These Battered Hands

by Laurel Ulen Curtis

  Callie gestured over his shoulder to me, and I did my best not to cringe. I didn’t want her to feel like she’d done the wrong thing, but I wasn’t excited about the new attention either. The more they watched me, the more I’d have to watch myself, marking my actions in some hollow version of their normal intensity.

  I’d have to watch the way I looked at her and spoke to her, and I’d have to do even more than I already had to.

  “Nikolai Bagrov,” she touted proudly.

  I smiled if only at the affection in her voice.

  “He’s the third ranked power tumbler in the world and makes my tumbling look like child’s play.”

  I closed my eyes briefly in resignation.

  The interviewer turned to me and back again. “What’s he doing coaching you then?”

  Callie went to answer, but I cut in and did it before her.

  “I’m retired,” I explained simply.

  Callie’s eyes opened wide in surprise, perhaps because I hadn’t officially told her, or maybe because I spent all of my nights tumbling with her. She knew I was still in competitive shape, but from the moment my parents died, I’d been done. My heart still loved the sport but I didn’t have the competitive edge.

  I just wanted to have fun. And now, I wanted to coach Callie.

  I’d deal with what came after that when I got to it.

  I did my best to steel my face, schooling my expression in to one of dry disinterest. I didn’t want him to get the inkling that there was something more or less to the decision or that anything about me was worthy of his interest.

  The media on scrutiny was well and intrusive enough.

  The interviewer shrugged, turning back to Callie to ask more questions.

  With a nod and a jerk of my head, I signaled her that it was time to be done.

  She understood.

  “I don’t want to cut you short, but I’ve really got to get going and get prepared for tomorrow,” she explained with a sweet smile I recognized as fake from a mile away.

  No one else was any the wiser.

  I knew part of it was a genuine disinterest in the interview, but the other fraction of its plasticity came from me and her inability to get a read on why my mood had taken a nose dive into the shitter.

  “Right, no problem. Good luck tomorrow,” the guy agreed easily, knowing the long day she had ahead of her tomorrow and counting it as normal.

  “Thanks,” she replied, shaking the man’s hand and coming to meet me where I stood.

  “Let’s go,” I directed shortly, careful to walk beside her without touching her as I did.

  She could feel the uncertainty wafting off of me, a nervous fidget making her normally smooth walk choppy. But this wasn’t the place to explain, so I ignored it, walking with my eyes pointed on the ground as we weaved through the crowd in the lobby of the hotel, waited on the elevator, climbed on, and rode it in silence to the sixth floor and our rooms.

  “My room,” I directed, knowing that the possibility of her father coming to her room was much higher than him coming to mine.

  “What?” she asked as soon as the door closed behind us. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nik.”

  Frustrated, I ran my hands down my face, and then pulled off my hat and pushed them through my hair. She shoved my arms out of the way and stepped into my body, wrapping her arms around me and looking up with big eyes.

  “What’s wrong?” she demanded, concerned.

  “Nothing, Cal,” I non-answered.

  She glared at me.

  I widened my eyes in apology and opened my mouth like a fish before the words formed. “Really. I’m sorry for worrying you. They’re just gonna be watching us now.”

  “What do you mean? They were always going to be watching us.”

  “No,” I corrected. “They were going to be watching you. I was going to be just another part of the white, fuzzy background noise.”

  “Oh,” she mumbled as she tucked her face into my chest , distraught.

  “It’s fine.” The cotton of her shirt rasped slightly with the soothing motion of my hands up and down the back of it.

  She pulled back enough to look at me again, forcing me to loosen my arms marginally. “I just didn’t think it was fair that I was getting all of the attention when you’re better than I am.”

  “I’m not better than you are,” I denied.

  “At tumbling?” Her scoff cut the otherwise silent air. “You so are.”

  I shook my head good-naturedly, my frustration easily replaced with affection.

  Man, I was in deep with her.

  “It’s just hard not to touch you,” I admitted, capturing the end of a strand of her long, brown hair and wrapping it tightly around my finger.

  “Oh,” she murmured, enlightened. “I understand.”

  Her arms tightened their hold, fingertips digging in through the material of my shirt and scraping at the skin underneath. I nodded at how in sync we were. Marveled at how our thoughts seemed to connect to one another.

  “You’re horny,” she said simply.

  Exactly.

  Wait. What?

  That wasn’t what I thought she was going to say.

  “No—”

  “If you wanted me, you just should have said something.”

  “Cal—”

  “After all,” she said, widening her eyes meaningfully, “We’re alone now.”

  Glancing around the dark room, I noticed the drawn curtains and the closed door and the utter silence from the rooms on either side.

  Oh. OH.

  I smiled and lifted narrowed one eye playfully, dropping my voice to a raspy whisper. “Do you want me, my little Pea?”

  Nodding, she smiled in victory, and my body reacted almost immediately. “Like you wouldn’t believe.”

  “Would you say that my fulfillment of this want is essential to your focus during the competition tomorrow?” I prompted with a raise of one brow.

  “Yes,” she agreed, bouncing her head enthusiastically. “Definitely.”

  “So, really, I’m just doing my job,” I reasoned jokingly.

  She pushed me to the bed, happiness radiating from her eyes and straight into the heart of me, and broke me with one simple line.

  “Come on, Nik.” Climbing me like a jungle gym, she settled one leg on each side from the top. “Get to work.”

  “How are you feeling?” I asked as we lingered in the hall waiting for her name to be announced and the grand march into the gym to begin. Her mother and father were in the stands, and for that I was grateful.

  I didn’t plan to have any inappropriate conversations or picture the things we’d done the night before, but we had a routine.

  Day in and day out we worked together alone, and that was what we’d become accustomed to. I needed her to feel free to tell me anything she needed to, and I needed to be able to do the same.

  In one smooth move, she stood up from her bag and turned to me, lifting both of her hands in the position for a double high five.

  I obliged without complaint or question, smiling just as she did when our hands came together and I felt the sticky indication that the gesture wasn’t about high-fiving at all.

  “Great,” she said as I pulled my hands away and immediately looked at them. Purple glitter sparkled from the surface. “Ready to fight.” I looked from my hands to her eyes, and that’s when she finished. “Like I have a little bit of magic.”

  “I can’t wait to watch,” I told her truthfully, knowing it was going to be the likes of which I hadn’t seen before.

  She was more than ready.

  The music of the march started, and knowing I had to, I stepped away. She forced her eyes forward and bounced her head to the beat, her tight, smoothed-back ponytail bopping as she did.

  Her shoulders were low and her head was raised high, her feet pointed to precision as she began her elegant walk out to the floor.

  The line surrounded
her, some in front and the rest trailing behind, and when the majority of them cleared I stepped to the end of the hall and turned left to head straight for what I knew would be her first event. She was starting on Vault, what I liked to think of as her neutral event. I didn’t expect her to bring in her highest score, but it wouldn’t be bad either.

  She’d recently learned to harness her power a little better. I waited to the side with the other coaches and glanced to the floor as they announced her. She looked up to the crowd with a smile and a wave, turning from one side to the other and back again before standing still back in line. Down the line like a wave, the rest of the girls followed suit in alphabetical order, most of them nearly ten years younger than she was.

  Some glanced at her with curiosity, but the others stayed focused, keeping their eyes on the ground or blankly ahead of them, no doubt running through some form of detailed visualization.

  It was a heady thing, coming to a competition where you had to show your best or risk losing everything. You could be one of the best performers in the sport at your home gym, but if you didn’t leave it all on the floor on competition day, none of your fancy skills meant squat.

  The introductions finally done, the floor cleared and gymnasts scattered in every direction. Callie came directly to the vault, going over to her bag that I’d carried over for her and pulling off her warm up suit.

  Her leotard was still purple, the short clipped velvet of the suit portion fading into the mesh and sparkly sleeves with a gradual ombre effect.

  She rocked her ankles back and forth, curling the toes of each foot into the ground and pulling back on her toes with her fingers, before bending at the hips and stretching her palms straight to the carpeted floor.

  Bouncing to move the muscles further, she came back to standing, twisting back and forth at the hips and then finally throwing each arm individually across her chest to loosen those.

  Drills took over, the act of throwing her arms above her head as if setting up for a skill nearly getting lost in a sea of girls doing exactly the same thing.

  She wasn’t the first up, so I walked to her instead of standing up by the vaulting table. I didn’t intend to talk to her unless she talked to me because, honestly, she knew everything I could possibly say to her. She didn’t need me to clog her head with a rote listing of the rules, and she didn’t need me to know what was at stake.

  She knew all on her own just by looking at the crowd and the judges and into the eyes of her competition.

  All of these girls wanted it. Wanted it in a way that clouded the air and threatened to choke you with its oppression.

  Think about the pressure you feel after studying for a test for a week, putting in the work and time and effort to do well, and magnify that times a million.

  Every athlete there had spent their life preparing for this very day. Whether that meant twenty-something years or seventeen, it didn’t get much more intense than that.

  I pulled my eyes from Callie to watch Jillian Kristone take her turn on Vault. She chalked her hands and wiped her feet on the floor, cracking her neck from side to side, then practicing her set and twist.

  I knew she’d be doing a Yurchenko two and half, just like Callie, what had become the new standard since every gymnast was capable of it in the Olympics four years ago. A skill that once seemed impossible now towed the line as the minimum. The progression was staggering.

  The difference in scoring mostly came from the height and distance, as well as the form.

  Jillian Kristone was one of the best vaulters in the country and arguably one of Callie’s biggest competitors for the day. Large and explosive, she knew how to convert her body’s energy into useful speed and blocking.

  But where Jillian excelled in power, Callie dominated artistic merit.

  And, thanks to a little pushing from me, my girl was looking pretty powerful in her own right.

  With a salute to the judges, she scooted onto the runway, glancing at her mark on the thick foam carpet to make sure she was at the right distance. It was the kind of thing girls double checked and triple checked, Callie included, because one step off would be the bearer of more than one step of consequences.

  Down the runway she went at a hard run, into her round off, backwards off of the springboard and onto the table, and up and off, twisting and soaring with great form and distance. She took a big step on the landing though, her power almost too much for the amount of rotation.

  I looked back to find Callie looking on, a determined gleam in her eye and a smile hugging just the corner of her mouth.

  She was in the competitive zone, ready, feeling the experience of having done this two times before and excited to use it to her advantage.

  She climbed the stairs to the vaulting platform without a word, knowing she was next, and I did my part by walking down to the end of the platform with the table.

  I climbed the stairs as well, adjusting the springboard to her positioning and making sure the mat was snug around it.

  I cleared the space, going back down the stairs and standing back to watch as she repeated much of the same routine Jillian had performed. Chalk on the hands and feet, wiping the feet on the floor.

  She did do one thing differently though, saluting the judges and looking down to check her spot, but stopping to look at her hands on the way back up.

  My chest swelled and heaved as I glanced at my own hands. Excitement tore through my body at the same speed as her run, each step toward the springboard like a pound of my heart. Her body stretched in preparation, twisting into her round off, slamming off of the board and onto the table, blocking perfectly, and soaring through her two and half twists.

  Her feet hit the mat and stuck as if suctioned to the ground.

  Raucous cheers hit me like a wave, the crowd instantly on their feet to cheer for her.

  I couldn’t clap my hands hard enough or scream loud enough, the cupping of my hands around my mouth meant to help Callie, and Callie alone, hear my voice.

  “That’s it!” I yelled as she stepped off the mat and jogged down the steps closest to me.

  She flew into my arms for a hug, and I embraced her fully, savoring the scant second before I released her again.

  We walked together toward the other end where her bag lay on one of the chairs and her smile was infectious.

  “Three more events like that, yeah?” I asked as she walked next to me, her hand on her hip and her breathing labored from the exertion.

  She smiled and nodded, grabbing her bottle of water from her bag and taking a big swig.

  Immediately, the lion’s paws came off and the focus shifted. She’d be going to Bars next, and the preparation started then. It didn’t matter what her score was or what had happened only moments before because it was in the past and nothing could be done to change it.

  Not all gymnasts had the ability to compartmentalize like that, breaking a meet up into parts and separating them with bolted and locked doors once they were done. One fall on one event couldn’t be the reason you crumbled, just as one success couldn’t be the reason you lost focus.

  Her grips came out of the bag along with a roll of pre-wrap and tape. I grabbed it from her hands without saying anything and directed her over to the side and out of the way. I helped her wrap both wrists, enjoying the opportunity to be close to her as I did.

  Her score flashed on the LED screen that ran the circumference of the arena just as it blasted over the loud speaker. Her head came up to take a look at the fifteen point eight, but that look was it.

  I could feel the camera over my shoulder, zoomed in on her face to get her reaction.

  This was a huge event, and every moment of it would be immortalized on TV and internet everywhere. Maybe that was the reason we didn’t say all that much. Neither one of us knew when someone was there or when the camera was on.

  Callie didn’t let it bother her though. She moved with the ease of someone watched and filmed twenty four hours a day for a reality sho
w—like the cameras weren’t there.

  She had a steady hand and a focused gaze.

  It was like she had none of the same monsters bullying their way around my stomach.

  The thing I liked to call—

  Nerves.

  Raw and chewed out and used up, I finally reached the point where they got so active, I went numb.

  Kind of like getting to the point where you have to pee so bad it goes away, or starving from a hunger so deep it stops.

  That’s what I was feeling for nearly the entire competition last night. I’d done okay.

  Actually, I’d done well, but the whole thing felt like a dream. I floated around in my head so much I almost forgot where I was.

  Success felt like enjoyment, but only when I saw the way it lit Nik’s eyes and body up like a beacon. He was without a doubt my biggest cheerleader, practically running along the runway of the vault with me, jumping five feet in the air at the end of my routines with a ridiculous fist bump, and always waiting with uplifting and encouraging words for me when I rejoined him.

  He didn’t hover and tell me what I should have been doing or what I shouldn’t because he knew I didn’t need it. My mind was already crowded enough, all of the voices of my naysayers, supporters, my self-doubt and opposing drive, and the many hours of advice Nik had managed to cram all the way inside from the time he’d shaken my spit-soaked hand.

  Now I was on the final event of the second day of Trials, and by some gift delivered straight from God’s hands, I’d been given the chance to finish on Beam.

  I knew most people wouldn’t praise this kind of fate, but for me, it felt like home.

  It felt like the best chance I had at finishing on a high note, going out with a bang, and earning a spot on my third Olympic team.

  I expected Nik to give me some kind of check-in question to see how I was feeling or a pep talk to make sure I was ready.

  But as he smiled at me with genuine warmth, affection, and pride, he only had one thing to say.

  “I can’t wait to watch you up there.”

  And, after hearing that, I knew I’d do everything I could to make sure I gave him one hell of a show.