Chapter 6
“………………Honestly Hank, she’s skin and bone, and all she did was sleep the weekend, I hardly saw her at all”
“Well I’m sorry Joyce, but what can *I* do about it? Now isn’t a good time for me, I’m trying to paint the nursery, Maureen’s having a tough time of it, what do you expect me to do, hmm?”
“I expect you to care Hank, after all, she’s still your daughter! Oh to hell with you, I don’t know why I bothered ringing you in the first place, you’re about as much use as a chocolate teapot!” Joyce slammed the phone down. She rubbed her forehead and sat on the stairs. The phone rang
“Hi mom, it’s me, I’m back safe okay?”
“Oh, hi love…”
“Sorry about sleeping so much – it just kind a crept up on me, next time I come home, we’ll do something, okay?”
“Sure – when will that be?”
“Um…four weeks, I’ve got the Mitsubishi Cup in three weeks, it’ll be the weekend after that…hold on…the 19th, yeah – Friday the 19th”
“Right…why does that date ring a bell with me?”
“Coz it’s the Mitsubishi Cup?” Joyce could tell Buffy was smiling.
“No, the nineteenth…”
“Something at the gall-“
“Oh, OH – I know what it is”
“What?”
“That’s the date Maureen is supposed to be having the baby”
“Like I wanna know…hi Fred – okay then mom, I’ve got to unpack, and I want to talk to Fred – I’ll phone you in the week”
“Remember I’m working late Thursday and Friday we’ve got that showing of African Tribal Art I was telling you about”
Buffy frowned but said
“Did you, oh, sorry haven’t been very listening mode Buffy, but enjoy, and don’t work too hard”
“I won’t – and eat something!”
“Yes mom – bye”
“ Bye love”
Buffy followed Fred into her room.
“So how did you do?” Buffy asked her friend
Fred turned round; all smiles, clutching a piece of paper.
“Da-da! There you go, look! One confirmed pass to the next round of heats for the Interstate Gymnastic Championships!”
“Clever girl!”
“So, ho did the weekend go?”
“Actually, I feel terrible”
Fred looked up from tucking away her certificate
“Terrible as in ill?”
“No, I slept mostly – and of course, mom freaked at the weight loss – kept trying to feed me up”
“And you didn’t succumb?”
“No…right from when she picked me up at the airport, she offered to take me into town, the Pancake House, MacDonalds, there’s this Viennese coffee house that does these cakes and gateaux to die for – but just the thought of it…”
“Well, that’s good – you won’t have to do the killer-laxative and throwing up routine then!”
Buffy frowned
“Killer laxative and…ew!?”
“That’s what some of them do, they splurge and have a blow-out on weekend passes, some can put on as much as 7lbs! Then like from NOW they take two whole packets of laxatives – spend the next three days in the toilet”
Buffy made a disgusted face
The lift ‘dinged’ to announce it’s arrival on their floor, and Jenny Calendar came out and walked towards them
Hello ladies…here are you assignments for this week…yours Buffy…and yours Fred, now any questions?”
“How did I do on my test paper?” Buffy asked biting her bottom lip
“Enough – just, your problem is dates – you just need to concentrate a little more”
Buffy nodded
**************************
Buffy skated out onto the ice, she got a little speed up, turned 90 ° so she was skating backwards, and attempted a jump with a triple twist, she almost succeeded, but she didn’t nail it properly and her leading skate was lost beneath her and she fell. She got up resignedly and tried again. It was one thing loosing weight to save her joints, only problem was, now her little bit of padding had gone, she had nothing to cushion the falls…
“Come on Buffy, concentrate, you need to throw that right leg behind you higher, that will help keep your balance - like this”
Illyria skated around and executed the perfect jump with triple twist and landed perfectly
Buffy nodded and tried again – this time she landed, and managed to stay upright, but it was clumsy, jerky and not smooth like it should be.
“Better, but keep your head lower, raise your hips”
Buffy practiced all afternoon, she came off the ice tired and aching slightly – nothing a hot bath wouldn’t cure.
When the bell sounded to indicate end of training, Illyria caught up with Buffy as she changed into her trainers
“You did well today Buffy, I could see you took what I said on board, do you feel you are ready for the um…” Illyria wiggled her fingers, trying to think of the name of the competition, and Buffy smiled and said,
“What, the Mitsubishi?”
“Yes! That’s it, the Mitsubishi”
“I need more practice on my routine, and I’ve sorted out some music for it though”
“Good, good, you are the only one to have mentioned music so far, I was going to ask during the next training session – what have you chosen?”
“It’s a Beatles song, Eleanor Rigby, but played on strings, by the New York Philharmonic, they play it quite quick, and it suits the routine”
“Excellent! Have you got a copy?”
“Yes, I’ve got it on my ipod – I do my exercises to it”
“Good” They both looked up and saw Coach O’Connor coming towards them, smiling.
Buffy felt a slight twinge in her neck, she put her hand up to rub the back with her fingers, and she rotated her head from side to side.
“Have a good weekend, Buffy – hey, got a twinge?”
“Yes just a bit (Angel grabbed her by the shoulders, turned her around and massaged her neck) Aah – um, yes thanks, but I slept most of it!”
He stopped and looked at Illyria and smiled when he said,
“Unlike the others, who seemed to have eaten through most of it!”
“Buffy has had a very good practice, and she has already picked out her music for her routine – something I hadn’t even mentioned to the others yet” Illyria said smiling
Angel gave Buffy a grin, and casually draped an arm around her
“Good, excellent in fact – when do you practice again?”
“Tomorrow, 2.30 my ice-time slot”
“Right, I’ll make a note to come and see how you’re getting on – do well at the Mitsubishi, and you should find the Grand Prix at Stuttgart easy” he gave her shoulder a squeeze, then dropped his arm.
Buffy nodded and stood, hoisting her bag on her shoulder
“Well I must go, got a math paper waiting for me that’s not going to do itself” Angel stood to one side and he and Illyria both watched her leave.
“And I thought that one was going to be trouble”
“She’s knuckled down well – she’ll be fine at the Mitsubishi – but the Chinese are good, VERY good, they’ll be at Stuttgart”
“Hmm, not really used to big venue’s yet though…tell you who might be a problem, though”
“Whose that?”
“Faith Hamilton”
“Faith, you mean your old pupil?”
“That’s the one – she’s been training in England, exclusively with that British guy, Rupert Giles – he of the 7 Olympic gold medals fame for Ice-Dancing…she’s been with him 14 months, and so I hear, they’re coming back to the states so she can represent her home country again”
“Then Buffy needs to train hard. Where will this Faith be homed?”
“Don’t worry, Buffy already knows this girl from the junior circuit, they are similar in age - Faith is going to be training out of Ethan Raine’s place………I’ll send someone from here – see if we can get some secret footage of her training, she how good she really is”
“You can do that?”
“It’s not what you know, but who…” Angel said walking away with a smile, tapping his nose then pointing to her
Illyria’s brows fell eventually – it would be VERY useful if they knew before the competitions who was doing what as regards routines. Not to steal the other competitors routines of course, just to make sure that their dancer’s routines were better……………
**************
“Okay raise your arm when you’re ready” Illyria called as Buffy took her place on the ice.
Buffy stayed still on the opening bars, and when the words would have started, she wriggled her arms upwards, staking forward, 90° turn, skate backwards, cross skates, up into a first jump, treble twist, great landing, she skated, concentrating on the beats to the moves of her routine, she made one error, she did a double toe loop instead of a triple – but unless you absolutely knew what it should have been, you wouldn’t have know.
The music finished and Buffy spun tremendously fast, then came to a dead stop, dropped her head and arms back dramatically on the last note.
“Excellent- bravo!” Both Illyria and Angel skated towards her, grinning
“I…made ………a mistake…” Buffy gasped, she was panting heavily
“Double instead of a triple toe loop, I know, but you could easily throw one in when you skate round before the final spin – between when you change legs spinning on the spot, and the ballerina spin, if that happens again” Illyria suggested
Buffy nodded, trying to get her breath back as they skated to the side.
**********
Ten days later, Buffy had the routine off absolutely perfect! She could skate it in her sleep – she did too!
***************
Buffy was lying on her bed, reading a magazine, when there was a knock at the door
“Yeah, come in”
“Look at what I’ve got for you!”
Illyria came in carrying a costume swathed in plastic. Buffy smiled and stood up, putting her magazine down on the nightstand.
Illyria hung the outfit on the back of the wardrobe door, and the plastic cover slid to the floor to reveal a midnight blue mini dress, the top half from the top of the bust to the neck and the sleeves were made of very fine see-thru organdie net, it had a sprinkling of diamond-like crystals over it that shone a rainbow of colours in the light.
“What do you think?” Illyria stood back so Buffy could take a better look
“Oh! It’s – it’s beautiful!”
“Good, I’m glad you like it – it’s for Stuttgart”
Buffy didn’t have to wear underclothes with the dress, just tights as the dress was made over a swimsuit, with built in bra top so there would be no ‘visible panty-line’.
“I’ll try it on after my shower”
“Good – see you later”
************************
Buffy did really well at the Mitsubishi Cup, she came third overall. That meant she had a ceding of No. 3 in the US, her marks put her in 68th cede in the world, which, for a junior switching ranks was excellent, it usually took at least 12 months to drop down from the one-hundred-and-something kind of numbers.
Having caught a slight cold at the Mitsubishi Cup, Buffy cancelled her home weekend pass, and told her mother that she would go home after the main competition.
*******************
Stuttgart came round fast.
Buffy got on the coach for the airport; she always had slight nerves on a longer flight.
When they eventually got there, the competition was due to start the following day, Buffy’s slot wasn’t until the evening – she had two daytime ice practice slots tomorrow, one 10.30-11.30am, the next at 3-4pm – tonight she could relax and watch the pairs and the men’s heats of the competition.
Top couple were from Belarus, Ivana and Boris Menova, a brother and sister whom Buffy had seen many times when she was a junior, other favourites for the title this year were a British couple, Carly Mason and Andy Johnson, and the American couple, Brad Douglas and Tanya Glenn.
Buffy got to the rink just in time to see the American couple skate their new routine, they’d picked a dance routine from the hit musical ‘Chicago’ – ‘All That Jazz’ – and it went down a storm with the crowds, fast paced, with some of their trademark moves incorporated into the routine, everybody watched the scoring with bated breath, the ‘technical merit’ scores came up first,
There were mostly 5.7’s, a 5.6 from the Russian judge, the British judge had given them a 5.8 – and as usual, the highest and lowest scores were eliminated, and the mean average was taken – this meant they were on course to beat the French couple, who’d come out of nowhere and were lying in third place.
The ‘overall marks’ came up, Buffy could see them, sitting in the scoring bay – waving to the crowd, Tanya’s arms full of flowers. Cameramen trained on them from 2 different angles.
The second sets of scores came up, and there was booing from the American corner – the marks were quite low, 5.4’s, even a 5.3 from the Spanish – GB judge gave them another 5.8, their best mark the other four giving them 5.5’s. Their coach stood by them and Tanya waved again and they stood, Buffy knew how disappointed they’d be feeling right now – they were back in fourth – nobody ever got anything for coming 4th…………
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