by Caela Carter
The truth was Grace didn’t care about what was fair and what wasn’t. Grace was awful, and even in her awfulness she couldn’t force herself to think more about her friend in the hospital than her own gymnastics career.
Because without her gymnastics, who would she be? A girl who loved her brother but had no idea how to communicate with him? A girl who was totally alone in a house with no mom? A girl who never had anything to say to her father when he wasn’t her coach? Without gymnastics, Grace would disappear.
She tripped out of a full turn.
It wouldn’t matter. No one thought the USA could win gold in Rome without both Grace and Leigh; there was no way the Olympic selection committee would make a team without either one of them on it. And without Leigh, Grace would certainly get a chance to compete in the all-around.
Grace thought this even as she lurched through another landing of a tumbling run. She managed not to go out of bounds, but she was totally off at this point. The music was two full bars ahead of her. She had to improvise some dance moves, move parallel to the northern boundary of the floor and launch right into her final tumbling run.
Her brain flipped back and forth between Leigh’s broken body and Wilhelmina’s stern voice.
But it wasn’t because she hadn’t eaten enough that she was imploding. That couldn’t be it. She wasn’t focused, that was all.
It wasn’t fair for her to focus, not fair to Leigh who didn’t have anything to focus on anymore.
It didn’t matter what was fair. It didn’t matter if everyone fell on their heads. It didn’t matter if she starved or if everyone starved. Grace was scaring herself but if she was honest, it might not matter if everyone died.
She wanted to be an Olympian.
Even if it meant being without Leigh. Even if that was all her fault.
WILHELMINA
As Wilhelmina watched Grace cave into herself on the floor, she found it impossible not to think about the huge hole, the missing link, the gap that Leigh had left. The spot that would need to be filled.
Everyone there could see it clearly. Not just in the empty folding chair where Leigh would normally be sitting. Not just in the silences that would usually be filled with Leigh yelling, “Come on, Grace!” You could see the hole in Grace’s gymnastics. You could see it in Maria’s tentative landings, in Kristin’s lip-biting, in Monica’s sad brown eyes. You could see it all over.
Wilhelmina had managed a close-to-perfect beam routine, managed a 9.587 execution score, even right after Leigh changed the way they were all thinking. And still, she wouldn’t be going anywhere. Right now, Wilhelmina was the best gymnast in the room. She knew it. She was better than this shell of Grace, and Leigh was gone. She was the best. And she was about to perform for the last time.
Even if Leigh’s injury meant Wilhelmina won the meet. Even if that happened, Wilhelmina wouldn’t go. She didn’t want to go to the Olympics and be the bane of Katja’s existence if Katja could tell the other countries’ coaches and espnW and Kerry and even Wilhelmina herself that she was only there because of Leigh’s fall.
Wilhelmina wanted to go honestly. She deserved to go honestly. She wouldn’t go as some second-choice alternative who had to talk about how great Leigh was to every reporter the whole time.
Her whole life Wilhelmina had settled for less than she deserved. She wouldn’t do that for the Olympics.
Stop! she told herself.
She bent down to stretch her hamstrings, to stop looking at Grace, to stop thinking about Leigh, to tell herself, Nine-point-five, nine-point-five, nine-point-five.
One more nine-point-five and I get to kiss Davion. To be a real girl. To spend the rest of my summer making out in the back row of the movies and exploring beaches and theme parks with my hot, goofy boyfriend.
Grace spun on the floor in front of them, stumbling over her toes. Wilhelmina was scared for her. She was in a more dangerous situation than Leigh. But Wilhelmina couldn’t do anything else about it, not until later.
Kerry came up beside Wilhelmina and she straightened up.
“Nine-point-five, huh,” Kerry said. “So far so good.” She was smiling, but sad.
“That’s the plan,” Wilhelmina said.
She hated that she’d have to hurt Kerry when she chose to slip out the back gym door.
Kerry nodded and stared into the distance. Grace’s floor music plunked to its conclusion and there was a spattering of polite applause throughout the arena. Grace looked close to tears as she exited the podium.
“There’s another thing,” Kerry said. “Now.”
Wilhelmina’s heart fell. In about thirty seconds her name would be announced and she’d have to chalk up and focus. She was looking forward to it. To forgetting the way Leigh’s head slammed into the beam. To being able to choose her last routine when her competitor hadn’t had that choice.
So she shook her head. She didn’t need Kerry to suddenly turn cutthroat like Ted. She didn’t need the added pressure of trying to climb on top of an injured gymnast the way others had tried to climb on her tired body for the past three years.
It was impossible not to think about the new hole in the Olympic roster. But Wilhelmina and Kerry didn’t have to talk about it.
That’s not what Kerry said.
“This is a sad stadium, now, huh? Everyone is thinking about the poor girl. Everyone is thinking about the end of dreams, about the price of your kind of a life, a childhood.”
Wilhelmina stopped shaking her head and studied the dark blue eyes of her wise coach.
“Maybe if you put on a performance like bars today for you, maybe you will help everyone smile for a little, huh? You can show everyone the joy of your kind of life. Maybe you can give Leigh credit for the way she spent hers so far?”
And that was a good enough goal for Wilhelmina’s last routine.
She took a step toward the podium thinking Kerry might be her hero in life, not only in gymnastics.
Get ready for some real gymnastics, she prepared the crowd. Get ready for joy. Leigh, this is for you.
CAMILLE
I have to get out of here. Camille turned her phone over in her palm like a precious stone. She looked over her shoulder to see that yes, Bobby was in the stands.
Camille went to the side of the floor to cheer on Wilhelmina. She would watch her friend clinch the meet, then she’d leave.
Camille wanted to go over the vault. She didn’t want to go to the Olympics. But she was already here. She wanted to spend the ten seconds it would take to give herself the thrill of landing that Amanar.
But she couldn’t now. She had to get out of the room. The depression was stifling. It put weights on Grace’s ankles so she stumbled all over the floor. It curved all their coaches’ lips into permanent frowns. It slowed down the floor music; it divided the clapping; it hung in a taut tension over the shoulders of the fans and the coaches and the families and the gymnasts.
Camille had to get to Leigh. Camille was responsible. And Camille was the only person who knew what she was going through, who could comfort her. Also, Camille could get there. She was probably the only person in the entire room who had a spectator who would drive her away from here, who would support her choice to leave.
But she didn’t want to ask him for something. She didn’t want to owe him anything anymore.
Camille studied the face of her phone. She opened up a text window and typed letters and deleted them. She did that again. She did it again. She had about three letters when something made her turn and face the meet.
It was a sudden sigh of relief from the collective population of the gym.
It was a loosening of the shoulders, a straightening of the frowns, a hoot here, a yelp there. It was one person, then more, then more enjoying themselves again.
Camille felt her arms part and her hands come together, smacking he
r phone in the middle of her own clapping. She was joining in the pulse of the audience as Wilhelmina went through her first series of upbeat dance moves in the middle of the blue floor. Wilhelmina opened her arms and arced them so that in one swift move she was able to point to every spectator and coach and gymnast, every individual in the room, and their clapping got louder.
Camille dropped her phone, turned off her brain, and watched her friend. She gasped as Wilhelmina leaped and flipped off the floor. Five feet in the air, then ten, then twelve. She whooped with the audience when Wilhelmina landed her double Arabian. Camille stuck out her hip and waved her arms in unison with Wilhelmina during her second dance series. She skipped and leaped on the sidelines as her roommate did the moves on the floor. She squealed and jumped when Wilhelmina took her final pose and stood smiling at the audience, her chest pumping to suck in air, her eyes shining with something between laughter and tears.
A few minutes later Wilhelmina sat pulling on her warm-ups next to where Camille stood.
“I’m sorry for cutting you off earlier,” Wilhelmina said.
But Camille didn’t care anymore. “How did you do that?” she asked.
Wilhelmina shrugged.
“You changed everything,” Camille whispered, sitting down next to her.
Wilhelmina flashed Camille a smile. “I don’t know,” she said. “I was just . . . enjoying it.”
“I have to get out of here,” Camille whispered. She felt like Wilhelmina could help her, like Wilhelmina could do anything. “I have to get to Leigh.”
Wilhelmina’s eyebrows knitted together. “The Olympics—”
“I don’t want to go,” Camille cut her off. “I’m tired. I’m done.” Her own jaw dropped along with her friend’s. She couldn’t believe she’d said it out loud. Finally. Her shoulders felt light, like she had never put on all of that weight that she’d worked so hard to keep. “I never wanted this kind of comeback.” Camille studied her friend. “Maybe this makes me selfish or crazy or something, but . . .” She trailed off.
Wilhelmina nodded, like this made sense. “A day ago . . .” she said. “A few hours ago, even, I would have hated you for saying that. But . . . I get it.”
Camille nodded. They’d be calling her name any minute now. Once they did, she’d have to get to the vault and go over it. She’d be sealing her fate if she didn’t run away soon. She flipped open her phone.
“I’m not going, either,” Wilhelmina said.
Camille froze. “What?” she asked. She didn’t have time to hear the answer. But she needed to hear it anyway.
“I . . . I don’t know,” Wilhelmina said. “I haven’t seen the scoreboard. I’m probably not going to win and if I don’t, Katja won’t choose me. I don’t want to be an alternate. And if I do win because Leigh fell . . . well, Katja hates me. She’ll tell the whole world I’m only there because Leigh fell. She’ll make me miserable. It’s just . . . It’s so unfair.”
Camille shook her head furiously. Alternate? What was Mina thinking? She was winning the meet. She would have beaten Leigh anyway, Camille thought, if you added up Leigh’s scores from yesterday.
“Or even if they put me on the roster because Leigh won’t be on it. Or you. Or whatever . . . I’m . . . I can’t do that to myself. I deserve to go honestly.”
“Honestly?” Camille asked. What did that even mean? “I—” Camille started. Then she shook her head. She couldn’t get into a long conversation right now. She had to get out of there. “Okay. Look. Text me from that locker room. Or call me? Before you announce that decision, talk to me.”
“Why?” Wilhelmina asked.
“I—I’m sorry. I—I have to . . . go.”
“What’s the rush?” Wilhelmina said.
“I have to get to Leigh,” Camille said. “I can . . . I can help.”
“Oh,” Wilhelmina said. “Then you can tell me if she’s okay?”
Camille nodded. “So . . . I guess . . .” Camille shrugged. “I guess . . . I’ll call Bobby. I don’t want to, but . . . He’s here. He’ll take me.”
“No!” Wilhelmina shouted.
Camille’s head shot up.
Wilhelmina was smiling. “Don’t call him. Don’t give him the satisfaction,” she said. “I have a plan.”
Camille nodded. Somehow she wasn’t surprised that Wilhelmina could figure this out.
“But,” Wilhelmina said, “don’t you want to go over the vault one more time before you disqualify yourself?”
“Yes,” said Camille. “Yes, I do.”
Five minutes later, she stood at the end of the vault runway.
I’ll stand here again, she told herself. There will be a school that forgives me for quitting this meet to check on a teammate. College gymnastics is all about teams. I’ll stand here for University of Florida or Alabama or UCLA or Stanford. I’ll be an NCAA vaulter.
It wouldn’t be the same, and that was good thing. But she wanted to remember it like this.
Camille closed her eyes to soak in the “Comeback Cammie” chant that was pulsing through the stadium. She let the sixteen-year-old inside her enjoy it for a moment. Then, the twenty-year-old Camille took off on the last elite runway sprint of her life, her hands hit the mat, her feet bounced off the springboard, her elbows launched her higher than ever off the vault, and she spun. She spun in the applause that echoed from the stadium walls. She spun above the ground, both her young self and her older self full of the joy that comes with weightlessness.
And after she landed, she didn’t stop walking until she was in the parking lot.
FINAL RESULTS
1.
Wilhelmina Parker
119.555
2.
Georgette Paulson
117.929
3.
Grace Cooper
115.840
4.
Monica Chase
115.225
5.
Maria Vasquez
114.730
6.
Kristin Jackson
113.945
7.
Annie Simms
112.515
8.
Natalie Rice
108.105
9.
Camille Abrams
60.950
10.
Samantha Soloman
60.405
11.
Olivia Corsica
59.550
12.
Leigh Becker
WITHDRAWN
The Verdict
WILHELMINA
Wilhelmina’s phone buzzed in the pocket of her warm-up pants as she followed the rest of the gymnasts into the locker room. She lowered herself onto the bench in the back, next to Monica, and snuck her phone into her hand.
Davion: The eagle has landed.
Wilhelmina smiled. She clutched tighter at the happiness she’d felt during that floor routine. She had to keep it. At least until she was alone with her family and the neighbor boys and Kerry. Safe. She’d done the best she could do to be both a good person and a great gymnast. She’d helped the stadium see the joy in gymnastics for Leigh and she’d gotten Camille to Leigh’s side. She’
d met her 9.5 goal on each apparatus. And she hadn’t looked at the score once. Not even now that the meet was over.
Wilhelmina was pretty sure Georgette had won the meet. Georgette had started in third place and had a solid day. But on the off-chance Wilhelmina had won, she wanted to hear it from her enemy herself. She wanted to hear her name come out of Katja’s mouth, to see the hatred on her face one last time, to face it down before she said no thanks and left the gym forever.
Wilhelmina was calm in this tense locker room. Wilhelmina was minutes away from retiring, hours away from her first kiss. But she was calm.
Tonight she’d cry into the privacy of her pillow. Oh, she’d cry. She’d cry because her career was over. She’d cry because any dream worth having would be painful to lose. But that was later.
Now, she had one thing left to do.
“Hey,” she whispered to Monica, “you need a new coach. You know that, right?”
Monica nodded. “Yeah,” she said.
“You don’t need to be treated like that. There are nice coaches out there,” Wilhelmina said.
Monica nodded. She looked nervous. Everyone in the room was nervous, probably, expect for Wilhelmina.
“You should talk to Kerry,” she said.
Now Monica smiled, surprised. Wilhelmina smiled, too. She was glad Monica was happy, but she wasn’t doing this for her new friend. She was doing it for her coach.
“You’d want me as a teammate?” Monica asked.
Oh. Why hadn’t she prepared for this question?
She turned to whisper into Monica’s ear. “I’m done, Monica. I’m done. And Kerry needs a new star. She could make you one. You have time. But I . . . I can’t.”
Monica’s eyebrows lowered into the most confused look and Wilhelmina panicked. She’d said too much. Before she could backpedal, before she could ask Monica to keep it quiet until she had a chance to tell Kerry herself, the selection committee came through the locker room door.