#mostly a joke

In the middle of her routine, Amber Glenn slipped on the ice and nearly crashed into you. When it happened, you were so focused on watching Alysa and Isabeau glide gracefully across the ice that you didn’t notice the third skater charging a lot less gracefully right in your direction.

Of course, she was pretty hard to ignore when you two made brief eye contact that read “Oh fuck” more than anything else. But luckily, she narrowly missed you.

Amber didn’t seem nearly as dazed as you were, because within seconds she sprinted back onto the ice and continued on with her routine as usual. Like nothing ever happened.

You, however, weren’t so lucky.

Your heart was still racing minutes after the routine ended. The obvious reason was because it was horrifying—a woman with knives on her feet almost smashed into you—but you knew something else kept your heartbeat irregular. You just didn’t know what.

Maybe it was the fact you knew the moment would get reposted on several different social media platforms and recorded with several different POVs, all of which including your unprepared and downright horrified face. Or maybe it was because it was one of your first times attending a figure skating event, and this was how it turned out.

Some would say you were blessed. But with the way your heart couldn’t shut up, were you?

You didn’t know the answer to that question either.

All you knew was that your heart needed to calm down.

By the time the show officially ended, your Google search history was filled with inquiries like: “How high is too high for a heart rate?” and “Heart rate calming exercises,” but results for the latter failed to help your case.

And frankly, you started to blame Amber Glenn for all of this. She was the one who landed into you; she was the one who made your heart race an uncomfortable amount. It all began with her. All of it had to be her fault.

You were on your way out of the venue when someone stopped you.

“What?” you hissed. You were already irritated by the slow traffic out of the building—slow walkers were the bane of your existence—so it came out with a bit more venom than you had expected yourself.

But as soon as you turned to see who stopped you, your heart skipped an entire beat or two.

It was Amber. And she actually looked quite hurt.

“Sorry. I just—I’m Amber,” she explained.

Dumbstruck, all you could do was blink. “I know.”

“And I slipped off the ice and almost hit you.”

“I know that, too.”

“OK, this is…Sorry, I’m being so stupid right now. I just wanted to ask if you could send me the footage from when I fell into you. I saw you were recording, and I thought it would be funny to, like, post or something.” You were still so shocked that it took you a bit to answer, but Amber seemed to take this as disapproval. “I’m so sorry, by the way. I didn’t mean to—“

“You’re saying sorry a lot.”

“Sorry—oh, oops,” Amber caught herself. Then she laughed, her nose crinkling with the effort, and you finally realized why your heart couldn’t stop racing.

It wasn’t because your life was momentarily in danger.

Actually, it was something far worse than that:

It was because you found this woman deathly attractive, and just being in her vicinity was enough to drive you insane. And judging by your heart, she already had.

Here she was now, looking into your eyes like you were the only thing in the universe, probably expecting an answer out of you, but you weren’t listening to a single word she said. Amber Glenn. God, Amber fucking Glenn.

“Um, but only if you’re cool with it,” she added to her previous statement, the one you most definitely did not hear.

You gave her your best guess: “Yeah, sure, I can send it to you.”

“Well, actually, I was kinda hoping you could give me your tag first. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I get a lot of DMs”—she cringed at herself—“um, so it would be hard to filter through all of them, just looking for yours specifically. It’s, just like, an efficiency thing,” Amber said, shrugging.

“OK,” you said slowly. To be honest, you just wanted the interaction to end. You wanted to be done with this hopeless, embarrassing crush as soon as possible—to get on with your life, to have your heart rate and insanity cured, to be as chill about this entire thing as she surely was.

But again, you weren’t that lucky.

Amber handed you her phone, her Instagram search bar ready to be typed into. Your fingers stumbled as they worked, and you prayed that muscle memory didn’t fail you. How embarrassing would it be to get your own handle wrong? How embarrassing would it be to have a crush on a super famous (and hot) figure skater who everyone already has a crush on?

You shivered. You handed her phone back.

“Thanks,” she said. “Do you mind sending it to me  right now?”

You really didn’t want to elongate this any further. “The internet’s not good here,” you lied.

“I can give you my hotspot!” she offered.

“No, really, it’s fine. I’ll send it to you later.”

“I don’t want you to forget.”

“How could anyone forget about you?”

You didn’t mean to say that out loud, and immediately you regretted it. “I mean, it’s not every day a figure skater almost gives you grounds for a lawsuit,” you continued, trying your hardest to play it off.

Amber winced at that. “I’m still really sorry about that.”

“And you’re also still saying sorry.”

“That’s because I am.”

For a second, you considered this. Considered the way her eyes filled with honest remorse, the way her bottom lip jut out. Everything she did was attractive, and so much so that it was almost annoying. “I gotta go,” you said, turning the other way.

“Wait!”

You turned back around but avoided looking at Amber directly because you knew you could never look away.

“Is that your dog?”

Amber turned her phone your way, showing you a picture you posted a few weeks ago of you and a Golden Retriever.

Really, you were more confused than you were shocked. “It’s my friend’s dog,” you blurted back.

“Are you kidding? That’s, like, the cutest dog I’ve ever seen in my life. What’s its name?”

“Her name’s Amber,” you replied. “But not, like, you Amber, but dog Amber.” That was a stupid response. “It’s—I’m trying to say it was a coincidence.”

She looked disappointed. “I wish a Golden Retriever was named after me, though.”

“It can be, if you want.”

“She’s adorable,” Amber reiterated, turning her phone back around so she could look at the photo. “And beautiful.”

“Well, ‘beautiful’ is an overstatement. You should see her when she chews on table corners. She goes super rogue sometimes, and it’s just…”

Amber smiled. She was watching you, evidently amused. “How do you know I was talking about the dog?” she asked.

Oh.