Page 123 of Oh, Flutz!

The song soon fades into “I Dreamed A Dream,” the music slowing down considerably into a much more melancholic and mournful tune. The music change always bothered me a little bit. Not because it was too abrupt, it was just more of a problem for me to change the energy from bold and daring back down to a cracked-open, grief-stricken girl. This part is a lot harder to sell, especially when you’re like me. When all you do normally is act like you don’t feel anything.

Anne Hathaway sings of dreams, impossible ones, of storms which cannot be weathered. Then she starts sobbing violently, and I have to force myself to focus so I don’t get thrown off. I nearly slip on the entry for the combination spin, pressing extra hard on my edge to stabilize myself.

What is wrong with me? Why is this getting to me?

I’d be mentally jumping up and down on my thoughts, but right now I’m so pressed for time that I can’t even distract myself from the distraction. I sink from a camel position down into a sit spin, and back up into a Bielmann, yanking my right foot by the blade all the way above my head.

Usually I’m so desensitized to the dizziness that spins and jumps don’t bother me. You have to be, otherwise you’ll never be able to do this sport, because of the nauseating speed of rotation. But right now I can feel my head swimming, feel myself traveling way off center, and I have to fight to stay balanced. You can do better than that, sunshine,a familiar voice in my head teases, and I feel my stomach drop at the smile that flashes through my mind, because it twists into the same smile falling, tears and red faces, choked voices. I’m trying, I swear I’m trying. I know it’s not a lot. I know it’s not enough.

I blink away the tears. It’s normal to have tears in spins. The cold and the motion—it happens all the time, along with the snot flying out of your nose (this can be an extremely unflattering sport). I need to relax. Actually, screw that, I need to focus.Nothing is wrong,I tell myself.Nothing is wrong. Katya, it doesn’t matter, stop thinking about it. You had to do it. You had no choice.

The music changes, moving suddenly into the chorus of “One Day More,” and I’m a half-second behind on getting out of my spin, so I immediately force an exit so strong I’m lucky to hang onto it. I cannot be late again. Iwillnot be late. I know this routine like the back of my hand, I’ve been skating to it for two years, but right now it’s pissing me off.

I race off into crossovers, approaching speed skater speed, the cheering audience melting into a colorful blur. The roar of the song is so loud that I can hear the lyrics clearly, echoing in the massive building and across the ice, over the scraping of my blades and the noise from the crowd and the blood pounding in my head.

I can hear the blood and I can hear my lungs heavingin, out, in, out, trying to keep up with the rest of me as I switch to backwards, because it’s somehow time for the final jumping pass, the final element. The combination.

I’m still a beat behind, and I’m rushing through the choreography, the connecting steps and footwork. I’m being sloppy. Shit. Shit. Tatyana’s going to kill me. I can’t finish late again; I have to be on time—

I glance behind me, the corner rapidly approaching, then tense my back. I’m going to need a ridiculous amount of power to carry me through three back-to-back jumps. If I’m totally honest, I don’t think I can do it. Oh my god, I can’t be doubting myself going into a jump. That’s the first lesson in skating psychology.Do it! Do it!I’m panicking.Do I triple? Do I cut out the third jump?The thought flashes through me in a haze of panic, and then I stamp it out. Come on, Katya. You can do this. Get yourself together.In. Out. In. Out.

I suck in a breath as I step into the mohawk and swing my leg up with all the power I can muster, every single ounce of energy left in my body and all the adrenaline pumping in my veins, and let the force launch me impossibly high into the air, four revolutions, down; toe pick in, up, four revolutions, down; toe pick in, one, two, three—

Screaming.

I barely even feel it, but I hear perfectly the sickeningthunkof my skull against the ice, snapping back from my neck as I fall back, tripping as I threw myself backwards and all, all wrong.

Oh, you stupid suka, is all I can think.

Then everything cuts to black.

Chapter Forty-One

BRYAN

EARLIER

LAKE PLACID, NEW YORK

Ican't feel anything.

There’s nothing left in my chest.

I went to sleep the night before it happened thinking her leaving was the worst thing that could happen. Even that night after Nationals five years ago couldn’t top it, because I’d just been a kid then. Nothing really bad had ever happened to me before. Now, it’s been less than a month since she got on that flight and left me stranded, I’m wearing a suit for the first time since graduation, and my father is dead.

I’ve learned all the different things people say to you when your parent dies.He was a good man. He was gone too soon. He’s looking down on you.

All of it is such bullshit, because half of these people barely even knew him. It’s all just people who worked with him virtually or knew him from all the time he spent at the hospital or people from school and his old job who hadn’t bothered to stick around after his accident. A bunch of Mom’s friends. Some guy I’d never seen before who looked at me like he’d seen a ghost, and maybe he did. Never have I ever gotten so many “you look just like him” comments than today.

The only people who really knew him all know he was an asshole. They just also know why.

Deanna and all the people from Moby’s are here, they supplied half the food for this stupid wake my mom insisted on hosting, and this whole place is flooded with people in dark clothes and fake-sad looks plastered on their faces because they don’t know what they’re doing here, either, and they don’t know how to act.

I just wish they’d all get out.

Alexandra’s downstairs with her friends, Mom was going around playing the grieving widow last time I checked, and I’ve managed to stay hidden up here in my room for the last few hours, staring at the ceiling. I’m sure everyone knows where I am, but they’ve left me alone thus far, at least. I might lose it if I have to hear one more person act like they care.

You know, you always think you have more time than you really do. My dad and I spent years in some kind of cold war with each other just because neither of us were man enough to deal with our issues straight-up. We wasted all that time, and for what? Just for me to be sitting here in my rumpled old Sunday suit in my childhood bed, sitting in my childhood room for the first time since I was sixteen and could still pretend like there wasn’t a ticking time bomb in the room down the hall where my dad was supposed to be? Just so the tidal wave I’ve been frantically paddling away from ever since I can remember can finally catch up to me and pull me under?

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