Page 120 of Wilder

“You need me more than I need you,” she told Lev.

She could see the anger building in his eyes, but she didn’t back down. It felt like she was at a crossroads. A monumental moment in her life.

Finally, Lev waved his hand dismissively in the air. “If you don’t win gold, you can’t blame us.”

Lexi turned and left their room, eager to get back to hers and take a long, hot shower. Her muscles ached, but it was anache that testified to all the hard work they’d done over the past weeks. And it had paid off.

After her shower, she dressed in a pair of cozy pajamas, then placed a room service order. Mik and the coaches would probably go down to the restaurant, but she had no interest in that.

She curled up in a chair by the window and unlocked her phone to see if she had any messages. Warmth spread through her as she saw Wilder’s name on her screen. She went to her text app to read the whole thing.

Wilder:Congrats on getting silver!We’ve been praying for you, and you did such a GREAT job. It was a beautiful program, and you looked beautiful as well. Look forward to seeing you skate at the Olympics.

As she read the message, tears pricked her eyes. After the interactions with Mik, Irina, and Lev, it was a balm to her spirit, and it encouraged her in a way nothing else had.

Even though she’d put distance between them—pushed him away, if she was going to be honest—he was still in her corner. Still praying for her. Still wanting the best for her.

She pressed the edge of her phone to her forehead as she bent her head forward. After she’d lost her dad and Mik and the coaches had abandoned her, she was sure that the only person who would be there as a support for her would be her mom.

Her phone dinged and when she looked at it, her heart pulsed with an ache as she saw two more messages had come in. One from Layla and Amelia, and one from Charli.

Both messages were enthusiastic about her performance and the result of the competition. Even though she’d had to pull back from coaching for the time being, they still supported her.

It reinforced her feeling that she was meant to be in Serenity. She wanted to coach the girls, especially Amelia, and she wanted to work with others who might want to learn from her. She didn’t need to coach top tier skaters, though she did feel she had plenty to offer them.

She would fulfill her commitment to skate through the Olympics and possibly Worlds. She hadn’t made up her mind about that just yet. But then she was done with competitive skating.

No longer was her drive to be a better skater than everyone else. She wanted—needed—to find a new purpose in her life.

After reading through the messages, she sent replies to Layla and Charli, thanking them for their support. She’d just finished the message to Charli when there was a knock on the door.

Getting up, she went to answer it. The young man there gave her the order she’d placed with room service. After thanking and tipping him, she carried it to the small table in the corner of the room.

It was just a simple salad with grilled chicken breast, but it would be enough. She hadn’t been able to bring her meal prep with her, so she had to make do with what she could find on the menu.

As she ate, she contemplated her reply to Wilder. There was so much she wanted to say to him, but she was still ever mindful of the fact that his life would be taking him away from Serenity. Until she was sure that her feelings for him were solidly in the friendship area, she couldn’t interact with him the way she wanted to.

Thanks. I wish we could have won it on our own merit, but a win is a win, and we did skate clean. Still don’t know about the Olympics. Hopefully, we’ll find out this week.

After she hit send, she went to her bag and pulled out her tablet. She found a site that had streamed the event and located their short program. Now that the competition was over, she was curious what the commentators had said with regards to her and Mik’s return to the ice.

She wasn’t as interested in their comments about their actual skating, though she did want to view it to see their performance for herself. Sometimes she didn’t remember the details since she didn’t dwell on anything that happened in the program until afterward.

Taking the tablet to the table, she set it up to play while she ate. As she picked up her fork, she took a moment to thank God for the food and for where they’d placed in the competition.

She wasn’t sure that God cared all that much about figure skating, but she was thankful for how well it had gone, so it felt right to thank Him for how it had unfolded.

During the short program warmup, the commentators touched on Lexi’s “retirement” along with Mik’s pairing with Amberlyn. They said nothing about what had led to their partnership dissolving almost two years ago and only seemed to have positive things to say about their return to competition.

She skipped the other pairs’ programs to get to her and Mik’s short program, then watched as they skated through it. The program wasn’t completely new, but they’d made changes to it, so the judges were seeing that revised version for the first time.

There were definitely a few issues, which was why they’d ended up third after the program. Their score was a an accurate reflection of how they’d skated.

Once that was done, she found the stream for the long program and once again listened during the skate warm up. The commentators didn’t say anything more than what they’d saidduring the short program warmup, and she had to say she really appreciated that they didn’t dip into the gossipy stuff that was found in the online forums.

And thankfully, they didn’t seem to feel that she didn’t deserve to be on the ice again.

After watching the long program, she felt like perhaps they’d been underscored, but not significantly. Not enough that they had been robbed of the gold.

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