Chapter Nine
Blaire woke before her alarm because her body was already buzzing with race-day adrenaline.
This was the first medal event for her at these Games, and in her internal math, it set the tone for everything else.
She moved through her routine on autopilot—stretch, hydration, light snack—while her mind cataloged the stakes.
The Super-G wasn’t her purest love the way downhill was, but it was still a chance to step onto that podium one more time and remind everyone why she’d dominated the field for a decade.
At breakfast, she kept conversation with teammates minimal, listening more than speaking as younger racers chatted about nerves.
Her eyes skimmed the room and inevitably found Isaline at the Swiss table.
They didn’t exchange more than a distant nod.
Blaire pulled her attention back to her tray, telling herself that today was about carving the line she’d trained for, not about who happened to be standing under the same flags.
The knowledge that this was her last Olympic Super-G sat in her chest like a metal implant.
She refused to name the feeling as fear, but every small movement felt more dramatic than usual.
The way her spoon scraped the bottom of her oatmeal bowl.
The weight of her accreditation badge against her chest. The taste of coffee she barely registered drinking.
On the shuttle up to the venue, she stared out at the mountain.
It was the same scene she’d seen a hundred times in training, but suddenly it looked different, decorated with Olympic blue banners.
Other athletes talked around her with their voices rising and falling in nervous patterns. She heard none of it.
Blaire had left her phone in her gear bag.
Isaline’s practical text from the night before had gone unanswered, not out of cruelty but because Blaire had no words that wouldn’t betray how much space the Swiss woman occupied in her head.
The crosswind warning had been thoughtful.
Professional. Exactly the type of thing rivals who respected each other shared.
It had also kept Blaire awake an extra hour, staring at those words and wondering what Isaline had really wanted to say instead.
The shuttle pulled into the venue staging area.
Athletes filed out into the cold, breath clouding, boots crunching on packed snow.
Blaire grabbed her race bag and followed the familiar path toward the wax cabin.
She let muscle memory carry her while her mind stayed locked on one thing she couldn’t shake: anything less than gold today would feel like failure.
After a quick check-in with her parents, who had arrived for race day, Blaire finished the activation set and grabbed a towel and used it to roll tension out of her shoulders.
Meanwhile, the TV in the corner cycled through early Super-G racers.
Tess appeared with coffee and set it on the bench beside Blaire like an offering of a speed drug.
“Clear your head before you ask the question. I can see your mind brewing,” Blaire said as she glanced up.
Tess ignored that. She sat, elbows on her knees, watching the screen for a beat before turning sideways. “You’re carrying more than usual. I can see it in your eyes.”
“It’s my last Olympics, Tess. I’m carrying a lot.”
“It’s not just that.”
Blaire tightened the resistance band around her wrists and exhaled through her nose. Around them, other athletes moved through their own routines. Voices surrounding them were muffled under music and announcer chatter. Tess waited, patient as a brick.
Finally, Blaire spoke. “What… I’m good, Tess.”
“You’re distracted,” Tess corrected. “Calm and clinical, but I can see something beneath that shield. I’ve seen you manage pressure since you were twenty. This isn’t pressure. This energy you’ve been giving off is something else.”
Blair hated this part—the part where someone who knew her well enough refused to accept the surface answer. Tess had been there for her first Olympics, her first heartbreak, and every year since. Lying to her felt pointless.
“St. Moritz wasn’t just a race for you,” Tess said, cutting through before Blaire could deflect. “And Isaline Senn isn’t just another name on the start list.”
The words landed like a punch to the gut. Blaire kept her eyes forward as her fingers worked the band.
“I’m not asking for details,” Tess continued. “But I notice when you check your phone more. I’ve seen you tracking results that aren’t yours. And it’s beyond obvious when you go quiet the second Switzerland comes up in conversation.”
Blaire let the band snap against her palm. The sting felt grounding. “None of this is changing my focus.”
“It’s not? Are you sure?”
“Positively sure.”
Tess leaned back and crossed her arms over her chest. “You’ve spent your entire career keeping people at arm’s length so they couldn’t get in your way. That worked. But you don’t get to pretend she’s background noise when she’s clearly as loud as a marching band trying to hold your attention.”
Blaire turned her head, finally meeting Tess’s gaze. “What do you want me to say?”
“That you know what you can carry today. I’m not sure there is enough room on your shoulders for a race and a woman.” Tess’s voice softened without losing its edge. “You’re allowed to want more than medals, Blaire. You’re also allowed to admit when something matters enough to rattle you.”
Blaire looked away as her throat tightened.
Tess stood and zipped her jacket. “This race is still yours. Whatever happens with her after—that’s yours too. But right now, you’ve got one job.”
The coach walked toward the start area, leaving Blaire alone with the truth she’d been dodging. Isaline had already changed the shape of these Olympics, whether Blaire skied well or not.
Blaire turned her back to the nearest camera cluster and let her gaze drift toward the mountain.
Snow glittered under hard sunlight, gates stark against white.
The course that she’d memorized was now real and waiting.
Around her, racers jogged in place, shook out legs, muttered quiet prayers in half a dozen languages.
The energy felt familiar—the Olympics always vibrated differently than the World Cup—but this time the energy carried a weight she couldn’t shake.
Her chest tightened without warning.
The memory hit sideways: twenty-two years old, standing in a different start house, believing she had infinite chances ahead.
Another Olympic Games. Another podium. Time that stretched forward like an open road.
She’d been so sure then—sure of her body, her trajectory, the promise that hard work always paid in gold.
Then the older racer, who’d kissed her in the dark, had left her like she’d been a practice run. The humiliation had taught her to never need anyone again.
Then the memory of St. Moritz played in her mind.
Isaline’s name flashing above hers on the board, and the jolt of pride she’d felt before jealousy could catch up.
The way Isaline had looked at her on the podium—warm, teasing, alive—like Blaire hadn’t just lost the win but won the chance at love instead.
And now this. The last time she’d stand here as an Olympic competitor. No more after. No next cycle to chase, no comeback to plan. Just this race, this hill, this moment that was already half-memory before she’d even clicked into her skis.
Her throat closed. One tear escaped before she could stop it, hot against frozen skin, tracking down her cheek in a thin, betraying line.
She angled her face away from the lens forty feet to her left.
Her jaw locked, and she forced her breath back into a steady rhythm through sheer will.
Her gloved hand swiped across her face once, fast, erasing the evidence.
No one could see this. Not the cameras. Not the younger racers who still thought she was untouchable.
Not Isaline, wherever she was in her own warmup routine.
Tess appeared at her shoulder, quiet as snow. She didn’t ask about the tears, and she didn’t comment on the emotions. She simply held out Blaire’s poles, grip-first, and let the gesture speak.
“One more time, Hollis.” Tess’s voice stayed steady. “Ski your own race. You’re not racing against yourself. Remember that.”
Blaire took the poles. The familiar weight settled into her palms, grounding her. She stared ahead with her throat still tight as she let the grief compress into fuel.
She rolled her shoulders, shook out her legs, and locked every feeling behind the only wall that mattered… the start gate.
Isaline’s bib put her ahead of Blaire in the start order. Blaire watched the racers before her finish, then shifted closer to the monitor as Isaline’s number was called.
Her pulse thudded steadily in her ears, but her hands gripped her poles tighter than necessary. She told herself this was routine—study the competition, clock the splits, find the advantage—but the moment Isaline launched from the gate, everything Blaire had spent two decades perfecting fractured.