Chapter 19 The Skate Date
Nineteen
The Skate Date
I laced up my skates. They weren’t as comfortable as I remembered, and the blades needed sharpening, but otherwise they felt all right.
I stood, my heart beating a little faster. It had been a while since I’d stepped onto the ice. Too busy with school.
After I did a couple laps, Dallas was still nowhere to be seen, but at that moment, I didn’t care.
The cold air whooshed across my face, and the edges of my skates carved deep into the ice underneath me.
It couldn’t get much better. I turned around and did some backward crossovers into a spin. I’d missed this. The feeling of flying.
Until Dallas whipped past and bumped my shoulder.
That was the thing about hockey players.
They always wanted to show off how fast they were, and how they could stop on a dime and switch directions.
That trick didn’t impress me. I was influenced by gracefulness.
The movement from one technical element to the next with the ease of a plane lifting off the ground and into the sky.
To me, figure skating was the superior sport.
Of course, I was biased because I was never good at stick handling.
When I’d played hockey, I was the outcast. The shy girl who didn’t play tough, who kept her angst inside and didn’t have the internal desire to be the aggressive scrapper my father had wanted me to be.
I turned forward on one foot, gliding. Ahead, Dallas was holding the ledge behind him and leaning against the boards. I did a T-stop next to him.
“Hey,” he said, slightly out of breath. “It’s good to see you.”
“Me too.” I looked up at the spotlights above the rink. They were tall and massive. It would be fun if it were dark outside.
“You were a hockey cheerleader, weren’t you?”
I looked at him. “Sorry to disappoint you.”
If he’d known me in high school, he’d never have looked at me twice. I’d been awkward and nerdy. The girl who didn’t talk to boys much and never attempted to draw their attention.
“Come on.” He pushed off and looked back at me, his smile making the creases beside his lips run deep. I sighed, wanting to trace them with my tongue. And therein was the problem of all problems. My being so attracted to him didn’t give me the upper hand.
We skated for a while, and it was wonderful. At one point, I started doing jump warm-up exercises. Of course, I didn’t just want to go for something easy. I wanted to dazzle him, which quite possibly could lead to impetuous sex.
I did a single Axel-single loop. The Axel went great, and I landed it clean, but I underrotated the loop and fell on my ass. Pain ripped through my tailbone, and I winced, hard. The older, heavier me had arrived.
Dallas helped me up. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, but I think my skating for the day is over.” We left the ice, and I eased myself onto a bench.
Sitting there, I wished I hadn’t done the combination jump.
I wasn’t sure which was more bruised, my bottom or my ego.
Hobbling back to campus wasn’t going to be sexy.
It was not going to result in me being pushed up against a wall with my legs wrapped around him.
All it meant was I needed some ibuprofen.
“So are you going to the ice cross finals on Friday night?” He unlaced his first skate.
“The what?” I bent over to undo mine, and a stinging sensation went straight down my legs.
He was working on his second skate. “It’s an extreme sport being hosted in the cities this weekend. Athletes race on skates down an ice track.”
“Sounds dangerous.”
“It can be, but it’s totally awesome.” He finished and put on his shoes. “They’re setting up a village next to the course with tents for drinking and eating and other stuff too.”
A fluttering filled my stomach. Another chance to be with him. Another chance at spur-of-the-moment sex. “Are you going?”
“Yeah.” He stood up.
“You want to go together?”
“Oh.” He frowned. “I can’t.”
His response hit me like a dozen tiny knives being thrown at my chest.
But seriously, what was wrong with me? Why had I asked for us to go there together anyway? It was in complete violation of my own ground rules—not to participate in anything relationship-y.
Actually, I knew why it hurt. Because I was trying to find that elusive moment when the “just sex” part of our deal would actually happen. Right now it seemed like an insurmountable peak that only an experienced mountaineer could conquer.
“Sorry.” He examined me. “I was just mentioning it because I thought you’d have fun going with your friends. I’ll already be there, but you can text me and we might be able to meet up.”
I nodded as I finished taking my skates off. But all I heard was the word “might.” I put the guards on the blades and put my skates into the bag. At this rate, I might still be sexless by spring break.