Chapter 18
Alisa literally dragged Tora into her room, almost by force, moving in panic, like an animal trapped in a confined space, spinning in circles without direction.
She threw her hands up and dug her fingers into her hair, as if she wanted to tear it out, and Tora immediately rushed toward her, grabbing her wrists gently.
Alisa was already crying.
“Why did you do that…” she whispered in a hoarse voice, even though before she was not shouting or anything, and it hit Tora as if something had pierced straight through her chest, because this was not the Alisa she wanted to see.
“Did what?” Tora shook her head, frowning, guiding her carefully toward the bed and sitting down beside her. “It’s okay, I’m here, I came… we haven’t seen each other for almost six months, Alisa… damn, I’m so—”
She didn’t have time to finish.
“You kissed me in front of Anfisa, you… you…” Alisa stammered, her voice trembling, the words collapsing under the weight of her panic.
“Hey… what is it?” Tora still didn’t understand at first, but then, slowly, it began to make sense, the realization settling in piece by piece.
So she hadn’t told anyone.
It stung, just a little, but at the same time, Tora understood, there, in Russia, things were different, and hiding something like that wasn’t just about privacy.
And most likely, she couldn’t.
“You just ruined my whole life,” Alisa hissed, covering her face with her hands as she broke down completely.
“Alisa, I… I just wanted to…” Tora swallowed hard, her throat tight, and stood up, moving almost automatically toward the small bar to grab a bottle of cold water. She poured it into a glass with slightly unsteady hands and brought it back.
Alisa took the glass and drank greedily, taking several quick gulps, then held it in both hands, staring at it as if grounding herself through the cold.
“Alisa, I’m sorry, I didn’t know you hadn’t told anyone about us, I… all my friends know, my parents even know, and—”
“Parents?!” Alisa looked up at her sharply, eyes wide, mouth slightly open. “You’re not serious right now, are you?”
Tora shook her head. “No, I’m serious. They know I’m dating you, even from a distance, and they’ve liked you for a long time already. They say you’re a good girl… a really good one.”
She smiled faintly as she said it, and Alisa’s breathing seemed to slow.
“I… I’m in shock…” Alisa whispered, finishing the water.
“Yeah… me too, in a way,” Tora admitted quietly.
“I didn’t think I’d tell them either, but for me this isn’t just…
something temporary. I’ve been thinking about you this whole time, about how to bring you closer somehow, especially with all these problems with the Internet, with everything…
I worry about you. I want you to come to Norway, to be with me, to train together, to be in the same team.
I think our coaches would be happy to take you. The Russian champion…”
Tora was smiling because it looked incredibly easy for her, but for Alisa, the anxiety inside her only grew stronger. That abyss of horror and fear for her future and her life expanded every day, like black holes swallowing each other and becoming bigger and bigger…
Alisa shivered slightly, and Tora moved closer, wrapping her arms around her without hesitation.
“I’m serious… of course, right now everything is complicated, it’s not the right time to solve it all, but after the Olympics… we’ll figure it out, okay?”
She looked at her with a soft, steady expression, and in that moment Alisa began to understand just how serious this was for Tora, how real it was for her.
“Come here, babe…” Tora whispered, lifting her hands and gently holding Alisa’s face, bringing her forehead against hers. “I missed you…”
Alisa didn’t answer right away; instead, she leaned in and slightly pressed her lips to Tora’s in a quiet, trembling kiss that felt both tender and desperate at the same time.
* * *
In the morning, Tora went to a local indoor arena to train, planning to rehearse parts of her program and work on her jumps, but the rink was crowded, far more than she expected, and it made everything harder, because even though other skaters were confidently jumping right in the center, she didn’t quite dare to go all out in that environment, and instead kept her jumps lighter, simpler—one turn, two, sometimes three—holding herself back, focusing more on individual spins, transitions, small elements, just enough to stay connected to the choreography and the music.
And yet, when she left the arena, she was immediately met by a crowd of journalists, Chinese journalists, their cameras flashing so brightly and rapidly that it almost disoriented her and they spoke over each other in quick, insistent English, throwing questions at her faster than she could process them.
“Are you here for the qualifiers?”
“But haven’t all the spots already been taken?”
“Is this a secret visit?”
“Why aren’t you with Loke?”
“Are you not together anymore?”
“Have you come to support your foreign boyfriend or girlfriend?”
“Oh, that’s a scandal!”
Tora could only catch fragments, so she simply shook her head, saying nothing at all, moving forward without stopping, until she finally slipped into the taxi she had called earlier, closing the door behind her like a shield against the noise.
After taking a shower, washing away the tension of it all, she changed into clean clothes, it was a short white dress and a leather jacket, and white sneakers for the bottom and she fastened the small dagger pendant around her neck, the one that symbolized her connection with Alisa, before heading back to the arena.
The timing was precise, Alisa was supposed to meet her at the back entrance and quietly guide her through the hidden corridors into the areas where only skaters and their closest people were allowed, so no regular fans would see her in the stands.
Alisa met her without a word, took her hand, and led her through the narrow passages until they reached the private lobby for skaters and their teams. She brought Tora inside before the show, when only familiar skaters, coaches, and organizers were allowed into the arena.
People had already begun to gather, and as the space slowly filled, Alisa guided Tora to her seat.
When she finally let go of her hand, everything suddenly felt cold without her warmth.
Tora stepped closer again and hugged her carefully, like friends would in public, because that much was still allowed and for a second Alisa tensed, but then she returned the embrace, and Tora leaned in slightly, whispering softly into her ear, “Good luck today… let’s take the gold, let’s take that Olympic quota. I believe in you. I love you, babe.”
Alisa pulled back with a small smile, nodded once, and then turned away, already slipping into her other world, disappearing down the steps and into the darker corridor that led back to the skaters’ den.
Because soon she would have to perform among the top five, to be on the five minute warm up on ice in group A and that alone carried a weight that could not be ignored.
It was so exciting and Tora felt it just as strongly, sitting there, watching everything unfold, because this wasn’t just another performance for Alisa, this was something far more important for her.
She had to take this last quota for women’s figure skating for her country and the pressure of it seemed to fill the entire space around them.
Gradually, the arena began to fill again after the break.
The empty seats no longer looked so vast as people returned in waves, taking their places, their voices blending into a low, constant hum.
Between different categories and groups there were full resets of the ice — moments when the arena was completely cleared, the audience asked to leave, the ice carefully cleaned, and the space prepared again from the beginning, as if each new group required its own stage.
Everything here was controlled and deliberate.
There was no need for extra eyes.
And after a couple of minutes, everything was buzzing again with applause, voices, and music, while the screens above showed advertisements for the sights of Beijing and also footage of the skaters who had already performed earlier in the program, and Alisa was in the very first group of women, skating right after the men, which meant the men had already finished and knew exactly how their quota stood, but Tora didn’t follow that at all, because for her it only mattered what would happen with the women’s quota, and whether there would be a place for Alisa…
it was incredibly important, painfully important.
Tora watched the six-minute warm-up on the ice as the group of five skaters came out, greeted warmly by the audience, waving to each side of the arena, and when Alisa’s gaze caught hers for just a second, Tora winked at her playfully, and Alisa seemed to blush, a soft pink spreading across her cheeks even from that distance, and Tora felt something tighten inside her chest, watching her with a hand pressed lightly over her heart as if that could somehow steady it.
Alisa moved easily at first, smiling, going through a couple of spins with that familiar lightness, but then her expression shifted, becoming serious as she entered the jump, and the triple lutz came out clean, but something in her reaction felt off, as if she wasn’t satisfied.
Tora caught herself thinking that maybe she had planned something more, maybe even a quad, and that thought alone made her uneasy and full of worry, because she knew how much was at stake here.
After the warm-up, program after program rolled by, scores appearing quickly on the screens, replacing one another, but Alisa was second to last to go on ice, and Tora knew that this position was never comfortable for her, because Alisa didn’t like skating toward the end, as if the later she went out, the heavier everything became,
And then it was her turn.
The arena seemed to freeze along with Tora as Alisa skated out to the center and took her opening pose, covering her face with both palms and then the music began.
Alisa skated her program to “Can You Hear the Music” from Oppenheimer by Ludwig Goransson, and Tora recognized it immediately, but not just from the film, she recognized it because they had watched it together one summer, not so long ago, and she remembered how quietly Alisa had sat afterward.
But the music was perfect for Alisa to perform.
Alisa went into the first jump successfully; the triple axel came out perfectly, and the audience applauded her with emotion.
Hooray! The first jump was behind her, but there were still six left.
Well, more precisely, Tora could only guess how many jumps she had; it could be anywhere from four to seven…
and she felt that the coach had definitely given her the maximum number of jumps in the longest program — how could it be otherwise?
It was important, very important, to secure a quota for the Olympics.
And Alisa, in fact, was truly fighting for her right and place to go to the Olympics.
For this chance — a chance to prove that she was worth it, that she was not the “loser” of the pair who had retired from professional skating that season, but that she would rise like a phoenix as a singles skater instead.
The program itself was so beautiful that it moved the people around her, and Tora noticed several spectators wiping their eyes from tears.
Alisa wasn’t just skating, she was reaching into something deeper through every gesture of her graceful hands, through the smoothness of her movements, through the way she connected one element to another as if it were a single continuous line without interruption. It was like a one single flow of grace.
She entered the spin through a layback and then rose into a Biellmann, unfolding into a full split, a needle element, with such control and depth that the audience audibly reacted, because that kind of flexibility was truly rare among her peers, and Alisa really did bend like a perfectly controlled ballerina that somehow held strength within it.
Tora knew this music, piece by piece, she knew roughly where the jump combination should probably come, and she also knew that Alisa had never landed a quadruple jump in front of her, not once, and even though she believed that Alisa could do it, there was still that small, stubborn doubt somewhere in the back of her mind.
But when Alisa took off, both blades cutting sharply through the ice, sending a spray of white behind her as she launched into the air and began to rotate, something shifted instantly, and before she even landed, the entire arena was already reacting, people rising from their seats, applause breaking out too early, as if everyone already understood what was happening—
She landed it.
A quadruple lutz.
Clean and controlled jump.
And getting the highest score for that specific jump alone…
Without hesitation she went straight into a triple axel as a cascade. At the end of the program!
Tora felt something inside her drop, because this was the final minutes of the choreo and Alisa still had the strength for these jumps, still had that precise control?
“Oh shit, she is really going to the Olympics with these quadruple jumps and this program…”
But after admitting that she suddenly, without being able to explain it even to herself—
She felt like she had already been defeated.