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I could easily tell she was struggling to find her footing after retiring. She needed to start living for herself instead of for a sport. “Ya know, you’re kind of in the perfect place right now for going through a breakup. As soon as I broke up with Garrett, I drove right here. Making a change for myself made me feel better.” I shrugged.
She laughed. “Nah, me and Duke will be fine. I love the shit out of that dummy.”
“No, I mean, you’re going through a breakup with skating. Quitting or retiring from a sport is the same as breaking free of a toxic relationship. But think about it this way– it might be fun to start living without skating impacting all your choices,” I told her.
She dropped the magazine in her lap. “Yeah. I just don’t…”
“Huh?”
“I don’t even know what I like.” Her eyes glassed over.
I nodded but stayed silent. I knew from teaching how important it was to give people ‘wait time’ to gather their thoughts.
“Like do I even like working out? Or was that just for skating? Do I even like these clothes? Or did I buy them all just because I could skate in them?”
“I get that completely. But maybe you just need to relax a bit. It seems like you’re putting a lot of pressure on yourself to figure it outright now, which is skating’s fault. Skating trained our brains to be that way.”
Her brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, skating made us feel a sense of urgency in life. We had to peak and make it as soon as possible so we wouldn’t run out of years to make it to the Olympics. I was called old and over the hill at like fifteen,” I rolled my eyes, “but with life, it isn’t a race. We have time. You need to give your brain and body a chance to slow down and figure it out. And as for Duke, he’s probably trying to help, but he doesn’t know how. With hockey, they were starting big moments in their careers at 15 while we were practically old news by then.”
“Wow,” she breathed out. “How did you sum that up so perfectly?”
I laughed. “I’ve thought about it a lot over the years, and I see kids in my classroom going through the same thing during their senior years,” I told her. “It affects every athlete at some point. Life changes, your body changes. The sport vs. athlete breakup is inevitable, whether you go through it at 15 or 40.”
Her lips twisted. “You’re right. I guess I am in the perfect place right now.” She smoothed her hand on the velvet salon couch. But enough about me. What about you? You gonna get an appointment too?”
“Eh,” I shrugged. “I’m still liking my brunette era,” I said as I caught my reflection in one of the many mirrors. Besides, Tyler’s voice from this morning telling me how much he hated change echoed in my head and I didn’t want to rock the boat just yet.
________
And change is what she did… An hour and a half later, Claire walked into the lobby with newly dyed pale pink hair cut into a cute lob.
When she went to pay, my sister told her it was on the house, but Claire insisted.
“This is on Duke. He’s the one who faked this whole thing, he needs to learn his lesson to never do that again. I still need to figure out what to say to him,” she said, anxiously tapping her foot.
“Wanna procrastinate a little more? Come back to my apartment?” I asked her. “Make the boys wonder what we’re talking about?”
She looked at me with a spark in her eye. “Ooh, I like the way you think, Josie. Yes.” As soon as her card was handed back, she grabbed my arm and whisked me away to tug me along.
On the sidewalk back to our apartment complex, Claire suddenly asked, “Wanna have a pre-game party and then go out? I’m just thinking… I don’t have to be up early for practice tomorrow and I wanna show off my new look. So why the fuck not?”
I rolled my lips together. I was hoping for another date with Tyler, but Claire needed some support. Besides, where Claire went, Duke was sure to follow, which meant I’d probably be running into Tyler anyway. “I mean, we totally could. I’m on break right now so no school for me, and I only have to monitor the rink tomorrow afternoon, and I could do that hungover… But I don’t have anything to wear. I only have like two cute outfits and I just used ‘em both up. I only have cardigans and teacher clothes left,” I said with a cringe.
“Oh that’s no problem. First we need to find out if my apartment is in the clear because I do not want to face him yet. Can you ask Tyler where Duke is?”
I quickly shot off a text to Tyler:Where are you guys? We want to get clothes from Claire’s place but she doesn’t want to bump into Duke.
He immediately texted back:Are you mad at me? I’m sorry, that wasn’t my idea.
I punched out No with a laughing face, then added:I think we were just caught in their crosshairs… but where are you guys?
Tyler:I just invited him up to my place… give it a couple minutes… can I see you?
Me:No! I have to stand in solidarity with Claire right now. Sorry!
Fifteen minutes later, we were raiding Claire’s walk-in closet.
