our goal is to fund-raise to pay for their services so there will never be any question if a gymnast can afford to access help.

  Jasmine hooked us up with a five-minute spot on NBC’s morning news show for Monday, June 8, so we’ll be the first story breaking after the weekend. The goal is to announce the launch of the Elite Gymnastics Foundation, spread awareness for the sport’s desperate need for reform, and, of course, raise money. NBC is the obvious choice, given Jasmine’s connections; she’s a familiar face, so their viewers will be primed to hear what she has to say.

  My alarm blares at five thirty on Monday morning. As I shower, I try not to dwell on how nervous I am. It�
��s been eight years since I’ve spoken to a reporter or been on TV. Doing press used to feel exciting—I liked when my competitions were broadcast live for viewers at home, and any questions thrown my way were easy to answer: How hard had I been training lately? Was I happy about my big win? Were the London Olympics on my radar? This is entirely different. I’m publicly calling out the failures of the sport that gave me everything.

  Jasmine dictated specific instructions on everything from what to wear to how to speak. She says I need to wear a simple, professional, solid-colored top or dress—no prints, because they look distracting on camera, and no green, because the green screen will turn me into a floating head. I own nothing remotely right, so I’ve borrowed a coral-red shift dress from her closet that I can just barely squeeze into. Jasmine promises the camera will only film me from the waist up. I’ve never mastered the ability to blow-dry my hair, but I do my best attempt at it while running through the sound bites I’ve practiced. Jasmine will do most of the talking on-air, but I can’t be entirely mute. It’s funny, I was never afraid to hurtle myself into the air and perform impossible-looking stunts, but saying a few lines to a camera crew strikes me as terribly intimidating.

  I step into my most professional-looking pumps to give myself a confidence boost, pour coffee into a thermos, and drive to NBC’s studio. Jasmine meets me in the lobby. She’s in a bright blue wrap dress with fluttery cap sleeves that show off her toned arms, reminding viewers of her athletic past. She chose these outfits on purpose: red and blue to remind everyone that even if we criticize the American Gymnastics Federation, we’re still wholly in support of Team USA.

  “You ready?” she asks as the security guard at the front desk scans my driver’s license and double-checks my name against his computer.

  “I barely slept last night,” I admit.

  She looks closely at me and scrunches her nose. “The makeup artist can cover up your dark circles—no worries.”