The Comeback

by E. L. Shen

  “Maxine,” she says, “you apologize right now.”

  I blink, the world continuing to swirl.

  “I—I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m really sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” Hollie whispers, but she’s backing out of the locker room.

  Her footsteps hurry down the hall.

  Mom careens toward me, her hands on her hips. “What has gotten into you?”

  I stare down at my feet, but she tilts my chin upward, forcing me to look at her.

  “In this family,” she says, “we don’t act like that.”

  “I’m sorry,” I mumble.

  Mom shakes her head. “I don’t care if you’ve had a bad skate, Maxine.” She pushes the pretzels into my hands. “It’s no excuse to treat people unkindly.”

  She sighs. My body feels like it’s shriveling into a prune. I wish I could disappear.

  Icy Apologies

  I toss and turn all night, and when at last I fall asleep, Kristi Yamaguchi emerges in my dreams. I’m sitting on a rubber floor, cross-legged, and she’s on the ice, spinning toward me, a wide smile on her face. She’s draped by a white background and nothing else: just her, the ice, and me. But when she gets closer, she frowns and shakes her head.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, staring down at my skates.

  When I look up, she’s gone.

  It is just white, white, white. I reach out to touch the ice, but no matter how far I stretch my fingertips, I can’t reach it. I am about to give up when a girl floats through the nothingness on a blue glass cloud, hovering above the ice, breaking the endless white. She’s sitting cross-legged, too.

  It’s Hollie, I realize. Her cloud dips down to my feet.

  “I’m sorry,” I tell her, and I mean it this time.

  Her eyes crinkle. “It’s okay,” she says.

  But even my dream self knows it’s not.

  Beep! Beep! Beep!

  My alarm cracks open my dream and I squint, adjusting to the light. It’s seven in the morning. In just a few hours, I’ll be back at the rink for my free skate. It’s a new day, I tell myself. Clean ice, clean start. You got this, Maxine.

  I can feel the bruise on my tailbone from yesterday’s fall as I swing my legs off the bed. I wince as I press a hand to the tender spot. Maybe Mom can rub some Tiger Balm on it. Tiger Balm fixes everything. I curl my toes against the hardwood floor. In my bedroom mirror, I can still see smudges of makeup rimming my eyes from yesterday’s disaster. I wipe the back of my hand so vigorously against my skin that my cheekbone briefly swells red.

  As I hustle downstairs, I smell crispy bacon and buttermilk pancakes on the griddle. There’s a protein-packed smoothie already waiting for me on the counter. More fuel for regionals.

  Mom is hunched over the newspaper, her elbows on the counter, reading glasses perched on the bridge of her nose. Dad stands over the stove in his pajamas. He tosses me a tentative smile. I know they had quite the chat last night. I could hear them whispering through the walls.

  Dad dishes bacon and pancakes onto a plate, and slides it over to me. I take it, scooting onto a kitchen stool.

  “Thanks,” I say, and then, with Mom still staring at the newspaper and Dad’s back to me, I gulp. Time to be a real intermediate lady, Maxine.

  “I feel awful about yesterday.”

  I look down at my food. Mom’s glasses peek out from behind the newspaper.

  “I hope so,” she says. “Although I don’t think I’m the one you need to be telling that to.”

  I bite my lip. “I’ll talk to Hollie at the rink today.”

  “Good.” Mom folds the newspaper and tucks it under her arm. “I talked to her mom on the phone this morning.”

  I sit up. “What?”

  Mom snatches a slice of bacon from the plate and takes a bite. “We’ve arranged a playdate for you two.”

  “A … “playdate?”

  I flash back to when I was six and used to sit in the living room with Victoria, dumping all my Barbies on the floor so that we could undress and redress them until we got bored. My chest hitches when I realize I haven’t talked to her in weeks.

  “A get-together. A hangout. Whatever.”

  Dad looks at me and shrugs. So this wasn’t just a chat. Mom has built the ship and is clearly intent on sailing it to whichever sea she chooses. We are all getting on board.

  “You girls barely know each other,” she continues, “and I think it would do you some good to try.”

  I swallow a piece of pancake. “I’m not sure Hollie wants to hang out with me.”

  “She just moved here a couple of weeks ago. From what her mom says, she doesn’t have any friends yet, Maxine.”

  Oh. I guess I didn’t think about that. My shoulders droop.

  “Okay.”

  Mom nods her head, like we’ve made a deal.

  “Okay.” She smiles, her hands on her hips. “Now finish your food. You’ve got a big day ahead of you.”

  Jennie

  The junior girls are mesmerizing. The metal bleachers stick to the back of my legs as I lean forward, watching their every move. Mom drove me to the rink early so I could collect myself before the free skate. Sometimes it’s calming to watch the older skaters finish up on the rink. The last handful of girls are warming up before their short program routines.

  With powerful yet dainty legs, they speed around one another in circles before taking off into triple Lutzes and triple flips. As they fly, their dresses swing and spin in a dazzling pageant. None of the other intermediate girls are here yet, so it’s just them and me.

  Jennie Kim glides by with a smooth black bun and an emerald-green dress. Her blades click against the ice, her eyes so focused she’s practically shooting laser beams. Kristi Yamaguchi may be my number one, but Jennie Kim is a very close second. She’s from New York Skating Club in Manhattan, so I only see her at big competitions.

  I follow her every move as she grabs her blade and lifts her right leg vertical to her left, almost parallel to her face. My eyes widen. She could be a trapeze artist.

  When the junior girls are done warming up, I trail after them as they pile into the locker room. Even though it’s the same room I saw yesterday, it’s entirely transformed. Dresses swing from every hook, dozens and dozens, with complicated, delicate beading and deep mesh V-necks. Makeup is strewn across the benches, brushes rolling onto the floor. And to think, I thought middle school beauty routines were intense.

  Jennie is huddled in the corner, a compact mirror inches from her face as she powders her cheeks. I touch my oily forehead. Should I be powdering, too?

  That’s when Jennie catches my eye, peeking out from behind the compact. I’m sure she’s pinpointed my chipped nail polish and childish fuchsia fleece.

  My cheeks burn. Stupid Maxine, stupid Maxine, STUPID. Thank God no one can see me blush through my tan skin. This is basically the only instance where I’m grateful to be Asian.

  And then Jennie does something strange. Her hand beckons me over. I look around, but there’s no one else behind me. Jennie Kim wants to talk to me. I swallow. My hands in my pockets, I walk slowly toward her. She’s still holding the compact, powder brush perched between her fingertips.

  “I’m so sorry,” I begin babbling, “I’m an intermediate, not a junior, and I know I’m not supposed to be here yet, or at all right now, but I like to get to the ice early and—”

  “Dude!” Jennie laughs. “It’s fine.”

  Up close, she is even more perfect than she seems on the ice. Maybe the powder is really working wonders, but her skin is radiant. Her brown eye shadow fades right below her brow bone, her liquid eyeliner effortlessly flicked.

  “Your makeup looks really good,” I blurt.

  Could. You. Be. More. Embarrassing?! The last of my dignity curdles in my toes. But Jennie just smiles. She lowers her compact.

  “Thanks,” she says, eyeballing the locker room clock. “Do you want me to do yours? I have some time.”

  “What?�
��

  “Your makeup.” Jennie grabs the giant makeup bag resting beside her and holds it up like she’s lifting Simba from The Lion King. “If you want, I could do it for you.”

  I plop myself down on the bench before she can change her mind.

  “Sure,” I manage to squeak out.

  “Cool.”

  Jennie waves a canister of foundation in my face.

  “Liquid’s the best kind,” she instructs, “and Fenty has the most shades.”

  I always use Mom’s foundation for competitions, but hers is an unsightly mixture of decades-old mustard yellow and muddy brown. I never put too much on. Otherwise it looks like I smeared my face with a dirty diaper wipe. Jennie’s foundation, though, blends into my skin perfectly.

  As if she can read my mind (I wouldn’t be surprised, given all her other talents), Jennie says, “This is perfect since we have the same skin tone.”

  She pumps the foundation onto the back of her hand and dabs it with a sponge before patting it on my face. My hands tingle. It feels like art class, except I’m the canvas. Then she pulls out another palette and swirls a big brush into bronzer.

  “Suck in your cheeks like this,” she says, her skin taut against her cheekbones.

  I giggle. “Fish face.”

  “Yeah, exactly.” She angles the brush and presses it into the crevices of my cheeks, drawing thin lines before blending with her brush.

  “Where did you learn to do all this?” I marvel as she fills in my eyebrows with sticky black goop.

  She shrugs, her shoulders shifting against her velvet sleeves. She flicks open the most dazzling eye shadow palette I’ve ever seen. It shimmers under the fluorescent lights.

  “YouTube videos, mostly.”

  I perk up. “I watch beauty YouTubers, too!”

  Jennie swirls a small brush into deep purple eye shadow. “Oh yeah? Which ones?”

  I rattle a couple off the top of my head, but Jennie scrunches her nose as I ramble.

  “Those ones are fine,” she says, gently pressing my eyelids closed to sweep on the eye shadow, “but you should really watch the Asian makeup gurus.”

  I feel my goopy brows furrow as I sit in the dark.

  “Don’t do that,” Jennie says, “you’ll mess up your eye shadow.”

  “Sorry,” I say.

  “Yeah, Mascara_Mimi is my favorite. And then probably BubbleTeaAndBeauty.”

  I grin as Jennie slowly paints liquid eyeliner onto my lash line. It tickles. “Does BubbleTeaAndBeauty also do bubble tea tutorials?”

  “No,” she says with a chuckle, “but sometimes she reviews flavors.”

  “Jasmine is obviously the best.”

  Jennie coats mascara onto my eyelashes. “Are you crazy? Matcha all the way. You can open your eyes now.”

  The world becomes color again: Jennie’s glowing face smirking, a twinkle in her espresso irises. She flips open her compact and hands it to me.

  “Ta-da,” she says. “You look beautiful.”

  I stare at my reflection. I’ve never seen myself look like this before. Not that I look like a different person, but I just seem more luminous. My cheekbones are like silver knives, ready to slice the ice. My eyebrows are fierce and defined. But it’s my eyes that make me gasp. Somehow, Jennie has brushed on the eye shadow at such an angle that it complements the paper-thin lines of my almond eyes. The eyeliner flicks upward with the natural corners of my skin. My eyes don’t seem small anymore. Or wide, either. They just look … nice.

  “Thank you,” I breathe. “You’re a wizard.”

  Jennie pats my head. “Watch those Asian makeup gurus,” she says.

  She grabs the compact from my fingers and gestures to the door. “All right, kiddo, I gotta go stretch.”

  I nod, and follow her out of the locker room. But I’m still thinking about my eyes. My eyes, my eyes, the lids I hate so much, their shriveled curves, the ugly slits. Now they are almost pretty.

  You look beautiful, Jennie said.

  Maybe, I think. Maybe more than almost.

  Ready or Not

  “Eagle wings, all right, Maxine?” Judy whispers in my ear, her parka pressed against my shoulder as I stand at the rink’s edge.

  “Yep.” I suck in the cold air. “I know.”

  The other intermediate girls turn in circles on the ice like ballerinas in a music box, twisting around one another during warm-up. As expected, Hollie is in blush pink for her Celine Dion free skate. Skating backward, she extends her right leg into a double Lutz, double loop. Perfection.

  I roll my shoulders and stretch out my arms, weaving in between the other skaters. Eagle wings, indeed.

  The faster the girls around me move, the easier they blur, until only Hollie remains in focus, the gauzy skirt of her dress flapping against her thighs. Mom’s comment this morning rattles around in my head: I don’t think I’m the one you need to be telling that to. A mirage of Hollie’s eyes prickled with tears skates across my vision—lips parted in shock, dream-Hollie floating toward me with hollow cheeks. I shake my head and focus on curving into a layback. If I bother her now, we could collide, and that would be really bad.

  I skate until my legs are warm and tingly.

  “Two minutes left,” the loudspeaker booms.

  Judy nods at me from across the rink.

  I’ve had a good warm-up. Now I just have to repeat it when it really counts.

  Judy paces at the boards, rubbing her hands together. We both know how important this free skate is. She won’t vocalize it because she doesn’t want to stress me out. But I need an incredible score to jump to fourth place from seventh to qualify for sectionals. Otherwise, my season ends here.

  We file off the ice one by one. The other girls stretch their legs over the boards and practice their landings on the mat until the announcer calls their names. But I trail after Hollie until we are just steps apart. Now’s my chance. I reach out a hand and tap her gently on the shoulder.

  “Hey,” I say.

  She turns, her green eyes blinking. “Hi,” she says, and then, cocking her head at me: “Your makeup looks pretty.”

  I smile, remembering my reflection in Jennie’s compact, the way the purple eye shadow gleamed.

  “Thanks,” I say. “Jennie did it.”

  Hollie’s face lights up. “She’s so cool.”

  “Yeah.” I nod. “She is.”

  She glances down at her skates. I fiddle with my tights, flicking the fabric against my skin like a rubber band.

  “So I just wanted to, uh, I just wanted to … to…”

  Hollie steps backward, hugging her elbows.

  “I—I—I’m really sorry. For yesterday.” My words falter.

  Hollie shifts her gaze from the floor to my face. “You already apologized. It’s—”

  I cut her off. “No, you never did anything to me and I was really—I wasn’t—I was being mean. I’m sorry.”

  I keep snapping the fabric against my leg until it stings.

  “You don’t have to say it’s okay,” I quickly add.

  A hint of a smirk emerges on Hollie’s lips. She relaxes her shoulders.

  “Okay,” she says. “I mean, it’s “not okay.” Hollie smiles.

  I can’t help but smile back.

  “Good. I mean, great.”

  “Well, I guess we’ll be seeing more of each other,” she says as she smooths down the pleats in her dress, “now that our moms planned a playdate for us.”

  “Yeah,” I say, “like we’re four. Maybe we should play Barbies.”

  “On the playground.”

  “Better yet, in the sandbox.”

  “Supervised, of course.”

  “Oh, absolutely.”

  I smirk, and Hollie’s eyes twinkle before we both burst into laughter. She holds her rib cage, clutching her dress’s beaded bodice.

  “Well,” she says, “we should probably get back to it.”

  “Right,” I say. “Good luck out there.”

&n
bsp; “You, too.”

  Hollie disappears into the locker room just as Judy runs out dangling an exercise band in one hand.

  “Maxine,” she says, “you ready?”

  I push a loose strand of hair behind my ears and steady my feet in my skates.

  “Yeah,” I say, “I’m ready.”

  The Results Are In

  The edge of the bench in the Kiss and Cry digs into the inside of my knees. My crystal-blue dress and gauzy tights are soaked with sweat. Judy hands me a towel to wipe off my forehead. Then she throws an arm around my shoulder, and I lean into her, rapidly swallowing the cold rink air.

  “You did great, kid,” she says, and I know she means it.

  It’s programs like these that I can hardly remember. The Gershwin piano keys flooded the rink and then it was just me and my skates. Every turn felt tight, every jump precise. But was it enough? I watch my rib cage expand and contract with the jewels stitched across my chest. In and out, in and out.

  Right now, Katarina is in first and Fleur is in second. My base technical element score was higher than both of theirs—my jumps were more complicated and better executed. Katarina’s artistry and choreography were killer, though, so she’ll most likely receive a higher program component score than me.

  There are only two skaters left, Hollie and Gwen, and if they skate clean, they’ll probably win gold and silver. That means if I can just beat out Fleur, I’ll be in fourth. I’ll make sectionals.

  I can’t see Mom and Dad, but I know they are antsy in the bleachers, trying not to talk about every element in my free skate, but definitely giving in and talking about every element in my free skate.

  That was a solid triple toe, right? I imagine them whispering.

  Right, so positive grade of execution there.

  Maybe we should replay it on your video camera just to make sure.

  No, no, the judges have it handled.

  But it’ll only take ten seconds! We’ll just check the triple toe, that’s it.