CHAPTER 10

BACK TO THE BEAM

“Back walkover!” Coach Jackson called two days later. She looked at the paper in her hand. “Your routine has you doing it three times, but do you want to start with once?”

Sofia nodded and flipped smoothly back into the back walkover. She was on day three of Dr. Wigton’s plan. For the first time in weeks, she wasn’t afraid.

“I think I can do it twice more,” she said after she finished. Something about knowing she didn’t have to do it made it easier to do.

Before her coach could protest, Sofia braced her hands against the beam and whipped her legs up again, then once more. It was the first time since her accident that being upside down had felt right.

“OK, that’s it for today,” Coach called.

Sofia slid off the beam. “It feels weird only doing one part of the routine,” she said.

Coach smiled. “I know. But just think of it as doctor’s orders.”

The next day, Sofia and Coach were back at it. They practiced another part of her routine. The following day, they did it again.

“I want to try something new today,” Coach said Friday, looking up at Sofia on the beam. “I called Dr. Wigton last night to update her on your progress, and she recommended that I slam the door during your flip.”

A tiny bit of fear knifed through Sofia’s stomach. She forced herself to take a deep breath. “OK,” she said, nodding.

“Are you sure?” Coach Jackson asked. “We don’t have to do it if you’re not comfortable.”

“No, I want to,” Sofia said. She was starting to feel like her old self. She didn’t want to give that up. “I want to do it all now. I don’t want to leave anything to chance.”

Coach Jackson nodded and took a step back. Sofia positioned herself at the end of the beam, and her coach started the music.

Sofia heard the horns signaling the start of her routine. Three back walkovers—one, then another, then another. Then the layout step-out. No hands.

Her body aligned itself. Sofia shut off her mind and let her body take over, the way Coach Jackson had taught her.

Then she did the next layout step-out and there it was—boom!—just as Sofia was in midair. It was muffled and dull, not the sharp, jarring noise she remembered. Maybe it had sounded like that all along and she’d imagined a much scarier sound?

Sofia’s feet hit the beam—not perfect, but solid—and she let out a huge breath. She’d done it. The whole routine. And she hadn’t fallen once.

Sofia turned and grinned. It hadn’t been easy, and she wasn’t all the way there, but she’d done it. She’d faced her trauma and found her way back to the beam.