“That’s not necessary,” I say. “Let me buy you that Gatorade, and then we’ll drill the choreography until it’s muscle memory.”
Hallie skips through the gym, leaning on one balance beam as she kicks up her feet and clicks her heels in midair, making her way toward the vending machine in the lobby.
“Motivating her with treats? Interesting coaching strategy,” he points out.
“Effective coaching strategy,” I correct him.
I head toward the lobby. Ryan makes a soft noise like he’s clearing his throat, and when I look back toward him, his mouth is half-open, like he’s about to say something.
“Yeah?” I ask.
He presses his lips together and dips his gaze away from mine. “Nothing,” he says. “I was going to say something, but it’s nothing.”
I look at him curiously, but he just crosses his arms over his chest and nods toward the door of the gym.
“Go catch up with Hallie,” he says.
• CHAPTER 8 •
I want to believe that I’ve grown up a lot since I was Hallie’s age. It would be nice to think that I’ve blossomed into a mature, confident, graceful adult. But then Ryan will make a particularly charming joke or simply breathe in my direction, and I’m forced to remember that I’ve been harboring the same teenage crush for a full decade. So maybe not much has changed.
“Heading out?” Ryan asks.
It’s a Wednesday in the middle of December; we’ve just wrapped up our morning practice, and we’re scattering in different directions for our midday break. Kim picked up Hallie for lunch and homeschooling, Ryan is retreating into the office for a meal, and per usual, I’m on my way out. Even though I’ve worked at Summit for a month now, I’ve never quite been comfortable spending the lunch break hanging out with Ryan. I know he stays here. I don’t want to intrude on his personal space—and if I’m really honest with myself, the prospect of regular alone time with him sounds like a nervous thrill. What would I say? So I typically eat at home.
“Yeah,” I say, a little embarrassed.
He gives me a bemused smile. “You know, you’re more than welcome to hang out here,” he says. “Even when you’re off the clock.”
I look at the door, then back at Ryan. “Do you want company?” I ask.
“That’d be nice,” he says. “Unless you have other plans.”
That’d be nice, I replay in my head. Between clubbing in college and a high-profile relationship with a famous athlete in my twenties, I eventually got comfortable around men—even intimidating ones I was attracted to. I could flirt, banter, relax. But maybe because Ryan is from a completely different era of my life, back when the prospect of interacting with guys point-blank terrified me, I lose my cool around him.
It’s time for that to change.
“Do you have food here?” I ask.
“I brought a ton of leftovers, if you want to share,” he says. “It’s just some chicken and rice and veggies.”
The offer is very sweet. “Sure, why not? Thank you so much.”
He heats up the leftovers in the office’s microwave and clears space off the desk for us to sit and eat.
“Did you make this?” I ask.
The chicken is a little bland, but it’s not bad.
“It’s basically the one meal I know how to make, yeah,” he says.
“I ate a version of this pretty much every single day back when I was training,” I say. “It’s like comfort food.”
“Exactly, same,” he says.
There’s a moment where neither of us says anything. I could change the subject to something completely professional, like Hallie’s floor routine—but I recognize it wouldn’t hurt for Ryan and me to get to know each other on a friendlier, more personal level, too.
“I actually love to cook,” I tell him. “My first few years in California, I lived in dorms or these tiny apartments with bad kitchens, but eventually, I moved into this place with a huge, awesome setup for cooking. For the first time in my life, it was like I had both the space and the lifestyle to actually enjoy food.”
“Oh, wow,” he says. He looks down and pokes a piece of chicken with his fork. “I wish I had known that before serving you this.”
“No, no, don’t worry, this is good,” I lie. “And it’s so nice of you to share. Maybe I’ll cook something for you sometime.”
I can’t tell if I’m overstepping a boundary, but he doesn’t seem to flinch.
“It’s funny that you say that you could enjoy cooking more once you left gymnastics,” he notes. “That’s how I felt about working out.”
“Yeah?”
“It turns out, once the pressure of winning medals isn’t hanging over your head, you can chill out a little more,” he says.
“No kidding,” I deadpan.
“I used to get so bored with conditioning when I was a gymnast, but after I retired, I realized I missed that kind of workout. So that’s why I started lifting weights just for me—not for the sake of the sport.”
“Ha, see, I felt the opposite way. I’ve done enough conditioning for one lifetime,” I say.
“Fair enough,” he says.
“How’d you get into coaching?” I ask.
“Back in high school, I coached kids’ classes, just to make a little money during the summers,” he explains. “So I knew I liked it. And then around the time I was thinking of retiring, my old coach from Michigan connected me to Mary here at Summit. The timing was perfect, since Hallie was leveling up and wanted to work one-on-one with a coach. The Conways looked into Powerhouse, but Dimitri didn’t have room for her at the time.” He explains that Dimitri’s hands were full with other gymnasts: Emma Perry, Skylar Hayashi, Brit Almeda. “And the Conways were pretty reluctant to find another coach in another state because of Todd’s career. So I was the best option—better than nothing.”
“They took a pretty big chance on you,” I say.
He knocks his knuckles against the wooden windowsill behind him. “Trust me, I’m grateful for that every single day.”
He already knows that I coached a preteen girls’ gymnastics team back in LA, and we trade coaching stories back and forth. He’s had more than his fair share of dealing with sassy thirteen-year-old gymnasts and their uptight parents, but so have I. This is such a niche profession, it’s rare that I meet someone else who understands it completely; even in the close-knit gymnastics circle, I don’t know any other coaches around my own age. I’m glad I got over my nerves about eating lunch with Ryan at Summit. It’s good for us to be friends.
• CHAPTER 9 •
While the rest of the world counts down to the clock striking midnight on New Year’s Eve, or the ball dropping in Times Square, we’re more focused in the gym. Chalk dust hangs in the air as Hallie Sharpies a red X over the day in the calendar in Ryan’s training binder. There are 175 days to Trials.
Hallie’s floor routine has been my singular obsession for most of the month. I sometimes catch myself tapping out the steps while rinsing my hair in the shower, or humming the music while I refill my water bottle. She has the choreography down pat by now, and we’ve settled on which tumbling passes go where. We still have a ways to go when it comes to her actual performance—but I know the nuanced details, like the sassy tilt of a head or the satisfying thunk of a cleanly stuck landing, take time to develop. She’ll get there. I’m optimistic.