The Figure Skater & The Hockey Player

Chapter 22

I never felt fire inside me.

When I felt fire, I felt sick.
My cheeks got warm, my skin boiled.  Fire didn't belong in me, it would melt my insides. Yet, I found myself wanting to be warm, to light the way she did, to set heat to the ice with ever soft stroke.

I watched as they looked at her, it was if they were watching a candle dance. Warm, and comforted by her presence she was the fire place in a mountain cabin. The blaze that ended the ice age. She was what people drank after playing in the snow.

I was never like her.
I was never warm.

" She is beautiful." Felix spoke, but it was a statement directed to no one. He spoke it to himself. A man of few words yet in the last three minutes the most I had heard him speak was in admiration for someone who hadn't even known his existence.

Crya hadn't even noticed our gaze, she truly skated like no one was watching.

" Cyra is a newer skater, fresh on the ice. She's in the earlier  stages of her professional training-" My words were cut short by the enthusiasm of Ivan.

His eyes lit despite my intentions.  " A natural!" Ivan interjected. " To have such raw skill is rarity these days.

"Not here at this rink, all our skaters come from good cloth. You won't find one that isn't brilliant. I only train the best." My Mom bragged , while I had hoped it was nod to my own skill, I knew it was homage to herself. An ode to the talent she spotted.

I rolled my eyes at her comment. Snatching my skates from the seat behind me, I headed down the stairs as they gushed over Cyra Lockheart.

They hadn't even noticed me leave too caught in there own conversation. I knew what was louder then words.

I spoke with the slice of my blades. I kicked off my shoes and began to put on my skates. I knew her routine as well as I knew my own. Having had to sit out the last few practices all I had time to do was watch.

I pushed open the doors to the rink and felt the cool breeze that welcomed me as I entered the ice. With effortless glides I was soon behind Crya who had not noticed my appearance. It took less than a second for me to mimic her movements becoming perfectly synchronized yet, our performance had not been been the same. She had the charisma, but I had the training. She might have melted ice when skates, but I cut it shaped it whatever I told it be.

Sawyer was wrong.

The ice didn't rule me.

I ruled the ice.

We both turned as we landed the axel, at that moment she finally noticed me. Her eyes widen startled by my presence, as well as my proximity. She had never experienced someone figure skating so close to her. While she continued to skate, her moments became restrained fearful of us concluding. I had no fears, because whether people believed it or not I had control. There would be no mistake of collisions, I wouldn't cut her.

She was out of her element not me, she pushed further to create distance, but I was right on her track executing a perfect lutz jump. The anxiety that ran through her as she felt gust of wind that created between us. For a moment she was there, and the next she wasn't.

I hadn't seen her fall, but I felt the absence. In the last few seconds the music intensified and so did. Pushing through the ice as if I had been sculpting myself in it.
It was me alone skating, but I was aware I had been not alone on ice.

I skated, but always I knew when to stop.

I knew when I was cutting close.