Don't Let Me Fall

Chapter One

Late June, 2024

"What do you mean he quit??" I said, my heart dropping into a pit in my stomach. I was sitting on a bench pulling my hair up for practice when my coach, Elena Belsky, walked up to me, saying we had to talk. She wore a tired face, furrowing her brows the way she does when she gets frustrated with her skaters on the ice. Shrugging, she took a deep breath, "Alexander didn't sign his contract, kept putting it off. So, technically, he's free to walk. I'm so sorry, Anya."

I stayed silent, putting my head in my hands. Test skates are in a month, how could he do this to me?

"Did he say why he's quitting?" I asked, keeping my head down.

"No," Elena said, taking a seat next to me, "just said he was sorry."

I scoffed, "Sorry? Yeah right."

Elena stayed silent, reaching over and rubbing my back. I got up, not in the mood to be touched. My skating career, that I had built up for years with my partner, was just yanked out from under my feet.

"We've been together for six years, Elena. We have placed or even been champions of countless competitions! Grand Prix's, Worlds, Europe, Russia...how could he just give it up? And not even tell ME?"

I could tell Elena was at a loss, so I took a deep breath. This isn't her fault, it's mine. I put myself in a situation where I have to rely on another person to achieve success.

"I'm going to go skate for a minute," I said, before abruptly taking off my guards and getting on the ice.

Skating is a place for solitude for me, no matter how many people are on the ice while I am. The sound of my skates against the ice is unnervingly soothing, like the drum of a heartbeat. In this moment, nothing else matters. My mind can go blank, turn off, while my feet guide themselves.

Until I see a pair of ice dancers rehearsing, and then the bitterness of anger towards Alex rises through my throat like bile.

Alex and I met seven years ago, when I was eleven and he was thirteen. We became friends, but nothing else, because he was skating singles and I had a dance partner. A year later, my partner got hurt in an accident unrelated to skating, but he was out for the whole season. Since we saw each other often at the rink, Alex knew the situation well, and offered to test out a cut of a program. Since we were so young, he didn't need to know complicated lifts, and we matched almost perfectly on the ice. Of course, humans by nature are not perfect and cannot be completely synchronized, but we were about as close as kids could get that young. We went on to win two junior titles that year and placed on the podium at three more. After such a successful season, there was no discussion of whether I'd go back to another partner. We just got back on the ice and started creating more programs.

And six years later, he doesn't even have the decency to show up in person to tell me he didn't want to skate anymore.

I think know why, even if Elena does not. We had just won our last competition of the season (and forever, I suppose) and walked outside to get some air. And under the moonlight, he grabbed my hand and made his confession. Told me that he could not imagine a life without me, how grateful he was for me. He didn't say it outwardly; perhaps out of fear of rejection, or maybe even fear of ruining our friendship. But I knew what he meant when he looked into my eyes like that.

As Scarface once said, "The eyes, chico. They never lie."

I pull out of my head, doing some light footwork before turning and doing a double salchow. The world goes blurry before I land and my ankle gives out, forcing me to step out of the original sticking. I look up, catching eyes with Elena across the rink, who raises an eyebrow at me. I skate over, allowing myself to bump into the wall.