Dark Night

Iced

Rats. My instinctive desire to please and meet or exceed my teachers' expectations were instantly at war with my dislike of the skating activities. I reluctantly joined the queue of students moving out onto the ice. I know the gym coaches were wondering about me; they were huddled at the end of the rink and I saw them watch me before turning back to talk. Whatever. I saw Mr Petrov on the ice watching the students, and Marc and Krista had taken a few students to the center of the ice in an impromptu lesson on spinning. A person I didn't know but who was probably the ice dance coach was scraping kids off the boards, helping with their balance and confidence. There was music playing over the speakers, which was nice. Coach hadn't said that we were to seek out help, so I just did my revolutions, returning a wave from the kid I'd helped last week. When I came back around, he stuck out his hand.

"Hey, can you show me how to do that stop? Not the snowplow, the one with the side of the skate?" A couple of his friends edged in closer to hear the explanation.

"There are a couple, the T stop and the hockey stop," I said. "I think the hockey stop is easier to learn."

"Ok, whatever,"  he said. I held up my foot a little.

"You can see that the blade of the skate isn't flat like it is for speed skating. It curves a bit, and if you look at the profile, you see that it has two edges with a hollow in between. So what you want to do is scrape one edge over the ice at an angle that will slow you down. You'll be stopping on the outside edge" I pointed, then put my foot down and demonstrated. "While you're moving, you turn your feet, knees bent, putting pressure on the front part of the inside edge of the front skate and the outside edge of your rear skate." I demonstrated again. "You guys try." I hauled one kid to his feet, but they all got the hang of it pretty easily. Then I figured I'd done my good deed for the day and moved on.

I looked over warily to see Mr Petrov skating beside me. "So you're Constantine's sister."

"Yep."

"It is interesting that you managed to get both John and Stan to rethink their approach to their programs for next year. Although Stan's interest is more in response to John's request for Ekaterin to make changes to his choreography." I shrugged.

"They both want to win. John is science-oriented. Discuss it in ways that he understands. My brother thinks he's the better skater and that he can win based on jumps alone. But he's going to be concerned if he thinks John's going to level up in a meaningful way."

"You judged John's deficiencies quite clearly."

"I used to study skating."

"Used to?" his tone was arch.

"Yep. Those who can't do, study." The rather demeaning phrase was 'those who can't do, teach,' but Mr Petrov was the most winning skater in Olympic history, so clearly he could do and I didn't want to unnecessarily upset him.

"What else do you know about skating?"

"That perfect ice for a figure skater is six degrees Fahrenheit warmer than it is for hockey players, between 24-26 degrees Fahrenheit, that it needs to be as free from defects as possible, clear as possible by tradition so you can see the patterns inscribed on it, made from hot water that is not hard, that it's not brittle, soft enough to dig a pick into without digging chunks of ice out but hard enough for the edges to cut into the ice, kept in ambient temperature of 60 degrees Fahrenheit with 40% humidity. I know that there's a fair amount of corruption, at least historically, in the judging, and a fair degree of bias, that the awarding of points for each element in a program is a Byzantine proposition, and that I don't understand why women aren't landing quads like the men do. That's what I know."

"So the rest is opinion?"

"Yep."

"I don't understand why Stan doesn't speak with you about his skating."

"You'd have to ask him." After a silence, I wanted him to go away. "Look, Mr Petrov, I'm here for my gym class, not to talk about my brother." Go away, I thought hard at him. 

Nope. "Ah, yes. Since you're clearly at home on your skates, let me see you spin." Great. Punishment learning. He indicated center ice, and behind him, I could see one of the coaches watching, so I skated over reluctantly and performed a really basic two-footed spin. It took him fifteen minutes before I could do a slower spin one-footed, then I took advantage of a momentary distraction to dart away. I took real advantage of the situation, borrowing skate guards from the desk and visiting the restroom in an effort to get people to go away.

Then I only had to hang in there a few minutes before it was time to leave. 

And the week started to feel like a grueling march of attrition. I couldn't get the coaches to go away. Even the ice dancer insisted on teaching me a simple footwork  sequence and encouraged me to have deep edges. I finally snapped on Wednesday when Marc was being pesky.

"I know you're just being nice, but frankly, every time somebody tells me I'm a good skater with potential, it's just a reminder that I might have achieved too, but I never had the opportunity, and it's way too late for me now. And it hurts. I'm here because I have to be and I couldn't figure out a way to break my leg so I could legitimately avoid it." I hastily wiped under my eye to avoid smudging my make-up. And then I did trip on an enormous gouge that somebody had managed to make and went head-first into the boards.

So that put an end to my skating. Thank god. The coaches let me stay behind Thursday and Friday because the trainer that Krista brought over thought it was borderline that I had a concussion. So aside from the headache, my week was looking up. I had a note to take home to Mom and Dad, proving at least that it was a result of a school activity for which they'd signed the permission slip at the beginning of the year and not my skateboarding.

"Krista asked how you were last night at practice," John said, dropping into his seat in math Thursday. "I said that you were fine, but they explained that you'd had an accident at the rink when you were with your gym class. Are you ok?"

"Had a headache," I said briefly. I wasn't going to admit to anyone that I'd fudged the concussion test a little. I hadn't outright lied, just exaggerated a couple of reactions. "I'll be fine."

"There's something wrong with the refrigeration in the ice in that one spot, it's a little too soft, but they would have to basically wreck the ice sheet to really fix it, so it won't happen until after Worlds. They put a cone out while they patch that divot." He studied me. "She said you'd been talking to Marc and you looked upset."

"I just don't want to be there, John. That's my brother's place, and I just don't want to go there. It's more of a sore spot than I'd realized." His face softened.

"So are you ready for the ACTs?" he asked, changing the subject. They were on Saturday.

"I don't know, I sure hope so," I said. "I don't even care anymore, I just want them to be over."

"I hear you. I'd be less anxious, maybe, if we'd gotten our SAT scores back. I hate that the tests are so close together this year." I was about to agree, but the bell rang and our teacher got up, moving toward the whiteboard with purpose and her purple pen. That meant something new to learn. Sigh.