Given Butterflies

Trouble

"Here listen to this." My coach forced the headphones over my hair. I waited. Something screeched in them. I tossed them off. He laughed.

"No really, listen!" He cried holding them back out to me. More wearily I took them. I slipped them on. The music was eerily creepy. It was a haunting rendition of something a bit familiar. I pressed my hands over the head phones to seal the music inside my head. I listened harder. It sounded like pain.

Not just any kind of pain. It wasn't like when you fell, scraping your knee. No this was more emotional. Like when the love of your life was just found sleeping with your best friend. Or like in Mafuyu's case hanging from the chandelier. This was gutter wrenching horrible pain. I pulled the headphones off. The last note still reverberating through my skull.

"You want me to skate to this?" I asked.

"You have less than a week to come up with music. Not to mention how hard it's going to be to create a show around whatever you pick!" He cried. I huffed. It had been a little over a week since our camping trip. I had seen Akihiko around but he said nothing about the music. He had come by the bar last weekend. Mafuyu was off.

"Hey, what brings you out here?" I asked as I finished drying the last of the glasses.

"I saw Mafuyu. Did you know he was going on a date with Ritsuka?" Akihiko asked.

"Yeah." I chuckled. "He was super hyped over it." I sighed out leaning my hip against the counter. "Along with being super worried." I looked down at my hands. I picked up a towel to dry them.

"Why?" Akihiko asked sipping his drink. "Afraid Ritsuka can't close the deal?" he chuckled.

"No, afraid he wouldn't be able to stop talking about Yuki." I said slapping the smirk off of his face with the towel. "His only boyfriend killed himself. You can't see how this is freaking the kid out?" I cried.

Akihiko had glared at me. He drank the beer I had placed before him. "Yeah, I guess. I mean if my only boyfriend..." He let the sentence trail away. He sat the empty glass down. Standing he tossed some money on the counter.

"See you around Haru." He called waving as he walked out. Why the hell did my heart have to beat like this just because he shortened my name! I fumed. I almost broke the glass as I picked it up.

"Hey, Earth to Haruki?" a hand waved before my face. I blinked. My coach stood there.

"I, uh, well I'm working on something." I told him.

"Let me show you the routine I came up with for this." He pulled out his sketch pad. I placed my hand over it.

"Please I don't want to be distracted. Really I'm working on something. You said I had until the end of the month." I waited for his nod.

"Yeah, you're right. I did. But that's pushing it." He warned me.

"I get it." I said. "If I can't get this something figured out by then, I will go with whatever you decide, deal?" I asked holding out my hand. He snorted.

His large thick fingers closed around my smaller ones. He pumped my arm up down and back up before letting go.

"Deal." He huffed. "Now you only have forty minutes before the hockey team needs the ice." He warned me. I nodded. He walked off as I went to center ice.

The sound of the music for my short program field the air around me. I launched into my skate. The good thing about waiting so long to come up with my long program, was that I had more time to prefect this one. Once I got the music, I would solely concentrate on that program for a bit.

I completed the program four times. In between I did some other jumps working my legs over the ice. I needed to build up the strength in them. I wanted to wow everyone this year. It may just be my last. I was twenty two. How much longer could I skate? A year, three? Defiantly not five. I frowned. I loved the ice. What was I going to do when I couldn't compete any longer?