After the Gold

by Erin McRae

BRENDAN HADN’T EXPECTED travelling as part of a coaching staff to be so different from travelling as a skater. But here he was in Indiana with a hotel room to himself, way less luggage, and no one to freak out to.

  The last part was the worst, he thought as sat at the desk with his laptop going through his notes and making sure he had absolutely everything in order for tomorrow. Not because he necessarily needed to freak out — he was nervous, sure, but his kids were as prepared as they could be. But because whenever he’d travelled for a competition, ever since he was ten, Katie had been right there with him. Even in those terrible years when they hadn’t been partners, he’d always known she was somewhere in the same city and skating on the same ice.

  Before he closed his computer for the night he refreshed his inbox one last time, another ritual he’d started since he got back to Denver. There was, as usual, nothing from Katie. Brendan sighed, snapped his computer shut, folded his arms on top of it and buried his face in them. He had to assume Katie had given up skating forever — or that her knee had forced her to do so. He’d texted, emailed, and called her in the first couple of weeks after she’d fled New York, almost frantic for wanting to know if she was okay. But the more time that went by without a response from her, the more evident the answer became: Either she wasn’t okay and there was nothing Brendan could do about it, or she was fine and she wanted nothing to do with him.

  Brendan shook his head and stood up to get ready for bed. He needed to not think about Katie, and he needed to sleep.

  SHELBY AND MIGUEL NAILED their short program, as Brendan had known they would. He managed to keep thoughts of Katie mostly at bay until they were about to do their free skate the next day.

  Before their names were called, Brendan leaned his elbows on the boards to give them one last pep talk. They had an actual coach who was more than capable of doing this for them, but in the last few months they had gravitated towards Brendan. He wasn’t sure what made them trust him so much, or from where he drew the words to calm their nerves and build their confidence, but he was glad of it, whatever it was. Glad, and also humbled. Brendan had been in their shoes once and knew how much faith they were placing in him. He couldn’t let them down.

  Shelby’s eyes were huge. Miguel looked grimly determined. They reminded Brendan so very much of himself and Katie at that age. The nerves would never go away, but with luck, support, and the right resources they’d become part of the process instead of a barrier.

  “Hey,” he told them both. Shelby reached for the box of tissues and blew her nose, still looking like a deer in the headlights. “You like skating, yeah?”

  The two looked at Brendan, looked at each other, and looked back at him in perfect unison. Their faces said plainly that they thought he’d lost his mind.

  When they didn’t answer, though, he lifted his eyebrows and repeated the question. Learning how to communicate their needs as athletes meant learning how to actually communicate. Out loud. He wasn’t going to let them fall into same bad habits as him and Katie.

  “Yes,” they said together.

  “Then don’t worry about what comes after. Go enjoy the shit out of the next three and a half minutes.”

  That got a smile out of them. Their names were announced, and he gave them each a last hug over the boards before they pushed off, hand in hand, for their starting positions.

  Brendan knew someone’s camera in the audience would find him either because they were curious as to how he was handling his transition to coaching or because it was an excuse for the internet to wonder what had happened to Katie. He folded his arms and told himself very sternly not to bite his thumbnail. He had every bit of confidence in his kids; they were a moment away from becoming extraordinary.

  He didn’t breathe until the song was done and Shelby and Miguel struck their final position. Neither they nor Brendan needed the judges to tell them they had absolutely nailed that program. Stunned, relieved smiles broke out over their faces, and they threw their arms around each other.

  Fuck. Brendan missed Katie. The old, familiar sensation of her absence was suddenly painfully sharp. He found it hard to breathe as it lingered, staying with him as Shelby and Miguel got their winning scores, through the congratulatory hugs, and during the medal ceremony. So many memories were tied up in the rituals of the day. Without Katie at his side he felt like he was missing half of his body.

  In the arena parking lot he waved goodbye to Shelby and Miguel and their parents, then leaned against his rental car as he watched them go. They were headed for a celebratory dinner, almost effervescent with their delight in their victory. Brendan was going back to his hotel room. He needed to review the tape of today’s performance and make notes for the kids and for his own work. He needed to reply to the emails he’d gotten today from his other team, still at home in Denver. But he also needed to make a plan.

  Time and therapy alone were not cutting it. He needed to solve things with Katie once and for all. Even if, after that, they never spoke again.

  HE WAITED TO CALL KATIE until he arrived back home the next day. He dropped his mail on the kitchen counter and looked around at the rest of his apartment. He was hardly ever here; his life was spent mostly at the rink or the gym. Without Katie crashing here on weekends and the odd weeknight, it looked more empty and bare than ever. A couple of dishes were sitting somewhat sadly on the draining board. Aside from his medals and a few framed photographs on the wall, the place looked more like a hostel than a place where anyone actually lived.

  This was not a home he could share with anyone, his previous invitation to Katie to move in with him notwithstanding. She’d been right to refuse that offer for so many reasons. His place wasn’t — and had never been — the home of a person who was ready to have someone in their life.

  What the hell am I doing here?

  Such a mood was, perhaps, not the best one in which to reach out to his ex-skating partner ... his ex-everything, really. But he needed to do this. Brendan scrolled to her number in his phone and hit call.

  He stared at his phone as it rang. His heart pounded. He told himself sternly that the worst that could happen was that Katie would hang up on him. If the last three months hadn’t killed him, that certainly wasn’t going to finish him off now.

  He let it ring until it clicked over to voicemail, but he was unprepared to leave a message, so he hung up. He’d write something out that made some sort of sense and call her back later. That way, if her voicemail picked up again, at least he’d be prepared.

  The second he set his phone down on the counter, it rang.

  Katie.

  Calling him back.

  Suddenly, he hated her all over again. By which he meant that he was totally in love with her all over again and in a total panic.

  Fuck.

  He answered the phone. And said nothing.

  Katie mirrored his silence, although he could hear her breathing. He wondered if they would hang up without speaking a word.

  Finally she spoke. “Hi.”

  “Hi.”

  She took a deep breath that sounded like all the ones before the music started. “I know you didn’t call just to say hi.”

  “No.” God, I missed your voice, Brendan thought. There was so much he wanted to say, but now that Katie was there on the line, he didn’t know how.

  Isn’t that always the problem with us, though? The chance that they would be able to fix things between them suddenly seemed remote.

  Katie sighed impatiently. He’d missed that sound, too.

  “I’m not hanging up on you,” she said sharply, “but I’m also not playing twenty questions. What do you want, Brendan? It’s almost my bedtime.”

  “It’s eight-thirty.” Where did she get off being angry about him calling, when she had been the one who left him in New York and had never even answered an email?

  “Do you know what time cows get up?”

  After all the years they had spent together, Brendan suspected he should. But if
she had told him before — and she probably had — he had forgotten. Ugh. “What time do cows get up, Katie?” he asked snidely. Then he kicked himself. Whatever his case was, he wasn’t helping it.

  “Four.”

  “That’s really fucking early.” As early as skaters get up.

  “Yeah, I’m not making small talk with you about cows.”

  “They won,” he blurted.

  “What?”

  “One of the junior pairs I’ve been working with. They won. Today.”

  “Congratulations,” she said tartly.

  Brendan wondered if she resented his bringing up skating. But what else was he supposed to do? Like she had said, making small talk about cows was definitely not an option.

  “Is this a nostalgia call?” she asked.

  “No. It’s not.” What does she want me to say? What do I want to say? “Are you okay?”

  “I’m great,” Katie said. She sounded like she meant it.

  “Really? Because —”

  She cut him off with an exasperated noise. “Why is that so hard to understand?”

  “Because you weren’t okay when you left. Because I’m not now. Because my kids won yesterday and all I wanted to do was get in a car and get to you.”

  He could hear Katie’s sharp inhale. “But you decided that would be a creepy, shitty, stalkerish thing to do?”

  “Yeah. Of course. Christ. I’m not trying to make your life harder.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Now that I’ve stopped being pissed at you all the time —”

  “I’m sorry about New York,” she cut in.

  Brendan could hear the nervous edge in her voice, could imagine how she worried her fingers together. She always did that when she was afraid she had disappointed him. He didn’t want to ignore that, but right now, he had to. Put your own oxygen mask on first, he told himself sternly.

  “Now that I’ve stopped being pissed at you all the time,” he repeated, needing to work up the courage to say the next, horrible, necessary words, “I want this shit between us to be over. Once and for all. Officially.”

  A pause. A breath. “You’re going to break up with me over the phone?” she asked incredulously.

  He stammered. How could Katie give him so much hope and be so utterly dire about their future all at the same time. “I ... uh ... what?!”

  “You can’t break up with me; we’re not together,” she said in a rush.

  That wasn’t any clearer. Brendan imagined her tossing her ponytail as if she didn’t care. But he knew she did. There was no way she couldn’t. Even if a permanent, official end to all that they had shared was what they both wanted. Because if she hadn’t cared on some messy, complicated level, she wouldn’t have run three months ago.

  “Okay, but we seriously need to talk. Preferably in person, I guess.”

  “You can’t drive to Wisconsin to break up with me.”

  “Would you stop saying ‘break up?’ You’re freaking me out and making this more complicated. Also, seriously, would I do that?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  Brendan exhaled. “Look, can I come see you or not?”

  “I’m not letting you drive fifteen hours so we can have an awkward coffee while gossipy strangers stare at us.”

  That didn’t appeal to Brendan, either. “I’ll come to the farm, and when we’re sick of each other — whether that takes an hour or a day or ... whatever — I’m sure my parents will be glad to see me.”

  “Really?”

  “They do like me, yes.”

  “That’s not what I meant.” She sounded incredulous. That was fair. The farm, whenever he’d been there had unnerved him. He’d been boorish and had acted like Katie should hate it too. Of course, she never had. She had every right to set this as a test.

  “Yes, I’ll come to the farm,” he said clearly.

  Katie hummed like she was considering it. But Brendan could tell that was a performance. Whatever her answer, he was nearly sure he would be getting in his car. And soon.

  “All right,” she said. “Pack a bag, get ready to work, and be excited for cow time.”

  Chapter 15

  THE MORNING AFTER BRENDAN Called Katie and Katie Finally Called Him Back

  Star Prairie, WI

  KATIE WOKE UP AT THREE-forty-five, rolled over, turned the alarm on her phone off, and flopped back down on her pillows. As always, she’d woken up automatically fifteen minutes before she’d actually had to. She’d spent years travelling the world for competition and glory, but this — a few extra minutes in bed in her room at her family’s farmhouse — was what felt like luxury.

  Her room didn’t look much different from how it had when she was a teenager. The walls were the same eggshell white, the carpet the same dark green. The trim had been newly scraped and re-stained in another improvement made by her uncle Jesse. It was now a deep brown that showed off the grain of the wood. The curtains, made years ago by Katie’s mom out of worn bedsheets, were light blue. The furniture — the bed, the dresser, and the little vanity under the dormer window — had been in the family for generations. Jesse had offered to re-finish those too, but Katie had turned him down. She liked the worn edges and the pale rings on the wood from where she’d left water glasses as a child.

  Here in this room with the sky still dark outside the windows, the call with Brendan last night felt like a missive from another world, tenuous and perhaps frightening. But whether that was good or bad, she didn’t know. Her heart had leapt to see Brendan’s name flashing across her phone screen, but just as quickly it had clenched and sagged in misery. He’d called so many times the first week or two after she’d left him in New York. She’d never picked up and never listened to any of his voicemails. Eventually, he had stopped calling. Why on earth he would be reaching out now, except to make one more attempt to yell at her for her disastrous choices, she didn’t know.

  But he hadn’t yelled. He’d been sad and uncertain and, as he so often was, so damn earnest. Now he was coming to visit. After twenty years of friendship and whatever else they were to each other, Brendan was still something she did not understand — ferocious, feral, patient, and too kind. She was finally going to have to deal with him off the ice, in the real world. That was new. And terrifying.

  What would Brendan think of the farm? Of who she was now? What about her knee? Or how she’d abandoned him? Katie wanted things to be okay between them, but if they couldn’t get there, that would probably be her fault — for running away, for ignoring his attempts at communication for so long, and for not being honest.

  Her knee was, unsurprisingly, no better than it had been when she left New York City. In some ways, also unsurprisingly, it was worse. Her local doctor had confirmed that surgery was unavoidable, and every day was a day closer to absolutely needing to have that done. She just couldn’t quite bring herself to pull the trigger. In the meanwhile, she was doing physical therapy in hopes of buying herself time.

  Katie glanced at her phone; her moment of laziness was up. She climbed out of bed, straightened the covers, and arranged her pillows. Her mind churned as she pulled on a pair of jeans with the knees almost worn out and a sweatshirt that had been washed so many times the original color was in doubt. It might have been Brendan’s; she couldn’t remember. It had been here, in her dresser, waiting for her when she’d come home.

  What are we going to talk about? Katie wondered as she jogged down the stairs to find Rob in the kitchen making coffee. She and Brendan didn’t have skating in common anymore. He was working with his skaters. She was milking cows. There was a lot to be said for the monotonous, peaceful rhythm of life on the farm. It was about as far from life on the competition circuit as it could be, and Katie loved it. Brendan didn’t; he’d shown that before.

  But still he was coming to visit.

  SHE COULDN’T SHAKE her distraction as she went through the usually soothing routine of the morning chores. Her mood must have shown. Halfway through milking, Jesse glanced
over at her from where they were disinfecting the cows with iodine.

  “What’s going on with you?”

  “Nothing.” Katie knew she sounded like an incompetent teen trying to avoid trouble, but what could she possibly say? Jesse had often been less judgmental of her and Brendan’s tumultuous relationship than the rest of her family, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to roll his eyes at the latest installment in the drama. Katie did, however, suppose she should warn her family about an incoming house guest.

  “Mhmmm.” Jesse looked suspicious and unlikely to let his inquiry drop. He could be as determined as Katie and as ambitious in his chosen profession. Which was probably one of the reasons they got along so well. “You’re not as good an actress as all those skating commentators say. So ’fess up before I ask again in front of Rob and your mother.”

  Katie reassessed how much she liked Jesse. He would absolutely carry through on that threat. She pulled a handful of freshly laundered cloths out of their bin to wipe down the cows with. “Brendan called.”

  “How did that go?” he asked mildly.

  “He’s coming to visit.”

  “Is he now?” Jesse looked surprised at that. “Not that we don’t have room, but ....”

  Katie turned towards the cows so she didn’t have to look at Jesse. “He said we needed to deal with our mess once and for all.”

  “And you said?”

  “That he wasn’t allowed to break up with me on the phone.”

  “Wait.” She could feel Jesse staring at her. “Were you —”

  “No,” Katie said sharply. “We were dancing around it. Or I was. Or something. I don’t know.” She took a shuddering breath. “I also don’t know what I want or why he’s coming or where we stand. I just know this is it. If we can’t make things work now, I’ll never have him in my life again. And I don’t want you to give me any advice, please, because then I’ll be pissed and confused about you too.”

  “Okay. That’s fine.” Katie finally dared to look over at him, but he was studiously attaching a milker to a cow. “We’ll keep pretending like your life is normal.”