“Solid Brady Bunch reference. You don’t get too many of those anymore.”
“We watched a lot of TV Land at my house.”
“Same.”
It’s not late at all, but I start changing into pajamas anyway, because I’m 85 years old. My classmates are all grinding to Ke$ha at this very second and on a normal Saturday night I’d be getting ready for some ibuprofen and a bath right about now.
But not tonight, because Emerson Bedford is sleeping over.
“We don’t have a guest room,” I explain, slightly embarrassed. Queen Emerson definitely isn’t used to such meager accommodations. “I can sleep on the couch, or we can share my bed, whatever.”
“Sharing’s fine.” She rifles through my t-shirts, chooses an MGMA invitational shirt that’s 900 sizes too big for both of us, changes, and sits cross-legged on my bed. “I wasn’t just being a bitch when I didn’t include you on my Rio team.”
My face gets red. “I don’t care. It was just hypothetical.”
“I just picked who would go if I had to choose at this moment. Obviously things can change. Honestly, I’d rather have you on the team than Charlotte anyway. Or Maddy, really. They’re both kind of jackasses. Worlds with the two of them was torture.”
“I thought Maddy was your best friend.”
Emerson rolls her eyes. “She was like my sidekick, as if we’re thirteen and trying to become queens of the middle school cafeteria. She has no mind of her own and only likes me because of who I am. Like, not ‘who I am’ personality-wise, but ‘who I am’ in terms of like, celebrity or whatever.”
“Yeah, I get it.”
“She’s a dick, and the second someone else on this team wins nationals or gets endorsements or goes on talk shows, she’ll be all over them. She’s the worst.”
“That sucks.”
“She’s just so vapid. Everyone is. No one is a real genuine person.” Emerson sighs, hugging her knees to her chest and resting her chin on top. “That’s kind of why I love it here. You and Ruby are both actually chill. Don’t ever tell her I said that.”
I laugh, and recline back in my armchair by the window, curling my legs under my butt. “I won’t.”
“Do you ever wish gymnastics was just…gymnastics?” she asks suddenly, staring at her toes. “No press, no endorsements, no…I don’t know, no Olympics even?”
“I wouldn’t go as far as no Olympics, but yeah, the rest is kind of annoying.”
“I love competing and everything, but like, I remember doing rec gym when I was four or five and it was just fun. There was no coach drilling you on skills or making you do pressure sets. If you wanted to do cartwheels for a full hour, fine. Wanna just jump up and down on the trampoline? No problem. I still love training, but it’s not the same with so many expectations. It’s too complicated.”
“Yeah, well, look at school. You color in kindergarten, you play with blocks, you go to recess…and then in high school the only thing that matters is getting good grades so you can go to college. It’s just growing up. Things are supposed to get more complicated.”
“Mmmm. I guess. Doesn’t mean I hate it any less. The business side, I mean. The Olympics, this whole journey, would be amazing if I could just do gymnastics and not have to deal with a single agent or manager or contract or reporter.”
“Or gym owners?” Whoops, that slips out. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”
“Sure you didn’t.” She laughs, then pauses. “Promise not to tell?”
“Yes.” My heart flutters, as if I’m about to have the identity of the Zodiac Killer revealed exclusively to me. “I promise.”
A big sigh, and then she starts. “It was Vera’s idea to move me, so that part is true. But the gym owners at Windy City were fine. I barely had anything to do with them since Sergei and I basically did our own thing. I don’t like that the gym is getting a bad rap because of these rumors that have nothing to do with them.”
She pauses and stares at me for a second. I clear my throat, trying to think of what to say, but before I can add my two cents, she sighs again and continues.
“Okay, so…my mother is the worst. It’s your basic Lifetime drama with my father walking out and my mom working two jobs to raise me on her own. She put me in gymnastics so I’d have something to do after school, like a baby-sitter with benefits basically.
“But when I was seven, she started partying a lot, not really taking care of me at all, reliving her wild youth that came to a halt when she had me. Forgetting to pick me up from school and the gym became a regular occurrence, and because I was so embarrassed of her, I would beg friends for rides home with their parents.
“One day, I had no one and decided to walk, a truly solid plan until the cops saw me waiting to cross six lanes of traffic and picked me up. You can imagine the social services drama that followed, and in the end, my grandmother got custody. I saw my mom occasionally, but she clearly cared about other things more than me, so my grandma took over. She wanted nothing to do with me, so aside from giving me food and a bed, I was pretty much on my own.
“When I got older and started winning everything and getting into higher levels of the sport, suddenly there’s my mom again, getting involved in my ‘career’ and moving into my grandma’s house to ‘manage’ me. She became, like, the craziest gym mom ever even though she had no clue what she was talking about and she basically drove me out of my first gym. She made things worse no matter where I went, and then pushed me to go pro the second I made elite. When my coach at the time advised against it, she ripped me out of that gym and moved me somewhere new.
“I started earning money, first a little from EliteWear leo catalogue modeling, and then more each year when I became more well-known. But she was spending it faster than I could make it, so when I was 15 I had to get a restraining order. I also had to sue my grandma for emancipation so I could get away and live on my own.
“My mom is so manipulative, she had me convinced she was better and I let her back in again, stupid me. But when I got huge deals after winning worlds, she started asking for thousands of dollars. After win number two last year, she said I owed her because she spent the first half of my life raising me. She tried to guilt me into giving her a ridiculous amount, and it worked. I gave her a lot of money.
“As if that wasn’t enough, this spring she started trying to blackmail me, saying she’d go to the press with ‘incriminating evidence’ if I got another restraining order or didn’t give her more money. Like, she has nothing on me, she’s just batshit crazy, but she lived so close and the threats were nonstop. I changed my phone number, email, whatever, ignored her, but nothing worked. Sergei was afraid it was destroying my focus, and then finally told Vera, who suggested – well, demanded – the move.”
I’m stunned. I don’t speak for a minute, letting her words settle before I can say anything, and even then, I have no idea what to say.
“Wow,” is all I can muster. “That…sucks.”
Emerson laughs, and dabs her eye. “Yeah, well…yeah. It sucks.”
“You just always seem so…confident, or whatever, well-adjusted? I never would have guessed things were so crappy.” I don’t add that I wouldn’t have been a monster bitch if I had known…not that I’ve been absolutely terrible to her, but I haven’t exactly been welcoming either.
“It’s called ‘faking it,’ my dear innocent Amalia. You’ll get used to it when the media crawls up your ass this summer. God, you’re so fresh and new, like a baby. At least your parents are sane. I’d kill for your family.”
Suddenly my drama doesn’t seem so massive. I won’t get to see my dad five days a week but at least he didn’t abandon me and makes major attempts to make our relationship great. And my mom might work late a lot but at least she has always provided for me and would never in a million years try to ruin my life. I feel like a genuine ass and am now actually so glad I didn’t complain about this whole new job situation to anyone.
Emerson yawns. “M
ind if I go to sleep? My brain is aching, I’m so tired.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty wiped as well.” We crawl under the covers, facing opposite one another, and within seconds I can hear her breathing, deep and even.
My mind is still going a million miles an hour after this chat, just in shock that Emerson is so much more complicated than the picture she shares with the world. Like, Ruby is Ruby – what you see is what you get. Sure, I guess even she has her secrets – like certain hot 20-something coaches sneaking out of her hotel room in the middle of the afternoon – but she says whatever is on her mind, every thought and emotion on the surface whether people like it or not.
Emerson is a billion percent more like me than I could have imagined, hiding her exhaustion and shame and drama behind expensive sunglasses and a fake smile. This is all making me more bummed out than I thought it would, and I can feel my anxiety rippling under the surface, my body’s natural reaction to situations even the slightest bit uncomfortable.
I curl into the fetal position, hugging one of my throw pillows tight to my chest, breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth while slowly counting backward from a hundred. It doesn’t fix anything but the yucky aura fuzzes slightly into the background of my mind and I’m able to drift into an only somewhat fitful sleep.
Monday, May 23, 2016
74 days left
When I woke up on Sunday, Emerson had already left, probably in an Uber back to the city. I almost don’t believe any of last night happened, though when I check my phone there’s a text thanking me for the night out and the t-shirt she wore is folded neatly on my desk chair.
I’m early for practice this morning, but I don’t want to go straight to the locker room in case it ends up being just the two of us, which could be awkward. Why? I don’t know. I’m an awkward person and even if the situation itself isn’t, I can easily figure out a way to make it so. I don’t know what else to say to her.
Thankfully Ruby saunters in shortly after me, and by the time Emerson gets there, we’re already changed, making small talk by the water fountain.
“Hey,” Emerson says, eyes down. Ruby and I respond “hey” in unison, neither of us looking up, though for Ruby it’s because she’s busy trying to pick out a warm-up playlist from Natasha’s iPod, not because she is crippled by the memory of her teammate gushing extremely personal secrets in her bedroom 36 hours earlier.
I jog out to the floor and run the perimeter until I feel warm enough to abuse my muscles. Really, I wouldn’t be able to live without my Sundays off, but it feels like the years and years of stretching that got me to my current levels of flexibility all completely disappear in the span of a single day. Mondays are always a killer.
The music starts, courtesy of Ruby, who has selected some old school NSYNC, which she blasts at full volume.
“This is terrible!” I yell when she barges through the door.
“Nope. You’re wrong.” She smiles, end of discussion.
Emerson walks in at the same time Natasha steps out of her office. “This brings me back to my early 20s,” Natasha sighs. “God, our music was the worst. Okay, today marks one week until we leave for nationals. It’s pressure sets all week. I want your brains in competition mode starting right this second, and honestly, I don’t want them leaving competition mode until the closing ceremony in Rio.”
“You all look like zombies today, so we’re gonna do something a little fun to wake us up. Ruby’s idea, actually,” Sergei says, grinning at Ruby. Ruby squeals and claps. I projectile vomit. “When you finish warming up, head to beam. We’ll start there today.”
When we get to the beams, Sergei has a trunk with him. It’s from the kiddy zone, full of costume pieces, beach balls, squirt guns, and various other objects that the baby rec kids use when they get bored, as if tumbling and jumping and climbing ropes isn’t enough to occupy them.
“Emerson, your face is the grumpiest. You’re up first. Get some warm-up work done and when you’re ready for a full routine, stand in your mount position and close your eyes. Natasha will spot you.” She rolls her eyes but listens dutifully, and there’s a hint of a smile on her lips.
“Okay,” he whispers to the rest of us. “Grab something from the bin. Your job during her routine is to annoy the crap out of her. Tickle her with a feather boa, bounce a beach ball at her face, squirt water at her…just be safe about it. I don’t want you pelting her with a beach ball when she’s in the middle of her flight series. The goal is to fight distraction, not kill your teammate. Oh, and scream a lot. This is a game where screaming is encouraged.”
This is actually awesome. When Emerson’s ready, she mounts the beam and we immediately begin our attack.
“Jesus!” she screams as a shot from Ruby’s water gun blasts her in the face. She jumps off and wipes off on her jacket, which she angrily tosses back to the mat.
“One point for Emerson!” Ruby yells, gleefully entering the demerit on a little notepad.
“One point for what?” Emerson’s still incredibly annoyed.
“You get a point every time you fall due to our merry antics. Whoever has the most points at the end loses. Just like golf.”
“Not fair!” Emerson whines, despite the fact that she is 18 and not six. “If I knew what you were doing before you did it, I wouldn’t have fallen.”
“What’s fun about that?” Ruby grins. “Get back on the horse, cowboy!”
Emerson pouts, but climbs back up and starts her routine again, her look of anger and consternation making it the most hilarious beam routine I’ve ever seen.
“In what world would this ever happen at a meet?!” Emerson says after dismounting, the rest of her routine fall-free. She was right – if she knew the game before she started, she definitely wouldn’t have come off. “I’m going to demand security checks everyone for water guns at the arena in Boston.”
“Obviously this won’t happen, but plenty of other things are there to distract you, like the crowd gasping when someone falls on another event just as you’re about to go into your dismount, or like a child randomly shrieking in the crowd, as small children are wont to do,” Natasha explains. “Now that you know you can hit beam through anything, the normal distractions of a meet won’t get to you.”
“They never do,” Emerson replies haughtily. “Now who do I get to distract?”
Ruby volunteers, happily. Emerson lightens up after giving Ruby a taste of her own medicine, but Ruby is as sturdy as ever, and actually laughs mid-pirouette as I tickle the heel of her foot that’s in relevé.
By my turn I’m expecting the worst, but it’s not so bad. The distractions clear out of my brain just as easily as an arena does. Ruby does manage to fire a line of water directly into my nose, but after a slight choking attack I’m fine and finish with no problems.
“Tie for gold!” Natasha announces. “Ruby and Amalia share it with perfect score. Emerson gets bronze with one point. This game was too easy for you.”
“But fun,” Emerson admits. “And a good way to psych us up for the rest of practice.”
Ruby smiles, looking at me as if to say “we finally broke her.”
“Yup,” Sergei says. “Now it’s time for the real work. Floor, all tumbling and then dance through. Vault, three apiece. Bars, first half, second half, then full routines. When we’re done with each, we’ll work problem areas. Khorosho?”
“Khorosho." Russian for okay.
Any weirdness that I felt toward Emerson less than 40 minutes ago is gone as the three of us laugh on our way to floor. Look at us. We’re a team.
***
“Surprise!”
When I get home from practice two days later, my entire bedroom is littered with confetti and Jack pops out from behind my bed.
Finding Our Balance Page 17