Wanted by the Champion: An age gap instalove romance

Alex

“You could just retire. It’s not like you wouldn’t have options. You could move into coaching, or choreography, for example.” My manager Kurt looks at me, and I shake my head.

“No.” I shift in my chair. It creaks beneath my weight, the sound loud in the quiet of Kurt’s tiny office. “I’m not retiring. That might be what’s right for Charlotte, but it’s not what’s right for me.” I’m only thirty-two. I’m not ready to retire. I don’t say this out loud, but I don’t need to. Everyone here knows how I feel.

Scott, one of my long-time coaches, nods, his eyes on me. “That’s what I was expecting you to say.”

Case in point.

Besides, if I retired, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. I’m not ready to hang up my skates and become a coach or a choreographer. I’ve been skating since I was eight years old. The plan had been to learn to skate and then take up hockey. Instead, figure skating had grabbed a hold of me and never let go, and I’ve been competing for over twenty years.

Now I’m Alex McIntyre, three-time world champion and Olympic silver medalist— accolades achieved and accomplished with my pairs partner, Charlotte, who has decided to call it a career and start a family with her husband. And as much as losing her sucks, I don’t begrudge her the right to live her life. Skating at our level is consuming. It takes over your entire life—your time, your body, your mind. It’s an all or nothing game to compete against the best skaters in the world, and I could tell her heart wasn’t in it anymore last season. So, when she told me she was done, it’s not like I was shocked.

Debra, my other coach, tilts her head, clearing her throat softly to bring me back to the present moment. “You could take a season off, decide what you want to do. You don’t have to make any big decisions today.”

I shake my head again. “I’m not taking the season off.”

“That’s what I was expecting you to say,” Scott says again with a wry twist of his lips.

Of course it’s what he was expecting me to say, because he knows me. He knows that I’m driven and that competing fuels me. Winning is the cherry on the sundae, but the good stuff, the stuff that I live for is the grueling training sessions and the competitions and always striving to be better. Without that, I don’t know who I am.

So, no. I am not retiring, and I am not taking the season off. Fuck that.

Pushing a hand through my hair, I blow out a breath. It feels as though the office walls are closing in on me, that there’s not enough oxygen in this room for the four of us. The air is thick and close. I trace the toe of my sneaker over a small stain on the gray carpet.

“So, new partner it is,” says Kurt, long fingers moving across the keyboard in front of him. “Deb, Scott, and I have put together a short list of skaters we think might be a good fit for you. They all have pairs experience, so we won’t be starting from scratch, and they’re all either looking for a new partner, or open to switching if the chemistry is right.” His fingers move again, the keys clicking softly. I can feel a restless energy building inside me, and I rub a hand across the back of my neck, trying to dispel it.

“I’ve emailed you a list of links,” says Kurt, fingers clicking his mouse. “I’ve included two performances from each skater we’re considering. Watch them and see what you think.”

I nod. “Yeah. Okay.” I mean, what else can I say? What other choice do I have? More of that restless anxiety bubbles up inside me, and I stand, slipping my hands into the pockets of my sweatpants. It’s a good thing I’m already dressed for a workout, because I need to hit the gym. Badly.

“We need to make a decision soon,” says Deb softly. “It’s already May.” I fight back the urge to snap that I know what month it is. I’m well aware that summer is around the corner, and if I have any hope of competing this fall, I need to start training with a new partner now. Like, this week. Not only will we need time to find our rhythm, but we’ll need to learn our choreography and get competition ready for October. It’s not a lot of time.

“I know,” I say, nodding. I force myself to smile. These people are on my team. They’re not working against me. It’s not their fault Charlotte was ready to retire. “I’ll watch the videos tonight and let you know.”

It’s hard for me to imagine skating with anyone besides Charlotte. She and I were partners for ten years, and we had a closeness that can only come from years of hard work and mutual respect. She understood me, and I think of her as my sister. I wish she hadn’t retired, but I get it. I do.

Kurt’s office is only a block away from IceWorks, the rink where I spend nearly forty hours a week training both on the ice and off. It’s a state-of-the-art facility, and only the best of the best are invited to train here.

I head to the gym, jam my AirPods in my ears, and grind through a workout designed to shut my brain off. I lift weights until my muscles scream with exhaustion, run on the treadmill until my legs burn, stretch until I feel like a rubber band, about to snap.

It doesn’t work. All I can think about is the enormous fucking question mark that is my future in the sport I love.

After a quick shower, I head home to my apartment. I should watch the videos, but instead, I procrastinate. I make dinner. I fold some laundry. I try to watch a baseball game.

But as much as I want to, I can’t escape the reality of my situation.

“Fuck.” I push up from the couch and head into my bedroom to grab my laptop. “The only way out is through,” I say under my breath, something I’ve repeated to myself countless times when coming back from a bad short program, recovering from an injury, or dealing with any number of setbacks.

Losing my partner of a decade is definitely a setback.

I lower the volume on the baseball game and set my laptop on my thighs, my bare feet propped up on the coffee table in front of me.

I open Kurt’s email and click on the first link to watch a video of a skater named Cate Wilson. Never heard of her.

The video starts playing. It’s a clip of Cate and her former partner Danny Swanson stepping onto the ice at a Grand Prix competition two seasons ago. The camera pans around the ice before settling on the pair.

And everything inside me goes very, very still.

“Cate,” I breathe, eyes glued to the screen. I feel like I can barely breathe as the program starts, her small, graceful body moving fluidly with Danny’s, gliding across the ice. Her dark hair is wound up in a bun on top of her head, the silky strands glinting under the arena’s bright lights. I watch the muscles in her arms and legs move as Danny launches her into a massive throw triple loop that she lands flawlessly. A radiant smile bursts across her face when she does, and something in my chest goes hot and achy at the sight of it.

I’m rapt throughout the routine, not taking my eyes off of her. I don’t even blink. Watching her is hypnotic. Her face is expressive, selling the emotions of the program.

She’s beautiful. Angelic. She’s strong and an incredibly talented skater. She’s graceful and flexible and skates with artistry and finesse.

She’s perfect. Not just perfect. She’s perfection personified.

The program finishes and she lets out a whoop and launches herself into Danny’s arms, celebrating the flawless skate. An unfamiliar sensation burns in my gut as she beams up at him and he brushes a strand of hair off her face in a familiar gesture. I don’t know Danny, but I suddenly want to break his fingers.

What the fuck? Am I…Jesus, am I jealous?

Of what?

I realize then that I’m half-hard and my eyes bounce back to Cate on the screen, taking in her sweet face with her full lips and wide smile, the tiny stud in her nose, the colorful paint on her nails. The rounded curve of her muscular ass, the toned shape of her calves. The image of those legs wrapped around me slams into me with the subtlety of a cement truck.

Oh, fuck. I don’t just want to skate with her. I want her. I want her more than I’ve wanted a woman in a long time. Maybe ever.

I palm myself over my sweatpants and swallow thickly. That’s a bad combination. Mixing feelings with a professional athletic relationship is often a terrible idea. And then there’s the fact that she’s young. Really young. Too young. I should click away. I should check out the other skaters.

I tell myself these things knowing full well I’m not going to. I want Cate. I want Cate. It’s as though I’ve been struck by lightning, and my life will now be forever categorized into two parts—before I saw Cate, and after.

I watch the other video of her and Danny that Kurt included in the email, and when it’s over, I stay on YouTube and search for more of her performances, ignoring the links to other skaters. My mind is racing with questions. Why isn’t she skating with Danny anymore? How have I never heard of her before? She trains only an hour away from here, at a less prominent rink.

How old is she?

I watch her skate with Danny again, drinking in her every movement, down to her fluttering eyelashes, and then I open a web browser and search her name, hungry for more information. My heart stutters when I see her birthday.

I was in middle school when she was born. I’m more than a decade older than her.

Then, I find the news articles, referring to her injury, to the accident, and I need to know what happened. My stomach lurches when I find it. The video is labeled “Cate Wilson/Danny Swanson Shocking Fall,” and my heart is galloping in my chest when I click on it.

The video starts mid-routine, classical music soaring through the speakers, Cate twirling in Danny’s arms in a white skating dress with a skirt that flutters around her toned thighs. The dress’s jewels catch the lights, sparkling as she moves with what I’m already recognizing as her signature grace.

I watch in horror as Danny starts to lift Cate but then seems to lose focus, making him catch an edge. He falls hard to the ice with Cate above his shoulder. She falls even harder than he does, and I swear the edges of my vision go black as her head hits the ice and she doesn’t move. For several long seconds, they both lie there, the music still playing. When she does move, her movements are slow and groggy, her hands clutching her head. The music stops, and medical personnel rush onto the ice.

Everything inside me is wound tight, and even though this happened two years ago, I have an intense urge to race out onto the ice and scoop her into my arms. To protect her from anything and everything.

I read in an article that she was badly concussed after that, and switched to singles skating the following season.

Does she even want to come back to pairs skating? The question makes my stomach sink.

I pull up several of her singles performances, sitting back on the couch and drinking her in. I can’t stop watching her. I’m addicted to her smiles, her little triumphant laughs when a routine goes well, the little teasing glimpses of her covered pussy in her skating dresses. Outside, the sun sets. Inside, the baseball game ends. And I’m still watching Cate, hard as fucking steel.

There’s a whole litany of reasons I shouldn’t request a trial skate with her. She’s too young. She’s had a terrifying injury. I’m already way too obsessed. And I don’t just want to skate with her—I want her. I fucking want her like I want air, and I have no idea how I’m going to navigate that if we do skate together. I have no experience with that because I always felt a kind of brotherly affection towards Charlotte. I never wanted her the way I want Cate.

But none of that matters. Because the words I type in reply to Kurt’s email feel like an inevitability, not a choice.

I want Cate Wilson.