AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I know you said you didn’t need to go back there, and I’m already committed to it, so you don’t have to, but I was thinking that it would be a nice warm-up for us.”
“Wait… You don’t skate solo in front of people anymore. You hated having to do it at the Ice Park.”
“You’re right. I only did it then because Cat made me, and she wanted me to find a new partner at the same time. Cat signed me up for this tomorrow thing. I didn’t know until yesterday. It’s part of the reason I think I was so mad at her. She told me about it, and I was pretty pissed off because I didn’t want to do it at all, but she wanted me to have a backup plan. Well, backup plans upon backup plans, technically, since her actual backup plan is for me to skate with Fortnite guy.”
“Who?”
“That Justin she keeps bringing up.”
“Oh, right. I forgot you call him that.” Belle chuckled and took a drink of her coffee.
“So, do you want to?” she asked.
“We don’t really have a complete routine yet, Chandler.”
“We’re mostly there. It’s only a local invitational, and they don’t have a same-gender pairs option, but because it’s me, and my family has been giving them a lot of support – and by that, I mean money – over the years, they’ll let us enter as a same-gender pair. We’ll just go up against male and female partners.” Chandler finished with her skates and turned to Belle. “I don’t want to be out there alone. I will because I made the commitment, even though it wasn’t me making it, but I don’t want to. I’d much rather be out there with you.”
“I haven’t been back there since I packed my locker, Chandler.”
“I know. And you don’t have to go back now. I don’t want to make you confront something you don’t need to in that changing room. But maybe you could at least be in the stands to support me or something? I can’t imagine Cat is going to show her face now that I asked her for a few days to breathe, and I could really use someone I know there.”
“You really think us using this as a warm-up is a good idea?”
“I do, yeah.” Chandler nodded.
“How about a deal?”
“Okay.”
“We finalize whatever routine we’d do for a free skate today, and if we feel like we have something good by the end of the day, we’ll do it. We’d need to use all the long program choreography from Cat. We don’t have a choice there. No way we can come up with that and the free skate in twenty-four hours. We’re far enough along on both of them that I think we can pull it off, but I think we can alter the free and have a little more fun with it.”
“Really? You’re sure?” she checked. “You can say no. I won’t be mad or disappointed. I know what happened to you there. It was my fault.”
“Partially your fault. Those bitches there with you all own their actions, though. None of them will be there, right?”
Chandler shook her head and said, “No. None of them made it beyond sixteen. Sarah got pregnant at sixteen and had to leave. Penelope tore her MCL and couldn’t compete for over a year, but when she came back, she wasn’t the same. Olivia just wasn’t good enough to place in any tournament, so they kicked her out.”
Belle smiled a little at her.
“What?”
“You remember the girls who were there?”
“Belle, I remember the whole thing. I know Penelope was the ringleader who shoved your clothes into the toilets, and Sarah and Olivia went along with it. I know who said what about you and when. I remember that I mostly sat there, saying nothing whenever it came up, unless one of them called attention to my silence, and then, I’d just agree to whatever they’d been saying. Whenever I walk into that changing room, I think about what happened that day and how it was my fault. So, yeah, I remember them.”
“We should get started,” Belle said and stood up, apparently ready to change the subject. “I’m thinking we keep the bones of the free; the jumps and the lifts we’ve already planned and worked on. We just work on the sequences and maybe change the music. Swan Lake? Is your sister trying to bore the judges?”
Chandler laughed a little under her breath as Belle took the ice again. She removed her jacket and set it on the bench, leaving the granola bars and apples inside to snack on later, and joined her on the ice.
“Where should we start?” she asked Belle.
“Me?”
“Yeah. Why not? You coach kids.”
“I teach them how to skate in a straight line, mostly.”
“Belle, you’re way better at this than I am. I’ve done what one coach or another has told me my whole life. You’ve always made skating your own. I’ll follow your lead here.”
