by Erin McRae
“Actually talked. About your deal.”
“We haven’t had time since Harbin. Last night was the closest we’ve gotten, but we made out instead and now everything’s a mess. And when I tried to talk about that, it turned into an argument.”
“It turns into an argument every time you two talk about anything,” Justin muttered.
“That’s because they’re not fucking,” Shane pointed out helpfully.
“Thanks, both of you, so much.” Brendan turned back to David and lowered his voice, not that that would stop anyone from eavesdropping. “We were fine as long as we channeled whatever feelings we had for each other into skating and ignored them everywhere else. At least, that’s Katie’s theory, so when we went and made out last night everything got broken, and here we are. Oops.”
David’s eyes widened. “Wait. Was that seriously the first time you two have been macking on each other?”
“In like eight years, yeah.”
“Jesus.” David blew out a breath.
“Tell me about it.”
BRENDAN LOOKED FOR Katie when he was finished getting dressed but couldn’t find her anywhere. Maybe she’d gone out for a run to work off some of her nervous energy. Which was fine, but Brendan would have preferred to discuss the need for a room switch before he went and did anything about it. But that apparently was not to be, and he needed to catch people before they got too settled.
Justin and Natalya were willing to help him out, and once that was settled, Brendan helped Natalya move her luggage to the room that was now Katie’s and dragged his own to the one he was sharing with Justin. Logistics finally resolved, he face-planted on his bed and slept for two hours without moving. When his alarm woke him so that he could eat dinner and get to the rink in time for that evening’s performance, he rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling, letting the disorientation of travel wash over him.
Forgetting where he was, was par for the course in a life that involved so much travel. But this kind of disorientation came from the fact that the bags on the other side of the room weren’t Katie’s and that, tonight after the performance, they wouldn’t be coming back to the same place. The decision to switch rooms was the right one, Brendan was sure, but it sucked all the same.
Despite everything, getting back to the rink for that night’s performance felt like a weight lifting off his shoulders. He liked skating; he loved skating with Katie. While he missed the adrenaline rush of competing a bit, he did not at all miss the sickening, stomach-dropping nerves of stepping onto the ice and hearing their names announced. No matter how long he’d had to get used to it, that had never really gone away. But on a night like tonight, all he had to do was relax and enjoy himself. He was determined to do that regardless of whatever was happening between him and Katie.
Once he got himself changed into his costume for the first number, Brendan knocked on the door to the girl’s dressing room. “It’s me, can I come in?”
He was greeted, as usual, by a chorus of assent, so he pushed the door open.
Katie, seated at a makeup table along the far side of the wall, looked over her shoulder at him. Her pale, elegant arms were raised above her head, her fingers attempting to twist her hair into place. “Oh good. I was going to text you.”
“Do you need a hand?” Usually the other women ignored his presence in their dressing room, but tonight, presumably thanks to the bus make-out, several pairs of eyes followed him as he went to Katie.
“God, please, I can’t get it to stay.”
“All right, here.” Brendan put his hands over Katie’s in her hair, carefully taking the braids between his own fingers.
“Do you have them?” she asked, as if he couldn’t redo her braids if they came loose.
Brendan nodded. “Yeah, you can let go.”
Katie slid her hands slowly out from beneath Brendan’s, the gesture almost a caress. He grabbed a handful of bobby pins off her table and stuck them in his mouth before he could do something like catch her hands again and kiss the backs of them in front of everyone.
“I hate this costume,” Katie grumbled once Brendan had taken over. She plucked at the short, fluttery sleeves of her dress.
“Stop moving your head,” Brendan said through his mouthful of bobby pins. Katie could have figured out her own hair or gotten one of the other girls to do it, but he’d learned to help her when they were kids and her mom or her uncles couldn’t come to competitions. It had become another ritual for them.
He worked in silence for a few more minutes. Katie picked up the hairbrush sitting on the counter and started turning it over in her hands. “You could have warned me about Natalya,” she said, not looking at him in the mirror.
Brendan took in a breath to steady himself and made his voice calm. Casual. Neither accusatory, nor defensive. If Katie wanted to be upset about his unilateral decision to change rooms, that was more than fair, but he didn’t want to have that fight minutes before they went on. “Sorry. It felt like the right thing to do. I needed a nap and I had no idea where you were.”
“Stretching.”
“How’s your leg?” Brendan leapt at the chance to change the subject.
“Attached to my body,” Katie said flatly.
No further discussion of that topic today, okay. “Excellent, now will you please stop fidgeting?”
Katie finally stilled herself. “Neon pink is not my color.”
“Consider yourself lucky. Someone thought orange suits me. I look like a sunflower.”
“That’s ’cause you’re so cheery all the time.” Katie finally looked up and made a face at him in the mirror. Then she passed him the hair spray.
Brendan’s heart leapt. Routine had always been their friend. It helped with the nerves that came with the sport and the anxiety that Katie battled regardless of it. If she was complaining about the admittedly hideous costumes they had to wear for the group numbers and feeling up to teasing him, things were returning to something like normal.
That hopeful feeling lasted all the way through the opening number, the girls’ number, the guys’ number, and a particularly fierce backstage game of Sorry! while other solo routines went on. But when it was time for their own program, he could feel Katie draw away from him again.
He watched her face in the dim light of the tunnel as Justin finished his routine. She’d changed out of the hated neon into the dress that their own beloved seamstress had made for her. She looked stunning in it, her dark hair and pale skin beautifully offset by the emerald green velour. But she also looked remote and untouchable, and Brendan groaned inwardly.
There was no time to talk her out of whatever nerves and insecurity the events of the last day had planted in her brain. The applause for Justin was dying down, and soon Justin himself was there, stepping off the ice as Katie and Brendan’s names were announced. Brendan high-fived him reflexively and took Katie’s hand. He hoped this wasn’t about to be a disaster.
He knew they were doomed when their first side-by-side jumps weren’t synchronized. The crowd applauded, but that almost didn’t matter when he could feel how off they were. Katie was too rigid on the first lift, and Brendan was helpless to do anything for her.
He commanded himself not to hold his breath for the throw jump; it was instinct to do so, but that would screw everything up. Throws were a moment when every part of his body needed to work perfectly so that Katie wouldn’t get hurt.
Katie spun through the air as he released her. When she hit the ice, her leg wobbled. It happened quickly, but Brendan felt like he was seeing it in slow motion. She tried to save her balance but couldn’t. She went down on both knees, her hands trailing through the bits of ice shaved off by their and others skaters’ blades before she regained her feet.
Only a few seconds passed before they fully caught up to the music again. Katie’s hand was cold when he held it tightly for the death spiral. She was smiling, but her smile was brittle, pasted on for the sake of the crowds and the judges t
hat were probably still there in her head.
As soon as they were back in the tunnel, Brendan pulled her into a hug. That’s what they did when something went wrong on the ice. Still together. Still okay. Still one.
Katie’s back rose and fell under his arms as she caught her breath. He wondered how long it would take her to remember that, after the events of the last twenty-four hours, she probably didn’t want his comfort.
“Shit. Shit shit shit,” she hissed even as she leaned into him.
“Hey.” He brushed the loose part of her hair back, untangling a strand from one of her earrings. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”
Katie didn’t reply, but when she pressed her face into his shoulder he could practically feel her frown. Angry with herself, not him. Brendan ached for her. Things happened on the ice. There was no reason for her to feel more pain about it than necessary.
He touched her cheek, the soft skin by her ear. “Come on, look at me.”
She raised her head. As he looked down into her eyes, all Brendan wanted to do was kiss her. If it hadn’t been for recent events he would have, on her forehead, like the good friend and perfectly platonic partner he was supposed to be. But given the circumstances, he had no idea what to do.
Something in his eyes must have shifted, because she straightened up, cold and remote and made of steel. Before Brendan could say anything, Katie nodded as if deciding something in her own head.
“Extra practice tomorrow,” she said. And then she was gone.
Chapter 5
WAY TOO EARLY IN THE Morning
Portland, OR
HER ALARM WAS SET FOR 3:45 a.m., but Katie woke up before it went off. Somehow, the act of setting her clock always, in turn, set the clock in her head. Such had been the case since she was little, getting up while it was still the dead of night to go to skating practice or work on her family’s farm. She was relieved the habit remained with her and Brendan no longer training for competition. If nothing else, it would keep Natalya from killing her for having her alarm go off so very, very early.
She found it immensely strange to room with someone who wasn’t Brendan. Was this how people felt all the time on the road? Sharing space with someone they liked well enough but who wasn’t — Katie didn’t know how else to put it — an extension of their own body and mind? The fact that she and Brendan couldn’t kiss and skate together didn’t change that about them.
Enough about missing Brendan. Last night she had fallen, and now she had to fix it. She pulled on her practice clothes — black leggings, a tank top, and a form-fitting jacket with a zipper up the front. She tugged it all the way up but knew she’d spend the whole practice slowly inching it back down as the cold of the ice gave way to the heat of the work. She pulled her hair into a high ponytail and spared the briefest of moments to brush her teeth. Makeup could wait. A shower could wait. Getting out on the ice and getting it right could not.
Katie grabbed her skate bag, slipped out of her room, jogged up three flights of stairs, and threaded her way through another hotel corridor until she was in front of Brendan’s room. Damn him for having the courage and decency to take a step away from their too-close quarters.
Katie banged on the door. When no one answered, she kept banging.
Brendan finally opened the door with tousled hair, a rumpled T-shirt, and a frown. “What?” he asked. Behind him, in the bed closest to the door, Justin swore at them both and pulled a pillow over his head.
“Come on, get dressed, we’re going to the rink.”
“It’s four in the fucking morning.” Brendan scrubbed a hand over his face.
“I’m aware of that.” Katie’s days had started at four most of her life. She knew what the hour — and its utility — looked like better than most.
“We don’t have to get up at four in the morning anymore.”
Says the boy who’s never lived on a farm. She shrugged as if she didn’t care. That was an act, but hopefully one he would fall for. “Well, you can sleep in. I’m going.”
She turned from the door, prepared for it fall shut behind her, but at the last moment, she heard Brendan’s hand slap against it. “Yeah, all right, give me ten, and you’re buying coffee.”
Katie smiled. They may have been a disaster, but that didn’t mean they weren’t better together than apart.
THIRTY MINUTES AND one Dunkin Donuts stop later they were at the rink. This early, it was empty of even the most dedicated of their tour mates. Katie dropped her bags and began to work through her stretch routine, loosening ankles and knees and hips. Beside her, Brendan did the same, albeit much more slowly.
Katie considered giving him grief for that. After all, she was the one who was injured and yet here he was moving like an old man. But she didn’t want to disturb their peace, hard-won with exhaustion and coffee.
In the first year that they had come back together after Stockholm, sometimes their coach had forbidden them from speaking on the ice. In the immediacy of it, Katie had felt that was a punishment for all their bickering, but it had been a trick that worked. If they couldn’t speak, they had to listen — not just to their coach, but to each other’s bodies and breathing and facial expressions.
She sat down on the floor, folded herself over her knees and grabbed her feet, massaging the tendons as she pointed and flexed. She was aware of Brendan watching her, but he remained silent as he focused on his arms and shoulders
Good. He won’t drop me again.
Katie lay back on the floor and kicked one leg up. She pulled it towards her, creeping into a split. By the end of the day, this would be almost easy, but for the moment, her body was reluctant. She huffed in annoyance, and Brendan, ridiculously, was instantly by her side.
“I’m fine,” she said, feeling shame, somehow, at breaking the silence.
“I know. Do you want help?”
She gave a little acquiescent tilt of her head. Brendan put a hand to her thigh and another to her calf and pushed her leg back slowly, until her flexed toes touched the floor.
“All right?” he asked.
She nodded, breathing through it. She pointed her foot, and Brendan pushed again, leaning against her leg until the top of her foot hit the floor. Katie sighed in relief at the feel of him and at the stretch successfully completed without agenda, but with so much wanting.
With their warmup finished and their skates on, Katie leaned on the wall at the edge of the rink, took off her skate guards, and glided out onto the ice. Beside her, Brendan did the same.
She’d been doing this for more than two decades, but this moment had never ceased to thrill her: The rest of the world home, warm and asleep; the ice a smooth blank canvas in front of them. It was far from bliss: It was cold; adrenaline and endorphins had yet to kick in, and she could feel every bruise and blister on her feet. But Brendan would reach out — she knew, without having to look at him — their hands would meet, and suddenly everything was possible.
When their skating worked, Katie didn’t have to think about what she was doing. Her mind could drift, a highly kinetic kind of meditation. But this morning, there was too much to do to let her mind wander.
They ran through the first minute or so of their Harbin routine, or at least their modified Harbin routine. The changes they were making so Katie could skate it relatively safely were far from a lock. Katie knew she wasn’t making that process any easier, but after a year of developing the original program any change felt like sacrilege and defeat. No matter how long she and Brendan worked together on tours and exhibitions, they’d never skate at the level that won them gold again. Everything had been on the line at the Games. Replicating that without the pressure of competition was impossible.
Katie wanted to get as close to it as she could, though. If she couldn’t have her favorite jumps, she could make other things harder. As they assessed what they could make work she did progressively harder jumps that she could land on her good knee.
The third time she landed a quad s
alchow throw, though, Brendan found her hand and pulled her to a stop in front of him. “I get you’re pissed about falling yesterday, but now you’re doing quads?”
Katie brushed a loose strand of hair out of her face with her free hand. “You throw, I spin. Don’t worry about it.”
Brendan frowned and gave a minute shake of his head. “This doesn’t work that way.”
“I can land them,” Katie insisted. The warm, intimate feel of the morning was draining quickly away, leaving them where they so often ended up: On the ice and upset with each other. She knew that was inevitable, but it still felt a little like heartbreak.
“I know you can.” Brendan pulled her closer and dropped his voice, not that there was anyone around to hear. “But your knee is one bad landing away from being out of commission for the rest of the tour and possibly the rest of your life.”
“I wasn’t landing on that leg,” Katie protested.
“And you can’t guarantee you won’t stumble or fall and hurt yourself anyway. You want to take risks with your health, fine, whatever, it’s your body. But you’re my partner and it’s damn irresponsible for you to take risks with my job.”
Brendan was absolutely, positively, one hundred percent correct. Which only made Katie angrier. “You don’t need to patronize me,” she snapped, skating backwards away from him and pulling her hand out of his grasp. “I know my own limits.”
Brendan followed her. “I’m not trying to be patronizing. Really. Just, Kate, you’re my partner. I will always worry about you.”
“And don’t say you’re my partner!” She spun away from Brendan, not able to look at him. He only ever called her Kate when he was very serious about something.
“Why? I am. And you’re mine.”
Brendan sounded hurt. Which only made Katie more frustrated. She loved him, more than she would ever be able to express in any kind of language. Why did she have to find a way to make that a bug and not a feature?