There. I wasn’t going to cry. Mr. Webber was going to be okay. He wasn’t giving up and neither were the doctors. I felt like an asshole abandoning him—if I stayed, maybe I could do something to help, though I had no clue what.
But he wanted me to go train with the Richardsons, so I’d do it. And he was going to beat the odds. And I wasn’t going to cry every time I thought about not having him by the boards giving me that impatient-but-fond glare.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. I knew who it was before I looked, and I guessed it was time to bite the bullet. The bar was so noisy with people talking and Sports Center on the TVs that I didn’t walk away to answer.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Where are you?”
“Waiting for my boarding call.”
She exhaled noisily. “I don’t like this.”
“I know, but it’s not up to you.” How many times could we have the same conversation? A zillion, apparently.
“I’m still your mother.” If she were next to me instead of Cheap Suit and Blonde Perfume, she would have jabbed my arm as she said it.
“Of course you are. But this is my career. I pay for my training now. I make the decisions.” It had been the only way Mr. Webber would take me on four years ago after I stupidly failed to make the Olympic team. No skating mothers were allowed at his rink second-guessing and butting in. “It’ll be fine.”
“Fine?” She sighed dramatically. “Sometimes I think you don’t even want to win.”
I gulped my beer, drowning my first response to tell her: no shit. “Of course I want to win,” I said dutifully. And I did.
I mean, why wouldn’t I? I had the talent to win. Winning was fun. Winning was good for endorsements and my future income doing tours. But I’d never wanted it as much as my mother. I’d never wanted it at all costs.
“Why would you train with the one person who can take the gold away from you?”
“Because that’s what Mr. Webber wants. And you know how successful it’s been for other skaters. Look at the past decade or more in ice dancing. Practically the whole top ten train together. And look at the Russian pairs.”
She grunted. Even my mother couldn’t argue with the Russian pairs’ sweep of the podium at the last Worlds. The three teams had the same coach and pretty much hated each other, but boy did the tension push them to new heights.
“I don’t want you distracted by Sakaguchi. He can beat you.”
“Henry’s, like, the least fun person on the planet. No passion. He’s like an alien but the most boring extra-terrestrial imaginable.”
“You can’t let down your guard. No making friends this time.”
I rolled my eyes. She’d always hated that I was friendly with everyone. She was going to criticize my lack of “killer instinct” any minute. “Henry can’t stand me. I’m the last person on Earth he’s going to hang out with.”
“He works harder than you.” She muttered reluctantly, “Maybe he’ll be a good influence.”
I shrugged, though she couldn’t see me. “Maybe. Mom, Henry Sakaguchi is irrelevant. I know I can beat him. I beat him in March at Worlds, and I’ll beat him again. I’m going to win gold in Calgary.”
She made a humming noise that sounded dubious. “You don’t have the killer instinct. He does.”
There it was. “And I’m still beating him because I have more quads.” How many times could we have this debate?
“And he keeps himself to himself.”
I gritted my teeth. This was her code for “Henry doesn’t talk about being gay on Instagram.” She honestly didn’t have a problem with me being queer, but she’d been dead set against me coming out since the skating establishment could still be stupidly homophobic.
But I was out, I wasn’t going back in, and it hadn’t been an issue. I was currently the best jumper in the world, and even the most bigoted judge couldn’t argue with my quads. The judges had been firmly behind me the past couple of seasons.
“That’s because no one’s interested in Henry’s love life. He doesn’t have one from what I’ve heard.” Yeah, he was good-looking, but too cold to be hot.
It was widely known in the skating world that Henry was gay—he’d informed people at his old training center some years ago—but it was never mentioned in the media or whatever. It wasn’t a secret, but it also wasn’t official.
I added, “Besides, I’m not the only out person in skating. Alex Grady, Matt Savelli. It’s changing every day. Especially after Dev Avira and Misha Reznikov went public.”
“They weren’t competing anymore when they came out.”
“Yeah, well, the times have changed.”
She grudgingly admitted, “It seems so. Which I’m happy about, of course!”
“Uh-huh.”
“You know the facilities won’t compare to what you have in LA.”