“Not just the stalkers. You’ve been kind of blue lately.”
She forced a carefree laugh. Sweet of him to be concerned, and most people wouldn’t have unexpected it from a man built like a tank. A couple of long, jagged scars marred his left cheek. She was sure they were from a knife or something, even though he hadn’t ever talked about it. Too rough a story for a pretty girl like you, he’d said.
“I’m not going to swim out to sea if that’s what you’re worried about,” she said.
He pursed his mouth, and she knew what he was thinking: It should’ve been me.
He’d said that to her when she’d opened her eyes in the hospital, and every time the doctors had wheeled her into surgery to put her back together. He’d only stopped because she’d asked him to.
It shouldn’t have been anybody.
But she could tell he was still feeling it from the way his eyes darkened every time he thought she wasn’t looking. She gave him a serene smile and made a gentle shooing motion.
“All right,” he finally said. “But if you’re not back in an hour, I’m coming looking for you.”
“I promise.” She watched until he vanished into the vacation rental, then started walking down the beach. Sun-warmed sand tickled her toes. She took off her flat, sling-back sandals and carried them in one hand.
The sea-salted air was refreshing, but the change of scenery hadn’t eased the pain in her heart. Four years. Everyone had told her that was enough time to accept the possibility of never achieving her dream, but they weren’t the ones who’d worked tirelessly since the age of five. Fourteen years of relentless, bone-cracking work, and then an accident at nineteen had derailed everything she’d been working for.
Life isn’t fair. She’d heard that a lot as well.
The knot in her chest grew bigger.
She’d sought out the best surgeons in the world, done all the rehab. She’d pushed herself hard, determined to get back on the ice, healthier and stronger than ever before. Kept her weight under control; every extra ounce helped gravity pull her down. Only the most nutritious food, carefully calibrated to create optimal health and an optimal bodyweight for figure skating, ended up in her belly.
Twenty-three wasn’t young in her sport. Actually it was sort of on the old side, what with new teenage sensations popping up every season, but she knew she could do it if her shoulder and hip would just cooperate.
She closed her eyes. It’d been so long, but her muscles still remembered what it was like to fly across a rink at full speed. She didn’t believe in slowing down or hesitating before executing her elements: a powerful takeoff on the outside edge as her free foot’s toe-pick hit the ice, pulling in her limbs and rotating in the air: one…two…three. Then a perfect landing on one foot for a split-second as she launched herself into the air again for a triple loop—three tight revolutions. And before she knew it her blade would be gliding across the ice again, creating a smooth, clean line, the combination jump completed as she transitioned into another element of her program.
But now…now her reality was different. Her body might remember, but it could no longer perform any of her key jumps with the consistency she needed. She could deal with the aching shoulder, but her hip couldn’t seem to handle loops at all. The surgeries and endless physical therapy just hadn’t been able to fix all the damage.
And there was absolutely no one she could talk to. Her father didn’t really understand what it meant to her, even though he’d had no problem forking over the money for her training, and her mother was too busy being a trophy wife. Her figure skating friends were single-mindedly focused on getting ready for the Olympic season. They were also avoiding her—she could tell. Not that she blamed them. Athletes were superstitious, and it probably made them feel uncomfortable to be around her, a former star who was now just a has-been. She would’ve felt the same if the situation had been reversed.
And Libby Grudin… Her best friend commiserated, but she also saw the accident as an opportunity for Sophia to live her life.
“There’s something so…cloistered about being twenty-three and never having been on a date,” Libby had said. “Look at you. You’re gorgeous! It’s about time you get out and experience the world. Do the kind of stuff women our age do.”
Sophia sighed and resumed her walk. Maybe Libby had a point. On the other hand, nothing had made Sophia feel alive like being on the ice. Every beat and strain of the music would reverberate through her, and it was like her soul was free.
To be free again like that…