The Promise of You and I

4. Cold, Hard, Ground

Edited by: @grecya14

4. Cold, Hard Ground

"You are SO dead," She's more than pissed. "We are gonna be late!!"

"I know, I know, I'm sorry!" I exclaim. "We won't be late... a lot happened this afternoon" my voice falls to a whisper.

"Well, we have a 20-minute drive there so sum it up for me." Her cold tone scares me a bit. I didn't even have to look at her to feel the daggers shooting from her angry blue eyes.

"Um..." I don't miss a single detail as I recounted my afternoon to her. She's easy to talk to, and I never felt embarrassed to tell her anything. I always hope she thinks the same for me.

"Wow." She was surprised sure, but she still had a glint of anger in her eyes.

Say something else... please!!

"I mean, yeah, it's a lot to take in," I mutter. "I honestly thought I was invisible to them, like I am- or was- before this afternoon," I state awkwardly recounting how many people were staring in the school parking lot.

Pulling into the skating area parking lot, I take note of the time. With 20 minutes of warm-up and two hours of strong skating, I should burn around 1800 calories. Enough to cover my lunch and no dinner.  

"I mean, you should try and talk to them tommor-" I slammed the car door. "HEY!" Taylor yelled, but it came out muffled from the closed window.

"You didn't have to slam the door on my face!" She's still mad.

"We got here with plenty of time! Stop being mad at me!!" My voice came out rude and angry, I honestly just wanted to change the topic. I don't want to talk about the boys anymore.

"Quit changing the subject. We are not done with this!" Taylor exclaims.

I roll my eyes and walk in. We had approximately 8 minutes to be ready for off-ice warm-up. Taylor and I strolled into the locker room and began to change into our leggings and shirts. I was pulling on my shirt when Taylor gasped. I sighed, knowing she was concerned or scared. She had seen my bulging ribs. They jutted out from my sides like ripples in a still pond. It wasn't like she hadn't seen me before, but I could tell she was still shocked. I was getting smaller.

I wanted it. Taylor didn't understand.

"I-" I began empathically.

"Hurry up, LADIES!" a loud voice echoed into the locker room. Coach Borne.

I glanced up at Taylor, her blue eyes seemed to burn through my skin. "We'll talk later," I whispered as I grabbed my bag and jacket, leaving her in the locker room.

Each of us would have two hours on the ice. We alternated private lessons, so I would have one hour with Coach Borne, then Taylor would. I would practice during her lesson, and she would practice during mine. It worked well. Especially on days like today.

Only one middle school-aged girl is on the ice with her coach learning basic skills. Her short, curly brown hair was pulled back to a small bun on the backside of her head. Her deep honey brown eyes meet mine. She must have felt me watching. I give her a polite smile and avert my eyes.

"You need to get here earlier," Coach Borne's stern voice pulled me out of my thoughts.

"Yes ma'am," I twitched my lips up into a small smile.

Her pink lips matched my small smile and she nodded. Her emerald green eyes somewhat complimented her thin blonde hair. She was about the same height as me, maybe an inch taller. She began to walk, motioning for me to follow her. "I want to work on your new free program today. If you could get here earlier, we could have already started." She chuckles a little to lighten the mood. She wasn't an angry tyrant, but she does know what she wanted us, as students, to do.

I give her a small giggle in return and put in my headphones. I had one of my favorite classical songs playing: Yo-Yo Ma playing "Bach Cello Suite No. 3 in C major".  On ice warm-up is rather short. Just a couple laps and a couple of simple jumps. I was starting my lesson about 4 minutes late, but I didn't care since I was already exhausted.

"All right, let's talk about music" Borne's friendly teasing was over, and she was staring at her clipboard as she stood perfectly still on her now aged skates. I was way out of breath and she didn't even notice.

Here we go... ugh.

~~~

The music she chose for me was Joshua Bell playing "Nocturne". It was a sad song, but slow enough that it was easy to get some graceful footwork. Well, graceful if I can pull it off.

"Alright Taylor! Your turn!" Borne yelled across the rink. Taylor, of course, has her headphones in. I skate over to her and bear hug her. We were the only ones at the rink aside from the young girl packing up, so lucky, her scream didn't alarm anyone.

"WHAT THE HELL, LEC!!" I could tell by her blue eyes glistening and sweat dripping off her forehead she was in the zone.

I stared at her unamused. She was supposed to watch the time too. "It's your turn," I muttered. Don't get me wrong, I love Taylor like a sister, but went she did stuff like this, it annoyed me like no other. She never pays attention to the time.

As if sensing my anger, her expression softened. She then nodded and skated toward Borne.

I turned to head toward the penalty box where my phone had been playing the music I was practicing with for my free program. When I reached the box, I went to Spotify to play my long program music: Piano Concerto No. 3 by Rachmaninoff.

As I turned, I hurried to my starting position on the left side of the rink. I was in a strong stance, but a sudden wave of dizziness fell over me.

I'm fine. Focus. I'm fine. Focus. I chanted in my head.

I went into my death-drop to sit spin. I landed cleanly and executed it perfectly. However, the dizziness was beginning to build. As I stepped out of the spin to begin footwork, I began to fall backward.

It was in slow motion. I tried to catch myself by placing my right leg behind my left with the toepick in the ice. I somehow froze in that spot and didn't fall completely to the cold ground. I adjust my feet back to their regular position and pushed myself towards the box to start the music over again.

That was close. Maybe I'm dehydrated?

I took a long gulp of water and unplugged my phone. I began to yank out my earbuds from my pocket when I saw a flicker of bright blonde hair heading over out of the corner of my eye.

"I'm fine," I state, not looking up.

"I know, I need to play Taylor's new music," Coach Borne said calmly.

I nodded and began to practice my skills. The dizziness doesn't fade away, but I still try to focus. Tightening my quads in preparation, I began to pick up speed doing back crossovers. As I turned to throw my double axel, dizziness took over. Despite my inner voice screaming at me to stop immediately, I go directly into the jump.

Taylor's music played right along with my failing jump: "The Four Seasons, Concerto No. 2 'Summer'".

I heard the scratches of my blades leaving the ice then the thump of my now limp, small body hitting the cold hard ground.

"ALECIA" Two people screamed.

Darkness.

~~~

A/N: Do you guys like the cliffhangers? This was an extra-long chapter so I hope you stuck with me through all the skating terminology!

I attached videos of the songs I mentioned and the tricks Lec was doing on the playlist linked below so you can check them out and get the idea from those!

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQljECufibunvA6nJg1sHRH5Wy1paE_Od

Love all you guys! Leave a comment, vote, and like of you enjoyed!!