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U.S. HIGH PERFORMANCE Figure Skating Camp
Sacramento, CA
***
THE FIRST DAY OF CAMP was always the worst. Checking in. Seeing everyone he wanted to, and everyone he didn't. Cayden Sauer topped Aaron’s list of people he wanted to spend as little time with as possible. Not because they were the ostensible rivals for an Olympic spot; Aaron had good friends he competed with all the time. But because Cayden was a jerk and seemed to like to make people feel small. In the constant jockeying for some sort of position, both in the social order and the psychological game, he was always an instigator in the unpleasant thick of it.
At least Aaron could sit on the other side of the room and ignore him during endless meetings that involved people reading aloud from schedules and rules Aaron could read himself. He had Zack’s email, asking him to ask Cayden to talk to him, but he could deal with that later.
The skaters at camp might have been on the same team, but they weren't, not really. There weren’t any other U.S. men’s singles skaters from TCI that Aaron could hang out with. Angel and Nikolai were in juniors, and Sam and Morgan were a pair. They all had their own schedules and their paths rarely crossed. Sure, being here was about preparing for the first half of the season, but it was also about starting to see who would manage to make the second half of the season and the Olympics. Which was the only reason anyone would put themselves through all this.
***
AARON SKATED A FEW laps around the rink as he warmed up to show off his free skate program for the federation officials. He tried a few jumps to test how the ice responded. Although the ice itself was fine, Aaron disliked pretty much everything else about the situation. The arena was mostly unpopulated, with empty seats stretching out on all sides. The panel of officials were seated behind their table, frowning and—it felt from the ice, at least—soulless.
Rightly or wrongly, Aaron was sure, any number of other people, including Cayden, were lurking somewhere, watching him and waiting for him to fail.
Don’t fail, Aaron told himself when he got the signal to begin. Just skate.
His first run-through felt bumpy. He had no falls or major wobbles, but he didn’t feel like his blades were fully in the ice or his head was fully in the game. He didn’t love that, but he knew he wasn’t alone in that. Camp was all the hardest parts of competition with none of the fun bits.
He was happy to watch the rest of his—Teammates? Competitors? Both, really—skate their programs before he had to go again. Technically, it felt better immediately. But after insisting to Zack and Brendan and Katie that he needed music with more space in it for stillness and expression, he now wasn’t filling up that space in the music. He was, simply, scared.
“Sixty second pep talk?” Brendan asked as Aaron got off the ice.
What Aaron wanted was to go take a nap until he had to skate again. “Yeah, sure.”
Brendan drew him off to the side away from the boards. "You're here," he told him, concern clearly showing on his face, "to solve their problems. And you better figure out how only you can do that, because everyone here can do a triple axel, so that's not the issue."
"Sometimes it's the issue," Aaron noted.
"Okay, sometimes it's the problem, but let's pretend it's not. What makes you special?"
Aaron was afraid he might have been gaping. He was probably gaping.
"Don't tell me you don't know."
"I don't know."
"Okay," Brendan said, "If I had to take a guess, it has something to do with that place you're from."
"All it does is make me sort of awkward."
"You're from the hidden world, Aaron. Time to stop hiding it."
***
CLOSE YOUR EYES, Zack had said. I don’t want you to think or feel or be anything else right now.
Zack had meant one thing when he had said that, but Aaron had trusted him, in circumstances far outside his experience, and it had been wildly worth it. Nothing that had happened since had made him regret that choice or mistrust his instincts.
Now, he needed to take that advice and make it about skating.
As the music for his program started, Aaron closed his eyes. Hardly remarkable in itself; many skaters did, to find some sort of internal reset. But then he kept them closed. He'd trained a million elements that way since he was a kid; he knew where his body was on the ice; he knew how fast he was going; he knew what to do; he just had to trust. Himself or Zack or his whole messed up life.
He came around one end of the rink into his triple axel. If he was going to die doing this, this would be it. But his entry was on a circle, not a line, and he was pretty sure he was cutting in away from the wall. Glide on the right back outside edge, step onto the left forward outside edge, and jump.
He came down clean, smiled, and still didn't open his eyes until he was sure he was right in front of the people serving as judges today.
He snapped his gaze up to look at them as he went by. He made eye contact with one of them, by accident, as he did it. And she gasped.
What a good trick.
What a good boy, Zack had said.
Aaron knew Brendan might kill him later, especially if the powers that be weren't impressed by this little experiment, but right now he was having the time of his goddamn life.
***
BRENDAN WAS WAITING for him when he finished as he got off the ice.
"What was that?" he demanded as Aaron slipped on his guards. He wasn't yelling—Brendan never yelled—but there was definitely an edge to his voice. Which put a bit of a damper on Aaron’s elation.
“I decided to try something.” Aaron said. He was breathing hard and had to scrub sweat off his forehead with his sleeve.
“Half your run-through with your eyes closed?”
“It wasn’t half,” Aaron protested, shifting from foot to foot. He still felt jittery with the thrill of the performance.
Brendan slung an arm around his shoulders and steered him away from the ice toward a quiet corner. And that was like Brendan too, not to scold where he might be overheard. Which was what made Aaron suddenly nervous. He’d taken a wild risk, and he had no idea yet if it would pay off. What if the officials hated it? What if Brendan was pissed at him? What would the other skaters who had seen it think—and say?
“If you’d hit the boards and hadn’t seen it coming, come on,” Brendan said, once they were away from everyone else. “You could have injured yourself. Badly. When we have you do elements with your eyes closed it’s not at speed or under pressure for a reason. What were you thinking?”
“You were the one saying I should trust myself more.”
“Yourself! Not the physical constraints of the time-space continuum!”
"But did it work? Was it good?" Aaron had to ask. Not to prove a point to Brendan, but because he wanted to know.
Brendan gave him a disbelieving look. "It was frightening.”
"Katie is frightening."
Brendan looked stunned. "Do you say that to her?"
"No. She says that to me. Like she says we're alike."
“Oh God.” Brendan sank his head into his hands. He ran his hands back through his hair, then looked up at Aaron. “Where is Katie when I need her? This is not my forte.”
“Um.”
“Aaron?” Both Aaron and Brendan looked up with a start. One of the officials was hovering nearby, notebook in hand. She gave Brendan’s spiky hair an amused look. “If you’re ready, we have the feedback on your long program now.”
***
THE OFFICIALS, AS IT turned out, loved Aaron’s new presentation of himself. They had reams of notes and things they wanted him to change and improve—hell would freeze over before the camp officials saw anything they didn’t want to improve, except maybe Jack Palumbo’s skating, but it was a resounding nod of approval.
Aaron felt like he was walking on air as he left the rink for the day. Outside he found Cayden, evidently waiting for the shuttle bus back to the hotel—and for once, not surrounded by his clique of skater friends. Now was surely the perfect time to fulfil Zack’s request.
“Hi!” he said brightly.
Cayden barely glanced up from his phone. “Hi?” he said.
How does he make even that sound mean? Aaron wondered. Like Cayden was some lofty skating god and Aaron was someone far beneath his notice. But he persevered.
“I have a favor to ask. Well, not for me. For my—for someone else.”
“Yeah?”
“So you know there’s a journalist who’s doing a piece on the people competing for—”
“For Koval’s space, yeah,” Cayden said. “I know. He called me and my coaches about fifty times. I hear he spent a lot of time at Twin Cities.” He gave Aaron a suspicious look that Aaron did not like at all.
“Why didn’t you answer?” he asked.
Cayden scowled. “Because I don’t do shit like that. If it’s not in my schedule, it’s a waste of my time.”
“That sounds excessively rigid,” Aaron couldn’t help but point out.
“What it is, is successful. Because that journalist dude is right about one thing: Only one of us gets that spot. And it’s going to be me. Because I spend my time working. Because I want to win. You, you just want attention.”
Aaron considered himself a fairly laid-back human being. High-stress competitive athletic career aside, he liked people and liked being friendly with them. But with Cayden’s words, he saw red.
“Sure I do. Why the fuck else am I an elite athlete?”
“Elite doesn’t mean scrambling for a spot on someone else’s misfortune,” Cayden said.
“My only competition is myself,” Aaron said. I work. I have worked so hard. And I will not let you drag me down.
Cayden gave a vague shrug. “That’ll certainly be true when I’m in Almaty and you’re... not.”
Wow, Aaron thought. I actually hate you. He tried to reign his temper in before he got in trouble for being unsportsmanlike. “You do you. It was just a question.”
“Not a very bright one.”
“Whatever,” Aaron said, already walking away. He could catch the next shuttle.
“See you at Nationals!” Cayden called after him.
Aaron couldn’t fucking wait.
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