Tumbling (33 page)

GRACE

Grace's fingertips were starting to go numb in Georgette's and Monica's hands. Her heart was getting pins and needles, too.

Where the hell is Camille?

Grace took a deep breath, pushing her hope through her arms and into the other gymnasts. A minute ago, she had looked at them all standing beside her, yearning for the same thing as her, with sore muscles like hers and lives on the line like her own. A minute ago she had felt like one of them, like she belonged here.

Grace was trying to stay that nice. She didn't want to be the twisted, deranged girl anymore.

“Well, now we've lost Wilhelmina,” Katja said. “Guess it's no surprise that one didn't stick around.” She was speaking under her breath, pretending they couldn't hear her. But she knew they could.

And Grace realized: she didn't want to be like Katja anymore.
Katja
was twisted and deranged. Katja was like the worst parts of Grace.

But she still wanted the woman to say her name.

“Kristin, check the bathroom,” Katja said. “Samantha, check the floor.” The gymnast chain broke.

The wait was not good for Grace. Once she heard her own name, she could go back to wishing and hoping and dreaming for everyone else. But she didn't know
how much longer she could wait without her dark side surfacing again. Her brain twitched with insulting thoughts about all the other gymnasts. Her mouth wanted to put down Monica again. She hated when she wasn't in control.

But for now she held that part of herself in check.

Her name would be next. She needed to hear it. She needed it to happen soon, please. To be relieved that she could keep working with her father, keep using her gymnastics to fill in the spot where her mother should be. She needed to hear her name to keep being herself. Grace was so tired. She wanted to hear her name, and then go directly to bed.

If Leigh were here, she'd maybe still be squeezing Grace's hand.

If Leigh were here, her name would be next, alphabetically.

But Leigh wasn't here. The guilt seized Grace's heart like a cold, dead fist.

Kristin ran back into the room. “Camille's not in the bathroom,” she said. She paused, then added sort of loudly, “But Wilhelmina is. That's where she is. She didn't leave.”

A few of the gymnasts smiled at Kristin's guts. Grace didn't have guts like that. Grace would never have the guts to stand up to Katja Minkovski. But she'd find the courage not to want to be her anymore.

Grace twisted her right fingers in her left hand.
Was Camille gone? Could she have given up on herself?

Samantha ran breathless through the door. “She's gone,” she said.

Elite gymnasts are stoic, so there were no gasps or jumps or startles. There was only a long row of jaws dropping.

Wilhelmina knew,
Grace realized.
That's why she looked so dizzy up there. She knew that Camille was gone before Katja called her name.

“I ran into her mother walking out the door,” Samantha was saying. “She said Camille went to see Leigh. In the hospital.”

The icy fist squeezed harder on Grace's heart and she was sure that it would burst again into a million moths that flew around her rib cage and reminded her that she wasn't perfect. But this time it wouldn't be because she failed to eat. It would be because she failed to care.

Camille had managed to love her best friend better than Grace did. Wilhelmina had helped Camille to care for Leigh. Grace was the worst.

“So . . . Camille is disqualified,” Katja was mumbling. She clucked her tongue and ran a pencil down her clipboard.

Grace would not be mean. She'd channel the best parts of Leigh to cover up the worst parts of herself.

Grace squeezed Monica's hand again. She gripped Georgette hard enough to leave a black-and-blue mark. She was terrified that the committee would go back behind the closed door to figure out what to do now before
announcing the rest of the team, before saying her name. She wanted her fellow gymnasts to form a wall and keep Katja here, force them to decide right here in this room.

“We will name the rest of the team, then the alternates. Then we will go back to decide who to promote.”

Grace breathed a whoosh through her teeth.

Here we go
, she thought.
Here we go. I'm next.

In a mere second she'd hear her name, she'd be officially on the team, the torture would be over. Once she heard her name, she could deal with everything else. Like whether she had a best friend anymore. And whether she had a coach anymore. And whether she even wanted either of them if they hurt her gymnastics. Grace had big questions to figure out about who she was and how much of her was a gymnast and how much was a feeling, thinking human. But she could figure all of that out in the next part of her life, the part that would start in a fraction of a moment when she was standing next to Katja as a part of the team. She'd figure out those big questions as an Olympian.

“And here are the Olympic team members.” That was all Katja said and Grace's grip was already loosening. She was Cooper. She'd be called first. Only Becker was before her. “Wilhelmina Parker, Georgette Paulson, Samantha Soloman—

She didn't hear any more names. A buzzing started inside her brain. It vibrated from one side of her skull to the other. How had she messed up that much?

I'm not on the team.

MONICA

Monica was clutching hands so tightly, she thought she might break them.

It felt like a short chain of girls now, though. They were dropping like flies. Leigh was injured. Camille was disqualified. Wilhelmina was so surprised she won the meet that she was off getting sick in the bathroom somewhere. At least that's what Monica suspected.

But Monica wouldn't let that affect her. She wanted to be team alternate. She hungered for team alternate. She'd had to talk herself up to wanting it and now she was likely to be it. She would be happy.

“And Maria Vasquez,” Katja finished. “So that's your team: Georgette, Maria, Samantha, Wilhelmina. And one of the alternates. We'll promote someone to the spot Camille vacated.”

Monica felt the hand in hers go dead. She turned.

Grace.

Grace hadn't made the team. She was staring, her skin ashen, her face so broken, Monica was afraid she'd cry.

But she couldn't worry about Grace right now. Right now it was almost her moment.

“And the alternates are,” Katja said, “Monica Chase. Grace Cooper. Kristin Jackson.”

The chain of girls broke into the nine separate links, each one of them with open jaws and pounding hearts.
The committee filed out the back door to discuss the last member of the team. For an instant, it was silent.

It was silent inside Monica, too. Nothing in her brain. Only Olympic rings in her vision. Only the sound of her own rushing blood in her ears.

Olympic team alternate.

She'd made it.

The locker room burst back into life, Olympic gymnasts clutching each other's arms and dancing in circles, non-Olympic gymnasts hugging and rubbing tears into each other's shoulders, Olympic team alternates standing hunched and tense awaiting that final name.

Monica was too shocked right now for the joy. She was too happy for the tension. She was too sympathetic for the sadness.

She backed up a few steps until the back of her knees found the wood of the locker room bench, and then she lowered herself onto it and sat. She was the frozen pebble in the middle of the swarming activity and emotion.

It happened. She did her best. She believed in herself. She was going to Italy.

She wanted to see Wilhelmina, Monica realized. She wanted to run to her and make sure she wasn't serious about quitting. The girl couldn't quit now: she'd won the Olympic trials, for God's sakes. But Monica didn't dare leave. She didn't dare lose this spot.

Grace lowered herself onto the bench next to Monica.

“Good job,” she said.

Monica tried to keep her smile contained. “Grace,” she said. “I'm sorry that—”

“Don't be,” Grace's words bit. “I'll be on the team in a minute. I'm the one they'll promote. I'm better than Kristin and
you
. Everyone knows that.”

Monica bit her lip, then forced herself to smile again. No one was going to ruin this for her. Not even Grace.

LEIGH

Leigh was numb in the bed. Maybe it was the drugs. Maybe it was the exhaustion. Maybe it was that without gymnastics she didn't know what to hope for, what to think about, who to be. Her parents were quiet, too; they'd finally gotten the hint.

The door opened and shut. Leigh didn't pick up her head. She wasn't a gymnast. She didn't have to be polite for the cameras anymore. There would be no cameras anymore.

“Well, isn't this nice!” her father exclaimed, his voice too bright and cheerful.

Her mother stood up by her side. “Oh, it's good to have friends at a time like this,” she said, trying to sound as cheerful as her father, but failing because of her tears.

“Leigh,” a voice said. It was musical, magical. It sparked goose bumps all over Leigh's useless body.

She picked her head up, ignored the pounding in her skull.

“Camille!” she said, too loudly. Her face burned again. She was numb and broken, but she still managed to embarrass herself.

Then her parents were gone.

Camille stood right inside the door and shifted from foot to foot. Leigh had never seen this gymnast look nervous before. She was always confident, always in control, always solid. But right now Leigh could tell she didn't know what to say.

What was she doing here? She couldn't know how Leigh felt, right? Leigh hadn't told anyone.

Unless it was that stupid hug.

Could Camille possibly feel the same way?

“Hi,” Camille said. “You okay?”

Yes
, Leigh thought.
Because you're standing in front of me right when I thought I'd never have a reason to smile again.

No
, Leigh thought.
Because I'm here in a hospital and not going to the Olympics.

Leigh said, “Who made it?”

“I don't know,” Camille said. She walked toward the bed.

Leigh's eyebrows jumped.

“I left before the team was announced,” Camille said. “I disqualified myself.”

“Why?” Leigh hoped Camille couldn't hear her heart pounding.
Camille has a boyfriend
, she reminded herself.
Camille is not thinking like you are right
now.

Camille sighed. She dropped into the chair next to Leigh's bed, where her mother had been. “Because I'm like you.”

“You are?” Leigh asked, her vision filled with shooting stars for a split second before she realized that there was no way Camille meant
like you
the way Leigh was hoping, because no one even knew Leigh was a lesbian. It would be easier if Camille knew. It would be easier if she didn't have to hide it.

“I mean, how? How are you like me? You aren't hurt, are you?”

“No, no,” Camille said. “I shouldn't have said all that stuff about comebacks. I feel like I cursed you. All I've done since the trials started is mess up my friends.”

Friend. She called me her friend.
It was both thrilling and disappointing.

“It wasn't your fault. I hit my head on the beam. I didn't get enough height.”

“Well—”

“I mean, it's nothing like what happened to you, actually, you know? I mean, you were in a car accident and you weren't even the one driving. So, like, it was someone else's fault when you—”
Shut. Up.
“You know what I mean.”

Leigh bit the insides of her lips.

I feel a lot like I did before we even started today
, she realized. Then, she was under the bleachers and on top of the scoreboard, ready to kick some butt. Now, she
was in a hospital bed and erased from gymnastics stats everywhere, ready to wear a knee brace. But something in her was the same.

Camille said, “I didn't mean to—”

But Leigh cut her off. “It wasn't your fault, okay? It was mine. Or it was gravity's. Or something. I'm a good gymnast, I know it. All athletes get injured sooner or later, if they stick with it for long enough. It was really bad luck that my injury happened then.”

“Wow,” Camille said. “You're smart, you know that?” She reached out and clutched Leigh's hand, her face more serious than Leigh had ever seen.

Don't hold my hand. It's confusing. I know it's normal to hold someone's hands if she's in a hospital bed, but for me it's confusing. There's no way you could know this but I have a crush on you. And it hurts too much to have you cluelessly holding my hand like this.

“So,” Camille said. “What did the doctor say?”

“I'm in a knee brace for a long time. Like, for weeks constantly and then, like, years while working out.”

Camille's eyebrows raised.

“And I have a concussion,” Leigh said. “So they're keeping me here overnight.”

“And that means . . .” Camille said. “I know it's not all about the Olympics and all that . . .” She trailed off.

“I can try again next time if I want to,” Leigh said.

Camille squeezed her hand a little. “Will you?”

Leigh let her head fall into the pillow. Would she? She wanted to. She couldn't be finished. She wasn't ready.
But why did the thought of another Olympic season make her so tired?

Camille's phone rang. She glanced at the screen. “I have to take this. Sorry. I'll be right back!”

Then she was gone.

WILHELMINA

“Okay, I'm calling you,” Wilhelmina said as soon as Camille answered. “It doesn't matter, though. I can't do it. I can't go to the Olympics with that witch who did everything to keep me from getting there, and she would have too if—”