Chapter 50

Chapter 50

In 2009, the National Championships came back to Cleveland.

Heath and I walked through the arena doors hand in hand, same as we had nine years before. But everything else was different.

Instead of driving hours due east on I-90 in a rusty pickup truck with a busted heater, we’d flown first class, direct from a resort in Saint Lucia. We were staying at a five-star hotel rather than a roach-infested roadside motel, and a private car whisked us to the competition venue right on time for our warm-up. At our first Nationals, no one knew who we were. Now we were greeted by a horde of fans shouting our names.

When we looked up into the stands, we saw our names too: written a foot tall in glitter paint on banners and signs, collaged using Kit Kat and Heath bar candy wrappers, emblazoned on homemade shirts above screen prints of us kissing, even scrawled on faces in my signature lipstick—a vivid red shade with a subtle golden sheen called “Bold Medal Favorite,” one of the many lucrative brand campaigns our sports agency had negotiated on our behalf.

Everything we wore, from our skates to our warm-up gear to our underwear, was provided via some endorsement partnership or another. Turns out that once you become rich enough to afford whatever you want, people fall all over themselves to give you things for free. Our two-week stay in Saint Lucia had been comped too, because a few photos of Heath rubbing sunscreen onto my bare back outside one of the resort’s private cabanas would send bookings skyrocketing.

We had everything. Except the national title.

So far that season, we were undefeated. Gold at Skate America. Gold at the NHK Trophy. Gold at the Grand Prix Final in Goyang, where we got to stand on the top step of the podium above all of our major rivals: Volkova and Kipriyanov on the silver medal step, Bella and Garrett with the bronze.

A preview of the upcoming World Championships, I hoped. The event would be held in Los Angeles that year, and I was looking forward to trouncing the twins on their own turf.

First, though, we had to win Nationals. We’d been in first place after both the compulsory and the original dances, gaining a five-point lead over the Lins. We didn’t watch Bella and Garrett’s free dance, but I snuck a quick glance up at the Jumbotron as they awaited their scores. The twins looked exhausted, and Sheila’s lips were set in the stiff smile she used to signal profound disappointment. They hadn’t done enough.

Frannie Gaskell intercepted Bella outside the kiss and cry to give her a comforting hug—which Bella accepted with a stiff back, arms stuck by her sides. Frannie and her partner were in third, a few tenths of a point behind Bella and Garrett.

As Heath and I circled the rink, waiting for the announcement of our names, he seemed a bit distracted. More than once, he let go of my hand and bent over to adjust his skate laces. A cold stone of worry tumbled in my stomach. We were ahead, yes, but we had to skate clean, make sure the judges couldn’t deny us the gold.

Once the music started, though, I realized there was nothing to worry about. Heath and I were as in tune as always. Our free dance was a total departure from everyone else in the field, set to a layered mix of moody classical piano and industrial rock Heath had arranged himself. We wore form-fitting black costumes embellished only with angular panels of mesh, and the choreography was powerful, almost aggressive, showing off our strength, the way we covered the ice together like a finely tuned machine.

Sheila Lin probably hated it. Good thing she wasn’t our coach anymore.

At that point, we didn’t officially have a coach. We jet-setted to training centers all over the globe, assembling a team of technical specialists and choreographers and trainers, picking up what we could from each before moving on to the next. It wasn’t conventional, but it seemed to be working for us. We controlled our career. We controlled our destiny.

Sometimes it seemed as if we’d worked with every ice dance authority in the world, but there was one missing from our collection: whoever had honed Heath’s technique during his three-year absence. He still wouldn’t tell me where he’d been, how he’d achieved such rapid improvement. I’d become increasingly frustrated with his silence on the subject, but any time I attempted to raise it, he’d shut me down with a haunted, distant look in his eyes—a look I remembered well from childhood, any time I made even the smallest reference to his life before we met. One thing was clear: whatever he had gone through, he wasn’t willing to go through it again. Or to subject me to it.

I tried to convince myself it didn’t matter. Heath loved me. He shared more with me than he would have with anyone else. He would tell me his secrets someday, or he wouldn’t. In the meantime, we were winning.

Our music ended with a piano glissando and a hissing electronic pulse. We held the final pose, panting in time. We’d done it, I could feel it in my bones. We were going to be the national champions. I’d won the title three times with Garrett. But winning it with Heath—and skating exactly the way I wanted to, refusing to rein in my power—meant so much more.

I started to take a bow. Then I realized Heath wasn’t standing beside me. He still clutched my hand, but he’d knelt on the ice.

My first thought was that there was something wrong—a broken lace, a muscle cramp. Or worse, an injury. But when I turned to face him, he was gazing up at me, holding something pinched between his thumb and forefinger.

A diamond ring.