Gold Medal Summer (10 page)

And I do.

Maybe the time for this — this Tanner and me thing — isn't now, no matter how much I like him, and no matter how much I want to kiss him again. Maybe some day, but not today, and definitely not if I want to win gold at Regionals and go on to Nationals.

And I want that too, more than anything else in the world.

More than hanging out with boys at a diner for sure.

Maybe even more than kissing Tanner.

Boyfriends are for other girls my age, not gymnasts. Not serious ones, at least.

Not me.

After we pay the check and say good-bye to Alex and Tommy, Tanner and I are alone again, standing on the sidewalk outside the diner.

“So …” he says with a smile. “What do you want to do now?”

A part of me, a
really
big part, screams
Kiss you!

But I don't say this. I can't. Not even a hint of it.

Be strong, Joey.

I hesitate. Then I take a deep breath and say it. “Tanner, I had a really good time with you tonight, but I can't hang out anymore.”

His smile disappears. “Do you mean you can't hang out anymore
tonight
, or ever?”

I close my eyes so I don't have to look at him while I do this, so I don't lose my nerve. “I
so
want to see you, like, every day. But I can't. I shouldn't. Not now, at least. Maybe after Regionals,” I add, trying to make the situation better, even though I'm not sure that after Regionals, my life and priorities will somehow magically be different than they are now.

“But what if —” Tanner tries.

I open my eyes. I can't let him finish. “This is just the way things are right now. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.”

“Me too.”

“As much as I want to be like some normal girl, I
have
to focus on gymnastics. Gymnastics is a full-time job.”

Tanner looks away. Moves aside.

“Bye, Joey,” he says.

“Bye, Tanner,” I whisper.

I lean forward and give him a quick kiss on the cheek.

And then begin the long walk home.

Alone.

Mom
is the only one home when I get there.

“I'm out back,” she calls when she hears the front door slam. “Come and say hello.”

Having a chat with my mother is
not
what I feel like doing right now.

“Joey?”

Fine. “I'm coming.”

I do my best to push thoughts of Tanner from my mind, replacing them with the memory of Sarah's stunned face earlier today after seeing my new moves on beam. This perks me up. A little. But only a little.

“Hi, Mom,” I say, walking across the deck. She's lounging by the pool, tiny splotches of barium yellow dotting her arms. Maybe she's been painting suns today. I head down the stairs and join her on a lounge chair. The water sparkles and shifts, the blue along the bottom as blue as the evening sky. Being here reminds me of my perfect night with Tanner.

Ugh.

My mother puts her magazine down and shades her eyes against the setting sun, staring at me hard. “Are you okay?”

Am I? “Yes,” I say. “I think so.”

She cocks her head, gets that concerned-mom look on her face. “You only think so?”

I shrug.

She hesitates. “Do you want to talk about it?”

I shrug again.

She waits.

Can I talk to my mother about Tanner? Should I? Is that crazy?

She's still waiting.

Okay. “It's complicated, Mom.”

“I can handle complicated.”

I take a deep breath. “It has to do with Tanner.”

Immediately, she smiles. “Oooh, tell me.”

All the air comes out of me. “It's not like that,” I say and before she can cut in, I go on. “I had to make a really difficult decision. You know … between Tanner and gymnastics.”

“And?” The hope in her voice is obvious. She votes Tanner.

I look at her, annoyed. “I chose
gymnastics
. Because boys and gymnastics don't mix. And like Julia said, the boys will still be around in a few years, but gymnastics doesn't wait.”

Mom frowns. “Your sister told you that?”

“Yes. And she's right. Gymnastics is everything to me right now.
Everything
,” I say in one big rush. “I can't give it up for a boy. No matter who the boy is.”

Then I stop. My mother has gone back to her magazine, automatically tuning out the minute I say how devoted I am to gymnastics, like she can't deal even with hearing about it.

“Mom?”

“Hmm?”

“Are you listening?”

“Of course,” she says.

But she's not. “I thought you wanted to hear what I had to say. That you wanted to talk!” My voice is getting louder. She doesn't respond. “Mom!” I shout. “I was talking to you! You said you could handle complicated!”

“I'm sorry, sweetheart,” she says, looking up again from the page. She sighs. “I just zoned out for a minute. Let's start again. Tell me what I missed.”

“Everything, Mom,” I say. “You miss
everything
.”

That's what comes out of my mouth, and it sounds weightier than I originally intend. But given the fact that this is turning out to be the day of drama, I may as well get it all out, since tomorrow I need to get back to focusing on winning at Regionals. Period. No other distractions allowed.

She closes the magazine and places it on the table next to her, looking worried again. I have her attention. “What do you mean by that, Joey?”

“I know that Julia's time as a gymnast wore you and Dad out. I know that it was difficult to stick by her day after day, win or lose —”

“— or fall or injury or night of weeping,” she interjects.

“Let me finish!” I shout, shocking even myself with such passion.

Mom opens her mouth, then thinks better of whatever she was going to say.

“I'm
your
daughter too,
and
I'm a
gymnast
. Like it or not. Falls and injuries and tears or not. Medals or not. The fact that you and Dad refuse to come see me compete bothers me more than I've ever said. It makes me hurt, that my own mother and father can't get up the guts to even
watch
. You realize that you don't know me at all, right? That you're abandoning me to do this alone? That you guys are the only parents who don't show? Do you realize you keep letting me down? Do you know all of this? Because I need you to. I need you to hear me.”

Tears well in my eyes. I don't think I knew until this moment how angry I've been at my parents. Gymnastics may require sacrifices of me, hard ones, forbidding me a normal social life and time to hang out and goof off and Tanner and kissing and a million other things. But it
shouldn't
require me to give up the support of my family. That's just too much for me to handle.

“Joey,” Mom says in a hushed, soothing voice.

“Don't
Joey
me!”

She purses her lips. Doesn't say anything else.

Maybe now she'll listen.

I do my best to slow my breathing before continuing on, my voice lower this time, so low it's almost a whisper. “I know you think you are protecting yourself from stress and pain, but if you guys don't get over this anxiety about seeing me do gymnastics, you're going to feel a whole different kind of pain, because you're not going to have been a part of the most meaningful thing in my life. Gymnastics is the
most meaningful thing in my life
, and I need you and Dad to deal with it.” Her eyes are on me, steady. “I
love
gymnastics. I love it, heart and soul. And because you're afraid to watch, you don't ever see me at my best. Sometimes I hate you guys for that too.”

Mom's eyes are glassy with tears.

My voice is hoarse. “I want you at Regionals. I
need
you there to support me. Please, please, please don't disappoint me on this.” I watch my mother, trying to read her. “Mom?”

I wait for her to speak. To say she is sorry. Anything. But I get no response. I hang my head, sad, frustrated, exhausted by so much emotion.

Just then, Julia walks out onto the deck. “Is everything all right?” she asks, hesitant. “I just got home and —”

“No. It's not all right. And I was just leaving anyway,” I say and take off.

When I get up to my room, I sprawl facedown on the bed. My sister's voice floats through the open window, then my mother's. They've obviously been talking ever since I left. At first, I cover my ears, trying to block them out, but then I decide I'd rather eavesdrop on their conversation.

“You guys aren't being fair,” Julia is saying.

Mom sighs. “That's not true. Your father and I are
more
than fair to Joey. We made a deal with her, and she knew the terms from the very beginning.”

“This isn't about paying the bills. Joey needs your support in other ways too.”

“She knows we support her! Every time I write a check I'm supporting her.”

“Mom!” Julia sounds frustrated. “It's not the same as being out in the stands at competitions so she can
see
your support.”

“Julia, I simply
cannot
do it again.” Mom sounds tired. Hurt by Julia's accusations, and mine. “I
cannot
handle the stress of watching another one of my children deal with that kind of pressure. It's inhumane, what those competitions do to you. I can't bear it. And that nasty Coach Angelo! I can't even be in the same room with him, let alone watch him scream at my daughter, and your father certainly can't handle it either, as he proved during your time as a gymnast. Every time I think of Joey on the beam or on bars or that godawful vault, all I can do is picture her crashing to the ground, over and over again, breaking her neck. I can't get these awful images out of my mind.”

“Stop being so melodramatic,” my sister shoots back. “Stop being so
negative
.”

“Julia —”

“You should see Joey,” my sister goes on before my mother can protest further. “She's amazing. You might be surprised how you feel when you watch her compete. I bet you'd forget all of that other stuff you're so worried about when you see her on floor and on beam. I'm not saying that you wouldn't feel
any
stress or
any
anger at Angelo or
any
worry about her feelings or whether she's going to get injured — that's still part of the deal. I get it. But I think you'd be proud of her. I
know
you would. I know I am, at the very least.”

Julia thinks I'm amazing? She's proud of me?
I guess Maureen's coaching really has made a difference.

I peek up from the comforter, lifting myself high enough so I can see through the bottom of the window. Mom wipes her eyes. She
is
crying.

Julia's not done yet either. “And is it really worth it, Mom,” she goes on, “to give up feeling proud of Joey to save yourself some heartache? Doesn't even a little bit of your heart ache anyway? Because of what you're missing out on?”

“Have you been to see Joey practice?” my mother asks in a small voice, sounding sad but curious too. She sniffles a little. This might sound mean, but I'm happy that she's feeling guilty.

“I
have
been to see her,” Julia says. “And I know I'm not a fortune-teller, but Mom, Joey is going to win Regionals this year. I know she is. I just do. And you and Dad
have
to be there for it. Just like you both were there for me.”

I can't believe Julia said that, about me winning Regionals. And that she's fighting so hard for me here. Tears stream from my eyes. I reach up to the top of the window, closing it quietly. I've heard enough.

Then I slip on my flip-flops and leave the house, because right now, after all that has happened today, what I need most is a friend.

My
best
friend.

When
I arrive at Alex's house, she's sitting out on the front steps, peeling an orange and leaving the rind in a pile next to her. I stand in the grass of her front yard, waiting for her to see me. She looks up.

“Hey!”

“Hey,” I say, walking up to her.

“So that was fun, you know, at the diner. With Tommy.” Alex grins. “And
Tanner
.”

I take a deep breath. “About the diner … and Tanner.”

“Tell me.” Alex pats the space next to her on the steps, the side without the orange peel, inviting me to join her there. So I do.

“Tanner and I aren't happening. At least not anymore. Not now.”

“Joey,” Alex says, sounding sad. “He likes you. And you like him back! It's obvious.”

My shoulders shrug. “I know.”

“Does this have anything to do with Julia pulling you out of the diner to talk?”

“A little,” I say. Then, “Yes. It was kind of a wake-up call. Julia said that I needed to focus, that boys are distracting, that boys were not for now but for later. And they'll still be there when I decide I'm ready to be done with gymnastics.”

“You agree with her?”

“Well, kind of. Gymnastics provides enough drama in my life already. I don't need to go seeking more, and boys and drama are like, I don't know, inseparable. All that wondering if Tanner likes me or if he's going to show up or not after practice was really distracting this week when I was trying to stick my beam routine.”

“But it's okay to like Tanner. I mean, it's
normal
to like boys. We're fourteen!”

“Yeah, but the timing isn't right. I need to focus.”

“Did you tell him already?”

I nod, playing with one of the orange peels, the smell of citrus strong and tangy in the air.

“Oh, Joey.”

“It totally sucks.” I look at her. “Especially because I kissed him.”

Her jaw drops. “You did not!”

I smile a little. “I did. Like, almost making out. We were in the backyard swimming at night.”

“Oh, that's so romantic,” Alex practically squeals. “So is he a good kisser?”

“Um, despite the lack of anyone to compare him to, I'd say yes.”

“Wow. You kissed Tanner Hughes.”

“I did. And now I don't get to kiss him again for who knows how long. Or maybe ever.”

But Alex gets a dreamy look on her face. “Or … maybe he'll wait for you and someday, like, after you win Nationals or even better,
the Olympics
—”

I roll my eyes. Alex keeps right on going, though.

“— right after you've gotten the gold for All-Around — the Olympics are somewhere nice and dreamy too, by the way, like Paris. So as I was saying, you've just gotten the gold, the national anthem is finishing, and you come down off the podium and everyone is hugging you and throwing flowers because you're America's newest sweetheart, and giving you flowers too, and you look up and there's Tanner! And he's wearing an expression of undying love on his face —”

“Alex,” I interrupt, even though I'm loving every word she says.

She holds up her hand. “I'm almost done!”

“Fine, go ahead.”

“So he's got undying love on his face and you run to him and he runs to you and he picks you up and twirls you around and then you kiss in front of
the entire world
because it's broadcast on television, because this is the Olympics after all, and you are glowing and happy and Tanner is too, because you can finally be together.” Alex smiles wistfully. “The end!”

“Are you sure?”

She nods, still smiling.

“What happens after the kiss?”

“Oh, I don't know. You guys go out for dinner or something.”

I laugh. “I'll admit, it's a good fantasy.”

“I know.” She sighs. “I wish it could have been me and Tommy. Oh well.”

“I don't understand. Why can't it be you and Tommy?”

Alex gets a faraway look on her face. Doesn't say anything.

“I thought he was nice,” I go on. “I like him.”

She lights up at this. “Really?”

“Yup, really.”

“That means a lot,” she says. Then she gives me a searching look. Picks up another orange from the bowl on the stairs and starts to peel it. She hands me one too. “Your sister's right, you know. About how boys and gymnastics don't mix.”

I brace myself for what's coming next.

“Gymnastics and I are over,” Alex finally admits.

I gasp, even though I was prepared. “For real?”

“For real,” she confirms. “We've been over for a while. It's just taken a long time for me to finally admit it.”

“But Alex, if anyone at our gym has a chance of winning at Nationals next year, it's you.”

“It's not me anymore, though. It's not what I want.”

I pop an orange slice in my mouth, chewing slowly, waiting to hear what she says next.

“Really, Joey. It isn't. I want dates with Tommy and kisses good night and a normal social life. Besides” — she lowers her voice — “I'm totally getting boobs!”

“What?! You are?”

“I am. I even had to go out and buy a bra. And you know what that means.”

“That you'd look really hot in your leotard?”

She laughs. “But even better in a bathing suit.”

“Wow,” I say, taking her decision in. “Wow.”

“Yeah.”

“Thanks for telling me.”

“I'm sorry I didn't sooner.”

“It's all right,” I say. Then I realize I have another confession to make. “There's something
else
I need to tell you.”

Alex's eyes are curious. “What?”

“I've been doing secret Friday night practices at the gym. Maureen choreographed new floor and beam routines for me.”

“No way! Coach doesn't know?”

I shake my head.

“Do you fear for your life? I mean, Maureen must.”

“Honestly, I don't think she cares. All she keeps saying is, ‘Joey, your talent was wasted on those other routines.'”

“Well, she's right,” Alex says, her mouth full of orange.

“I know. I've always known. That's why I wanted this.”

“So you like the new routines?”

I smile. “I
love
them. They're graceful and fun and peppy and they make me happy. And the music is pretty fantastic — none of that boring classical stuff.”

Alex puts an arm around my shoulder. “You're going to win Regionals this year, Joey.”

“I'd like that,” I say, even though inside I'm thinking about how sad it will be to compete without her. “So … when are you going to tell Coach the news?”

Alex sighs. “I don't know. Soon. I mean, he's probably guessed by now. He's called the house a gazillion times and I haven't called him back yet.”

“Do me a favor?”

“What?”

“Talk to him on a Sunday. Or at least wait till
after
practice is over.”

She laughs. “I can probably agree to that. Oh, Joey,” she adds.

“I know,” I say. “I'm going to miss you so much.”

“I'm going to miss you too.” I lean my head on Alex's shoulder. She keeps her arm around me and we sit like this for a long time not saying anything.

“Things won't be the same without you,” I say after a while.

“Not the same, no,” Alex agrees as the last rays of sun disappear beneath the trees. “But we'll figure it out. Our friendship goes way beyond gymnastics, Joey. It always has.”

 

That night, before bed, I go through my ritual. I kiss the palm of my hand and tap each of the posters with my four favorite goddesses of gymnastics, in all of their grace and gold medal glory — Nadia, Dominique, Nastia, and Ecaterina. “Come on, ladies. Lend me some of your magic,” I say like always.

But for some reason, this night feels different. Alex's confidence that I'll win Regionals and Julia's calling me amazing scroll through my mind again and again. Their faith in me is having an effect on the faith I have in myself. And this might sound crazy, but tonight, I think that someday
I
could be one of the gymnasts featured on a poster, with girls looking up to me, Joey Jordan. Just like I look up to Nadia and her fellow champions.

Just like other girls look up to my sister, Julia.

And then I do something I never believed I would want to do. I get up and go to my closet, digging into the far back, behind piles of forgotten clothes I don't wear anymore, to slip out a rolled-up poster from its exile in the corner.

A poster of Julia Jordan, U.S. national champion.

I tack it up on the wall next to the other gymnasts who have been my heroes ever since I started to compete. And as I drift off to sleep, I think that maybe, just maybe, winning gold medals runs in this family, and that someday, I'll know what it feels like to stand up on that podium for real.