#chenbell

“It shouldn’t be this hard,” she says finally.

“I know.” He sighs. “I wish . . . I don’t know. I wish I could be there. Or you could be here.”

“That’s the thing, though, right? That’s not an option. And we can’t do two more years of this.”

Two more years of their hearts sinking as it becomes obvious that the FaceTime will go unanswered. Two more years of misconstrued messages and misplaced jealousy. Of telling themselves that it will all be easier when they finally see each other in person, only to have their reunion rescheduled. And rescheduled again.

“So we just, what?” he asks. “Go back in time? Be friends and pretend like this never happened? Because I don’t think I can do that.”

This is the part that she’s been dreading the most. “Neither can I. Which is why I think we . . . give each other some space. Don’t talk, for a while.”

His face tightens. “Right.” 

“Not forever,” she says hurriedly. “I don’t want that either. Just until . . .”

Here she trails off. Until what? Until she stops loving him? She can’t imagine how long that will take.

But she can see their new lives rolling out in front of them, leading them in different directions. Knows that fighting to hang onto each other is only going to hold them both back.

“Until it hurts less,” she finishes, her words unconvincing even to her own ears.

“Right,” he says again, voice terse. He’s no longer looking at the screen. “If that’s what you want.”

It’s the last thing she wants. But it’s the only way she can possibly see getting through this.

Neither of them speak for a long minute. He takes a deep breath. “Well, I guess that’s it, then.”

“Nathan -”

“Good luck with school. I’m proud of you.” He reaches toward his screen, about to hang up, but there is one last thing she needs to tell him.

“This was the best year of my life,” she says, wanting him to know that she doesn’t regret any of it. 

The look in his eyes would have broken her heart if she hadn’t already broken it herself. He smiles sadly. “Mine, too.”

Then he’s gone.

She buries her face in Nala’s fur and cries.

—

She starts school. It’s overwhelming, exhilarating, terrifying, boring . . . everything she had been hoping it would be. She loves the energy on campus, the experience of sitting in a lecture hall, even loves the way her first reading assignment makes her eyes cross.

Every time she gets the urge to text him, she writes it in her notes app instead. By the end of the first week of class, there are 47 messages there that she’ll never send.

I just had to run across campus to get to class now I understand why you use that dumb skateboard.

I feel old. Am I too old for this?

Psych prof is Raf with a Texas accent, maybe long lost twins?

I miss you

She reads them back all at once, then hits delete.

He doesn’t go to Nationals, and she’s both relieved and disappointed. Most of their friends are there; they gently inquire about how she is doing. She recognizes the tone. She wonders who he told about the breakup first, what he said. She refrains from asking any of them about him. She tells them she is doing fine. 

Because she is. She’s grateful she came, and that she has a job to do while she’s here. It’s fun to see the event from another perspective, to be a part of the action in a different way. It’s also a little bit strange how her competition days already feel like they were so long ago. The world just keeps moving on.

Meanwhile, Nathan goes to the White House. Her aunt, apparently behind on the family gossip, sends her the video, adding How cool for him!!! 

Mariah watches it standing in the mixed zone, feeling like the ground is falling out from under her feet. He cut his hair, is all she can think. He cut his hair and shook the President’s hand. And I had no idea.

She excuses herself, finds an empty stairwell where she can pull herself together. Reminds herself that not being a part of his life is what she said she needed. Returns with a smile on her face. 

She is doing fine.

A bunch of the alumni skaters go out on the final night of the competition. The last time she was out in San Jose was on tour in the spring, when she made out with Nathan in a corner booth while their friends laughed and danced, all of them stumbling back to their hotel giggly and tipsy, on top of the world.

Tonight she drinks too much, finds herself leaning over a toilet in the club bathroom like she’s 21 again, apologizing profusely as a friend holds back her hair.

“You gotta let yourself grieve, babe,” her friend says, rubbing her shoulder gently. “If you don’t let yourself feel it, it won’t get better.”

“He cut his hair,” Mariah replies sadly.

She always told him how much she liked it long.

—

In late March, her sister sets her up on a date with one of her boyfriend’s friends. Mariah protests, says it’s still too soon, but her sister convinces her to at least give it a shot. 

“It’s drinks, not a lifetime commitment. Plus he’s never worn a pair of skates in his life,” she says, applying Mariah’s eyeshadow. “It’ll be a good change of pace for you.”

His name is Tyler. He’s nice. Tall, blond, blue eyes. Texan, born and raised. They talk about her classes and his job. He laughs politely at her jokes (admittedly not her best work), walks her to her door, gives her a hug. Says he’ll call her. She’s doubtful he will. She breathes a sigh of relief once she’s inside.

She was right. She wasn’t ready. What she is, instead, is exhausted. She’s tired of pretending that she doesn’t miss Nathan, that she doesn’t want to talk to him everyday.

She has her phone to her ear before she can even really process what she is doing.

He answers on the second ring. “Mariah?”

She did not think about what she was actually going to say if he answered. Or how good it would feel to hear him say her name.

“Hello?” Nathan asks. She can hear people and music in the background. A normal college student out on a normal Friday night. She’s not sure why that makes her sad. “Mariah?”

She manages to find her voice. “Hi.”

“Hi.” The background noises recede a bit; she wonders if he’s moving out into a hallway. “What’s going on?” She tries to identify his tone. Confused? Wary? Hopeful? Maybe that last one is her wishful thinking.

“I, um. Sorry to bother you.” This was such a bad idea.

“Is everything okay?” 

“I went on a date,” she blurts, then winces.

“You called for the first time in months to tell me you went on a date?” He sounds pissed, and she can’t blame him. 

“I hated it.”

A beat of silence. “Okay? I don’t know what you want me -”

“I just miss you. All the time.”

She hears a door shut, the hum of the party going quiet. He exhales. “I miss you, too.”

“Well. Good.”

He gives a soft huff of laughter. The tension eases, a little.

“You’re at a party?” she asks, because it feels like the easiest topic to grab a hold of. 

“Yeah. I mean, kind of. Just some people hanging out.” 

It’s the kind of vague answer that would have driven her crazy several months ago - who is “some people”? Where are you? - but she knows she no longer has the right to ask for details. So she nods, even though he can’t see her, and reaches desperately for another topic. “How’s school? Do you still like your lab?”

“Mariah. Stop.” His voice is gentle but firm. “You can’t just call out of nowhere and pretend like everything is normal.”

“I know,” she says, chastened. “I’m sorry.”

“I was just starting to figure out how to do this, how to not have you in my life, and I finally stopped thinking about you for one second, and now you . . . It’s not fair. Because nothing with us has changed.” He pauses. “Has it?”

She desperately wants to say yes, things have changed. Fuck the distance, fuck school, it doesn’t matter. They can try again. They can make it work this time.

She’d be lying. And they both know it.

“No,” she says. “It hasn’t.”

The silence stretches between them, the conversation all but over but neither of them willing to sever their tentative reconnection. Both clinging to their phones like they're a lifeline.

He says, “I should go.”

“Okay,” she replies. Neither of them hangs up.

She hears a knock, the sound of a door opening, party noises flooding back into the room. A girl’s voice asks if everything’s okay. He says he’ll be done in a minute. The girl says something Mariah can’t quite catch, and he chuckles. The door closes again.

“You should go,” she says. It comes out sharper than she intends it too.

“Yeah.” He hesitates. She knows he’s debating how to acknowledge the voice. She wonders if he’ll downplay it. Or maybe try and make her jealous.

He simply settles for, “Bye, Mariah.” Which stings more than any explanation would have.

She texts her sister. Tells her to tell Tyler that she had a nice time.

—

She’s thrilled to be invited to perform in Japan that summer. She’s been going a little stir crazy, camped out in Dallas, traveling only for smaller domestic shows for most of the spring. So a couple of weeks in Japan, doing what she loves with a bunch of her friends, is exactly what she needs.

Tyler drives her to the airport. “I’ll miss you,” he says, lifting her suitcase out of the back of his truck. “Two weeks feels like a long time.”

She stands on her tiptoes, gives him a quick kiss. “I’ll be back before you know it.” 

She doesn’t look back at him as she rolls her bag inside. It’s only once she gets past security that it occurs to her that she probably should have. 

She’s jittery the whole flight. She can’t focus on a movie, or her magazines, or even her podcast, and eventually she gives up and just stares out the window. She’s never been a great flier, but her nerves are worse than usual. She tries to convince herself that this has absolutely nothing to do with Nathan headlining this show.

And the reason she spends far too long getting ready on the first day of rehearsal has nothing to do with the fact that they have not been in the same room together for nearly eight months.

Because if that was the reason, it’d be ridiculous. They’ve both moved on. She’s with Tyler. He’s with . . . well, she heard about a gymnast. And then a tennis player. Whatever. It doesn’t matter. She and Nathan are both professional adults. This will be fine. She’s fine.

He’s already on the ice when she gets to the arena, halfway through his runthrough. She slips silently into a seat at center ice, a few rows back, and watches.

The song is moody, one of his cool indie bands singing about missed chances. He arcs his way across the ice, his movements precise and achingly beautiful, blades as sure as ever. She is not surprised that his skating still takes her breath away. 

His program ends. He returns to himself, back from wherever it is that he goes when it’s just him and the ice and the music, and his eyes meet hers.

For a second, it feels like it’s just her and Nathan again. Her shoulders relax, the tightness in her chest eases, and she forgets that she has spent the last twenty-four hours sick with anxiety. 

Then he skates toward her, and she remembers. She meets him at the edge of the rink, clutching her equipment bag so she has something to do with her hands.

“Hey,” he says. His hair has grown back out a bit, curling over his ears and the back of his neck. “Did you just get in?” His tone is cordial, a little cautious. She’s glad that he seems to be nervous too.

“Yesterday,” she replies. “I haven’t really slept, so today should be interesting.” 

He glances back to the ice, where the other cast members are starting to gather. “I should let you get ready, but uh . . . maybe we can catch up at lunch?”

“I’d like that,” she says honestly.

Something that looks like relief flashes across his face. “Great.” He begins to skate away, pauses. “It’s, um. It’s really good to see you.”

A few hours later, they grab their lunch from catering and bring it outside, perching on some benches near the arena entrance. They start with the easy stuff, a bit haltingly: school, family, what tv they’ve been binging. Shaking the rust off, uncovering their neglected friendship one layer at a time. Eventually the muscle memory takes over and they begin to fall back in their old rhythm. She’s telling a joke and he is laughing when tears spring to her eyes.

God, she’s missed him.

She looks down at her half-eaten salad, not wanting him to see that she’s upset, but of course he still knows her too well for that. He reaches out as if he’s going to touch her hand. Seems to think better of it.

“We should get going,” she says, avoiding his eyes. “I’ll see you inside.” She leaves him sitting on the bench. 

She looks back at him as she opens the arena door. He is watching her walk away.

—

Her skate lace breaks about twenty minutes before the start of the first show. She’s tearing apart the empty dressing room, feeling fairly ridiculous in the neon green dress she’s been given for their 80s-themed opening group number, and beginning to panic because she can’t find her replacement laces. Then - of course - Nathan appears with supplies, telling her to sit down, his fingers confidently tying her boot exactly the way she likes to wear it. 

Always prepared. She’s still surprised that he was never a Boy Scout. She watches him work, his face serious and focused, and tries to ignore the pounding of her heart. She is acutely aware that they are alone in this part of the building right now, the rest of the cast and crew already gathering near the tunnel.

He finishes with her lace and pauses. She thinks maybe he is going to say something but then, slowly and deliberately, he slides his hand up from her skate and runs it along the back of her leg. Her breath catches, the desire hitting her all at once. They lock eyes, his burning with the same intensity she feels, and as he begins to pull away, she grabs his wrist. 

His lips are on hers in a flash. Mariah digs her fingers into his hair as he rises to his feet, lifting her along with him. She kisses him urgently, desperately, the way she has wished she could kiss him everyday since the last time she saw him.

She gasps as he presses her back against the dressing room wall, his hips grinding against hers. Their hands are everywhere as they try to touch every bit of each other, working to make up for so much lost time. She wraps a leg around him, pulls him closer, knowing that they are both wearing their skates and guards and their balance is precarious, not caring in the slightest. 

His hand is roaming along her upper back, searching for something, and he finally growls, “WHAT is this costume?” 

“The side,” she breathes, lifting her arm so he can access the closure. She wriggles out of the strap as he unzips her, his mouth on her breast as soon as her dress falls away. She arches into him, her hands finding their way to his waistband, when the backstage lights flicker.

Five minutes to showtime.

They freeze, foreheads pressed together, breathing heavy. Then he disentangles himself, making sure she has her balance as he does so, takes a step back. She loops her arm back into her costume, concentrating on closing the zipper and clasp while he gets himself sorted. 

It was a mistake and it wasn’t. It can’t happen again but it will. It will shatter their barely mended hearts. She knows these things in her bones.

She pauses on her way out of the room, moves the rogue curl on his forehead back into place. She says, “We’ll talk after the show.”

He nods.

They don’t do much talking.

—

For ten days, it’s easy - too easy - to pretend. She can almost believe that they are back together for real, that they aren’t going to be returning home to completely separate lives 1,600 miles apart. 

It should worry her, she thinks, how simply things click back into place. How right it feels, being with him, despite every reason they broke up in the first place still being true. How quickly she loses sight of the big picture when they are together.

We’ll deal with it later, she tells herself every night as she lies next to him, him falling asleep instantly; her wide awake, mind spinning. 

It’s a losing strategy, but it’s the only one she’s got. 

She wakes the morning of their last show to her phone ringing - Tyler, again. She tries to ignore the stab of guilt in her stomach as she sends the call to voicemail, puts her phone back on the nightstand face down. Another thing she will deal with later. She looks over to see Nathan watching her, face inscrutable. She looks away.

“What are you going to tell him?” he asks.

She has been wrestling with the same question, but it rankles coming from him. “I’m not sure that’s your business.”

He scoffs. “C’mon.”

She grabs a t-shirt from the floor, one of Nathan’s, and slips it on as she gets out of bed. “I’m not talking about him with you,” she says. “It’s not - he’s not - he has nothing to do with what happens between you and me.”

“So what does, then? If he’s not a factor?”

She stares at him, exasperated. “How many times do we have to talk about why this won’t work?”

“But it IS working,” he says. “Right now, it’s working. Really, really well.” He slides on a pair of sweats, crosses the hotel room so he can take her hand. “I don’t want to give us up again.”

She sighs. “It always works, when we’re together. But, Nathan . . . we are almost never together.”

“I graduate in less than a year.”

“And then you’ll go back to Irvine, skate again. Or start grad school. You finishing Yale doesn’t suddenly solve our problems.”

“I could come to Texas.”

“We both know you’re not moving to Texas,” she says. “Be serious.”

“I could. I will, if that’s what it takes. They have schools there. And ice rinks. And you.”

She reaches up and kisses him softly. “I love you. You know that, right? It is not easy for me to say no to this.”

He drops her hand. “Then don’t say it.”

“Nathan . . .”

“I don’t understand why you don’t even want to try.” He steps away from her as he speaks, snatches a sweatshirt from his suitcase and pulls it over his head.

“We did try, remember? We tried so hard.” 

He shakes his head. “We gave up too soon. We’ll do better this time. I’ll do better this time.” His voice breaks, and she starts to move toward him. He takes another step back. “Just tell me we can try.”

She wishes that she could give him what he is asking for. “Maybe we shouldn’t make any decisions right now. Maybe we wait until we’re home. And then we can see how we feel.” We’ll deal with it later. 

His shoulders sag. “Fine.”

“We have one more day here together. Let’s just enjoy it. Okay?” She gives him her best attempt at a smile before heading into the bathroom.

When she comes out two minutes later, he’s gone.

—

She breaks up with Tyler as soon as she gets home. She knows she was using him, knows she will probably always feel guilty about it. He does not seem surprised, but because he is unfailingly nice, wishes her well. Tells her he hopes she finds what she is looking for. She doesn’t tell him that she thinks she already has, and that she lost it.

Nathan goes back to Connecticut, starts his senior year. Gets accepted to almost every med school he applies to. Of course.

They don’t vanish from each other’s lives again, both agreeing that of all their bad decisions, that was the worst one. They slowly re-learn how to be just friends. They are successful, for the most part. Completely successful, if they don’t count their lapse in judgment at a friend’s 30th birthday party in the fall. Which she doesn’t, since there were extenuating circumstances (namely tequila).

They both date other people, though never seriously, and never for long.

Two of their friends get married the summer after Nathan graduates. She gets a text from the bride a couple of weeks before the wedding: FYI, Nathan didn’t RSVP for a plus one. 

Mariah texts backs, JUST FRIENDS.

She gets an eye roll emoji in response.

The wedding is gorgeous, because of course it is. She cries through the entire ceremony, and also all of the speeches.

After dinner, their teammates conspicuously vanish from their table all at once, leaving her and Nathan alone. She glances at him. “They think they’re subtle.”

He smiles. “They really do.”

She raises her wine glass. “Congratulations on graduating.”

“Thank you.” He raises his beer in response. “Only took me six years.”

“Well, you did win an Olympic gold medal in the middle there, so you know. You should only be a little bit ashamed.”

He laughs. The dance floor is filling up behind them, and he stands, reaches out a hand. “Shall we?”

She takes his hand, follows him out to join their friends.

When a slow song starts, he draws her close. She wraps her arm around him, nestles her head against his shoulder. 

He says, “I love you.”

He says it simply. Not asking for anything, not making some sort of grand romantic gesture. Stating it like it’s just a fact. 

“I love you too,” she replies.

And maybe it really is that simple. It doesn’t matter whether they are friends or lovers or strangers or some weird thing in between. Despite her best efforts, she can’t stop loving him.

It is a terrifying thought and also a comforting one. 

She does not quite understand the logic. It’s the same color as her lips, almost. It’s so expensive for something so small.

She wants to be the French girl again, wants raspberries. Wants to be dreaming in that cafe. At home, she tosses the tiny bag in a corner and does not think about it again for a week.

When she wears it to the rink for the first time, Adam takes her chin in one hand and inspects her. He gives a brusque nod of approval.

“This is the beginning,” he says.

When she steps on the ice, Nathan is there. (Nathan is always there.) He tosses her a lopsided smile. “You look different,” he says.

She keeps looking in the mirror. She does not see it.

2. Fix your highlights.

She sleeps and sleeps. She uses an eye mask, earplugs. Blocks out the world. Because when she’s not sleeping, it feels like, she’s crying. On the ice. At the grocery store.

She makes the appointment because Adam will not stop hounding her. Because she doesn’t want to hear it anymore.

In the chair, she stares in the mirror again. Always her own face. The dark circles standing out on her skin despite all the sleep.

The lipstick is growing on her, though. She’s started wearing it more, keeps it in her purse instead of stuffed away in her dresser drawer with her socks.

“Can I take all of this off?”

The stylist is talking to her and she is only half listening. But she snaps to attention when she realizes, sees the fistful of hair that the woman is gripping in one hand.

All that. Eight inches of hair? Nine. A year of growing it out, maybe two. Almost as long as her whole engagement. So much work, endless maintenance and conditioning. Constantly pinning it back and braiding it into compliance and smoothing down the flyaways.

“Take all of it,” she says, not realizing that she has decided until she says the words.

She walks out of the salon looking not quite like a blonde and not quite like a brunette, her unruly river of hair cropped to her shoulders, the ends blunt, well-behaved. Somehow, she seems both lighter and more adult. She feels free.

In the car, she inspects it in the little mirror behind the sun shade. She reaches into her glove compartment, draws out a bobby pin that she splits open with her teeth. She pins back one side by her temple, feeling more like herself.

At the rink, she sees Nathan before she sees Adam. She is lacing up her skates when he saunters in, late as usual.

“Hey supermodel,” he singsongs to her as he passes. “Looking fresh.”

“Oh shut up,” she says, flinging a towel at him. But she senses something in his gaze, the way it lingers for an instant longer than usual.

Adam’s gaze lingers too, but in a totally different way. He says nothing. She sees the tears bloom in his eyes and suddenly they’re both gasping for breath, trying to calm their sobs.

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” he says, gathering himself. He gives her shoulder a squeeze, nudges her toward the ice. She has the best practice she’s had in months.

3. Get a new program.

She grows tired of being ethereal. Of rhinestones. Of being cute. She does not feel cute. She feels shipwrecked. She feels like the woman who sits down after practice and binges episodes of Breaking Bad with an open bag of Pirate Booty on her lap, her dog curled up on the opposite side of the couch.

She feels like the woman who sporadically panic-texts Nathan at all hours, the thoughts vague and incomplete.

Right boot is wonky can you look tmrw

Watching The Prestige do you think the machine works I dont

Lutz arm position. Don’t trust Adam - need a second opinion

Step sq feels corny, y/n?

This LV purse is too $$$ but am buying anyway. Tell me not to buy it.

Nvmnd bought it.

He takes too long to answer, the typing bubble appearing and disappearing multiple times beside his name before he finally sends something back.

Finally, it is Adam who makes an executive decision. He watches her after a run through of her free skate. She’s quiet, arms folded.

“We’re canning this program.”

“What? That was fine.”

“Exactly. You need something else.”

They work together on it. There is a new song, one about heartbreak, a romance shattered. A new costume, not so far off from the new lipstick shade — a mood more than a color, a sky under storm clouds. No embellishments. Not a single sequin.

Between her and Adam — and Nathan, who weighs in only when he’s asked, sometimes in response to the midnight texts — they figure out the movement. Long arcing sequences from one end of the rink to the other. She feels it in her bones. It is not like anything she’s ever done.

At first, she cries every time she runs through it. Then she stops. Adam does not give much feedback but puts his arms around her instead.

“Good girl,” he says. “Good girl,” in a soothing voice she has heard before. She uses it to speak to her dog.

Nathan does not say much about the program. She sees him when the music starts. He is watching or not watching, maybe out the corner of one eye. But by the time she poses on the last note, her heart pounding in her chest, he is gone.

4. Nathan.

It’s not Adam’s idea, exactly. But he does not discourage her.

At first, she thinks, she knows, that she will never kiss anyone again. She will never fall in love again. She will never stop crying. Her mother will never stop calling her twice a day to ask how she’s doing. There will never be a single morning for the rest of her life that she will not reach across the mattress for him and find nothing but cool, empty space. She will never stop aching for him.

And then something changes.

The pandemic comes for all of them. That’s one thing. It shuts them away in their apartments and closes the rink and cancels all the big competitions.

But this is not what changes.

When they all start to emerge after the initial terror, slowly, faces covered, still afraid, they bind into tiny groups for safety. And somehow, without even discussing it, the tiny group becomes her and Nathan.

They share ice time and workout time. They take drugstore tests until their noses bleed. They watch movies at each other’s apartments after practice. On weekends, they drive up and down the Pacific Coast Highway in his car, windows down, music blaring. In Del Mar, they run on the beach and debate which ending of Pretty in Pink is better. (She supports Blaine. He roots for Duckie against the odds.) They stop at Long Beach and walk to the lighthouse, masks looped around their wrists, not saying much at all.

Two weeks before Nationals, they are home on a warm day, just beyond the rink parking lot on a patch of grass. They do lunges while Adam barks at them, counting off reps, and her eyes wander to the backs of Nathan’s legs in his shorts, the strong cords of muscle moving under smooth skin. And she feels it all at once, the wetness blossoming between her thighs, the heat burning on her cheeks.

She stops doing lunges and walks away, her back to both of them. Nathan shouts after her but keeps going. Adam does not break the count.

She scolds herself. She’s lonely. She’s isolated. The pandemic has been hard. He’s her friend. They are friends.

That night, Adam pours her a giant glass of pinot gris at his apartment.

“You know, it’s not a terrible idea,” he says, his expression serious. He would not dare joke about this. “It might be nice. A soft place to land.”

She’s known for so long, and she is not stupid. She feels the way Nathan’s eyes follow her, noticed it even when she was a teenager and later, when she was engaged. She sees the way he reacts when she competes. She has gone straight from the Kiss and Cry into his arms and felt his nervous heart so many times, whether he was embracing her to congratulate or console her. Despite everything — her boyfriends, her fiancé, his occasional girlfriend — It has always been the two of them.

Around Nationals, they test and quarantine and isolate. They walk around in two masks apiece, terrified of having their competition chances derailed by the virus. They even keep their distance from each other, paranoid about exposure from anywhere, worried they might infect each other, let something slip into their tiny group.

He wins and no one is surprised. She wins and everyone is surprised.

Her head spins. Coming out of the Kiss and Cry, she catches Nathan’s eye for an instant but is whisked away. The TV network wants an interview. A USFS rep wants to speak with her. Fans give her flowers and take photos. She feels lightheaded at the medal ceremony, the gold heavy around her neck. Coming off the ice, Adam puts his arms around her she wonders if she will break. She doesn’t.

It’s late when she gets back to her hotel room, lays the flowers and the medal side by side on the dresser, unzips her team jacket. She wipes off the new lipstick with a tissue. She is about the run the water for a shower when she hears the knock. She doesn’t have to check the peep hole.

“Ah, sorry,” he says, raking a hand through the tangle of unruly curls at his temple. “Do you want me to get a mask?”

“No. We’ve taken like thirty tests since Wednesday.”

He looks a little sheepish, like he doesn’t know what to do with his hands. He jams them into the pockets of his sweats. He calls her “champ,” which makes her laugh. He says “fellow Olympian” in a way that makes it sound like he’s making fun of the idea — how huge and serious it sounds — but she can tell that he’s proud and excited. The light dances in his eyes. They rest on her face and then skitter away.

When she steps out of the room toward him, he does not flinch. He does not step backwards or dodge her. She prepares herself for all of these possibilities, just in case, because she knows that in spite of everything, her heart is still healing.

She knows it will happen, that she will not lose her nerve, when his hands move to her waist, when she can feel the press of his fingertips through her clothes. But she waits anyway, giving him a minute. Maybe she’s giving herself a minute, too. She presses the palms of her hands against his chest and they sway for a moment, one foot to the other, getting their bearings.

“This is the part where you should tell me to stop if you want me to,” she says.

“I’m not going to tell you to stop,” he says, his voice barely above a whisper.

The way that she has planned this in her head, the kiss will not be a big deal. It’s a kind of experiment, she tells herself. If her recent experience with men has taught her anything, it’s that her eyes can play tricks. And other parts of her body cannot be fully trusted either.

She tells herself that this kiss in particular does not need to mean anything. It does not need to be repeated. It does not need to be discussed, if Nathan doesn’t want to discuss it. It doesn’t need to be the beginning of anything or the end of anything. It is, despite the abyss of a feeling swirling under her ribcage, just a kiss.

And for an instant, when she tips her head to one side presses her lips to his — gentle, a little tentative, both of their mouths determined to stay closed — all of her level-headed reasoning works. This is totally fine, she thinks. I am totally fine.

But when his hands leave her waist and glide over the small of her back, pressing her closer against him, she stops thinking. One of her hands finds its way to his strong back while the other does what he did a moment earlier, as though he showed her where and how. She lets her fingers touch his curls.

Maybe it is the sudden urgency of his touch that shuts off her busy brain. Maybe it is that she feels delirious, caught between the rock-hard plane of his abdomen and the softness of his lips. Maybe it is that she feels herself responding to him in turn in ways that he surely can feel and ways that he can’t. And maybe it is that her ex does not enter her mind even once.

She stops him for only one reason, though. Because she knows exactly what she is about to do, what to ask him for. And her body might be ready — racing a hundred miles ahead, her joints loosening and her breath getting faster — but her head is not.

She feels her breath come back all at once, as though she’s made it to the surface after a long time underwater.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“Never say that again,” she gasps, her grip on him tightening, furious. “Not about that, anyway.”

She kisses him once, twice more, fast and urgent. He looks like he’s been underwater too, and more winded than after any of his free programs. She brushes a stray tendril off his forehead with the back of her hand and he catches it, presses his lips against her knuckles.

“I should go,” she says.

“I know,” he says. He doesn’t let her go. His hands stay where they are. “Can we talk tomorrow?”

“I guess if you want to talk, that works too,” she says softly, her lips against the sensitive skin just below his ear. She feels the reaction bolt through his body then, too, his sharp exhale. So she’s not alone in this, then. It’s the two of them. As always.

When they release each other, say their goodnights, it takes too long. There is giggling. By the time she finds her way back into the room, she feels lightheaded. The sensation of his lips stays on her skin. Her body feels as though it’s humming and too-warm.

She cranks the air conditioning. She runs the shower as hot as it will go. She uses her new color-protecting shampoo on her honey-gold highlights. The shampoo is too expensive and she has to carry it everywhere with her now, which annoys her. She has to always check a bag.

When her hands move against her own skin, she thinks, I’m not going to think of Nathan. I’m absolutely not. She does.

As the orgasm blooms against her fingers, her body bucking forward under the water, she feels light, her feet barely touching the tile. The waves of it course through her, as though she is expelling years of history in seconds. It leaves her gasping, her tears indistinguishable from the water gushing around her, her sadness indistinguishable from the giddy sense of wonder that replaces it. It leaves her spent, her limbs heavy, ready to crawl under the sheets.

She says goodbye to her mother and turns, wiping her eyes, to see Nathan approaching. “You okay?” he asks, his concern evident on his face despite the N95 he’s wearing.

She shrugs. “I know it’s dumb, but I really thought that this year I might be able to have a somewhat normal Christmas. Like the last two years haven’t taught me anything.”

“I know you were excited to see your family,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well. I wasn’t feeling all that festive anyway.”

“You not feeling festive just seems wrong.” He pauses, then surprises her by saying, “We’ll have to make things extra fun here, then.”

She can’t help but laugh. “Okay, who are you and what have you done with Nathan?”

He huffs as if she’s offended him. “I like Christmas.”

“Right, of course,” she says. “When I think of ‘holiday spirit’, you’re always the first person that comes to mind.”

“Okay, see, now this is like you’re issuing a challenge. You think I can’t do Christmas?”

“I know you can’t do Christmas.” She smiles underneath her mask at the competitive glint that has appeared in his eye, raises her own eyebrow in response. “But I would really like to see you try.”

“Well, then, get ready for the best Christmas of your life.” He pauses, backpedals. “Okay, probably not the best, because it’s a pandemic and your family won’t be here. And we’ll still have to train. But it’ll be good.”

“That’s very sweet. Thank you.” She reaches out, gives his hand a squeeze. She intends it to be a quick, friendly gesture, but finds her hand lingering on his.

Things like this have been happening lately - little moments of intimacy that catch her off guard. An arm thrown around her shoulder for a photograph that feels anything but casual, her skin tingling at his touch. A shared look of amusement over an inside joke becoming charged with something else, until she drops her gaze, cheeks flaming. A correction he offers on one of her jumps, gently moving her arms into the proper air position, that leaves her breathless and keeps him from coming within three feet of her for almost a week.

If it was anyone else, she’d do something about it. But it’s him. It’s them. And she has no idea what to do about that.

She drops his hand. He clears his throat, stuffs both of his hands in his pockets. “You’re welcome. I’ll, uh, see you back in there.”

She watches him retreat down the hallway, still feeling the warmth of his hand in hers.

—

Despite his protests, Nathan knows that he is indeed bad at Christmas. He’s never had a reason to be good at it, really - its proximity to the Grand Prix Final and US Championships means it’s taken a backseat to training for the last decade or so, and the people in his life have long accepted that they will not be encountering a holly jolly Nathan so close to two major competitions.

Which is why he can’t quite believe that he’s standing on Mariah’s front stoop, struggling to put up an inflatable four foot tall reindeer. In retrospect, he should have picked up something a little smaller, because this takes up about half her doorway.

He wrestles the final strap into place just as Mariah’s car pulls up, her dog’s head sticking out the back window. 

“What are you doing?” she asks, grinning, as Nala begins barking frantically in the general direction of the reindeer. “Shush,” Mariah scolds as she lets her out of the car.

“Trying to do Christmas,” Nathan replies, plugging in the cord and nodding in satisfaction as the inflatable animal lights up. “See? Festive.”

Mariah laughs, moving closer to let Nala sniff suspiciously at the decoration. “It’s so cute!”

“I noticed you hadn’t put anything up and I thought maybe you might want something … new. Or different. Or whatever.” He waves his hand vaguely, as if that is supposed to clarify what he is trying to say.

It’s been nearly six months, but he’s still not exactly sure how to navigate the Romain-sized elephant in the room. For the most part she’s avoided the topic with him, and he’s tried to follow her lead. But not talking about Romain means that Nathan does not know how she’s feeling about relationships, generally. And sometimes - like last week at the rink when she grabbed his hand - he really, really wishes he knew that bit of information.

“It’s perfect,” is all she says now, inspecting the reindeer. “What should we name it?”

“Well, I think Santa’s reindeers already have names,” he replies. “They’re kind of famous. So maybe just pick one of the nine?”

“Ugh, that’s so BORING though.” She steps back, hand on her chin, thoughtful. “It’ll come to me.”

“I don’t know what’s wrong with the classics, but you do you.” 

“I always do.” She opens her door and ushers Nala inside. “Do you have to get going, or do you want to stay for dinner?”

They’d fallen into a routine of dinners and movies and game nights over the last year and a half, but the autumn competition schedule had interrupted their rhythm, and it’s been awhile since they’ve hung out away from the rink.

He doesn’t know if it’s weird to miss someone that he still sees every day, but weird or not, he’s missed her. “Dinner sounds great.”

Her face lights up, and he thinks maybe she’s missed him, too.

—

If the reindeer porch decoration hadn’t proven that Nathan was taking his oath to get her into the holiday spirit seriously, him agreeing to watch a Christmas movie - The Holiday, no less - after dinner definitely does.

“Are you sure you aren’t a pod person? You know this is a romance, right?” she asks, pressing play. Nathan has a better working knowledge of rom-coms than one would expect (she gives full credit of this to his older sisters) but she has never successfully lobbied to get one chosen for movie night before. 

“I am aware,” he says wryly. Then he adds, “Talking about it made you smile. So.”

The sentiment, and the matter-of-fact way he says it, makes her heart stop for a minute. She turns to look at him, but his eyes are fixed deliberately on the tv screen. 

She knows they need to talk about it, what they are becoming to each other. But there are less than three weeks until Nationals. Seven weeks until Beijing. And things are fraught enough: her trying to make the team, him pretending like he’s not nursing another injury while carrying the weight of their entire federation on his shoulders, both of them dodging an ever-mutating virus. They shouldn’t have this conversation now. And she’s not even sure what she’d say if they did.

But for a second, as she watches Kate Winslet realize that she is the leading lady of her own life, for God’s sake, Mariah considers it: just grabbing him by the shoulders and shouting, what are we doing?!

She doesn’t, of course. Like so much between them lately, she packs it away for another day.

As he leaves, he pats the reindeer decoration on its head, and says, “What about Iris?”

“What?”

“For the name. You know, like in the movie. She seems like a reindeer with gumption.”

“Yeah,” she says, pleasantly surprised that he was actually watching and not sneaking NBA highlights on his phone. “She does.”

He hugs her goodbye, his hand on her head in the way that makes her want to stay tucked against his shoulder until New Year’s.

“This was fun,” she says as he steps away. “Maybe you’re okay at this holiday stuff after all.”

“More work to do, though,” he replies, climbing into his car. “It won’t feel like Christmas until you’re forcing us all to wear Santa hats.”

The next morning, for the first time this season, she listens to Christmas music on the way to the rink.

—

He will not admit this to Mariah, but filling their evenings with holiday activities is also doing him good. Driving to a ritzy neighborhood with Michal and Dani and their toddler to look at the ridiculous Christmas light displays keeps him from dwelling on his salchow, which he keeps popping. And he can't obsess over his jump layout while he's trying to stop Nala from eating all of Mariah’s ornaments when they set up her tree.

(“Better late than never,” Mariah says, when Nathan asks if the tree is really worth the trouble just four days before Christmas. “The freaking story of my life.”)

So instead of skating, he’s spending his down time in the final days before Christmas thinking about the way she looked at him after they finished her tree and stepped back to admire their work, her eyes soft and happy. And about how he’s 90% sure, if the dog hadn’t chosen that exact moment to try and attack a string of twinkle lights, he would have closed the distance between them in two steps, put his arms around her, and kissed her.

He loves that dog, but it’s going to be awhile before he’s ready to forgive her for that.

Dani and Michal are hosting them for Christmas Eve (thankfully, because while Nathan is getting better at this holiday stuff, hosting is not something he is in any way equipped for). Dani greets him with a warm hug, shows him where to drop off his gifts, and then Nathan is confronted by a toddler wanting to play. He waves to Mariah and Michal and allows himself to be marched over to the far end of the living room.

“Don’t worry, bedtime is in half an hour,” Michal says with a laugh, as Nathan is handed a tiny teacup.

After many games of pretend, during which he is alternately a horse, princess, skating coach, and race car, Dani and Michal whisk their daughter away to begin her bedtime routine. Nathan finds Mariah in the kitchen, where she’s helping with final dinner prep.

She gives him a bright smile. “I haven’t even had a chance to say hi to you yet.”

“Hi,” he says, smiling back. “How is your Christmas Eve going? Because I am already exhausted.”

She laughs. “You were really being put through your paces.” She stirs something on the stove, then shrugs and steps back. “I don’t know what I’m doing. Dani just told me to ‘watch this.’ Watch what? What is it going to do?”

He leans over her to take a peek. “Putting you in charge of the food really is a bit of a risk.”

She swats at him, and they stand in companionable silence for a moment. Then her face turns serious. “Nathan?”

“Mariah?” he parrots back. He’s teasing, trying to hide his nervousness about whatever it is she’s about to say. They are standing close enough that he can actually feel the deep breath she takes before she starts.

“I . . . was really dreading Christmas this year. It’s why I wanted to spend it with my family so badly, because I didn’t know how I would handle it here. Alone. I thought it was going to be so hard, and that I would spend the whole time missing the way things used to be. But I never felt alone at all. And I never wished that I was doing something else, or was with someone else.” She pauses, her eyes searching his, as if she wants to make sure that he’s really hearing what she’s trying to say. “Instead I had so much fun. And I guess, I just wanted to say that I always have fun, with you. So thank you.” 

“You’re welcome.” He wants to touch her, but he is not sure if she has more to say, so he waits. And then her eyes move, just for a fraction of a second, to his lips.

He is done waiting.

—

What’s weird is how not weird it is.

That’s Mariah’s first coherent thought, as her brain begins to catch up to the fact that it is Nathan whose lips are finally on hers, that it is her friend she’s known for half her life whose touch is making her weak in the knees. She had assumed, in the weeks they spent dancing around this moment, that it would feel at least a little bit awkward.

But it doesn’t, not at all, and that is what has her a bit off-kilter. Well, that, and the one hand he has on her back and the other he has in her hair, and the way he is kissing her.

When he pulls back she sways a little, unprepared for the loss of contact, and puts a hand on his chest to steady herself. He watches her carefully, a bit of worry in his dark eyes.

“Oh, wow,” is, mortifyingly, what comes out of her mouth.

He grins, and she knows that whatever might happen to them next, he will never let her live that down. “Wow, huh? I’ll take that.”

“Oh, shut up,” she says, using the hand that is still on his chest to give him a light shove. “Don’t get all full of yourself.”

He catches her hand before she can pull it back, eyes serious again. “Mariah, I -”

“Okay, she’s asleep!” Dani’s voice arrives in the kitchen before her head peeks around the corner, which gives Nathan enough time to drop Mariah’s hand and take a step back. “Group picture time before dinner! And can you take the gravy off the heat?”

“The gravy!” Mariah hisses at Nathan, horrified. “I was supposed to be watching it!”

“It’s fine,” he laughs, turning off the burner. He puts a hand lightly on her back to steer her out of the room, the heat from his touch radiating up her spine. She is not sure how she is going to get through the rest of the evening pretending like everything is normal.

She’s grateful that the Brezina’s dog heads straight to her as she sits for the photo, because she needs to wrap her arms around something before she bursts. Nathan positions himself behind her with about an extra foot of space between them, as if he doesn’t quite trust himself, either. 

It’s the farthest they are apart for the rest of the night. She can’t help it; their kiss has unlocked something, and she needs to know how this feels. To brush his arm at dinner. To sit next to him on the couch, thighs touching just enough to send a thrill through her. She’s still amazed at how natural it all is. Like they were always going to get to this point, somehow.

At one point Dani catches her eye, tilts her head toward Nathan. She mouths, “WHAT IS HAPPENING?!”

Mariah feels herself blush, and her best friend claps silently in glee.

Eventually they gather their things, say their good nights. Laugh about how they’ll see each other at the rink in about sixteen hours - no days off during an Olympic year, even for Christmas. Nathan and Mariah step outside together, Dani giving her a knowing look before shutting the door firmly behind them.

“So,” he says, as they take the few steps to her car parked in the drive. “Is it time for you to admit that I can, as a matter of fact, be festive?”

“I think we have unlocked a Christmas superfan, yes,” she replies. “I am very proud.”

“Well, I had a secret motive, you know.” He catches her by her waist, spins her to face him. 

She circles her arms around him, tilts her chin up. “Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah.” He pulls her a little closer, his eyes sparkling. “See, there’s this girl that I like a lot, and she really likes Christmas. And I wanted to make her happy.”

Their first kiss in the kitchen had been frenzied, the uncorking of weeks of buildup. Their second is gentle, a promise of things to come. She smiles against his lips. 

“Merry Christmas, Nathan,” she says, reaching up and pushing a curl off his forehead.

“Merry Christmas, Mariah.”

They are not supposed to still be doing this.

The thought flashes in Mariah’s mind, then vanishes as another wave of pleasure ripples through her. She moans, one hand tangled in Nathan’s curls, the other braced against the headboard, her hips rocking toward him. He glances up at her from his position between her legs, eyes smug, and she’ll be mad at herself later about how incredibly hot she finds him when he’s being cocky, but right now she is so close so close so -

She breaks, his name escaping from her lips somewhere between a gasp and a scream. She grasps his shoulder, pulling him back up to her so she can kiss him deeply as she rides out the aftershock.

“Good morning,” he says, once she has dropped back onto her pillow, limp. 

“Mmph,” she replies, unable to muster much else at the moment.

He chuckles, annoyingly (and justifiably) proud of himself, and presses a kiss against her temple. “I’m going to take a shower.”

“Mmph,” she repeats, squeezing his hand as he rolls out of bed and disappears into her bathroom.

They are one hundred percent, definitely, totally not supposed to still be doing this.

It hadn’t surprised her, really, when he appeared at her suite door in the Olympic Village after making his media rounds, well after curfew, still in his medal ceremony uniform. In a way it had felt inevitable that they would find themselves tangled together in bedsheets adorned with Beijing 2022 logos, his gold medal glistening on the nightstand next to them. And it made sense that they would be back in her bed again the night following her free skate. That they would spend their last days in China avoiding the knowing glances of their teammates as they found excuses to disappear together, over and over again.

They mutually agreed that this new aspect of their relationship would stay at the Games. It worked there, in that strange bubble so removed from the rest of the world, but it wasn’t meant for their real lives. So when he swung by after his press tour to drop off the Jimmy Fallon autograph she had requested and they found themselves naked on her living room floor, well, that had surprised her. She could barely meet his eyes at their rink’s “Welcome Home” event a few days later, uncertain of what they were to each other now and terrified that every person in attendance knew exactly what she was thinking every time she looked at him.

They spent the next month criss-crossing the globe separately, texting often, agreeing again that their friendship was too important to risk over (admittedly really great) sex. And that was that - until the first night of tour rehearsals in Florida, when she was unable to stop herself from knocking on his hotel room door.

And then they stopped making rules. Or discussing it at all.

“We’re just living in the moment,” she had told her sister last month, as her older sibling made skeptical noises on the other end of the line. “It’s fine.”

But it is now July. The end of their summer together is looming. And it is not fine.

The water in the bathroom stops, and Nathan emerges a few minutes later in a tee shirt and sweats. He grins when he sees that she has still not moved an inch from where he left her. 

“Oh, shut up,” she says, and he laughs. 

“You want me to take Nala out?” he asks. “Then I told Raf I’d stop by and help with some of the juniors. I can pick up lunch on the way back.”

“Thanks,” she says, and he leans over and gives her a quick kiss before heading downstairs. She hears him greet Nala, listens to the jangle of keys and collars and scampering paws as the two of them get ready for a walk. 

Boyfriend behavior, her sister’s voice hisses in her mind, and Mariah promptly pushes it aside. Because whatever it is she and Nathan are doing, it’s not that. It absolutely cannot be that.

By the time she’s showered and downstairs, Nathan has already left for the rink. She notes that he has fed Nala and emptied the dishwasher, and she is suddenly furious. Because how dare he. How dare he walk her dog and clean her kitchen and hold her hand and keep his guitar in the corner of her bedroom. How dare he let her get used to him like this, when he is just weeks away from moving across the country to return to his Ivy League school and never look back. 

After her heart was smashed to smithereens a year ago, she told herself she’d be smarter next time. No athletes. No long distance. Nothing complicated.

So it doesn’t matter that when she thinks about going back to being just friends, a pit opens up in her stomach. That imagining a future where someone else gets to kiss Nathan good morning makes her feel more than a little bit sick. 

They cannot keep doing this.

It’s another two days before she can bring herself to say it. They are having dinner, talking about their upcoming ice show in Japan, Nathan’s indie rock playlist softly playing from the speaker on her counter, and she blurts out, “I think this tour should be it, for us.”

He freezes, fork halfway to his mouth. He studies her face carefully, then says, “No.”

She frowns, pushes on. “You’ll be leaving for school right afterwards anyway. And I don’t expect you to not . . . meet people there.” Her heart twists just thinking about it. “This has been an amazing summer, Nate, but we’ve always had an expiration date.”

He stands up, paces a bit. Fiddles with his curls like he does when he’s deep in thought. Finally takes a deep breath and asks, “Do you know when I first realized I was in love with you?”

She blinks. “What?”

“I was seventeen. It was both of our first Worlds, but I was the one who was kind of freaking out. We had been training together less than a year, but you already knew me well enough to see that I was a mess. And you came and sat with me. I don’t even remember what we talked about, but I remember that you made me laugh. And that being with you just made my nerves totally disappear. And of course I already had a giant crush on you, even though you had a boyfriend and were so, so far out of my league, but at that moment I just . . . knew. That it wasn’t just a crush.”

Her heart is racing. She feels like she is teetering at the edge of a cliff, with no idea which way she might fall. “Nathan, I -”

“I have been in love with you for half a decade, Mariah.” He sits down in the chair next to her, takes her hand. “And that is not going to change when I go back to school.”

“But you never said . . .” 

He smiles ruefully. “You were pretty clear that you did not want this to be serious.”

She flushes, angry at herself for being so concerned with protecting her own heart that she had forgotten about his. 

“I know that this has been something different for you than it has been for me,” he continues. “And if you really think that we should end things after Japan, then okay. But before you decide, I need you to know that I love you. And I want to tell you that, and keep telling you that, for as long as you let me.”

He reaches up and gently runs his thumb under her eye, and she realizes that she is crying. She half-laughs. “God, I’m such an idiot.”

“No, you’re not,” he says. “Come on.”

“I am.” She presses her hands to her face, attempting to steady herself. “I am. Because I have been trying so hard not to let myself feel anything. I was so scared of what would happen if I did. And then it turns out I’ve just been in love with you this whole stupid time.”

His lips are on hers almost before the words are out of her mouth. He pulls her to her feet, chair clattering to the floor behind her, one hand on the back of her head and the other circling her waist. He is kissing her like he doesn’t ever intend to stop. Which, she can now admit, would be just fine with her.

She puts her hands on his cheeks, draws back so that she can look at him. “I love you,” she says, plainly. She sees the wonder in his eyes at the words, that shy boy she knew from the rink so long ago emerging for a moment, and she can’t believe that she made him wait so long before she figured this out.

They stand there for who knows how long, just holding each other, swaying slightly to the music still playing from the kitchen. She knows that nothing they have said tonight will magically make the coming months any easier. But she is no longer terrified of what comes next. 

A few weeks later, Mariah has to almost physically restrain him from helping her move. It’s sweet, she supposes, but also exasperating.  

“I would never be able to show myself at a rink again if Nathan Chen pulled a muscle trying to lift my couch,” she tells him. “I’m hiring movers, we’ve got it handled.”

Of course, he shows up anyway, with McDonalds for her and pizza for the movers. She thanks him and then shuts herself in the bathroom and cries, touched by his thoughtfulness and infinitely grateful not to have to go through the day alone.

That night, standing in her new living room surrounded by boxes, she tells him that she hadn’t realized just how much she needed this fresh start, a home where she won’t picture Romain at every turn. He slings an arm around her shoulder and says that he thinks the place feels like her.

Nathan doesn’t push her to go back to the rink, but the delighted smile he gives her when she walks back in after nearly a month immediately calms her nerves. He sticks close to her that day - she’s guessing he wasn’t intending to spend the session just working on spins and footwork - and she’s grateful for his calm presence as she gets her feet back under her.

There had been a small part of her worried that their friendship wouldn’t be able to bridge the gap that Romain had left, despite Nathan’s assurances; she had wondered if Romain had been right when he joked that he was the glue that held them all together. She’s relieved to find that this, at least, is one thing she did not need to worry about. That she and Nathan are the same as they have always been.

Except, if she’s being honest, that is not exactly true.

She first realizes it as they are settling in for one of their semi-regular movie nights. He is absently scratching Nala’s head with one hand and clicking through the titles on the screen with the other, one dark curl falling across his forehead, brow furrowed in concentration. 

She is unprepared for the warmth that suddenly fills her chest as she watches him.

He senses her staring, looks over at her. “What?”

She blinks, shakes her head. “Nothing. Find the movie already, gosh.”

“You’re just going to fall asleep anyway,” he mutters. “Not sure what the rush is.”

She tosses a throw pillow at him, and he laughs, and her traitorous stomach explodes in butterflies. She sinks back into her corner of the couch. 

Well, shit.

—

For a while, she tells herself that she is imagining things. That she and Nathan are friends, have always been just friends, and she is getting contentment confused with something else. She certainly does not have a crush on Nathan, of all people. 

And her heart doesn’t occasionally skip a beat when he shoots her a half-smile after Raf says something that they’ll make fun of him for later, and she never finds herself lingering in their goodbye hugs just a bit longer than she used to. Never fights the urge to call him just to hear his voice.

Really.

They are chatting on the bench as he changes out of his skates. Nathan’s frustrated with his lutz, annoyed with Raf, and she’s relieved that she’s able to coax a laugh out of him before he takes off for the day. She steps onto the ice, still smiling a little, and finds Adam watching her.

“Oh my god,” he says. “Well, this is an exciting twist.”

“What?” She busies herself with some arm circles, already feeling the color creeping into her cheeks.

Adam leans forward and whispers conspiratorially, “You and Nathan. You like him.”

“Stop,” she says, trying to keep her voice even. “I do not.” 

“Oh my god,” he says again. “You’re blushing! I can’t believe you didn’t tell me. When did this start? This is great for you. I’ve told you a hundred times, you’ve gotta get under someone to get over someone.”

She smacks him on the shoulder. “No one is getting under anyone, because nothing is going on.”

“Well why not? The poor guy’s been in love with you since he was a teenager. Throw him a bone.”

“He has not,” Mariah says reflexively. “Don’t be silly.”

Adam is suddenly serious. “Mariah. You have to know that Nathan is crazy about you, right? If there’s something there, why don’t you say something?”

She tilts her head back and stares at the rink ceiling for a moment. “Okay,” she sighs. “Let’s say I have been having some . . . feelings.” 

Adam nods. “Which I have said, because it’s true.”

“If - that’s if - it is true, there’s too much on the line to do anything about it. I need to have a decent Grand Prix to have a shot at the Olympics, and I already got a late start to training this year because of my messed up personal life. And you know what this season means for Nathan. If I said or did something and screwed things up, for either of us, I’d never forgive myself.”

“So your plan is what, exactly?”

“Basically just ignore it until it goes away?” 

Adam lets out a long suffering sigh. “And force me to watch you two idiots flirt and pine everyday for months? This is a terrible plan.”

“Asking you to coach me was a terrible plan,” she grumbles.

He laughs. “Girl, I am doing you a favor and you know it. Now let’s get to work.”

She rolls her eyes and skates toward center ice. Adam shouts after her, “For the record, I actually think it would help! You’re both wound so tight you’re going to pop!”

She holds up her middle finger as she waits for her music to start.

—-

Adam is right, though she’ll never tell him that. Ignoring her feelings is not a viable strategy. So more out of self preservation than anything else, she starts to steer clear of situations where it is just the two of them. And since Nathan is juggling about a hundred Olympic promo shoots and interviews with his training anyway, she’s fairly certain that he hasn’t even noticed.

She’s on her way out of the rink when she hears him call her name. His voice echoes a bit in the empty hallway. “Mariah, hang on a minute.”

He’s jogging to catch up with her, still in his skates and guards. She turns, waits for him to reach her. “What’s up?”

“Um.” He seems suddenly uncertain. “You’ve just . . . rushed out the last few days, so I wanted to check in. Are things okay?”

“Oh.” She adjusts the bag on her shoulder, doesn’t meet his eyes. “I’m fine. I just have -“

“Plans,” he finishes for her. “Yeah.” He shifts his weight a bit uneasily, adds, “It feels like it’s been awhile since we hung out.”

“I know,” she says. As always, he’s more observant than she gives him credit for. She reaches up and gives him a soft squeeze on the shoulder. “Movie night soon, okay?”

He nods, and she turns to leave. 

”Do you have a date?” he asks suddenly.

She laughs, surprised. “What? No.”

He looks sheepish. “You’ve just had lots of plans lately and you haven’t really said what they were, and I thought maybe - nevermind.”

Something stirs in her chest, and she can’t stop herself from asking, “What if I did have a date?”

“Then you’d be going on a date, I guess,” he says. “I don’t know. Whatever.” 

“Whatever,” she repeats, suddenly annoyed. “Okay, sure. So if it would just be whatever, why did you even ask?” 

“I don’t know. I wish I hadn’t, now.” He runs a hand through his hair, lets out a frustrated breath. “I should get back to practice.”

But she is unwilling to let this go. “So if I was seeing someone, it wouldn’t bother you at all?”

“No! I mean, I don’t know.”

“Stop saying you don’t know!” The volume at which she says those words takes them both aback. She takes a deep breath and looks down at her shoes. This is ridiculous. She’s acting like a teenager.

“I shouldn’t have asked, I’m sorry,” he says. “It’s none of my business.”

“No, it’s not that.” 

“What, then? I feel like I’m missing something, here, Mariah, and it sucks. You’ve been avoiding me, and I miss you, and -”

She kisses him. 

It’s not perfect. She’s failed to correctly factor in the extra height that his skates give him, so her angle is a bit off. And she still has her stupid bag on her shoulder, which swings into his side as she leans into him. But it takes him just a moment to recover from his surprise, his hands circling her waist and lifting her the fraction of an inch needed for him to deepen the kiss, and then she can’t remember why she was fighting so hard to not let this happen.

He pulls away first, looking a bit dazed. For a moment they are both speechless.

“So here’s the thing,” she says. “I have wanted to do that for weeks.”

His lips quirk upward. “So you don’t want to plead temporary insanity and run away?”

She shakes her head. “But I know the timing is terrible, so if you would prefer that we just pretended that it never happened, I’d understand.”

He tips her chin up with a finger and presses his lips to hers. The kiss is gentle but sure, and she can feel them crossing a bridge to something new. 

Eventually, they will talk. He will confess the years that he spent dreaming of her one night when he thinks she is already asleep; she will tell him that she loves him as they drive to the rink on an otherwise unremarkable December morning. They will laugh and they will fight and they will skate and they will figure this out, their new normal.

Today, though, he just smiles and says, “I really do have to get back. Raf is going to be so pissed.”

He gives her one more quick kiss and heads back down the hallway. He turns and calls, “Hey, you don’t really have plans tonight, do you?”

“I better have some now!” she yells back, laughing.