Rocking Thin Ice

by Z. Allora

  Skipping through most of the women’s competition, he did slow down for Tanya Maya’s boobs ’cause they were lovely. She is stacked.

  When he finished ogling Tanya, he fast-forwarded to the men’s competition. Where is he?

  Drake skimmed through the first four male skaters. They were too overly alpha. None fit the bill. He definitely had a type when it came to guys, and Blaze Parker embodied it. He liked guys who were pretty but strong, with long, toned limbs and rounded asses. Blaze’s light brown hair was chin-length and long enough to grab on to. But it was the air of defiance—that Blaze could put anyone in their place—that really turned Drake’s crank.

  A close-up on Blaze’s face let Drake catch the glint of determination in Blaze’s hazel eyes and made Drake shiver with anticipation.

  On Drake’s phone, Blaze Parker skated to the rink’s center. He wore sexy emo eyeliner and dark shadow on his lids, making his eyes look huge. When he lowered his head, his hair fell over his face like a curtain. His sparkly dark purple outfit clung to his body like a second skin.

  Good God. Drake’s heart raced. Seeing Blaze’s Instagram pictures of his dog and drawings of dragons were cool, but nothing beat seeing him on the ice.

  The music started. Blaze went into his first spin, and tails of pink and lavender unfurled from his costume’s waist as he twirled. Why purple and pink silk fabric equated to sexy didn’t matter in Drake’s head—they just were.

  Drake drank in each twist and turn as Blaze nailed every jump. God, the determined way his muscles worked so he could take flight enthralled Drake.

  Damn, they were only two years apart, but the way Blaze moved suggested he had centuries more experience.

  Last year Drake had a girlfriend for about three weeks. They had done some stuff but not much. Two months ago, he hooked up with a girl at a party, but she went to a different school, and he hadn’t seen her since. Maybe he should have texted her?

  Look at Blaze Parker’s ass! He rubbed the front of his jeans with impatience. Pausing the video, he kicked off his pants and climbed back onto the bed to utilize the video.

  THE NEXT day in the school cafeteria, Drake decided to come out to his friends at lunch. “Hey, it’s no big deal or anything, but I’m bi. I just wanted you to know.”

  “You’re like Steward—I mean, you know, that weirdo in physics?” Dixon Fox, one of the guys Drake had known since grade school, could be all right, but sometimes idiot was the best word to describe him.

  “Steward Fudson, who is probably going to be our class valedictorian?” Drake asked.

  “Yeah, I guess. Whatever, man. You’re gay like him?” Yet again, Dixon spoke before he thought.

  “Don’t out people, asshole,” Taylor growled.

  “What? Everyone knows.” Dixon looked at those sitting around the table.

  “Whatever. May karma pay you a visit.” Taylor waved him off and took some deep breaths.

  “Nothing wrong with being gay, but I’m bisexual,” Drake clarified.

  “So gay,” Dixon insisted like a dumbass.

  “The word bi is key to his statement,” Taylor bit out. He glanced around, daring anyone to challenge him.

  Dixon backed away from Taylor. “Okay, down, boy. Down.”

  “Did you just call me boy?” Taylor geared up to kick his ass.

  Fuck, Dixon must be a moron. Did the idiot not know that was a racial slur? Drake wrapped an arm around Taylor to keep him in his seat. “No need, man. Not worth it.”

  “Fine.” Taylor shrugged off Drake’s restraining grip.

  Dixon shook his head. “Bi is fine and all, but if you’re planning to be a guitar player in an actual band, you should really only be seen with the girls.”

  Was Dixon suggesting Drake stay in the damned closet?

  “What a stupid fu—” Taylor growled.

  Drake grabbed Taylor in another restraining embrace. “Don’t trouble yourself, Tay. Besides, Piper’s looking your way.”

  Would Piper’s smile be enough to disengage Taylor’s attack mode?

  Taylor immediately stopped trying to pound on Dixon and grinned back across the lunchroom at the girl with the lovely smile.

  Piper was hot.

  Yeah, Drake was definitely bi.

  Chapter 1

  Five years later…

  BLAZE SLIPPED in his earbuds and listened to “Nobody but You” by Midnight Shadow as he went through his precompetition stretches. The lyrics weaved their way into his heart, and the driving guitar fed his soul.

  Ha! That was ridiculous, but the words kept getting embedded in him, making him wonder what he was missing. Whatever. He had started following Drake Keys on social media, and the guy was all kinds of hot—a real rock-star pinup, with his guitar strung low at his hips.

  When the song drew to a close, Blaze pushed down the emotions that tried to surface, and tuned into the skating competition’s broadcast. His coach would kill him, but he wanted to hear what the announcers were saying as he continued his warm-up. He extended his arms as he listened.

  “The bitter rivalry between twenty-seven-year-old Trent Richards and twenty-five-year-old Blaze Parker might be settled here tonight on this very ice. Seven years ago, they were rink mates, and even shared a coach. I’ve heard it said they now care more about beating each other than securing a spot on the men’s Olympic team.” The ex-Olympic ice dance champion turned announcer didn’t bother to keep the titillation out of his voice.

  His ice dancing partner, and now co-announcer, tsked. “Though that’s just hearsay. We’d understand if it were true, after everything that happened between them. Very sad.”

  Blaze rolled his eyes as he jogged in place. Yeah, sad…. Rub salt in the open gashes caused by Trent’s betrayal.

  It happened seven years ago, but every sharp and painful detail had etched itself into his brain like the drama went down yesterday. He had been such an idiot.

  He couldn’t believe he’d gotten his first invitation to a party thrown by the other skaters. Maybe they were finally accepting him. But even better, Trent would be there.

  During the party, Blaze had sat mostly by himself in a chair off to one corner as the others talked in little groups scattered around the room. He felt like an outsider, observing them, until Trent approached him. “You want to go someplace and… talk?”

  Trent’s invitation had Blaze tripping up the stairs after him like an eager puppy.

  There wasn’t much talking. Trent unzipped his pants and asked, “So, Blaze, do you spit or swallow?”

  “I gargle. Want to see?” Blaze tried to be bold yet graceful as he dropped to his knees. He was thrilled to have the guy he was half in love with offer him exactly what he wanted to do.

  Even now, mortification swamped him. He hadn’t had much experience, but he’d idolized Trent since he was ten, so he never even considered Trent didn’t feel the same way.

  Rooted in his brain was how calmly his older brother, Luke, took the fact that Blaze had become infamous at eighteen. Trent and his friends had posted the G-rated parts of the hidden video they had taken, ensuring Trent remained anonymous but Blaze’s stupid comment could be heard, and the bobbing of his head clearly implied everything that happened. As much as Blaze missed his parents, he was grateful they hadn’t been alive to see him humiliated in such a way.

  His coach had already been on him about being too gay. Blaze had tried being more masculine. He wanted to please his coach and the judges, he really did, but that simply wasn’t him. His scores suffered for his inability to pretend to be someone he wasn’t.

  The announcer broke into Blaze’s trip down Bullshit Lane.

  “For the audience not in the know… a compromising video resulted in Blaze Parker losing his coach and forced him to take a hiatus from skating competition.” No one could miss the smirk in the guy’s voice or the fact he didn’t place any of the blame on the poster of the video. Somehow when people figured out it was Trent, he had been cast as the injured party
by having slutty Blaze in his sphere.

  Maybe Blaze should have been over the mortifying event by now, but he had lost everything. His coach dropped him, his friends wouldn’t talk to him, and the cruelty at school had become so intolerable that he left before graduation. He took the GED. His brother, who had taken care of Blaze since their parents died, made yet another sacrifice for him and took a promotion he hadn’t wanted so they could move away from the situation Blaze’s stupidity had created.

  Basically, Blaze had been forced to start from scratch in Safe Haven, Colorado, while Trent got sympathy and understanding.

  Granted, the new town had scored high on being LGBTQIA friendly, had a skating rink and several Olympic-level coaches, but to be victimized and then have to suffer all the consequences ate at him.

  The female announcer lowered her voice and said, “Though Anna Orlov took him on, and over the last seven years, he has remade himself.”

  “I wonder how much she has to do with Blaze’s image.”

  “All of it,” Blaze muttered to himself.

  His coach had stopped him from feeding the social media trolls and living down to expectations. She taught him how to respect and develop Blaze Parker as a brand. After a couple of years, people associated him with skating, his tiny dog, silly happy memes, and dragons—not blowing a bastard—but still the injustice ate at him.

  “Ladies and gentleman, Trent Richards is taking the ice.”

  It wasn’t lost on Blaze that much of his success with skating had been partially due to the move and getting Anna on his team. Maybe some people could have gotten over what happened, but he couldn’t seem to get past it. His fury coated his exposed weaknesses with vengeance.

  Anna stepped in front of him and yanked the earbuds out of his ears. He paused only for a moment, then went back to his warm-up routine. “Why are you listening to this nonsense?”

  Several of the other skaters stopped and glanced in his direction.

  Foiled again, though he gave her his wide-eyed “I’m innocent” look. Apparently the expression didn’t work on her as well as it did on his brother.

  “Just keeping you on your toes,” he said, then sighed.

  Anna pointed to his costume. “I thought we decided you’d wear the red.”

  He smiled and dusted off his all-black costume—even his fingerless gloves were a mesh black. It had taken him forever to crochet them, but one of the kindly seamstresses in town had taken him under her wing and given him some assistance. “You decided you wanted me to wear red. I decided since I was the one wearing it, I’d go with my choice.”

  She shook her head and groaned. “Why do you always wear black? Is it to mourn the death of my patience?”

  Blaze needed to stop relieving his competition stress by trying to bug her. But habits die hard. Giving her a suitable glare, he snarked, “No, the demise of mine.”

  Anna chuckled and yanked him into a hug.

  He kissed both of her cheeks and slid on his skates. “I found new music.”

  “Did you?”

  Blaze cued the song on his phone and handed her the earbuds. “Here, listen.”

  He tied on his skates and did some bends while he studied her reaction. Well, she didn’t hate the music; she listened to the entire song.

  She gave him a nod. “Decent. What is this music?”

  After shrugging into the new rainbow-colored sequined crop jacket he’d worked on for weeks, he did a slow spin. “See, my costume’s not all black.”

  She fussed with his asymmetric chin-length hair like the strands had done her wrong. “There. You are stunning. Now tell me about the song?”

  “It’s ‘Nobody but You’ by Midnight Shadow.”

  “Never heard of them. Good sound. They’re different, like you,” she mused, more to herself than to him.

  “They’re a band that has been touring with my brother’s favorite band, Velvet Touch.” Luke had dragged him to the concert when they played in Denver a couple of months ago.

  She guided him to the hallway. “You’re almost up. I’ll see if you can use the music in the future.”

  Future… aka the Olympics. She refused to name the games for fear of jinxing him.

  He grinned. “Thanks. I’ll gladly let you deal with all the nonsense of musical rights and usage, as usual.”

  When he stood at the ice and looked around the stands filled with people, he found several waving signs and plushie dragons. The show of support never failed to make him feel wanted.

  Anna pocketed his phone and tugged on her gloves. “I’ll see you on the other side.”

  He gave her a nod and pulled off his skate guards.

  During practice, he could feel the coldness of the rink, but during a competition, he burned with energy. The tension he chose to name as excitement kept his body close to boiling.

  As Blaze stood to the side of the entrance, Trent stopped at the boards near him, the crowd still going wild for the ass clown.

  Why come over to this side of the rink? “Trent, shouldn’t you be on the other side at the kiss and cry? Or in your case, the crying place?”

  Trent continued to blow kisses at his fans but took the time to lean toward Blaze with a smirk. “Looks like I’m going to fuck your ass tonight, Blaze. I hope you brought lube.” Then he skated off.

  Blaze swallowed his rage.

  Why had he made that stupid bet? How could he possibly think winning this bet would allow him to move on? The whole thing was insane, but his mouth got in front of him, and before he could call back the words, the asshole had accepted. Though Blaze had no plans of losing and he fully expected Trent to back out.

  “We’ll see,” Blaze muttered, waiting for the idiot to clear the ice.

  He stepped onto the ice and felt everything start to change.

  Gliding across the rink, Blaze felt emboldened by his fury, which funneled into determination, and he inhaled the brisk air laced with popcorn, soda, and the smell of possibility. This was destiny.

  He stretched his arms out and did a slow circle on the ice. Luke and Anna always teased him that he marked his territory the same way his puppy did. In a way, he did. He swayed his hips to skate to the middle of the ice, giving the crowd languid movements to refocus all their attention onto him.

  Once in the center, he spun to a stop and went into a stance with hands behind his back. The audience hushed.

  Every second he was on the ice had been a fight, and everything boiled down to these moments of battle. Like all athletes, he fought his body to push past limitations, and he usually won the daily battle. The fight against expectations wasn’t always an easy win.

  Not even “butching it up,” as his first coach recommended, had worked, because his delicate, more feminine features weren’t something he could change. The fact misogyny is one of the factors that contribute to homophobia hadn’t been lost on him, but instead of addressing it head-on, he fought the ugliness by not giving people the opportunity to invalidate him.

  The throbbing guitar of “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” blared over the ice, filling him. Pat Benatar’s song had become his theme song through the years, and a dare to the Skating Federation. However, when you issued this kind of invitation, you had to back that with skill and perfection.

  He might look breakable, but he’d show the audience his core had been forged of titanium from the hell he’d gone through. The song got everyone clapping while he danced into his first quad and then his second. The driving ’80s backbeat fit his jump-heavy program.

  The lyrics of the song fed his intentions. He’d dealt with feeling like a loser for too long, and he was done. The time had come to retrieve what Trent had taken from him.

  Hard-rocking lyrics demanded he take back his power as he soared over the ice and into a triple. So unless Trent had left every bit of himself on the ice… this competition would be Blaze’s. No one and nothing would take this away from him.

  He lost himself in the music, moving his body and allowing
muscle memory to take over. The culmination of years filled with hurt and anger morphed into triple axels and lutzes that would ensure his victory.

  Winning this competition and dealing with Trent would finally allow him to break free of the chains that had kept him bound to his past mortification and feelings of unworthiness. He’d be able to move beyond Trent and stupid decisions—although Anna would point out, not if Blaze kept making dumbass decisions.

  What was I thinking with this bet?

  Focus!

  At the halfway point, Benatar’s fighting words transmuted into the slower “We Are the Champions” by Queen. Blaze needed to live the music. The transition worked and allowed him a few seconds to breathe. He skated by the judges mentally, singing how he had paid his dues….

  Fuck. He gave more than his fair share. The judges, in turn, lowered his score whenever they could get away with the travesty, even the ones not from openly homophobic countries. It was the reason he’d worked incredibly hard to seek perfection, because anything else wouldn’t count.

  The pinging keys of the piano echoed through the rink, paving the way for some intricate footwork. Queen’s music allowed him to use his more feminine movements as a foil, making his next set of jumps seem that much more unexpected and powerful. He’d fuck expectations of the feminine being weak as often as he could.

  Freddie Mercury sang how he’d committed no crime. Blaze gained speed, thinking about his biggest mistake. How many times would he be punished for simply giving head to someone he’d liked?

  Fury at needing to prove he wasn’t the hurt kid they’d tried to shame out of competition attempted to invade him. He crushed the emotions and accessed the control that drove him forward.

  The music ramped to a climax, and all the way, Blaze did lutzes, salchows, toe loops, triple axels, and ended in a motherfucking quad. All in the second half of the program… because he could.

  The crowd lost their minds and screamed for him. When Freddie sang about taking bows, Blaze glided past the judges, showing them more respect than most of them ever showed him.