Beaming Through It All

Chapter One

'How do you do that?!'

I smiled for myself and turned round. How many times had I heard this sentence?

'Do what?' I said. The boy was staring at me, his mouth open. I had just performed a round-off followed by a flic-flac and a backward salto on the beach.

'That! The stuff you just did... It was amazing!'

'Thanks.'

I had always thought gymnastics were all my life. I spent my time at the club, training again and again, trying more and more dangerous tricks and working on them. It was just perfect. It made me feel so good: improving my performances and getting more skilled everyday.

The thing is, I was good at it, and since everyone was impressed by my moves, I just wanted to get better all the time. What I felt then was quite amazing.

As always, I felt a feeling of pride rise into my chest. The boy kept staring as I did a handstand and remained in that position for a while before turning around and getting back on the floor.

'I wish I could do that,' he said. 'It must be fun. And it's so classy.'

I smiled again, and he smiled back, still impressed. I knew he must have thought that amazing as I was, my life was probably too.

But it wasn't though. I didn't have so many friends apart from those at the club, because I didn't have time for them and also because they didn't share my passion for gymnastics. As you may guess, I had never had a boyfriend. And when I wasn't training or competing, I had to watch my food and go to bed early so I never went out for fun. Eventually, my parents were divorced and never talked to each other anymore. My sister, with whom I could have shared my grief about them as she was in the same situation, was always hanging out with friends and the rare times I saw her, she would hurry elsewhere – her room, the phone or out - and wouldn't really talk to me.

But I was fine with all of this. I didn't need to have so many friends, as long as people admired me for my skills; and I didn't need to care about my parents, as long as I spent time thinking about my training; at last I didn't need to have a strong relationship with my sister, as anyway I had to remain concentrated to work on my moves.

My sister was older than me. I know that as the oldest, she was supposed to care about me and teach me all the girly stuff she could, but when I became old enough for this I was already training hard and I didn't have time left. She did try to take me out and to make me discover real life, but I had always been too busy and she had eventually given up.

'You can't be a gymnast for ever,' she would tell me. 'Really, Jenny, you've got to get out of this narrow world. Come on, for one night. I'll take care of everything.'

I usually said something like: 'Sure, later, but tonight I have this big competition I have to think about. I promise we'll do that soon'.

Of course she would come back to me a few days later, generally just after the competition. 'We've got to celebrate. Come on, let's eat together, just you and me, and watch a girly movie in a theater. It's gonna be awesome.'

And I found another excuse, I had to remain focused because there were new moves to work on at the gym, or I had to work for school as I had neglected it before the competition.

Therefore there's no wonder she gave up the idea of "getting me out of my world", and I don't blame her. I even have to admit she was very persevering.

I sometimes surprised myself thinking about my sister and admiring her. She was sort of right when she said I was in my world, since I always felt like she belonged to a totally outside one. When I came home after practice and sat down in the kitchen to eat something, I would hear the door of her room burst open and her hurrying down the stairs and calling my name. When she saw me sitting there, she always stopped dead and gave me a panicked gaze.