Quadruple Flip

Chapter 2

Chapter 2It was early November and Tom Alan Baranowski had landed in New York only a couple of hours ago. He’d taken a train from the airport, then a cab from the train station, all by himself. It felt odd to travel alone, without Erika and his sensei Nobuo, his Otousan.

He stood in the back of Irina Mischen’s practice rink in Lake Placid eavesdropping—but not on purpose; he just couldn’t make up his mind whether to go in or turn around and go out. Tom Alan wasn’t particularly good at making decisions—big or small.

Watching the short, handsome ice dancer pace, he decided even Milo Fisher’s pacing was enchanting. Milo had his cell on speaker, holding it down in front of him instead of at his ear.

“No, Dad, I’m not really planning on coming over anytime soon.”

“Bugger! Why not?” Milo’s father asked.

“I’m training,” Milo said. “Jenn’ll be back—”

Milo’s father cut his son off. “There’s something you should know.”

“Bollocks, Pops.” Milo sighed. “What have you done now? Trying to ruin someone else’s life for your own gain again?” Milo asked. “No,” he said, shaking his head, wild, cocoa curls bouncing. “Forget it. Don’t tell me. I bloody well don’t want to know. Whatever you’ve done, you’re on your own.” He went for the Off button on his phone.

“Don’t hang up,” his father begged, as if sensing the call was coming to an end. “I’m in hospital. I might…Bugger! They don’t know…I’m undergoing a series of tests. This could be the end. It’s right serious. If it is…”

Milo rolled his espresso-colored eyes. “It’s too early in the morning for this drivel, Pops. I can’t…” Then Milo seemed to soften. “What kind of tests?” he asked.

“My heart,” his father answered. “It’s been wonky a bit…”

“Wonky? Like pain?”

“I get out of breath at the slightest exertion.”

“Oh. You are right fat now, aren’t you? Okay, that was not the nicest thing to say. I mean,” Milo amended, “if you lost some weight, it would not be a bad thing. It would help whatever is wrong, wouldn’t it?”

“Jeez, I’m working on it, kid,” the Brit on the other end huffed. “It’s not bloody easy.”

“Okay. Calm down.” Fisher breathed in and out. “I’m sorry. And yelling is probably not good for you either. Tell me what happened.”

“I was banging this punk kid, all green hair and safety pins for earrings, and maybe it was just the ball gag, but I got all winded and scared and I lost my—”

“Oh, sod off, Pops. I’m thrilled you’re enjoying your newfound homosexual freedom,” Milo said sarcastically, “but I so don’t need those kinds of details.”

A moment of silence lasted more than twenty seconds. “I can maybe fly out before the holidays,” Milo offered. “Training, Grand Prix Final…It’s in Japan…I don’t know. Jenn is out a couple of weeks, but she’ll be back, no problem. I just don’t know.”

“Yeah.” Fisher’s father sounded genuinely disappointed. “You were great in Canada and Skate America.”

Milo and Jenn had medaled at both, now headed to the Grand Prix Final.

“You watched?” Milo seemed surprised.

“Of course, I watched. I always watch.”

“I never knew.”

“You’re good,” his genuinely proud and suddenly remorseful-sounding father said. “I have always been proud of you for what you do. I…I definitely should have said it more.”

“Um, thanks, Dad,” Milo said.

“You’re welcome, son.”

Milo tugged at his wild mane. “I’ll call. Okay? We can Skype. Keep me posted. I mean if it’s bad…If…Well, keep me posted. Okay, Pops?”

“Sure. We’ll know more by this time tomorrow. I’ll ring you, say about half seven in the evening your time.”

“Cool. Call me. Or I’ll call you.”

“Sounds good.”

“Good luck…Dad.” Milo blew out a sigh after ending the call, then threw his head back and shook it, setting the fronds of brown that topped it bouncing like a palm tree in a late-summer Florida hurricane. Tom Alan watched the diminutive ice dancer grab hold of his tank top, yank it from the bottom up over his face, and howl loudly and forcefully into it. “Aaaooww-rrrrr!”

Both startling and intriguing, the sound and Fisher’s hairy torso also brought to mind a werewolf in a homoerotic movie trilogy Tom Alan liked. He wasn’t yet aware how the growl that echoed off the ice and concrete in the empty arena summed up the complicated feelings Milo had toward his ailing old man. He only knew it was kind of hot.

When he found Irina Mischen standing beside him, Tom Alan tried to win his new artistry coach over with humor. “I was just gonna go with ‘Hi!’ Do you think I should maybe howl back?”

“Hi will do fine,” Mrs. Mischen said softly. “Good morning, Milo.” That, she practically yelled.

“Huh?” Milo pulled his shirt away from his face and gazed up at the gargantuan, blond standing beside his coach.

Tom Alan continued to look over the petite British beast with the out-of-control hairstyle as well. They were acquaintances from figure skating circles, but since Tom Alan lived in Japan, and Milo now spent most of his time in the US, they didn’t know each other well. He had never really seen Milo out of costume. He’d never seen him unshaven and uncoiffed. Well, uncoiffed to the extent he currently was, anyway. He’d certainly never seen his bare torso—all-white skin and dark fur—or his bare legs, all muscles and hair. He’d never been so close to him either—close enough to touch him or to take in his natural scent once Milo approached. Mmm.

“Milo, this is Thomas Baranowski.”

His last name sounded funny when Irina Mischen said it. “Tom Alan,” he amended.

“This is Tom Alan What’s-it?” Milo still held up his shirt, still showing off his flat, pale, hairy gut. “You are?” He looked Tom Alan up and down. “Blow me!”

Tom Alan’s eyes grew wide. “Um…What?”

“It’s an expression of surprise, now, isn’t it? Sometimes I’m all Brit. You’ll get used to that.” Milo kept talking. “You’re a big bloke, aren’t you? Stonking for a skater, was what I was thinking. Mostly.” He smiled. “I’m Booger.” Milo let his shirt fall back into place and extended his right hand.

“Why?” Tom Alan asked—of the nickname, not so much in protest of Fisher covering himself. Although…

The guy was hot on a TV monitor. He was hotter from a distance as they passed at various events. Two feet away, with four of five senses working—his handsomeness, the accent, his aroma, his hand in Tom Alan’s—Milo Fisher was smoldering!

“That’s what my mates call me. Booger,” Milo said, sounding more British by the moment.

Tom Alan looked at Milo’s nose, then quickly averted his gaze. “Why?” he repeated.

“That’s a story you’ve got to earn.” Milo grinned, shaking Tom Alan’s hand.

Despite the chilly temps inside the practice rink, Milo wore short shorts, a sleeveless T-shirt, and kneepads in case of falls, along with his skates. He had rock-hard, sculpted inner and outer thighs, calves that could hammer a nail, and biceps that looked like they might go with a body way taller and broader. A dark n****e played peekaboo, coming to light every now and then as he fidgeted. It seemed as if Milo Fisher hardly ever stood still—maybe because he was on the verge of hypothermia with so much exposed flesh, or maybe that was just his way. There was definitely something primitive about him, even when not roaring like an animal. It was that abandon, combined in just the right amount with grace and style, that made Milo and his partner Jennifer Brand so enchanting on the ice.

Tom Alan, on the other hand, hunched and slouched as if he was always the tallest kid in class and had spent his childhood trying to hide it. “Stand up tall. Straight and proud” was Irina Mischen’s first order of the day, her Eastern European accent all business. Not a smile crossed her lips in the twenty minutes Tom Alan had known her. “You must project elegance,” she reminded him, right on the spot. “Carry it off the ice, so it will follow you when on it.”

“If this Tom Alan What’s-His-Name has any elegance at all, Mrs. Mischen,” Milo said lightly, “then he’s hiding it bloody well.”

“Sorry,” Tom Alan said.

“Pardon me?”

Tom Alan mumbled, too. “Sorry…um, Boo…ger.” He put his hands in his pockets—not because they were cold but because he was painfully shy with new people, particularly cute men.

“Well, it was just a joke now, wasn’t it?” Milo said—or asked—Tom Alan wasn’t sure.

“And it is why we are here,” Mischen stated. “So some of you, Milo, can rub off on him.”

Unlike Milo, Tom Alan was dressed as if ready for an arctic expedition. Heather-gray sweats—with a noticeable bulge just below the waist he caught Milo noticing—a long-sleeved green T-shirt under a short-sleeved burgundy T-shirt, with another short-sleeved white T-shirt beneath both. He even wore a ski hat—orange-black-and-gray striped. Despite all those layers, it felt as if unshy, homosexual Milo Fisher had stripped the quad-throwing dude down to nada in his mind. His appraisal showed in his up-and-down squint, and his approval—he licked his lips—made Tom Alan slouch some more.

“Straight!” Mrs. Mischen scolded.

“So, you’re the guy I’m partnering with, then?” Milo asked. “While our regulars recover?” Though his look may have said “interested,” his tone said, “why me!”

“I guess,” Tom Alan said. He thought about adding one more “Sorry.”

Erika had a concussion. She had also bruised her hip. She’d been off the ice almost a week already and would probably be off at least another two. It would give the pair only one week to practice before the Grand Prix final, if they were included. The best they could hope for, with their gold at Skate America and being forced to withdraw from Skate Canada, was to become an alternate. Even then, some other team would have to pull out. It was possible, but unlikely.

They’d made a splash with the media, for sure. The accident was all over the news. They’d made a name for themselves among figure skating watchers—just not the judges.

Jennifer’s injury was less serious. She had a simple muscle strain, according to Milo. Still, she’d been forced to take things easy for a while.

“Do you feel you have any artistry at all when you skate, Thomas?” Mischen, a former figure skating medalist herself, circled Tom Alan like a general.

“I guess,” he answered.

“You guess?” Mrs. Mischen asked sternly. “You do not know?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tom Alan said.

“‘Yes, ma’am’ what, Thomas?”

“Yes, ma’am…ma’am?” Poor Tom Alan was befuddled.

Milo barked a quick laugh. Watching Irina Mischen bust someone else’s balls was apparently amusing.

Mrs. Mischen could hardly hold back her own smile. “Your artistry is near nonexistent,” she said.

“Oh. Yes, ma’am.” Tom Alan hung his head, as if lack of artistry was akin to being caught m**********g in the public library. “It is.”

* * * *

It had seemed a masterful plan. In the summer before the Olympic Games, changing coaches became as common as changing socks. Skaters turned into nomads, training here and there for small sections of time to improve every detail of their performance. In an era when even the slightest movement could raise or lower a score, where one-one-hundredth of a point could be the difference between gold and silver, flying across the globe to work on one’s weaknesses was necessary. Milo and Jennifer had made a permanent switch, coming to the States to work with Mischen, and, according to what Mischen told Nobuo, five months in, they couldn’t be happier. Conversely, Tom Alan had been there twenty-seven minutes and suddenly couldn’t wait to get back to Japan.

* * * *

“I’m going to put on something classical,” Mrs. Mischen stated. “I want you to improvise movement.”

“Improvise?” He knew the definition, but the concept eluded him.

“Feel it. Let it command you. Allow the music to come through your positions, allow your expression to be an extension of the melody.”

“Oh.”

He still didn’t get it.

Tom Alan removed his neon-yellow skate guards anyway and stroked his way to center ice. “Swan Lake.” At least he recognized the tune. Maybe that would help.

It didn’t. Irina Mischen’s headshake said it all—and then she said it aloud, “What have I gotten myself into?”