Chapter 5

Chapter 5

The heater in Lee’s Chevy pickup didn’t work, and frigid wind cut through the cracked window seals. Even so, my memories of that drive with Heath are drenched in warmth.

Our gloved hands entwined over the gearshift, winter sun caressing our faces as we sang along to Savage Garden and Semisonic on the radio. The prickling heat that spread across my chest, then pooled lower, every time Heath turned to smile at me.

After miles of fallow cornfields, dairy farms, and industrial smokestacks, Cleveland finally appeared on the horizon. We were hours earlier than we would have been if we’d had to take the bus—right on time for an open practice session on competition ice.

Walking into the arena, even with my unwashed hair in a haphazard ponytail and the burnt taste of gas station coffee on my tongue, I felt impossibly glamorous—which seems ridiculous to me now. A multipurpose sporting complex in Cleveland, Ohio, is not exactly the height of sophistication. But that day, staring up at the cresting wave of blue stadium seats, I felt like I’d finally arrived.

As we stretched out the tension of our sleepless night and all those hours in Lee’s icebox of a truck, I watched—and judged—the other skaters.

Right away, I spotted last year’s silver medalists, Paige Reed and Zachary Branwell, both clean-cut Nordic blonds from Minnesota. They showed enviable technique, but despite being a couple off the ice as well as on, there was about as much heat between them as two untoasted slices of white bread. Paige favored her left leg too, thanks to a preseason injury.

The other two teams, I didn’t recognize. So either it was their first time at Nationals, like us, or they’d been ranked too low last year to make it into the TV broadcast. There was a skinny, flat-chested girl and a freckle-faced guy who weren’t a serious threat; they had decent edges, but no flow in their movements, and they held each other at arm’s length like they were at a middle-school dance.

The last pair—both sporting ponytails: his dark and tied with ribbon like a nobleman, hers platinum and pulled so tight she looked like a face-lifted divorcée—weren’t half bad, but they lacked connection too. They were skating next to each other rather than with each other.

Heath and I could beat them, I thought, a giddy buzz growing in my chest.

Just then a big band track trumpeted over the loudspeakers, and a new team took the ice.

Instead of typical warm-up gear, they were in full costume and makeup. The girl’s dress was a retro confection that sparkled like an ice blue disco ball. Her partner wore matching suspenders over a black shirt perfectly tailored to emphasize his impeccable posture. And they weren’t simply warming up or running through their program. They were performing all-out, finishing off every step with a smile up to the rafters, as if the arena were full of adoring fans.

This was our real competition.

I twisted my ring, trying to settle my nerves. Since my very first juvenile competition, I’d worn my mother’s Art Deco engagement band as a good luck charm. When I was small, it hung on a gold chain around my neck. By sixteen, the ring fit my middle finger—and I’d started keeping it on my person at all times, because I knew if Lee got his hands on it, he’d pawn the diamond and drink the proceeds.

“Don’t worry about them,” Heath said. He could always read my moods like a weather report. “If we do our best, that’s all that matters.”

I had no interest in “our best” unless it was the best. We’d been the best at our small-town rink for so long, it had ceased to mean anything. If we wanted to keep improving—if we wanted to become Olympic-caliber athletes—we needed to be pushed, to be challenged. Well, here was the perfect challenge, passing right by us in a blur of blue sequins.

I took Heath’s hand, and we stepped onto the ice. As we completed a few circuits, the other team finished their program—then cut a path to the center of the rink. Their music started up again, and they repeated their choreography, step for step, smile for smile. They didn’t even look winded.

Heath raised his eyebrows, as if to say, Shall we? I grinned and pulled him into a hold, not bothering to correct the way his hand drifted too low, settling into the crease of my waist.

We were off, whirling around the rink, syncing our movements to the song. This was how we stretched out our training time at home—we’d show up early and improvise to whatever music happened to be playing, whether it was the Top 40 pop they blasted during public skate sessions or the perky cartoon themes that accompanied kids’ birthday parties.

Our feet followed the bombastic harmony of the horn section first, then sped up to chase the driving string bass line. We spun faster and faster, my ponytail coming undone, wild curls whipping around my face, the competition forgotten. For a few blissful moments, it was only me and him, only the ice and our blades and the beat.

And suddenly I wasn’t in Heath’s arms anymore.

I was sprawled facedown, my hip wrenched at a strange angle, ice burn all over my palms. Snow sprayed in my eyes as a pair of skates skidded to a stop a few inches from my nose.

“Are you okay?” a voice said from somewhere above me.

The skates were so clean, they looked brand-new—blinding white leather, carefully knotted laces. I polished my boots every night before bed, and they were never that spotless.

“Katarina.” Heath’s voice now. His breath at my ear. “Can you stand?”

I blinked melting snow from my eyes. Or maybe I was crying, I couldn’t be sure. I kept staring at those skates, studying them. There was something engraved on the blades too. Words, in delicate, flowing text. A name.

Her name. Isabella Lin.