Chapter 13
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
“So how have you been feeling since the last time we talked?” Adi asks, crossing one leg over the other. I’m used to talking to her online, and even the knowledge that she has legs is enough to throw me.
“Fine,” I say, leaning back in my chair. We’re in another hotel room, smaller than my shared one. “I mean, it’s been a lot,” I say, forcing a smile. “Four days ago I was home getting ready to watch the Olympics on TV and now I’m here.”
She pushes away one of the braids that has fallen over her face.
Adiola’s originally from Guyana. She explained her background to me very clearly the first time we met.
Two degrees from UofT in kinesiology and psychology, then graduate studies at McGill.
I didn’t really need her whole resume to be convinced she knows what she’s doing, but I guess a lot of athletes do.
We’re so used to having every metric tracked and ranked to prove we’ve earned our spot, we want to know that everyone else has done the same too.
But since that first meeting, our relationship has become less formal. She’s not big on things like jokes or smiling, but she listens, makes good suggestions, and isn’t afraid to call me on my bullshit.
Like now, for example, where the silence hangs between us, and all she does is arch a single eyebrow to tell me she knows my little summary has left a lot of details out.
I sigh. “I’m tired. And wired. I thought I had missed my shot and now it’s here and I don’t want to blow it.”
Adi nods, making notes. Like her legs, it’s weird to be able to see her notebook.
On a computer screen, every so often I will see her glancing down, and her shoulder moving like her hand is scribbling across a page.
But getting the full 3D view now is as disorienting as everything else has been since I arrived in Italy.
“And your teammates?” she asks. “Have they made you feel welcome?”
Have they? What is she suggesting? That they should have rolled out the red carpet and baked me a cake?
“I guess,” I say with a shrug. “I arrived late and everyone was scheduled for practice. Then my boot failed and . . .” More shrugging.
This is so embarrassing. She’s giving me that shrewd look like she knows I’m holding something back, and I feel like she’s not going to let me leave until I tell her the truth. All of it.
“Austin looks good,” I say, because maybe a compliment will save me from having to explain the whole pole-whacking thing yesterday.
Adi nods, making more notes. “This is the first time you’ve skied with him since he was injured, isn’t it?”
She always says it like that. Since his injury. Since he was hurt. I always call it the accident. Talking about his injuries is too hard. Too scary. Too close to the even more terrible things that almost happened.
“How do you feel about him being here?” she asks.
“Great,” I say, forcing my smile forward again. “I’m happy for him. His recovery has been incredible. Everyone’s talking about it.”
“Which means they’re not talking about you,” she says as she writes something down.
“What? No. I’m not jealous, if that’s what you’re saying.
” If anything, it’s a relief to not be in the spotlight.
I could be the story here. The sportscasters and commentators talking about my last-second qualification and what an uphill battle it’s going to be for me to win here.
If they’d rather talk about Austin and his recovery from basically being a pile of disassembled Lego pieces in a hospital bed, let them.
“I’m not saying anything,” she says, in that infuriating therapist voice where she damn well is saying something but it’s not the thing that she’s actually saying.
Subtext. Therapists love subtext. They love making you say the hard thing, then repeating it back to you without all the hedging and stammering it took for you to set the thing free from your brain in the first place.
“It’s not jealousy,” I insist. “If he wants to be the team poster boy, good for him. I don’t care about that.
I care about—” The admission gets stuck in my throat because while my feelings are surging ahead, my memory is still stuck on the mental image of Austin in that hospital room.
Adi presses her lips together, waiting patiently.
Fucking therapists. The only thing they like more than subtext is the value of a dramatic pause.
Well, tough shit. I look down at my hands. I can wait her out.
“You care about Austin,” she says softly, and when I nod, she continues. “You both underwent a significant trauma last season. We’ve talked about this.”
We have, but even now I’m still not sure I believe her.
Sure, sitting in the snow holding him and panicking that no one would find us was scary.
But Adi and I have been over that whole thing a million times.
I walked out of that forest with nothing more than pins and needles in my foot from sitting too long.
Austin’s the one who needed months of rehab and his own separate training program to get his body working again.
All I had to do was qualify for the Olympics in a sport I’ve spent my whole life training for, and I couldn’t even do it.
Also, I’ve never told Adi about that night.
It didn’t seem right. Not that she’d tell anyone.
Team gossip is more contagious than mono at a summer camp, but Adi’s a professional.
But if I couldn’t even bring myself to tell Austin it happened, there’s no way I was going to tell a shrink.
Besides, it’s a completely separate thing.
Sure, the accident was traumatic. The night before?
Best night of my life. Why would I need therapy about that?
“I’m fine,” I say for what feels like the tenth time since I walked into her makeshift office.
The pause that follows is even heavier than the last. She knows I’m lying, but she can’t force me to say anything.
I used to worry that therapists had sneaky ways to pry uncomfortable truths out of you, but the real truth is I’ve never said anything to her I didn’t want to.
Case in point: she still thinks I’m hung up on Austin’s accident and not the fact he said he loved me and promptly forgot about it.
She says, “I’m only here to help you compete as well as you can. If there’s something standing in the way, we can talk about it.”
I pinch my lips together because I’m not ready to say the thing she wants from me. Not now. It’s too late now. I’m at the Olympics. There’s no room to deal with broken hearts. If I was going to tell her about that, it should have been months ago.
As I leave our appointment, an arm slips into the crook of my elbow.
“There you are. I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
It’s Tara the Terror. She smiles sweetly at me, but her grip on my arm says whatever is about to happen will be done her way. No delays from me. I’m used to competition weekends running on a tight schedule, but the Olympics are a whole new ballgame.
“What’s up?” I ask.
“I need you and Austin on the bus in ten minutes. Can you do that?”
I can be on the bus in ten minutes. No problem. But with Austin?
“I’m not his keeper.”
She arches an eyebrow in an expression that is annoyingly similar to one Adi gave me not too long ago. It leaves me feeling like I’m made of tissue paper and everyone can see right through me.
“I heard about your little thing yesterday at practice. We can’t be having any of that in front of the cameras, hmmm?” The last sound curls up sweetly, but her fingernails on my sleeve are more like a cat about to strike.
“What cameras?”
Her grip tightens on my arm even further and I’m very close to getting scolded like a middle schooler in front of all the people who are now up and moving about.
It’s not only the Canadian freestyle team staying here either.
Australians, Norwegians and Germans. Pretty sure I saw a couple people in what I think is the national team gear from Luxembourg.
They’re all moving through the central foyer of the hotel, carrying equipment and calling out to each other, but heads will turn when Tara starts yelling.
“It’s on the schedule,” she says instead, speaking through tight lips.
Clearly she doesn’t want to cause a scene either and for that I’m grateful.
At least with Tara, whatever she’s shuttling me and Austin off to, it’s probably something media related.
We’ll smile and tell some journalist how excited we are to be here and that we’re taking it one day at a time.
No big deal. No emotional confessions. That’s not what the world’s sports broadcasters expect from us.
“I’ll get my coat,” I say.
Nine and a half minutes later, Austin and I are sitting as far apart from each other as possible inside the same ten-seater van Tara used to bring me up from the airport.
He got on first, so sitting three rows back was my choice.
Childish? Sure. But I’m still feeling a little raw from my chat with Adi, and anyway, the second the van door closes, Austin slumps to one side, squishing his team jacket under his head like a pillow.
I let my chin drop and nap as best I can too.
Unfortunately, we don’t go very far. Twenty minutes later, we’re pulling up to the main lodge at the base of the mountain. The driver rolls down his window and tells a man wearing a reflective vest something in Italian, and we’re waved through.
“They’re using the main lodge as the media centre for all the events at Livigno,” Tara says. She pops her seatbelt off the second the van rolls to a stop. “Come on. We’re late.”
“Late for what?” I ask from the back of the van, because I still have no clue what we’re doing. Austin shakes his head as he exits, but he doesn’t say anything.
We follow after Tara as she takes us through the media centre.
Ski lodges around the world all have a certain vibe.
High ceilings. Carpet that’s been trod on by decades of wet slushy ski boots, but is necessary to keep the people wearing those boots from slipping and killing themselves before they ever get on the hill.
Tall windows that give you a view of the mountain.
The faint smell of sweat from clothes that never fully dry between runs.
Today, all of the usual tables and chairs where people would gather to eat or sip a hot chocolate to warm up on a cold day have been taken away, and tiny media stages have been set up side by side.
Camera crews crouch, ready to record, as well-dressed journalists stand in front of green screens or sit behind desks, speaking in a crush of languages I don’t know.
I spot a few reporters I recognize from different events and start to drift to the left when I spot the set that’s been erected for the Canada Sports Broadcast Network, because clearly that’s where we’re headed, right?
But as I’m about to greet Pete Waterstone, Canada’s favourite sports broadcaster, who is currently reading notes to himself behind a desk, Tara clicks her fingers and points to a door at the far end of an aisle between all the small sound stages.
I duck my head, dropping my gaze like I’ve been caught doing something I shouldn’t, and follow after her again.
She leads us outside, toward a separate area that looks like the kind of play space they use for little kids learning to ski.
Lots of equipment in primary colours. Arches to ski under.
The two official mascots for the games in tall cut-outs fixed into the snow.
Flags flutter in a soft breeze. And two people in CSBC-branded gear wave at us as we arrive.
“Hey guys!” the woman says. She looks like she’s maybe a little older than me. Asian, with dark hair braided in pigtails.
“We’re so glad you’re here,” the man behind her says. He’s Black and maybe a couple years older too. He’s got a tall, lean build like someone who goes to the gym for fun, rather than because it’s his job.
We shake hands and introduce ourselves while Tara says, “This is Ray and Chantale from the CSBC content team.”
Something shivers up my spine. Content team? That doesn’t sound good. What happened to a quick interview with Pete about the honour of representing my country?
But Ray and Chantale clap their hands and look way too excited considering it’s nearly minus fifteen degrees outside and we’re not moving enough to stay warm.
“We’re so excited you agreed to do this with us,” Chantale says with a huge smile.
“Sure,” Austin says. “It sounded like fun.” But when he glances my way, his expression is nervous, not like he’s pleased to be here.
“Uh, I’m sorry,” I say, because admitting now I have no idea what’s happening won’t get me killed. Tara doesn’t like to have witnesses. “What exactly did we agree to do?”
Chantale and Ray’s grins get even wider and they laugh like my question is hilarious.
“It’s part of CSBC’s new digital media programming. We’re going to play some games,” Chantale says. “Come on! It’ll be great!”
She waves her arm and she and Ray hurry off to the preschool play area, which maybe isn’t set up for kids after all.
Austin follows, but I stay where I am for a second.
Games? What kind of games? And why me and Austin?
Where’s Kage? Matthieu? Surely Tara should have brought someone from the women’s team along?
But she’s not worried about any of that. Instead she puts her hands on my shoulders and turns me until I’m facing the table where Austin and the two super smiley twins are waiting for me. Then she gives me a shove.
“Play nice,” she says, and the two words are not a request. They’re a warning. I may not be having an intimate sit down with Pete Waterstone, but I’m still representing my country, and Tara will make sure I get buried in an avalanche if I screw this up.
Play nice. Sure. I can do that.
Right?