Losing the Ice (Ice Series #2) (12 page)

He pushed me upward, and I locked my muscles into place, holding myself steady in the air. Excitement and joy bubbled inside me, but I suppressed all of it to make sure I held my position completely still. Josh rotated slowly as we moved across the ice, and I caught the huge smiles of Em and Sergei at the boards.

Josh lowered me into his arms, and he spun me around as we held on tight to each other, exhaling with laughter.

“That felt
so
good,” I said.

He touched his forehead to mine. “Let’s do it again.”

And so we did. We knocked out the easy lifts and then did all the ones from our programs. Our movements were still tentative, but I was up in the air, and that was all that mattered.

At the end of the session we found Stephanie on the bleachers, and she gave us a genuine ovation. Josh hugged her, and her eyes watered again.

“Looks like my work here is done,” she said.

“You headed to the airport soon?” Josh asked.

She nodded. “The car’s waiting for me.”

“Thank you again,” I said. “I could say it a million times and it wouldn’t be enough.”

“Well, I didn’t do it for entirely unselfish reasons. I got to skate with Josh again, which I thought would never happen.”

Josh smiled. “It was like we hadn’t missed a beat.”

“Will you be able to come to Greensboro?” I asked.

“Nationals? I… umm…” Stephanie stammered in surprise. “I have school, so I’ll have to check my schedule.”

“We’d really like you to be there,” Josh said.

Her mouth curved into a little smile. “I’ll try to make it happen.”

We walked her out to the lobby to say our goodbyes, and we watched through the glass doors as she climbed into the town car. I shook my head as I reflected on what a strange and unexpected morning it had been.

“What’s wrong?” Josh asked.

“Oh… nothing. I was just thinking about how unpredictable life can be.”

“Today it was finally unpredictable in a good way,” Josh said.

I laughed. “Yes. We need more of these good surprises. We’ve had more than enough bad ones lately.”

He grasped my hand and kissed the back of it. “2011 is going to be nothing but awesomeness. I can feel it.”

“So, you see us doing very well at nationals?”

He grinned. “We are going to blow everyone away at nationals with our amazing comeback.”

“Only if you get to work,” Em said behind us.

We turned toward her, and she stood with her hands on her hips and a stern look on her face. Her serious expression cracked, and we all laughed together. We’d been so tense with worry lately at the rink that the feeling of lightness made me giddy.

Then I remembered just how much we had to get done in four weeks.

Chapter Eleven

I pulled my hair into a tight ponytail and checked my makeup in the locker room mirror. I didn’t usually wear makeup for practice, but at nationals every little detail was scrutinized. The judges watched all the practices, which meant I had to make an effort on my appearance.

My phone chimed in my bag, and I quickly looked at the alert. Josh and I had received so many tweets and messages of support since we’d been in Greensboro. The latest was a best wishes post from a fan with a link to a local news feature on us. I clicked the “Like” button and made a mental note to watch the video later.

Walking down the corridor to the ice, I exchanged smiles and hellos with some of my competitors and their coaches. When I emerged from backstage, I stood at the boards and breathed in the smell of the freshly-cut ice. The large arena was almost empty and peacefully quiet since most fans hadn’t arrived in Greensboro yet. A few days remained before the start of the senior-level events and most importantly, our short program.

I bounced on my skate guards and flexed my knees to stay warm. Josh and I had practiced that morning at the much smaller rink adjacent to the Coliseum, and we’d done a solid run-through of our long program. We would normally rest and not utilize both practice sessions allotted for us, but we needed every moment on the ice we could get.

Em came up beside me with two cups of coffee, and I paused between bounces.

“Double fisting it already?” I said. “We’re only on day four of the event.”

She and Sergei had been in town longer for the novice and junior pair events, where our training mates had racked up a slew of medals. The younger generation of Team Cape Cod was the talk of the competition so far.

Em laughed and set the cups on the boards. “One of these is for Sergei. It does feel like we’ve been here more than four days, though.”

The other teams in our practice group gathered around me, and I looked up at the digital time on the scoreboard. We only had a minute until the session would begin.

“Where’s Josh?” I said.

Em started toward backstage, but Josh came out of the tunnel with a dazed look in his eyes and not a smile to be seen. The vibe he gave me was much different from the happy one he’d had earlier. What had happened between the time we’d warmed up off ice and now?

The announcer came over the PA system, and as she read the pairs in the group, Josh and I gave Em our guards and stepped onto the ice. We went through our individual warm-up routines, circling the ice multiple times, and then came together to start our crossovers.

“You okay?” I asked.

He nodded but still didn’t speak. He just took my hand and quickened his step.

We made a few passes around the rink and warmed up our triple twist and our throw technique with an easy single. Since we would be first in the group to have our music played, we went over to Em and Sergei at the boards for a drink of water and instructions for our short program run-through.

“Mark the jumps and skip the footwork, but do everything else,” Sergei said.

“Yes, Sir.” I saluted him, hoping to make Josh smile.

I got nothing.

We skated to the middle of the ice and waited for the announcer to call our names. The smattering of fans applauded, and I put my hand on Josh’s chest for our opening pose. His T-shirt rose and fell against my palm more rapidly than normal, sending a wave of fear over me. Josh put his hand on my hip, but he didn’t lock eyes with me to complete the pose. Instead he stared down at the ice.

The romantic piano music began, and we glided together slowly at first before picking up speed. We blew through the triple twist and skated through the spots for the side-by-side jumps and the throw flip as Sergei had directed. Josh’s grip on my hand grew more intense with each stroke we took, and a sinking feeling invaded my stomach.

We curved with the corner of the rink and set up for the lasso lift, but Josh’s hands were shaking too violently to even attempt it. He pulled away and skidded into the boards, and I hurried to his side.

“Do you need water?” I asked.

He shook his head and took deep, extended breaths.
Why is this happening again?
I wanted to ask him, but he wouldn’t have been able to answer me. I didn’t understand what had gone wrong. He hadn’t had any episodes since Stephanie had worked with him.

Our music continued to play while we camped at the boards. When Josh had his breathing under control he stood tall and said, “I’m sorry.”

“You know you don’t have to apologize to me. I just want to know why it happened.”

He pushed his fingers through his hair and gripped the short locks. “I saw the video of the accident.”

Oh no.
I’d only seen it once, and Josh hadn’t watched it at all. His doctor had suggested he shouldn’t.

“Where?” I asked.

“Someone sent us a link to a news story on us, and I wasn’t thinking and clicked on it. The first thing they showed was the accident.”

I cringed and rubbed his arm. “Let’s go talk to Em and Sergei.”

We cut across the ice, and Josh told Em and Sergei what he had seen. Em made him continue to drink water even after he insisted he was fine. The few spectators who had shown up were all watching us and not the pair doing their run-through behind us.

“I want you both to stay off social media the rest of the week,” Sergei said.

I didn’t give any joking salutes that time.

“Are you good to keep going, Josh?” Em asked.

He replied with a stiff nod.

“You have a lot of time left on the session, so why don’t you do the Salchows and the throw and then take another stab at the lift,” Em said.

We entered the traffic of the other three teams and moved leisurely around the rink to regain our feel for the ice. I had questions for Josh about how the video had reignited his fears, but those had to wait until we finished practice.

We took off on the Salchows, and Josh landed wildly with his leg flying out and his upper body pitching forward. More problems came on the throw flip. I was already thinking about the lift coming up, and I slipped off my landing edge, sprawling my limbs over the ice.

I caught up to Josh and internally berated myself. I had no business making mistakes. With Josh dealing with so many demons, I had to be one hundred percent on my game.

We sped up our crossovers to get ready for the lift, and we grabbed hands for the swinging entry. Josh swung me up, and I wanted to scream with glee, but he stopped the motion before I made it above his head. His arms collapsed, and I came down on his back. I held onto him, sliding down until my feet hit the ice.

“It felt like we had it,” I said.

Josh scrubbed his palms on his black pants. “My feet didn’t feel right.”

Sweat trickled down his hairline, and he wiped his face on the sleeve of his T-shirt. The lift would have worked if Josh had kept going. I knew with absolute certainty there hadn’t been a technique problem. It was all in Josh’s head.

We didn’t make any more attempts during the session, and the media was all over us in the mixed zone afterward. We tried to avoid directly answering the questions about the aborted lifts. No one knew the problems Josh had experienced, and we were going to keep them private. Our answers centered on how happy we were to be competing again. We had to spin any positives we could find.

After I changed out of my workout gear, I went out to the shuttle bus that would take us to the hotel. I expected to see Josh on the bus, but he wasn’t there and he didn’t show up before we pulled away from the arena. I found him at the hotel, already in our room, sitting on the bed with his head in his hands.

Moving beside him, I put my arms around him and rested my chin on his shoulder. “You’ve come so far since the accident. Don’t let this set you back.”

He slowly sat up. “I didn’t think seeing the video would affect me so much, but as soon as I saw it, that feeling of dread came back… like I had no control over anything. And then when I walked into the arena, it reminded me of the last time we skated in a place like that, and I saw us falling all over again.”

“You do have control. You’ve been in complete control on the ice since Christmas. When you start to doubt yourself, think about all the great practices we had at home.”

He arched his neck back and let out a loud breath. “This is so frustrating. I never thought I’d have stage fright skating in a big arena.”

“Maybe we can ask the organizers to move the pairs competition to the practice rink.” I smiled a little.

His lips made a half-hearted attempt to return my gesture. I leaned over the side of the bed and reached into the outside pocket of my bag for the color-coded event schedule.

“We have practice at the secondary rink tomorrow, and then we have the twenty-minute warm-up Thursday morning at the arena. That’ll give you a chance to get comfortable there, and we can work through any issues before the short that evening.”

“We should be worrying about normal stuff like landing jumps and keeping our spins in sync instead of...” His voice tightened. “You’re supposed to be able to count on me to be strong, and I’m a freaking mess.”

My fingers clenched into a fist. I wanted to strangle the person who had sent the video. I knew no harm had been meant, but it had put Josh back in that dark place. I couldn’t let him get swallowed up by it again.

“If you weren’t strong, you wouldn’t be here right now, about to compete two months after a terrifying injury. A lot of people wouldn’t come back from that.” I turned his face toward me. “I believe in you, and I believe in us.”

He gazed at me a long minute. “I just want to be the partner you deserve. The man you deserve.”

“You are. You are everything I need and so much more.” I softly kissed him and whispered on his lips, “So much more.”

He cradled my head between his hands and pressed his mouth to mine with more intensity. I felt how much he wanted to show me his strength and to conquer everything he was battling. I’d spoken from my heart when I’d said I believed in him, but I feared he needed more than sheer will to finally slay his demons.

****

The aroma of coffee surrounded me as I sat at a table in Café Expresso, waiting for Josh to join me. He’d let me use the bathroom mirror first to do my competition hair and makeup, so he was still getting ready. I’d been too jumpy sitting in the room and had gone downstairs to sit in the café and watch the lobby activity.

“Coco!” Quinn squealed and ran from the elevator bank into the open café. Liza trailed behind her.

“Hey, Cutie.” I tickled Quinn’s stomach.

She giggled and climbed onto the chair next to mine. “Mommy said I been a good girl all week, so Sissy gonna get me a treat.”

“Where’s Alex? Has he not been good?” I asked.

“No, he was a bad boy.”

“He apparently had a meltdown at Fan Fest this morning,” Liza said. “Something involving a teddy bear.”

Quinn reached up to one of the braids in my up-do. “Your hair look so pretty.”

“Be careful.” I leaned away from her little fingers. “It took me half an hour to get these right.”

“You usually do those in no time,” Liza said.

“My hands were shaking too much.”

Liza sat cross-legged on the chair across from me. “My dad said Josh didn’t have a good warm-up this morning.”

I fiddled with the ends of my jacket sleeves. Despite my pep talk a few days earlier, Josh had been a walking and skating bundle of nerves. It was like his self-doubt blockaded all the positivity I kept feeding him.