#snowboarding

And unlike Alysa, you can’t stay dissolved in bed for the rest of the afternoon because you have a final.

That fact sits at the center of everything now, even as the room still feels warm and intimate and a little dazed from everything that came before it. The emotional part of the day might have been all-consuming, but your body doesn’t care. Your competition doesn’t care. Big air is still happening, and whatever just healed between you and Alysa has to fit around the reality that in a couple hours, you’ll be standing at the top of a jump with your entire body expected to perform on command.

So the shift in you is subtle, but immediate. Not cold or distant. Just focused.

The version of you that Alysa knows well—the one who can go from soft and undone in bed to mentally sorting through logistics in real time—starts to come back online. You sit up first. Check the time. Run through the timeline in your head. Warm-up, transit, base area, gear, body temp, energy level, nerves.

Alysa watches you do it from the bed, still a little boneless from everything, hair messy, expression softer than she’d probably ever let anyone else see.

And then, because you are still you even now, you make her get in the shower with you. Not for the reasons she’d clearly prefer, but to have her close.

It starts normal enough—warm water, steam, both of you quiet and still a little wrapped up in each other—but the second you decide it’s time to actually wake your system up, you twist the temperature knob without warning. The water goes freezing.

Alysa jerks so hard she nearly slams into the wall. “Oh my god—what the hell?” she yelps, glaring at you through wet hair plastered to her forehead.

You’re laughing immediately, even as your own body tenses under the shock of it. “Contrast shower,” you say, like that explains anything. “Stimulates the nervous system.”

“You could’ve said that before freezing us.”

“You would’ve complained.”

“I’m complaining now.”

You grin at her and push wet hair back out of your face. “Yeah, but now it’s already happened.”

Alysa squints at you like she’s considering a response and decides there are too many to pick from. “You’re actually evil.”

“Mm.” You twist the knob back toward hot and she visibly relaxes under the warmth again. “And you’re welcome.”

She mumbles something under her breath that sounds suspiciously like I take back at least three nice things I said to you earlier, but she stays close anyway. Of course she does.

By the time you’re both out, dried off, and dressed enough to start moving again, the room feels different than it did when you first came into it. Something has shifted now that you’re no longer tucked safely away in private. Earlier, the room had felt like a pause from the world. Now it feels like a threshold. The place where whatever the two of you just fixed has to start existing outside of long talks and locked doors.

You’re the first one dressed enough to be mostly functional. Compression shorts, bib, base layers—everything practical and fitted and designed for movement rather than comfort. Your hair is dry now, and you’re standing near your bags going through the last mental checks, the room gradually filling with the soft sounds of preparation: fabric rustling, zippers, gear shifting, the muted clink of things getting packed and repacked.

Alysa is slower. Not because she’s being difficult, but she has nowhere near the same level of urgency. When you finally turn toward her, she’s halfway dressed in something that makes you stop immediately.

Puffer pants, sure. But under her Team USA puffer jacket she’s wearing a light hoodie. Thin enough that you can tell at a glance it is nowhere near sufficient for standing around a mountain venue in late afternoon and evening.

You stare at her. “Seriously?”

Alysa looks up. “What?”

“Lys.” You gesture vaguely at all of her. “We’re up in the mountains. It’s like negative ten.”

She blinks once. “In Celsius.” Alysa pauses. “I don’t know what that is in Fahrenheit.”

“Neither do I,” you say. “But it’s negative. That’s enough.” You fold your arms. “You need something thicker underneath.”

“This is all I brought.”

“You packed one warm thing?”

“I packed based on vibes.”

You stare at her flatly. “That’s maybe the dumbest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

Alysa shrugs in that maddeningly calm way she has when she knows she’s technically wrong but has decided not to care unless forced. “I thought the jacket was doing the work.”

You let out a breath through your nose and turn toward your bags before she can see that you’re trying not to laugh. “Okay,” you mutter. “Hold on.”

You crouch by your luggage and start digging through the larger suitcase—the one full of sponsor gear and backup layers and the random assortment of branded clothing they give you at events whether you ask for it or not. Your hands move quickly, shoving aside neatly folded thermals, team-issued tops, extra socks, a fleece quarter zip, a pair of leggings you forgot you even packed.

Behind you, Alysa has gone quiet. You don’t notice why at first. You’re still rummaging, thinking in practical terms—something warm, oversized, easy to throw on, preferably thick enough to work under her jacket without making her look like a marshmallow.

Then Alysa sees it before you do.

The hoodie.

The one from the sponsor box. Thick, oversized, dark, your last name stitched across the back in bold letters. The one she’d stared at over FaceTime like she wanted to burn the image of it into her brain and then tried to play it off with a quiet, useless nice.

You’re still reaching for something else when Alysa steps closer. There’s a strange look on her face. Not nervous exactly—Alysa doesn’t wear nerves in big obvious ways—but something close to it. Something more deliberate than usual. Like she knows this moment is small on the surface and significant underneath it. And you realize almost at the same time she does what this is.

This is the first real chance she’s had to do something differently.

Not in a huge theatrical way. Not in a speech. Not in private where she’s already peeled herself open for you.

Alysa reaches down and lifts the hoodie out of the suitcase. For a second she just holds it. Unfolds it once, enough for the fabric to fall open properly, enough for your name to show. Then she looks at you. And there is something almost startling about how shy she suddenly seems.

It’s subtle. Most people probably wouldn’t clock it but you do. The way her shoulders hold a little too still. The way she doesn’t quite meet your eyes for the first second. The faint flush rising over her cheeks that definitely was not there a moment ago. Alysa, who just hours ago was nearly shaking apart asking to kiss you, is somehow even more embarrassed by this.

She clears her throat. “…Can I wear this?”

The question is simple. But it lands bigger than it should. A month ago, you would’ve teased her immediately. Would’ve dragged it out, made her ask twice, smirked at the fact that she wanted your name on her back so badly she could barely hide it. But that version of the moment belonged to a version of the two of you that doesn’t quite exist anymore. It’s not gone but now you can see what this is costing her.

This isn’t Alysa being possessive in the easy, private way she usually is. This is Alysa making good on what she said. Letting something internal become visible. Taking a step she’d spent two years skirting around, and doing it in a way that makes her vulnerable enough for you to handle gently.

So you don’t tease. You just look at her for a second, really look at her, and nod. “Yeah,” you say softly. “Of course.”

The relief in her face is immediate and so fleeting you almost miss it. She recovers quickly, but not quickly enough to hide the fact that she’d been genuinely braced for you to say no.

Alysa pulls off the thinner hoodie and trades it for yours. The fabric hangs loose on her instantly, oversized in a way that somehow makes the whole thing worse and better at the same time. The sleeves go a little long. The shoulders sit broad on her frame. The cotton is thick enough that she visibly relaxes into it the second it settles over her.

And then she turns just slightly, enough that you catch the back. Your last name. Big and bold. On Alysa.

The sight of it hits you embarrassingly hard.

You can’t even pretend otherwise because heat rises into your face before you can stop it. A real blush. Instant and obvious and impossible to hide, especially because Alysa notices almost immediately. Of course she does.

Her hand drifts over the front pocket of the hoodie like she’s trying to play it cool now that the hard part is over, but when she looks back at you and sees your face, something smug sparks to life behind her eyes.

There she is. That familiar Alysa shift. The one where she gets shy and then compensates so hard she swings straight into teasing.

“What?” she asks, voice suddenly much lighter. “Do you like it?”

You roll your eyes on instinct, which only makes her grin wider. “Don’t start.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re about to.”

Alysa glances down at herself, then back at you. “I think it looks good on me.”

“It does,” you say before you can stop yourself.

That only makes her grin sharper. You hate her a little. Or you would, if the entire thing weren’t so painfully endearing.

She turns halfway toward the mirror, looking at the fit, then glances over her shoulder just enough to see the back. Your name. Right there on her. Visible. Easy to read. Impossible to mistake.

And there’s a subtle shift in her expression again, a brief quietness under the teasing. Something private. Satisfied. Like the reality of it matters to her more than she can fully say.

When she looks back at you, the smugness is still there—but softer now.

“Warm enough?” you ask, trying for casual and getting something a little more flustered instead.

Alysa tugs lightly at the hem. “Yeah.” A beat. “Smells like you, too.” She says it like it’s a completely normal observation, but the look on her face says she knows exactly what she’s doing now.

“You’re very annoying.”

“And yet,” Alysa says, stepping closer, “you’re the one blushing.”

You groan and stand up before the conversation can get any worse for you. “Can we go?”

Alysa’s smile turns into something smaller, more private, but she nods immediately. “Yeah.”

She grabs her jacket, but doesn’t put it on yet. Not inside where it’s still warm enough in the hallway. So when the two of you head for the door, she’s just walking beside you in your hoodie, your last name stretched clear across her back, the jacket held loose in one hand.

And then, without hesitation, she reaches for you. Your hands find each other naturally now. No pause. No second-guessing. No careful testing to see who’s allowed to initiate first.

Just contact. Easy. Intentional. Chosen.

You step out together like that—hand in hand, heading back toward the world, toward your final, toward cameras and cold air and whatever this new version of the two of you is going to look like once it has to exist in public.

And for the first time, it doesn’t feel like something Alysa is trailing behind.

It feels like she’s actually walking in it with you.

———

By the time the two of you make it down to the base area, the air is sharper, louder, busier. The quiet, insulated bubble of your room is gone, replaced with the constant movement of athletes, coaches, staff, boards scraping over packed snow, radios crackling, announcers somewhere in the distance testing microphones. The sky is starting to shift into that late afternoon light that makes everything look brighter and colder at the same time.

This is your world again. And Alysa can feel the shift in you the second you step into it.

You’re still holding her hand, but your attention starts moving—eyes scanning the course, the jump structure in the distance, the wind flags, the scoreboard, the timing of everything. You’re already mentally placing yourself into the timeline of the event, into the rhythm of competition. The emotional storm of earlier is still there somewhere, but it’s been filed away into a compartment labeled later.

Right now, you have a job.

Inside the lounge, it’s warmer, quieter, TVs mounted along the walls showing live feeds of the slope and replays from earlier runs. Athletes are scattered around—some stretching, some staring blankly at screens, some pacing, some laughing too loudly in that slightly manic pre-competition way.

Your coach is already there, leaning against a table, arms crossed, watching one of the earlier heats on the TV. When he sees you, he nods once, then his eyes flick to Alysa and then immediately to the hoodie, recognizing the front from the times you’ve worn it.



He knows your last name sits across Alysa’s back.

You walk over and start talking through timing and warm-up runs, moving into a small open space in the corner where you can start warming up properly. You’re stretching, rolling your shoulders, doing small jumps in place, going through the routine you always do. Your coach talks through conditions, wind direction, speed adjustments, the takeoff lip, the landing zone. You respond automatically, focused, sharp, already halfway in competition mode.

Alysa sits nearby, not hovering but not far either. Close enough that she can see you clearly. Close enough that if you look up, she’s right there.

The hoodie is still on.

Every so often the three of you talk—small things, random things, nothing serious. Just filling the space so the waiting doesn’t become too heavy. A comment about the last rider. A joke about the announcer mispronouncing someone’s name. Your coach asking Alysa about the team final and Alysa answering in her usual calm, understated way like she didn’t just win Olympic gold.

Then a couple of your snowboard friends wander over, boots clomping loudly against the floor, boards tucked under their arms, energy loud and easy like always.

“Yo,” one of them says, nodding at you. “You ready to send it?”

You shrug slightly. “We’ll see.”

They start talking—about the jump, about someone’s practice run, about wind, about who’s throwing what trick tonight. Normally, Alysa would just stand slightly behind you and let you handle the conversation, smiling politely, letting people forget she’s even there. But this time she doesn’t stand behind you. She stands next to you.

And at some point, without making a big deal out of it, her hand settles on your back. Not possessive in a showy way. Just there. Warm. Steady. Casual enough that it doesn’t look like a statement, but intentional enough that it definitely is one. Every once in a while she adds something to the conversation. Not a lot. Just small comments, a quick question, a quiet joke that makes one of your friends laugh. Mostly she just stays there, present, listening, her hand occasionally shifting slightly against your back when you move.

You notice the effort she’s putting in, you appreciate it. Because she is trying to make good on her promise. You don’t say anything.

Eventually, it’s time.

You start pulling on the rest of your gear properly—jacket, gloves, neck gaiter. One AirPod goes into your ear, music low enough that you can still hear your coach but loud enough to start narrowing your focus.

Alysa is right there with you, helping without being asked.

She holds your helmet while you zip your jacket all the way up. Hands you your gloves. Pulls your sleeve straight when it gets twisted under the jacket cuff. Small things. Quiet things. The kind of help that only comes from someone who’s watched you do this a hundred times.

You reach for your helmet, but before you can take it from her, she steps a little closer. You look up at her and before you can ask what she’s doing, she leans in and presses a kiss to your cheek.

It’s quick. Soft and intentional.

You freeze for half a second, not because you don’t like it—but because you weren’t expecting it. Not here in the middle of the lounge with people walking around and TVs playing and your coach literally ten feet away pretending not to see anything.

But the kiss lands exactly where it needs to. Right now, under the layers and the music and the focus and the noise, your nerves are starting to climb. The kind that sit low in your stomach and tighten slowly the closer you get to the start. And that small, simple kiss feels grounding in a way you didn’t realize you needed.

You look at her, a little surprised, to which she just shrugs slightly like it was nothing, but there’s a softness in her eyes that gives her away.

“Results don’t matter,” she starts repeating what normally are her own pre-competition affirmations. “They don’t define who you are.”

You stare at her for a second, listening.

“After today,” she continues, voice calm and steady in that way she has when she’s absolutely certain about something, “you’re still the best snowboarder I’ve ever seen. And the world will know that too. Because you’re taking gold.”

You huff a small, embarrassed laugh, looking down for a second. “You’re biased.”

“Yeah,” she says. “I am but I’m also right.”

You nod slowly, letting the words settle, letting yourself believe her. Then she leans in again.

This time, she kisses you on the lips. And the world narrows instantly.

You don’t even think about where you are or who might see. You just melt into it automatically, like your body already knows how to respond to her and doesn’t need permission. The kiss is short, but it’s enough that your brain goes a little fuzzy around the edges and your balance shifts forward slightly without you realizing it. Alysa’s hands move to your waist immediately, steadying you so you don’t stumble into her.

When she pulls back, you’re blinking a little slower than usual, eyes unfocused for just a second. She sees and she smiles—just a little smug, just a little pleased with herself.

You narrow your eyes at her slightly, but there’s no real annoyance behind it. Just warmth. A quiet, steady feeling that the two of you are okay.

She hands you the helmet finally, and you slide it on, buckling it into place, placing your goggles to settle on top of your helmet. Everything clicks into place—literally and mentally.

You squeeze her hand once. She squeezes back. Neither of you says anything dramatic because you don’t need to.

Then you turn and head toward the slope, toward the start area, toward the jump, toward the moment you’ve been building toward for months.

Alysa stands there for a second, watching you go, your name still stretched across her back, your last look at each other lingering for just a fraction longer than necessary.

Then she turns and heads toward the stands.

And for the first time in a long time, neither of you feels like you’re doing this alone.

————

By the time Alysa makes it to the designated section for different discipline athletes at the bottom of the course, the light has changed again.

Everything looks sharper now under the event lights—snow lit almost blue-white in places, the jump towering against the mountain like something unreal, the landing zone carved clean and bright beneath it. Music pulses through the venue in bursts, loud enough to keep the whole thing feeling restless. The crowd is bigger now too. Fuller. More awake.

Alysa had watched your warmup run from inside one of the heated tents, half because she’d been told to and half because she didn’t entirely trust herself standing out in the open while you were doing something that made her chest seize up every time. But that’s over now. Warmups are over. Practice is over.

This is the real thing.

And now she’s down here where she can actually watch it happen.

You have to go last. Like, of course you do. You qualified too high not to.

Objectively, Alysa knows that’s a good thing. It means you earned the spot. It means you’ve put yourself in the best possible position. It means the whole field has to put something down before you even drop.

Emotionally, though, it means waiting. It means standing here while everyone else takes their turns, while the announcer cycles through names and countries and trick calls, while Alysa has to keep her body upright and her face normal and her mind from jumping too far ahead.

In between riders, while the announcers are filling time and the cameras are cutting to crowd shots, the live feed suddenly pans across the section and lands on her for half a second too long. Her own face appears on the giant screen above the course, bundled in a puffer jacket, your hoodie peeking out underneath.

Alysa freezes for exactly one beat. Then she does what she always does when cameras find her—she gives a small, polite smile and a quick wave, nothing that draws more attention than necessary. Controlled. Neutral. The same expression she’s worn in kiss and cry booths and mixed zones and medal ceremonies.

The camera cuts away. But it happens again a few other times. Another crowd shot, another sweep across the private sections, and again the lens finds her. This time she just claps lightly, nodding like she’s reacting to the run that just happened. Calm. Composed. Athlete supporting other athletes. Nothing to see here.

But inside, she’s not calm at all. Every time the camera pans, she becomes hyper aware of everything—where her hands are, what her face looks like, how close she’s standing to the barrier. Old habits. Be careful. Be controlled. Don’t give people too much.

So she keeps herself contained for most of the event. She claps when someone she knows lands something clean. Offers a quick nod or a “that was nice” when one of the skiers in the section reacts to a run. She even makes small talk when spoken to, which in itself should probably count as a public service.

A few people in the private viewing area drift in and out of conversation with her—other athletes, coaches, a couple skiers she vaguely knows through the general chaos of multi-sport events, and, annoyingly, your friend is there too. The same snowboarder from opening ceremony. The one who’s always just… around. Not doing anything wrong, not actually irritating in a real way, just somehow perpetually existing in your orbit enough to get on Alysa’s nerves by default.

He says hi at one point, easy and casual, and Alysa says hi back because she’s not actually rude. Then someone else says something about the wind on the left side of the jump, and Alysa nods like she has a strong opinion on it when really all of her attention is split between the course and the giant screen and the fact that at some point very soon your name is going to come out of the announcer’s mouth and her entire nervous system is going to light on fire.

The truth is, she is nervous. Deeply, physically nervous. She doesn’t doubt you. Not even a little. Alysa knows in her bones that you are very, very good at what you do. She’s watched you snowboard more times than she can count. She’s seen you train, seen the ease in your body when you’re locked in, seen the line between fearless and calculated that great athletes somehow know how to walk. She knows what your talent looks like up close. Knows what it sounds like when your board lands right. Knows the difference between a run that’s just clean and a run that makes people go quiet for half a second before reacting because they know they saw something special.

You are not the source of the nerves but rather the sport itself is. The height and speed needed for execution, the fact that one bad angle or one wrong landing can turn into pain so quickly. Alysa doesn’t like that part. Never has. Even after watching you do this over and over, some part of her body still reacts to it like it’s the first time—tightening, bracing, wanting to grab onto something every time you leave the ground.

She doesn’t want anything bad happening to you. That thought is always there under everything else. Quiet but constant in a very immediate, protective, specific way. She doesn’t want your knee twisting. Doesn’t want your shoulder slamming into hard-packed snow. Doesn’t want your breath knocked out of you or your body hurt or your face tightening on impact in that way that would make her own pulse stop dead.

So she stands there in the cold and folds all of that into stillness. Her hands keep finding the zipper of her jacket. Pulling it down half an inch and back up again. A restless little motion she doesn’t fully notice she’s doing until she’s already done it five times.

The rider before the current one drops in. Alysa’s whole body registers it immediately. Second to last.

Which means after this… You.

She exhales slowly, but it doesn’t help much.

The current rider lands clean enough, sliding into the runout and making their way toward kiss and cry while the score gets processed. It’s a good score—respectable enough that the crowd responds, enough that people around Alysa start murmuring, recalculating placements, doing the mental math that always happens in the space right before a favorite or a top qualifier drops in.

Then the announcer starts. Then your name. The second it rings out over the loudspeakers, something in Alysa straightens on instinct. Not just her posture—everything. Her focus sharpens. Her shoulders square. The background noise drops away a little because her brain stops making room for anything else.

To her left, your friend reaches over and pats her shoulder once in this annoyingly friendly, older-brother kind of way. “Don’t worry,” he says. “It’s gonna go great. She’s a pro.”

Alysa nearly rolls her eyes. Not because he’s wrong. And not even because she hates him—she genuinely doesn’t. If anything, he’s irritating in the most harmless way possible. But she doesn’t need him telling her that. She knows already.

Still, she keeps the eye roll to herself because this is not the moment to be petty. “Yeah,” she says simply, gaze never leaving the course. “I know.” Her hands tighten instead—one gripping the other sleeve of her jacket, fingers brushing the bit of your hoodie cuff peeking out underneath.

The thick cotton is mostly hidden now under her jacket, but the sleeve is still there, and the second her fingers catch on it, the contact does something grounding to her. It’s stupid, maybe. Or maybe not. It reminds her of who she is here. Not just another athlete in the crowd. Not just someone nervously watching from the side. Not just one more person hoping you land.

She’s your girlfriend.

The thought lands with a kind of quiet force. The hoodie proves it. The walk down here proved it. The way your hand fit in hers proved it. The kiss in the lounge proved it. The whole afternoon proves it. And after everything the two of you just clawed your way through—after the fear and the apologizing and the honesty and the way she nearly lost her mind thinking you were about to leave her—there’s something unbelievably steadying about that fact.

She’s your girlfriend.

She’s here whether you stomp the cleanest run of your life or get bucked sideways by bad air, whether you go to the podium or just walk out of here frustrated and bruised and pissed at the score, Alysa knows what her job is now.

Be here and don’t make this about her nerves or old habits. Don’t flinch so hard she looks like she doubts you. Don’t get trapped in the fear part of wanting to protect your relationship that she forgets the showing up part. Just be here for you in whatever shape the next hour takes.

Her hand stays wrapped in the cuff of the hoodie sleeve, thumb rubbing once over the thick fabric.

The mountain hums around her. The crowd shifts louder as your name carries through the venue. Somewhere above them, you’re getting ready to drop. And Alysa, nervous and protective and a little too aware of every possible thing that could happen, plants her feet in the snow and holds on.

Alysa watches you from the bottom of the course with her entire body pulled tight.

The announcer is still introducing you, the crowd still reacting, but all of that fades behind the single clear sight of you at the top of the slope. Even from down here, even through the distance and the lights and the helmet and the layers, she knows your posture instantly. The way you stand before a run—loose but locked in, calm in that almost irritating way you get when you’re about to do something difficult and make it look easier than it is.

And god, you look good.

It’s a stupid thought to have in the middle of an Olympic final, but Alysa has never claimed to be normal about you. There’s something about the way you move when you’re in your element that hits her harder than almost anything else. The confidence of it. The ease. The way snowboarding seems to pull some sharpened version of you to the surface—cooler, cockier, more alive. You look like you belong on a mountain in a way that makes everyone else seem like they’re just visiting.

You drop in.

Alysa’s breath catches immediately.

You come down the slope fast, knees flexed, body low and balanced, not fighting the terrain so much as moving with it. There’s none of the stiffness she sees in some of the other riders tonight, none of that split-second hesitation that makes a run look hard. You carry your speed cleanly into the takeoff, pop off the lip with this precise snap of your body, and then you’re airborne—board rising with you as you spin, pulling a simple but clean backside spin with a grab that makes the whole thing look controlled instead of frantic. Nothing outrageous, not one of the giant trick-bag runs meant to blow the whole field apart, but solid. Stylish. The kind of jump that gets respect because it’s done properly. You spot the landing and come down smooth.

Alysa exhales so hard it almost makes her dizzy. Safe.

That’s the first thought. Before score, before placements, before style points or technical value or anything else—safe. Her lungs finally work again as she watches you ride out, steady and composed, board cutting a clean line through the runout. The big screen catches you at the bottom.

You slow to a stop and click your board off with the kind of efficiency that comes from doing the same motion a thousand times. Then you kick it up into your hand and stand there in the snow looking annoyingly good for someone who just launched themselves off a giant jump. Alysa can’t help it. The sight gets her every time. The board in one hand, the helmet still on, your whole body humming with adrenaline and that casual coolness you slip into so naturally in this world.

You push your goggles up onto your helmet and pull your mask down. Then you look at the camera and smirk. Not a huge grin. Just that crooked, smug little expression that says you know exactly how good you look and how well that run went. You make a quick hand gesture—something loose and dismissive, like eh, not so bad—and the private section around Alysa laughs and reacts immediately.

She nearly smiles despite herself. Of course you’d do that. Of course after making her almost pass out from stress, you’d get to the bottom and act like you just hopped off a lift.

You stand in front of the score board, board propped, waiting. The number comes up: 76.75.

It’s solid. Not enough to lock anything down, but enough to build on. Enough to keep you in it cleanly. Alysa watches your face on the screen as you read it. You nod once, that charming smile pulling at your mouth—not overdone, not dissatisfied either. Just a quiet acknowledgment: good start, move on.

Then you’re off. The cameras stay with you for a bit as you move around the board area and back into the athlete path behind the main zone, making the trek toward the system that will take you back up for run two. Alysa tracks you instantly, eyes moving from the screen to the actual course-side route where athletes pass through.

And then you look up. Your eyes move through the crowd and the private sections like you’re searching on instinct more than anything, and the second they land on Alysa, your whole face changes—not dramatically, but enough that she sees it. The cool, camera-ready snowboarder expression softens around the edges. Warms.

You start walking toward her. Your friend gets to you first, of course. He’s already loud before you even reach the barrier, reaching out to clap you hard on the back and pull you into one of those quick one-armed half-hugs men seem biologically incapable of not doing around competition. “Let’s go!” he says, grinning. “That was clean as hell. Solid start.”

You laugh, still a little breathless from the run. “I’ll take it.”

He daps you up, still talking, still loud, still there, and Alysa endures it because she’s not a monster. She even appreciates that he’s genuinely excited for you. But the second you turn from him toward her, everything else blurs again.

There are cameras around. Staff. Riders walking back and forth. People everywhere. A week ago, even three days ago, Alysa would’ve felt that awareness immediately and let it stop her. Now she feels it and pushes through anyway. Not because she’s suddenly fearless about public affection. She isn’t. The hesitation is still there, still built into her, still this habitual little brake that tries to engage every time something private threatens to become visible.

But she has you. Your hoodie sleeve is warm against her wrist under her jacket. You’re standing there flushed from the run, goggles shoved up, smile still hovering, looking right at her.

And in Alysa’s head the rationalization happens quickly, almost funny in how transparent it is: no one’s really looking over here, they’re all resetting for run two, people are moving, the cameras have probably shifted—

Good enough.

She reaches out, catches you lightly by the collar of your jacket, and pulls you in. Then she kisses you.

It’s gentle, almost at odds with the rush of the event around you. Brief and controlled but unmistakably real. The helmet and the lifted goggles make the angle awkward enough that Alysa has to tilt in carefully, and because she’s still Alysa, there’s that tiny bit of self-consciousness sitting under the action. But she does it anyway. Lets herself do it anyway.

You melt immediately. The whole cool snowboarder thing you’d been wearing on your face a second ago just drops. Gone. Replaced by something softer and brighter and so obviously delighted that it almost makes Alysa laugh. You smile into the kiss, all that smug post-run energy dissolving into pure giddy affection, and when she pulls back your eyes look almost embarrassingly lovestruck.

You blink at her once, twice, still slightly dazed from how unexpected it was.

Then the only thing you can come up with is, “You gonna kiss me after every jump?”

Alysa rolls her eyes, but there’s no real annoyance in it at all. She gives you a small shove at the shoulder, just enough to send you back half a step. “Go,” she says.

You’re still grinning when a staff member comes over, already gesturing for you to move. “Back up, back up.”

You nod and start backing away, board in hand, still looking at Alysa for one second too long before turning to head for the lift system.

Two more jumps. That’s all that’s left.

The second run starts building, and the atmosphere changes again. More tension. More misses. A couple riders don’t land cleanly, one goes down hard enough that Alysa’s whole body flinches even though she doesn’t know her. Another rides out messy, clearly fighting the landing more than controlling it. Around her, people start murmuring about conditions—wind shifts, snow texture, speed differences, the lip maybe not feeling right tonight.

Alysa hates all of that instantly because once her brain latches onto the possibility that the snow or conditions might be off, it starts applying it to you automatically.

What if it throws you off too? What if you catch an edge? What if the inrun speed shifts just enough to mess with your timing?

By the time your name is announced again, Alysa’s pulse is right back in her throat.

You drop in for run two. And this one is different from the start. More speed. More commitment. You carry yourself into the takeoff with less of the opening-run caution, and Alysa can see it even before you leave the lip. Then you’re up—higher this time, body tight and deliberate as you spin through a bigger frontside rotation, hands finding the grab with total control, the board tucked neatly under you as the whole thing opens out against the night sky. It’s the kind of trick that makes the crowd react before you’ve even landed, because everyone can tell midair that it’s clean.

And when you come down, you stomp it. Board to snow, centered, solid, riding out with enough confidence that by the time you hit the bottom you’re already feeding off the energy coming from the crowd.

You throw your arms up, asking for more noise, and they give it to you instantly. You lift one finger to your ear in that obnoxiously charming way that says louder, and the whole venue gets even more animated.

Alysa is cheering now too. She can’t help it. The run deserved it, and something about seeing you so obviously happy—so fully in it—pulls the reaction right out of her.

You stand in front of the board again. The score comes up: 89.50.

The private section erupts around her. Alysa watches the screen as you grin, fist pumping once before turning away, already moving with a different kind of confidence now.

Your total jumps to 169.25. Strong. Very strong.

Maybe not untouchable yet, but enough to keep you alive.

You spot Alysa again on your way through, and for a second it looks like you’re going to cut toward her. Your whole body angles like that’s the plan. But this time a staff member is already there, one hand out, steering you firmly back toward the lift route before you can reach the barrier.

You laugh, half protest, half acknowledgment, and let yourself be herded away. Alysa watches you go and feels the nerves come back tenfold.

Because now comes the part she knows too well. A normal person—someone rational, someone strategic—might look at 169.25 and think play it safe. Protect yourself. Don’t overreach. Wind is picking up you can’t be too risky for the sake of your career.

But you are not built like that. Alysa knows you. Knows the exact look you get when you think there’s more available than you’ve shown. Knows the streak in you that refuses to leave the biggest thing on the table if there’s still a chance to take it. Knows you are one of those deeply frustrating athletes who will look at a very respectable standing and immediately decide the only sensible response is to try something you’ve only nailed twice in practice because it might blow the whole thing open.

She knows you are going to go for it. And you do.

By the time run three starts, Alysa can barely feel her hands. The field is shaking itself out in messy ways. A few riders go down. A few land and still don’t get what they need. The whole event has that final-round edge now where everyone knows this is the last chance to change the story.

Then it’s you. You drop in and Alysa’s whole body goes silent inside itself.

Everything about the approach looks sharper. Hungrier. You gather speed down the slope and hit the takeoff with total commitment—no visible hesitation, no second-guessing. Then you launch. It’s bigger than the earlier runs immediately. You throw into a more difficult spin, body compact and precise, the board whipping through the rotation before you open just enough to spot the landing. Alysa doesn’t fully register the exact trick name—only the violence and beauty of it, the controlled risk, the way you seem suspended up there for just long enough to make everyone stop breathing.

Then you land. Perfectly. Not just clean. Perfect. The board hits, absorbs, rides out like the whole thing was drawn that way ahead of time.

The crowd explodes.

Alysa doesn’t even remember starting to cheer. One second she’s frozen, the next there’s sound tearing out of her chest with everyone else’s. You ride to the bottom on a wave of noise and adrenaline and then, because you’re apparently incapable of not being a menace when you’re happy, you spray the cameras with snow, laughing as you do it.

Then you just drop. Flat onto your back in the snow, starfish-spread like your body finally has to let go of all the tension it’s been holding.

Alysa laughs out loud in pure relief.

You click your board off, then toss it a little too dramatically to the side in celebration before grabbing it again. On the screen, the camera stays with you as you stand and knock your knuckles against the board once, twice, a little private ritual of satisfaction before heading to the score area. And because you apparently still have energy to spare, you look right into the camera and yell, “Let’s fuckin’ go!”

The crowd around Alysa laughs and cheers louder. Even people who weren’t rooting specifically for you are caught up in it now.

By the time you reach kiss and cry, the other snowboarders are already crowding around you—hugging you, shoving your shoulder, congratulating you with that immediate post-run chaos that happens when everyone knows they just watched something huge. You grin through it, hugging people back, still riding the high, maybe already a little glassy-eyed from adrenaline and relief.

Then the score comes. 91.25.

Alysa loses whatever composure she had left.

She’s cheering now—actually cheering, not the polite athlete clap. She’s yelling, jumping a little, grabbing the railing in front of her like she needs somewhere to put all the adrenaline that isn’t even hers. The cameras could be right on her and she wouldn’t notice. Wouldn’t stop. Wouldn’t tone it down. Being careful is not more important than being there for you. Looking composed is not more important than being proud of you.

So if the cameras catch her now—if somewhere on a broadcast there’s a shot of Alysa Liu in the stands, jumping and cheering and looking like she cares way too much about one particular snowboarder—then so be it. Because she does. And for the first time, she decides that maybe that’s not something she needs to hide so carefully anymore.

Next to her, your friend is doing the exact same thing, and before she even thinks about how annoying he normally is, they’re both grabbing at each other in pure celebration, half-hugging, half-shaking each other because there’s too much energy for anything more coherent.

Over by the kiss and cry, you’re getting swallowed in congratulations. Other riders hugging you, thumping your helmet, smiling into your shoulder. On the screen you look wrecked in the best possible way—laughing and crying at once now, wiping at your face once and then giving up because everyone keeps touching you, talking to you, celebrating you.

And Alysa watches all of it with her heart somewhere up in her throat. Because the whole world is seeing what she already knew. And because, underneath all the cheering and all the noise and all the relief, there is still this smaller awareness threading through her now: she is doing something she would not have done before.

She is outward in this. Not wildly. Not perfectly. Not without the old hesitation still flickering at the edges every now and then. But she’s here. Loud for you. Visible for you. Standing in your hoodie, in public, celebrating you without trying to shrink herself out of the moment. A few days ago that would have felt impossible. Now it just feels necessary.

Whatever happens after the scores settle, whatever medals do or don’t come next, whatever cameras caught and whatever people speculate, there is no question anymore where she stands.

And as Alysa watches you at the bottom of the course—surrounded by snowboarders, laughing through tears, every cool edge stripped open by joy—she feels that certainty settle in her bones.

This is what it means to show up.

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I guess the last chapter wasn’t the last chapter bc now i feel the urge to do Alysa’s final too and then maybe we’ll be done if I don’t decide on doing a SMAU LOL

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Tag list :P

(sorry if I’m missing your tag it’s honestly hard to keep up with who wants it 😭)

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