by Claire Adams
“It’s not over yet,” he says, and he puts an arm around me as we watch the rest of the field take their turns, but nobody comes up to Ian’s score.
I’m beyond ecstatic; I can only imagine what Ian must be feeling right now.
It feels so weird that it’s already over, but that’s it. Ian’s got his sponsorship.
At least, that’s what we think.
The woman comes over the loudspeaker, and I pull Ian close as we wait for her to announce him as the winner, but she doesn’t.
“That was just a spectacular round on the vert ramp, ladies and gentlemen. Next up on the vert ramp, we’ve got the best trick competition,” the woman says and my blood turns cold.
“I forgot about best trick,” I tell Ian. “Tell me you’ve got something prepared.”
He doesn’t answer.
“It doesn’t matter,” I tell him. “You’re doing great out there. Just throw something down.”
“Yeah,” he says blankly.
“I mean, you get three tries, right?” I ask. “You just need one of them to—”
“One,” he says before kissing me on the forehead and heading back toward the ramp.
One?
Ian’s going to be the first to go, but the organizers are taking their sweet time calling a start to the trick competition.
I turn around and look for Rob. He’s back about where I was standing before I came forward to meet Ian, and I make my way back to Rob.
“What’s he going to do?” I ask.
“I totally forgot about the one-trick competition,” Rob says. “All I’ve been going over with him is vert shit.”
On his last two runs, Ian pulled at least a few tricks that would bring him a high score, but he can’t use any of them. He’s already done them in competition today and they always take off points for repeats.
There’s no timer this time.
Ian drops in successfully, so there’s a big chunk of worry out of the way, but he doesn’t look too confident coming up to the other side of the ramp.
Ian uses his launch to get more speed, and he comes back fast. One more speed/height launch and this next one is going to be it, whatever “it” is going to be.
He’s got great momentum coming to the jump and his wheels leave the ramp and he’s doing… I don’t know what he’s doing.
As soon as he’s airborne, Ian’s spinning and going for what looks like the beginnings of a nuclear grab, but the board comes away from his feet before his hand can replace it.
Although he’s in full spin, he manages to snatch his board out of the air, his back hand on his front truck and the spin slows drastically as he brings the board back to his feet, completing his second full rotation.
Now, all he has to do is land.
So much happens in the time it takes Ian to go that last couple of feet before he reaches the ramp.
His wheels come down hard on the downslope of the vert ramp and his knees bend as he goes from the vertical slope to the horizontal flat, clean.
This time, covering my ears doesn’t make the slightest perceptible difference.
Epilogue Pt. 1
Ian
I called it the Mia grab.
To be perfectly frank, I hadn’t planned on making up a trick that day, but that’s what ended up winning me the gold and a nice, shiny new sponsorship.
That said, things haven’t been all smooth sailing.
A lot of my time’s been spent on the road doing demos and competitions. Earlier this month, I qualified for my first X Games, and yes, I’m competing in vert.
The Mia grab has become a part of my personal legend, but what’s both great and terrible about that is that neither me, nor anyone else, knows exactly what I did. If nothing else, I guess that means I can just come up with something new and call that the Mia flip, but I’m getting off topic.
It’s been a year.
One year, and Mia and I are still together.
I didn’t end up staying with Rob too much longer, though he does usually end up crashing on one of the couches in my new house.
The most important thing that happened after I fell into the pro scene is that I’ve been able to take over the full-time care of mom. Dad, on the other hand, is gone.
I don’t know what triggered it, but one morning, I got a phone call from him, and when I answered, his only words to me were, “Take care of your mother and take care of yourself. Hopefully, one day you’ll grow out of this skateboarding business.”
And that was it. After that, he just left.
It’s been about six months, and it’s sad, but the only positive thing about mom’s condition is that most of the time, she doesn’t know that dad left her. I just hate it when she remembers.
Mia’s on her way toward graduating with highest honors, though her final semester does have that algebra course she’s been putting off forever, so those honors may or may not still be there when she’s done.
Right now, I’m at the old skate park with Mia, perched atop the vert wall.
After we got home from the competition—and after having sex many, many times—Mia decided to fill me in on her little secret: She’s been practicing her board skills for the past four years, she was always just too shy to come out of the garage with it.
Now, though, all that’s about to change.
“I don’t know,” she says. “I think they’ve built this thing up since the last time we were here.”
“We were here yesterday,” I tell her.
“I didn’t say whoever did this weren’t skilled workers,” she answers.
“Shh,” I tell her. “Just relax and close your eyes. Now,” I say, “tell me what you see.”
Epilogue Pt. 2
Mia
I can feel the warm breeze running over my skin as Ian asks me a second time to tell him what I see.
“I see,” I start, “me. I’m rolling down the ramp and out clean.”
“Good,” he says. “Now, open your eyes.”
I’m not quite ready, so I leave my eyes shut a few more seconds as I try to mentally work through this.
Ian’s taken me to the park as often as possible ever since he found out that I’ve been hiding my own skating progress, but the biggest thing I’ve dropped into was a halfpipe and Ian was right: that’s a whole other thing.
“Mia?” he asks, kissing my forehead.
“Yeah?” I answer, finally opening my eyes.
“You don’t have to do this if you’re not ready,” he says. “I don’t want to pressure you into doing this.”
“Well,” I tell him, “if I’m going to be your arm candy when you’re traveling across the globe, the least I can do is know how to bring it on four wheels.”
He grins his white-toothed grin, saying, “After we do this, we’re going to head back home and work on your trash talk. You, my dear, have a very long way to go.”
“Whatever,” I tell him. “Any final pointers before I break my neck?”
“I think between here, home, and the last year or so, we’ve pretty much covered all the finer points,” he says. “What I will tell you is that it’ll go so much easier if you’re relaxed and loose when you drop in. Otherwise, well…”
“Yeah,” I mutter and take another look down at the concrete, seemingly so far below.
Ours isn’t a perfect situation, but we’re making it work.
“Will you hurry up? I’ve got things to do!” Abby shouts from the concrete below.
Going after Ian the way she did almost ruined our friendship. It would have ruined our friendship if she’d persisted, but even that quick kiss did its fair share of damage.
Now that I’m living with Ian, though, being vindictive toward someone who was once so close to me just didn’t seem like the thing to do. Of course, I didn’t let her off completely free of punishment.
“You’re on the clock!” I shout down to her.
“Well,” she calls back up, “I think the kid’s diaper’s wet, so I’m goi
ng to go get him changed in the car.”
Every new parent should have a free babysitter.
Yep, that’s right. That day in the janitor’s closet when I forgot to grab my purse, and with it, my condoms, was the day that I became pregnant.
That was an uncomfortable conversation with dad.
He’s really started to come around ever since I moved in with Ian, though, my dad. Telling him that that guy he was so worried about knocked me up didn’t go over so well.
Now, though, when Abby has to work or, more commonly, when I just get sick of having her around, I send her home and call my dad. It’s been a long road, but I think we’re starting to make progress.
“You ready?” Ian asks.
“I don’t know,” I tell him. “Just go over it for me one more time, start to finish.”
Ian runs through it all with me, answering the few questions I have left: He really has been working with me a lot since I “came out of the garage,” as he likes to call it.
“Okay,” I tell him finally, and I roll my board to the lip until only the tail between my foot and the edge is keeping the board in place. “I’m ready.”
We’re not rich, but we’re comfortable. What’s more, we’re happy.
That day of the Midwest Championships, I realized quite possibly the most important thing about my relationship, not only with Ian, but with others as well: Ian was right. It was fear.
I didn’t believe him until I figured out what he was trying to say to me.
“The point is that I love you.”
“You’ve got this,” Ian tells me, echoing my own words from a year ago.
There’s no telling what’s going to happen in the future, but Ian, Emma, and I have got a firm foundation with each other, a beautiful life.
Right now, there’s only one thing left to do.
I put my front foot on the board, and I lean in.
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GAMED BOX SET
By Claire Adams
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 Claire Adams
PART 1
CHAPTER ONE
Quinn
His face on the magazine cover kept eclipsing my textbook. I recognized him from high school, junior high school actually, and the thrill of seeing him again was more exciting than gross anatomy. I tried to tell myself it was the magazine that was grabbing my attention. I had obsessed over the new hit multi-player online game Dark Flag since it came out. Owen Redd was rising to dominance as the game's first clan leader. He was a star in the gamer community.
And my sister's boyfriend, I reminded myself.
I never understood how he put up with Sienna. She had wanted to change him from the moment they met. My perfect sister, with her stellar G.P.A. and her driving ambition to be a surgeon, wanted her boyfriend to be more than a gamer. I always suspected she started dating him as a challenge. Sienna was always trying to improve, perfect, and control the world around her. Owen struck me as another project she took on – change the school's most popular rebel into the prom king. She kept a framed picture of their prom court on the desk in her dorm. Owen's crown was crooked, but he and Sienna were still together.
I wondered if she knew he was on the cover of a magazine. Sienna would not be impressed, but it really was a big deal. I reached for my phone.
"The studying going well?" my roommate asked.
"Can you believe the professor gives us a quiz at the start of every class? Seems cruel," I said.
Darla shook her head and laughed. "I heard he charts the quiz scores on a board."
I groaned. My sister's name was on the top of that board and I could not help but look at it every time I sat down to struggle through another quiz.
Darla gave my long hair a sympathetic tug. "Have you ever considered changing your major? I know nursing is a noble profession, but as far as I can see, you don't like anything about it."
"I like it," I said. "It’s just a lot of memorizing and papers and sitting around studying new research. There's not a lot of, I don't know, action to it."
"Well, if you're looking for action, I heard there's a Dark Flag party over in the basement of the Mathematics lab," Darla said.
My roommate was the opposite of me in many ways – an art major with a concentration in textiles – but she was also a gamer. I stood up to lead the way out the door.
"Wait, you forgot your phone," Darla stopped me. "Ugh, I think your advisor is calling."
I looked at the caller ID and bit my lip. Alice Bonton had a sixth sense about when I was going to do something fun instead of study. There was no reason I couldn’t let the call go to voicemail, except my father's nagging motto: never put off for tomorrow what you can deal with right now.
"Ms. Alice, how is your evening?" I asked. Darla shrugged her shoulders and left without me.
"Quinn, I'm glad I caught you. I mean, I'm not glad, I'm just grateful you answered your phone," my advisor said.
"If this is about skipping class last week, its sounds much worse than it was. I was actually volunteering my time down at the blood drive. I just forgot to get a volunteer form signed," I said.
"Skipping class again? That's the fourth time this month. That's once a week. Quinn, I'm concerned. I know this isn't the time to discuss it, but–" her voice cracked. "I'm not sure how to do this."
"I can make up all the work, I promise. I'm studying right now. Literally, the book is open in front of me. I love nursing, I really do. I've just been distracted lately." I stopped myself before I started talking about the new game. My college advisor would not be impressed to hear how dedicated I was to a new online game.
"When was the last time you went home? Spent any time with your family?"
"I don't know, fall break? So, well, I guess about a month," I said. "But I'm going home for Thanksgiving. Sienna wants to stay on campus, but I agreed to go home. I'm in charge of making the gravy. Sienna makes the best stuffing, but she's only staying on campus to get a head start on studying for finals. She's pre-med and wants to be a surgeon."
There was silence on the other end of the line. Finally, when I had held my breath long enough to see a few stars creeping around the edges of my vision, my advisor said, "I know you look up to your sister, but I hope you have considered finding your own path."
I could feel dread hanging over the conversation. Ms. Alice's words were heavy and she struggled to speak. The same weight settled over me. "Am I getting kicked out of the nursing program?"
"What?" my advisor asked. "No. I mean, I don't know, the skipping class is getting out of hand. I just think now is a good time for you to consider what you really want to do. You shouldn't stick with a major just because of family expectations. Instead of following in your sister's footsteps–"
"Ms. Alice, are you alright? Maybe I should make an appointment during your office hours," I said. "I'm going online right now to put in the request. I don't want to take up any more of your time this evening."
"Wait, Quinn, I'm calling late for a reason," my advisor said. She cleared her throat and paused again.
"Oh no! You're right. I didn't know how late it was! I promised a friend I would cover his shift at the front desk of our dorm. I gotta go, Ms. Alice. I'm sorry. Thanks for your concern. We'll talk soon!" I hung up the phone and put it down as if it burned my hand.
I was never rude and I never lied, but I had been both to Ms. Alice for no discernible reason. Something in her heavy tone and her pauses made me nervous. I looked at the clock. It was past ten o'clock on a weeknight. My stomach twisted. Why would my college advisor
be calling so late?
I stood up and brushed my hair back, doing my best impression of my sister's hair flip. Sienna never let other people bother her. My sister would have cut the strange phone call short twenty seconds after it started. On the other hand, I was wracked with guilt. I felt as if Ms. Alice was trying to tell me something and I had not done a good job of helping her spit it out.
Despite the guilt, I brushed my hair and got ready to join Darla at the gamer party. I moved quickly and was out the door before I could even shut my abandoned textbook.
"Oh, sorry. Excuse me," I said.
The taller of the campus security guards held up both hands. "Whoa, slow down. Are you Quinn Thomas?"
My stomach turned sour. "Yes?"
"Your advisor is Alice Bonton?" he asked.
"Yes. Wait, what's going on?" I asked.
His rotund partner shoved his hands in his pockets and scowled. "Your advisor needs you to meet her at Alton Tower. We're here to give you a lift. That's all we know."
"Please come with us, Ms. Thomas." The taller guard stepped aside and ushered me past.
I took a step before I saw the sharp look pass between the two men. "What is this all about? Has something happened?"
Neither said a single word more. I fought the urge to run and instead walked downstairs and out the front doors. The fat guard waved a thick hand towards the campus vehicle. My feet froze and an angry buzzing started in my ears. The taller guard stepped around me and opened the passenger side door, relegating his partner to the backseat.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
The lanky man folded himself into the driver's seat. Instead of answering, he turned the key in the ignition. I tried to close my eyes and take a calming breath, but an incessant flashing of lights stopped me. An ambulance drove past and joined the whirling lights of a police car not far away.
Alton Tower. That's where the guard said my advisor was waiting. I knew it because it was my sister's dorm.
The campus vehicle bucked the curb and drove right onto the lawn outside Alton Tower. Another campus security Jeep, the police car, and the ambulance blocked the front door of the dorm. I sat in the car, not sure where I was supposed to go.