Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Mollie
Indie shows up to Alex’s house an hour early with two ring lights, a portable tripod, three backup chargers, and a bag of sour gummy worms that she dumps on the kitchen counter like she's stocking a bunker.
"Nervous snacks," she announces. "For me, not you. You're not allowed to eat on camera."
"Ha fricking ha." I pull my hair up, then let it down, then pull it up again. My hands won't stay still.
Indie catches my wrist. "Leave it down. You look more approachable with your hair down."
"I'm not trying to be approachable. I'm trying to accuse my former coach of being a predator on the internet."
"Right, but you want people to listen." She steers me to the couch and pushes me down. "Approachable gets listeners, polished gets skeptics. Trust me on this."
She's not wrong. I've spent years building an audience on this platform and I know exactly how it works. The algorithm rewards authenticity. Or at least the performance of authenticity. No makeup, no ring light cranked to full blast, no studio setup. I need to be just a woman on a couch, in her living room, with her boyfriend’s dog and her best friend.
Does that sell the whole ‘I’m telling the truth’ bit enough? I’m not sure.
God, I'm going to throw up.
Alex walks in from the kitchen with two mugs of coffee. He sets mine on the side table without being asked, and leans down to kiss the top of my head. The smell of him, cedar and soap, settles something in my chest, if only for a moment. I grab his shirt and give him a quick kiss.
"You good?" he asks.
"Absolutely not."
"You're going to be great."
"I'm going to puke on camera. Then it will go viral and I’ll be the puking girl."
He crouches in front of me and takes my shaking hands in his. His blue eyes are steady and serious in a way that makes my throat tighten. "You don't have to do this today. You filed the complaint with the Federation. You can let the process work."
I screw up my face. "The process takes months. The girls Savard is coaching don't have months. And I can’t let the Seattle Havoc hire him. That’s would be beyond the pale."
He searches my face for a second, then nods. "Okay. Then I'm right here."
"Off camera, though. We don’t want to muddy the water by bringing a famous face into the story."
"I’m here for you, Freckles. My celebrity is here to be used or not used at your discretion.
" He squeezes my hands and stands up, retreating to the kitchen.
Out of frame, close enough that I can hear him breathing if the room goes quiet.
Gordie follows him for approximately four seconds before deciding that I'm the better bet for attention.
The big black dog plods back to the couch, where he collapses at my feet.
"You're such a ham," I tell him. He thumps his tail once and puts his chin on my ankle. I run my fingers through the silky hair of his ears.
Indie is fussing with the tripod, angling my phone so the shot catches the couch, the window behind me with the lake light, and enough of the room to feel like a living space and not a set. She dims the ring light until it's barely there and checks the Wi-Fi twice.
"Audio is good. Light is good. You look beautiful and trustworthy, and like someone people want to root for." She sits down beside me and opens TikTok. "I'm going to monitor comments. You focus on the camera and talk to me like we're alone."
A million angry butterflies swirl through my stomach. "We're not alone. There are going to be thousands of people watching."
"Pretend they're all me."
"Thousands of Indie Washingtons?" I crack a weak smile. "The world couldn't handle that."
She grins and bumps my shoulder with hers. "Damn right."
I look over my shoulder at Alex one more time. He's leaning against the kitchen counter with his arms crossed, watching me. He doesn't say anything. He doesn't need to. His expression says everything I need to hear right now.
I'm here and I'm not going anywhere.
Reassured, I turn back to Indie. "Go."
She hits the button. The little red LIVE icon appears. I inhale and refuse to look at the number of followers watching my stream.
"Hey everyone." My voice comes out steadier than I expected. "I'm Mollie Tate. I’m a content creator for the Seattle Havoc hockey team. Today I need to talk about something personal.” I take a beat. “I– I'm asking you to hear me out."
The phone screen is far enough away that I see the comments rolling in, scrolling fast. I blink and force myself to focus.
"Up until a year ago, I was a competitive figure skater. I won silver at the National Championships when I was nineteen. I was on track for the Olympic team. But that career ended when I broke my ankle during a fall at Nationals. It was pretty traumatic for me and wound up ending my career."
Gordie nudges my hand. I reach down and scratch behind his ears without looking away from the camera. The contact steadies me, makes me feel better.
"What most people don't know is what happened just before my fall.
Twenty minutes before I went out on the ice, I had a confrontation with my coach.
His name is Jean-Luc Savard. He's a former hockey player turned figure skating coach.
He coached me from the time I was fourteen until the day I fell. "
I did it. Saying his name out loud, on camera, to thousands of strangers, feels like stepping off a cliff. My heart hammers so hard I can feel it in my teeth.
This next bit is scripted, so I read it slowly and carefully, looking into the camera.
"Without going into too much detail, Coach Savard spent several years grooming me. Telling me I was special, that I was so mature for my age, that… I could do anything, but only with his support." I pause, swallowing.
"He was very possessive. He forbade dating, told my parents he’d drop me if he ever heard so much as a rumor about me on a date.
He also started to comment on my body. How I was really filling out, how my butt looked nice, my thighs.
One time, he even commented on how other young men probably looked at my breasts. "
My voice wavers for the first time. I press my fingertips into Gordie's fur and keep going.
"He told me repeatedly that to be great, I had to stop hanging out with my friends and family and focus on skating. Spend all my time with him. By the time I was seventeen, he was the only adult in my skating life. And my parents trusted him completely. I trusted him."
Indie squeezes my arm. I can feel her vibrating with anger beside me, but she keeps her expression neutral for the camera.
"The whole time, he was touching me in ways that weren't appropriate. More than correcting my form. It made me feel awful. By the time I understood what was happening, I was so deep in it that I felt like I couldn't suddenly say no."
I pause. Take a breath. Gordie lifts his head and looks at me with those amber eyes and I swear this dog knows exactly what's happening.
"The day I fell at Nationals, Coach Savard tried to get me to sit in his lap.
And I freaked out. He screamed at me. He told me that everything he did was for my career, that I was being an ungrateful brat.
" My throat tightens, but I push through.
"Twenty minutes later, I went out on the ice and missed a jump I'd landed a thousand times.
I shattered three bones. My competitive career was over. "
I take a deep breath and blow it out. The comments are scrolling too fast for me to make them out. Time to bring this home.
"I'm telling this story today because I recently became aware that the NDA I had with Coach Savard won’t protect him against what I’m about to say.
For a long time, I have been stifled, threatened by Savard that if I spoke up, he’d sue me into oblivion.
” I suck in a breath. “Jean-Luc Savard was my coach. A person in a position of authority. And he abused my trust. If he was willing to do it to me, he’s doing it to other people.
" I have to stop for a second because my chin is wobbling. "I can’t let him get away with it."
I hear Alex shift in the kitchen. I don't turn around.
"I've filed a formal complaint with the Skating Federation.
But formal investigations take time. I'm speaking publicly because I want Coach Savard to know that someone is watching.
And I want to ask anyone who has had a similar experience with him to come forward.
I guess this is my moment of bravery. A chance to find my voice. Be brave with me."
Indie pulls up the email address we set up and holds it toward the camera. I read it out loud, slowly.
"I know this is scary. Trust me when I say that this is the last thing I want to be doing.
" My voice breaks on the last sentence and I wipe my eyes quickly.
"Coach Savard, if you see this, I'm not scared anymore.
I'm angry. And I refuse to let another girl go through what I went through because I was too afraid to say your name. "
Indie looks at me and I nod. She reaches for the phone.
"Thank you for listening," I say to the camera. "Thank you for sharing. Please be kind to each other in the comments."
Indie ends the live. The red icon disappears, the screen goes dark, and the room is suddenly very, very quiet.
My hands are still shaking. I press them flat against my thighs and stare at the phone on the coffee table. Gordie puts his massive head in my lap and I bury my fingers in his fur. He smells terrible, like he always does, and the familiarity of it makes my eyes sting.
Alex crosses the living room in three steps and sits down beside me. He doesn't say anything. He puts his arm around my shoulders and I lean into him. His chest is warm and solid and his heartbeat is steady against my cheek.
"Forty-seven thousand peak viewers," Indie says, from her end of the couch. Her voice is soft and a little awed. "It's already being clipped and reposted."
All I can do is nod. I’m oddly numb, when I thought I’d feel relieved. "What if nobody believes me?"
"Fuck ‘em." Alex runs his thumb across my knuckles. "The ones who matter will."
"What about the team? Juliet is going to lose it."
"No. Juliet is going to support you. And if management has a problem with it, they can talk to me."
"You can't fight everybody, Alex."
"Watch me."
I laugh, watery and raw, and tuck my face into his neck. I let him comfort me, pull me into his embrace.
What a good place to be at this moment.