Page 95 of Wilder

“You’ve been to the Olympics and dealt with what happened with your dad,” Wilder said. “I think we all know you can handle whatever comes your way. But things are different for you going into this. You had support back then, and we’re going to give it to you now.”

“I don’t know why. You didn’t even know me until a few weeks ago.”

“What can I say? I’m a good judge of character.”

Lexi gave a huff of laughter. “This still isn’t about dating, right?”

Wilder hesitated a moment before he nodded. “You’re my friend.”

It was a bit of a left turn in their conversation, but the more time they spent together, the less it felt like just a friendship. She needed the reminder as much, if not more, than Wilder.

“Our lives are too different for anything but friendship.” The words hurt to say, but she felt it was necessary. “I mean, if you’d even feel any sort of way… about… things.”

“Don’t sell yourself short,” he told her. “If the circumstances were different…”

His words and the shrug that followed made her heart race.

No. She didn’t want to think about that.

She couldn’t compromise her goals in life to follow him traveling all over the world, and she doubted he wanted to change the way he lived his life just to be with her. His work with the orphanages was definitely an important thing to him, as were his travels.

Wilder cleared his throat. “Anyway, does this mean you’ll have your evenings free?”

Lexi nodded. “We’ll be training more during the day, but I’ll have my evenings now.”

“You can join us for our pizza nights,” Wilder said. “And maybe come to church with us, if you want to.”

“Pizza?” She shook her head. “That’s not part of my meal prep.”

“We usually have pizza night every Friday. It’s family and some friends, and we get together for pizza and sometimes we play games.”

“Sounds like fun.”

“It usually is. You could bring your own food, as long as you can handle being around pizza without giving in to temptation.”

“I’ll have to see.”

“Let me know if you want to come,” he said. “Even if it’s at the last minute, since you’ll be bringing your own food.”

“Well, I won’t be able to come this Friday since the new schedule isn’t taking effect until Monday.”

“It’s usually every Friday, unless there’s an early basketball game.”

“Basketball game?”

“Jay coaches the high school team, and they usually have a game on Friday or Saturday night.”

Lexi marveled at the normalcy in Wilder’s life. Pizza dinners. Church with family. Basketball games. It was a life she’d never experienced, but she knew that it was far more common than the life she’d lived as a professional athlete.

Did she want to become a part of that? To find out what it was like to live a normal life? Or would it lead to distractions that she didn’t need as she trained for another crack at the Olympics?

The normal life had never appealed to her, simply because she’d never imagined a life different from what she’d had. Getting back to training with two big competitions looming was once again offering that life. But now, she wondered if she couldfind a way to balance the skating life with something more… normal.

“I’ll have to see how my training goes,” Lexi said, reluctant to commit to anything before she saw how the change in her schedule was going to play out.

“Fair enough.” Wilder paused, then said, “Do you put up a Christmas tree?”

“I’ve never done it myself,” Lexi said, grateful for the change of subject. “My mom always hired someone to come in and decorate our house for the holidays.”

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