Imperfection

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Everyone always talks about how perfect figure skaters are, how perfect Yulia is.
But no-one sees what happens behind the scenes, they don't see the pain, the bruises, the yelling, they don't see anything.
Yulia is burdened daily by the undeniable truth that she won't be perfect in the eyes of Eteri until she is Olympic champion.
Currently Yulia is training for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, the pressure has started to add on as the month near the Olympics.
Not only is it the Olympics, she'll be performing in-front of her home crowd, in-front of Russia.
There is only three months until the Olympics, but training has gotten so much harder, she still has competitions before the Olympics, but that doesn't change a thing, if anything it makes the pressure worse, because not only does she have the Olympics coming up, she still has to preform in the competitions, and Eteri won't take anything other than perfection.
Yulia truly wants to make Eteri happy, to make her finally proud of her, but know Eteri she never will be.
She trains hard everyday, through pain and sickness, yet it's never enough for Eteri, it's never enough for Yulia.
Sometimes when she wins a competition she has this moment of joy where she thinks that finally Eteri is proud of her, that finally she is enough for her, but she never was, and she never will be.
Eteri only cares for winners, she doesn't care if you came second or third, it's first or nothing in Eteri's eyes.
And you can't weigh over 50KGs while training under Eteri, because fat girls don't win.
Eteri will always know when Yulia has gained weight, Eteri weighs everyone on her team daily, to make sure that no one is weighing too much.
Because at the end of the day, what Eteri says goes, and fat girls don't win competitions.
— — — — — —
It's the third of December, Yulia is in Fukuoka, Japan, for the Grand Prix Final, she arrived two days ago, she has had one unofficial training, and today is her first offical training on the ice she will be competing on.
She skates her short program on the fifth, she's terrified, her skating hasn't been the best lately, and she knows it.
— — — — — —
[A couple of weeks later]
Yulia skated her short and long program at the Grand Prix Final, she skated her short program on the fifth of December, and scored a total of 66.62, placing her in fourth. Yulia skated her long program on the seventh of December, and scored a total of 125.45 points. Yulia scored a total of 192.07 points with her short program and long program, placing her in second.
— — — — — —
She falls as she smashes into the ice, pain shooting up her hip. It's the third time she's failed on this singular jump; her triple flip - it used to be perfect, she used to be perfect...
"YULIA!" screams a very angry voice.
The voice of the infamous Eteri Tutberdize, her coach.
Eteri Tutberidze is one of her coaches, alongside Sergei Dudakov.
Yulia Trains at Khrustalny Rink in Moscow, Russia.
"Your jumps are sloppy, Yulia. Sloppy girls don't get medals!" the blonde-haired coach yells.
"Try again!" She shouts.
Yulia tries again.
And falls again.
"Shit," Yulia says angrily out of frustration.
"Your jumps are sloppy, and you're getting fat," The blonde coach yells at her, "You're eating too much, you need to lose some damn weight."
"Fat girls don't win medals, and they certainly don't win the Olympics," yells Eteri angrily,
"Get out of my sight."
Yulia looks at her with tears in her eyes.
"Did you not hear me? GO." she repeats.
Yulia leaves the ice quickly, tears streaming down her porcelain skin.

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