Letters to Nowhere

by Julie Cross

  “And the fourth teammate?” Jackie leaned forward in her chair as if anticipating my answer like I was telling the most interesting story ever.

  I removed the yogurt container, placed it on Jackie’s desk, and crumbled up the empty bag, tossing it in the garbage. Jackie opened a drawer and pulled out a plastic spoon, setting it on top of my strawberry yogurt. I stared at it, the lump from earlier returning to my throat. “Stevie is the other one. She’s nineteen. She’s the most experienced gymnast. She’s been all over the world.”

  “How do you like staying with Coach Bentley?”

  My mouth opened and then closed again. Jackie laughed at my reaction and added, “Your grandmother explained the living situation, but just so you know, I only spoke with her to get an idea about whether I’d be the best match for you. She and I won’t discuss you further or even speak one–on–one again. Everything you say here is just between you and me.”

  I could feel heat creeping up my neck. This was the first truly personal comment so far and I already didn’t like it. It would be better if she did talk to Grandma every day and tell her I’m doing just fine. Tell her everything I said and did that proved I was adjusting and could handle this situation.

  My eyes stayed on the yogurt as I peeled the lid off. “It’s only been one day, so nothing to report, really.”

  She flipped back a few pages in her notebook. “And he has a teenager of his own, is that right? He’s a single father?”

  “Yes,” I said right away. “Jordan, he’s…well, I don’t know how old he is. Old enough to drive, but not out of high school yet?”

  She scanned her notes. “Seventeen. What’s he like? Do you get along with him all right?”

  “It’s only been one day,” I said again. “I don’t really know anything about him.” Except that he likes to have girls over and make out on the couch when his dad’s not home. “He seems normal, I guess. Other than drinking out of the milk carton and a lack of respect for punctuality and sanitary issues.” I glanced up at her, worried all of a sudden. “I sound like a germaphobe. I’m totally not.”

  “I don’t think there are many elite level athletes without some sort of Obsessive Compulsive symptoms,” Jackie said. “Rituals and routines are part of the success, so you’re bound to want to replicate those situations over and over again.”

  “I can’t take medication,” I said immediately. “It could be a banned substance—”

  “I’m a PhD, not an MD,” she clarified. “And an MD would only recommend medication if the rituals or worries were getting in the way of normal life, which doesn’t seem to be the case with you. For example, if you became so overly obsessed with germs that you were afraid to leave the house or touch anything with your bare hands. Or if a morning routine made it impossible for you to get out the door or anywhere on time. Constant checking and rechecking. Things like that.”

  What about avoiding your house and avoiding your parents’ car, driving a car…? Gymnastics had taught me to face fears head–on or they blow up so big you’ll never be able to conquer them. But maybe I had faced them by getting away and moving on?

  Jackie’s eyes drifted to the clock on the wall. “We’re out of time today, but I’ll see you again on Thursday?”

  “Yes, Thursday.” I tossed the empty yogurt container into the garbage can and headed for the door, but before leaving I found myself turning around to say something else. “Did I…you know…do okay with this?” Jackie’s expression was a bewildered one. “My grandma will want to know how I’m doing.”

  “There’s no score in therapy. No Russian judge,” Jackie teased, but her smile dissolved when she saw the heat flaming on my cheeks. “But if I had to score you, I’d give you a seven out of ten.”

  I opened my mouth to explain that the perfect ten was no more and to find out what, exactly, I’d been deducted for, but she cut me off before I could speak.

  “You didn’t tell me much that I hadn’t read in your National Team bio and interview questions online, but I thought you explained the relationship with your teammates very honestly. It proves why you’ve had so much success in the sport—you’re realistic when it comes to gymnastics. What surprised me is, and I really want you to explore this before Thursday, the fact that you haven’t given much thought as to why Coach Bentley let you into his home. It’s a big responsibility.” She held up her hand, probably to stop me from answering now. “Don’t tell me today, write down a few ideas and bring them next time, okay?”

  I nodded my agreement and mumbled a good–bye, my head still deep in thought as I got into Coach Bentley’s car.

  Why did he agree to this arrangement? Not just agree, he had been more than accommodating. He’s been parental.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  January 30

  Dad,

  Today, I went to the shrink that Grandma is making me see. We didn’t talk about you and Mom at all. I didn’t want to. Here it’s okay, but if I started telling people about my letters and what’s going on inside my head, it would just make everything blow up and I wouldn’t be able to stop it. Today, after therapy, I started reading through the pamphlet that I had grabbed from the funeral home weeks ago. It’s full of quotes about dying and death. I know how you always like to quote famous books and important people so I figured you’d appreciate these more than Mom.

  “Death is delightful. Death is dawn, the waking from a weary night of fevers unto truth and light” –Joaquin Miller

  “What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls the butterfly” –Richard Bach

  They both sound really nice, but that doesn’t make it real to me. I can’t make myself think this way. What about you?

  Love, Karen

  “Good, very good,” Coach Bentley said when I landed my fourth, nearly perfect uneven bar routine. “You’re done here. Move on to the pit.”

  Moving on to the single high bar over the pit meant getting to work on new release moves and skills not yet in my routine with the intent of eventually increasing my difficulty score. Skills like the one in the video Jordan had caught me watching this morning.

  From the corner of my eye, I saw both Blair and Ellen grind their teeth, hating that I had moved on before them. Chances were that they’d both nail their routines this time around.

  Evening workouts meant maneuvering around the many team girls at lower levels and all the recreational classes. I had to share the pit bar with a small group of level 6 girls and their coach, Jeff.

  The more I nailed my competition routines, the more new skills I was eager to try. This was usually Blair’s department. She got bored with the repetition of doing routines on every event several times in a row, but whenever we worked new skills, she’d do something amazing and totally out of left field. I was the consistent one—clean routines, average difficulty, nothing flashy or original but not a whole lot to deduct either. Lately, I’d been feeling a bit caged. Bentley’s coaching style was different than Coach Cordes’s. Bentley wanted ten clean routines—no major mistakes—every day, between the morning and evening workout. Cordes rarely had us doing full routines until a couple weeks before a competition.

  As I swung around the pit bar, I couldn’t stifle the desire to try something new, despite the group of level 6 girls and their coach watching. And to my credit, it wasn’t exactly a new skill. It was a release move I did in a piked position. But if I did it in a layout position (totally straight body—like a pencil), the difficulty went up about two notches. Which was the gymnastics equivalent of two touchdowns, assuming I could catch the bar.

  Right before I let go, I played the videos I’d been watching of the layout Jaeger in my head, visualizing which direction my momentum would be headed and when to reach for the bar again. I figured I’d end up facedown in the pit on my first try, but instead, one of my hands caught the bar and the other brushed it before sliding off. I hung with one arm, swinging until I could drop and land feet first into the pit.

  “Awes
ome!” Coach Jeff said. “I didn’t even know you were working on those. Where have I been the past few weeks?”

  I smiled and gave him a high five as I climbed out. I glanced over at the uneven bars and sighed with relief when I saw that Bentley had his back to me, watching Stevie’s routine with a careful eye.

  Coach Jeff turned to address his group. “See, girls? That’s what you’ll be doing if you get your swings higher and work hard on all your basics.”

  One of the little girls rolled her eyes behind Jeff’s back and I laughed under my breath. That would have totally been Blair a few years ago.

  Stevie was the next in my group to join me at the pit bar and by that time, the level 6 girls had moved on to another event. We both chalked up in silence and I avoided eye contact with her before making my third attempt at the new release, hoping she wouldn’t even watch me. This time I got both hands on before sliding off. When I climbed out, Stevie was standing over me, her mouth hanging open.

  “What the hell was that?”

  “It was an accident,” I muttered. “At least it kind of was the first time and then I just thought maybe—”

  “It looks great. Really great. But competing it…” She shook her head in disbelief and before I could stop her, she shouted across the gym. “Hey, Coach! Karen wants to show you something!”

  Ellen landed her bar dismount with a thud that echoed through the entire gym, because Stevie Davis, the three–time world competitor, had just spoken loud enough for everyone to hear, and people always hung on every word Stevie said.

  “What are you doing?” I hissed at her, keeping my head down.

  She grinned, wider than I’d ever seen her smile. “I didn’t say what exactly you were going to show him. That’s up to you.”

  Anger and adrenaline both flamed inside me. I could see Stacey, baby Olivia latched to her breast, stop her beam coaching with the level 9s and 10s to glance over in this direction. Most of the other coaches in the gym had stopped to watch, therefore the gymnasts were also at a halt.

  Finally, Bentley turned around and walked in our direction. “Karen?”

  I glanced wearily at Stevie, who was still grinning. Realistically, I wasn’t screwed. I had several options. I could do something he already knew I could do and pretend to be excited about it. Or not. Hadn’t I said that the dead parent excuse was the best get–out–of–jail–free card? Sure, normally I would have been worried about getting in trouble for taking risks without permission, but seriously, what would he do to me?

  I felt a determined anger surge through me as I swung into the new release. This time, I felt the perfection of my timing and knew before I even saw the bar again that I’d catch it perfectly. When I did, everyone in the gym clapped.

  “So awesome,” Stevie whispered after I’d climbed out of the pit.

  Bentley just stood there with his arms crossed, face totally unreadable. Stacey handed baby Olivia over to one of her team girls and came striding our way, looking either really impressed or totally pissed off. Both expressions were very similar on Stacey’s face.

  I busied myself in the chalk bowl, waiting for one of them to say something.

  “It would be an easy upgrade,” Stacey said right away. “She wouldn’t have to redesign her bar routine at all.”

  “She caught it on, like, the third try,” Stevie chimed in. “That has to mean something.”

  I was surprised Stevie got involved in this discussion, but I wasn’t about to stop her. However, I knew better than to open my own mouth. Stevie and Stacey went back and forth for several minutes weighing the risks and rewards of upping the difficulty during the season. Neither of them mentioning me heading off to UCLA in June. Neither of them mentioning the end of my elite career. Maybe I wasn’t the only one secretly planning to stick around longer?

  Bentley said nothing for a long time, listening to them. Finally, he cleared his throat and all three of us looked right at him.

  He placed a clean white sheet of paper on his clipboard and wrote Layout Jaeger on the top. He hung it on a screw that stuck out of the side of the pit bar. “We’ll keep a tally sheet. Karen has to catch the release a hundred times and mark them all here. Then another hundred with the rest of the routine added after the release. Then another hundred with full routines on the uneven bars. If you can do that, we’ll add it in to the nearest competition.”

  He hadn’t said “no” or “let’s wait for the off season,” which I guess was something positive, but still, those goals were pretty impossible, considering I had three other events to train. With ten routines a day, I should be able to hit one hundred in about ten days, but first I had to get my numbers in on the pit bar and get brave enough to even try the skill without the protection of soft foam blocks underneath me.

  One step at a time, Karen.

  The discussion was over after Bentley presented his compromise. It was genius on his part, really. He left everything up to me, instead of forbidding it and having me or Stacey bug him about it every day.

  Before we took our usual mid–practice snack break, I joined Blair and Ellen, who looked more than distraught about me getting that much attention in a single practice.

  “Awesome job,” Blair said without really looking at me.

  “Yeah, totally cool,” Ellen chimed in, giving me her crowd–pleasing smile.

  I was pretty much on cloud nine at that point, even if my teammates were jealous. But my big accomplishment was quickly forgotten. During a bathroom break, I noticed a reddish brown stain. One that had seeped through my nude colored briefs all the way to the very expensive pink leotard my mom had given me for my seventeenth birthday a few weeks ago. My heart pounded. It wasn’t like I didn’t know this moment was coming, but I didn’t recognize the low–level cramp or the lower back pain. My mom always got back pain with her period.

  I had prepared for this and yet I was totally and utterly petrified at the sight of blood leaking from a part of my body that had never bled before. I hustled out of the bathroom stall and retrieved my gym bag, where I kept both feminine products and an extra leotard. Even with my previous tampon training, my hands were shaking so much that it took a while to get it in.

  Stevie and I really hadn’t talked about period stuff, but I was pretty sure she’d had hers for at least a few years now. I knew for a fact Blair and Ellen had not. I knew this because the three of us were in the bathroom during a competition last season and we overheard this mom and girl in a stall basically in utter distress because the girl had just started, obviously for the first time, and she had no idea how to use a tampon and had two more events to compete.

  With gymnastics, pads are not an option. Leotards hardly cover anything and our legs are constantly coming apart with straddle jumps and splits. Then you have sports photographers snapping pictures with their fancy closeup lenses. You can’t hide anything.

  Ellen and her flippant little girl nature didn’t think much of it, but Blair and I both freaked out, knowing that could be us any day now, and we didn’t want to be stuck in a bathroom stall forcing our mothers to give us a tampon lesson during Nationals or World trials. After that, we had a sleepover and pored over the directions on the Tampax box, and then we went through three boxes until we had mastered the art of it.

  By the time I made it back into the gym, the others were five minutes into beam workout and Stacey looked more than livid at my disappearance.

  “Did you change leotards?” she snapped at me.

  I felt my heart speed up again. I could tell Stacy the truth and I probably should, but for some reason, I freaked out, maybe out of fear that she and Bentley would be concerned about this new change affecting my gymnastics, like with Blair’s growth spurt. “I…uh…spilled Gatorade.”

  She let out an angry breath. “Gatorade?! That’s pure sugar, Karen. You know that.”

  I leaned close and whispered, “I had diarrhea this morning. I’m feeling much better now.”

  She sighed, looking less pisse
d off and reached in Olivia’s diaper bag, pulling out a banana. “Eat this. It works better than sugary drinks.”

  Like I would actually eat something from a bag that holds diapers.

  I watched her bend down to the little car seat resting on the floor by the beams and place a pacifier in Olivia’s mouth. She used her foot to rock the seat back and forth while keeping an eye on Stevie’s beam routine.

  Grief heavier than I’d ever experienced in the last three weeks swept over me. Would Stacey be there for Olivia when this happened to her years from now? Most likely she would. The odds were in her favor. And most likely she’d be around for all the events that followed this one.

  But my mother had already missed this and everything after. She might have been a little materialistic and self–centered at times, but she would have made this whole period thing so much easier. I could practically hear her voice in my head.

  “Yeah, it sucks, Karen, but at least you don’t have to keep worrying about when it’s going to happen.”

  She would have done something special, but not humiliating. Like planning a girls’ night downtown. Maybe even stay in a hotel and shop and watch movies all night. She would know exactly how to tell my dad and not have him feel like his little girl was suddenly going to move out and get married to some asshole. And Mom would never let me feel bad about growing up. Not that Coach Bentley or Stacey would out loud, but silently…

  Olivia’s little eyes fluttered shut and I couldn’t stand it a second longer. I had to get out of here or I’d fall apart in front of everyone.

  My eyes stayed on the banana in my hand. “Actually, I’m not feeling well. I just puked in the bathroom. I thought it would go away, but I’m still really nauseous.”