![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icarusAnd now for the windup to the freeskate... skinscript and I will be busting our tails on the choreography this weekend.
The story in one file up to an earlier chapter: Out Of Bounds.
Title: Out Of Bounds
Author: Icarus
Rating: NC-17 overall
Pairing: John/Rodney
Summary: "Let me guess. Your brain's revving like a squirrel on amphetamines."
A/N: Thank you once again to the beta team,rabidfan and roaringmice (skating consultant), tingler, and now skinscript (choreographer).
[Previous][Next]
Out Of Bounds
by Icarus
The pinging clatter of something plastic dropped on tile and a soft curse made Rodney squeeze his eyes shut, squirm under the blankets, then blink, mumbling, "Marlowe was Shakespeare, I'm sure of it..." He came to, befuddled. The knowledge that it had been John's voice, and that he himself had been half awake for a while from the bright stripe of light under the door percolated through Rodney's consciousness.
He sat up and rubbed sore eyelids with the back of his hand, pinched the bridge of his nose, then threw the covers off with a sniff. He glanced at the glowing numbers on the alarm clock. After ten. So much for turning in early. He staggered over to the bathroom in a T-shirt and underwear and popped the door open.
John was sitting on the closed toilet seat, still dressed. Rodney could have sworn they had a competition tomorrow -- no, no, he was absolutely certain that they had a competition tomorrow, a vitally important one that required, among other minor essentials, sleep.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to wake you," John said with a cringe. He looked and sounded far too alert. His hair stood out in an uncontrolled mess, like he'd run his hands through it.
Rodney folded his arms and nearly missed the doorjamb he attempted to lean against. "Let me guess. Your brain's revving like a squirrel on amphetamines."
"What?" John's eyes were bloodshot. His chin tipped down. "Yeah, something like that."
"This might seem like a stretch, but I'm thinking actual sleep will solve that problem. If you'll just lie down—"
John made a frustrated noise and dropped his head to his hands in his lap.
"You need to be well-rested, to spoil before the race—"
"Rodney!" John clutched at his hair. He gave Rodney a baleful glance, his voice cracking as he said, "Just ... go back to snoring, all right? I'll deal with this my own way."
"I don't snore—" Important matters like slander came first. "—And studies have proved that overused muscles—" Rodney stopped when John's narrow glare turned murderous. He twiddled his fingertips together as his argument collapsed. Rodney may not like to admit being wrong, but he certainly could recognize when he was or else he’d never be such an accomplished skater. "That's not working for you, is it?" he asked, wilting.
"No." John looked away toward the tile wall. "It never has."
Of course Rodney would be the first to acknowledge that although he was an outstanding technical coach, the ins and outs of his students' various quirks, neuroses, and – yes – psychoses generally escaped him. But he'd been fairly confident that he understood one John Sheppard, if only by dint of proximity and the massive amounts of time they spent together.
He was floored to discover that he'd been wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong, about something as crucial as John's training regime immediately before competitions.
Rodney started thinking very, very rapidly. "Stay here," he said, stabbing a finger at John.
He didn't wait to see if John followed directions but grabbed his robe off the back of the bathroom door, fumbled his arms into uncooperative sleeves, then aimed himself at the telephone. He could dial the number without even thinking about it. He sagged back onto the bed for a few moments of blissful snoozing while it rang, a soft, distant sound.
"Hello?" said Radek's puzzled voice. Glassware clinked and there was the sound of dinner party laughter in the background.
Rodney force-blinked himself awake. "I need your help."
Twenty minutes later, Rodney had sent John to fetch coffee—since he had energy he might as well make himself useful—and the phone rang back. Rodney had the dresser lamp on by now and had pulled on a sweater and his nearest available trousers (moderately clean). "Uh-huh, uh-uh—great." He scribbled down the address and directions.
"Oh, and Rodney? Maddy wants to meet you."
"Yes, yes." Rodney waved that annoyance away.
"And you're doing her benefit next year."
"What?!" Rodney snapped, sitting on the bed to put on his shoes. John stepped in, a steaming cup of coffee in hand. He stared at Rodney as if he'd grown an extra head or two. "I asked for your help, not to sell my soul to the devil!"
"The blood is dry on the contract," Radek said, calm and merciless. "Whether you accept her help now or not, you are still doing it."
Rodney grumbled, "She was probably plotting this all along..." and hung up on him. He seized the coffee and felt the gentle burn down his throat. Finally awake, he remembered John, who was watching him with a wary flicker in his eyes.
"What I do for you...." Rodney groaned. He set down the cup, seized John's costume from the armchair at threw it at him. "Get dressed here. It'll save us time."
Rodney took it as proof that he had John well-trained, because John started getting into costume before he asked, "Where are we going?"
"You'll see."
~*~*~
John had assumed they were going to a rink, so he was surprised when Rodney turned down a residential driveway that was almost hidden between enormous pine trees. The car rolled almost silently along smooth blacktop. After several minutes they passed a small cottage on the right and then, catching a glimpse of a much larger house through the trees on the left, they turned towards a greenhouse.
Rodney pulled up to it and killed the lights.
"Now be quiet. Maddy said she'd leave it unlocked but the last thing we need is Yvonne mistaking us for a couple of burglars. Hopefully she remembered to disable any alarm systems or we're going to have a lot of explaining to do to some nice, brutish American police officers."
"Yvonne lives here?"
"Of course not! This is the gym. Radek tells me she lives in that cottage house we passed."
"She never mentioned being filthy rich." John frowned. He stepped out of the car, the door squeaking as he shut it.
"You are disturbingly obtuse." His door slamming sounded too loud in the quiet pines. The air was still. "Just what do you think 'has done a lot for figure skating' means? And why have you been sucking up to them? Not that it hasn't proved useful tonight."
"I haven't been sucking up to anyone," John muttered to his shoes.
By then Rodney had led John to a sliding glass door. It rumble-glided open at a tug and Rodney let them in. John looked around at stands of trees and the dusting of snow they could see through the walls of the cold oval-shaped room. The moon was overhead, blurred through silvery clouds. Rodney slid his hands along the far wall until he found a light switch, giving a triumphant little, "Ha!"
The fluorescents flickered to life overhead.
It was the outdoor rink John had always imagined, only under glass. John stood gape-jawed, not sure whether he should feel really lucky, or robbed, since Yvonne had been using his rink all along.
"It's hardly bigger than a puddle," Rodney was saying behind John as he stripped off his coat, clicking on more lights, "but you're used to that."
John settled on lucky, with a smothered guilty wish that he and Yvonne had become closer friends. He couldn't justify it now because he could never be sure of his motives.
"What are you standing there for?" Rodney snapped his fingers at John in rapid succession. "Skates!"
Rodney yanked on his own skates, which looked absurd with his corduroy pants, actually beating John onto the ice. "Come on, let's get this over with."
Looking around, John wanted to savor this. He tugged laces tight as Rodney put the CD in with a rattling click. "Hang on, hang on...."
He dusted ice dust off the trailing strands of his costume and tested the surface beneath his feet with little side to side sweeps. The ice was frozen solid enough for hockey, difficult to get a bite into. It would force Yvonne to work her edges hard. If John hadn't known Yvonne's mom was a former skater, he would have guessed it now.
Rodney skated backward in front of John. The drums of his long program music played a little too softly, but John could get why they didn't want to draw attention. He skated a warm up lap, ignoring Rodney at center ice.
"Now give it to me," Rodney said, giving up the center spot with two little pushes. "Pretend this is the arena. I'm right here."
John ducked his head into the backward spin, not quite in time with the beat, his back leg outstretched behind him. He circled his arms inward, spun about sharply to come out of the circle, head and shoulders dipped low as he picked up speed around the little rink.
Then with the sudden snap of the music, he bounced, both feet off the ice. Rodney flowed along the inside circle as John set himself up for his first jump, looking over his shoulder. He turned with his landing leg leading, then pushed up into the triple axel, getting more distance than expected. He landed with a jolt to the ankles. John twisted around, arms pulled in for the second jump, landing that with his chest too far forward.
Rodney yelled, "Too big!" He was still following at speed. He crossed one skate over the other to slow down.
"It's never too big." John grinned. But he slouched with his hands on his thighs and curved around the ice. He decided to restart his run-through from the top and began plotting his marks on this smaller rink. "This time I'm going all the way," he called out. "No stops."
"I'll believe it when I see it," Rodney sniffed.
~*~*~
After forty minutes and three complete run-throughs the session had degenerated into goofing off. Rodney had his toe-pick planted, forward knee bent, their hands grip-locked as he swung John around in a slowing spiral pattern, lowering him almost parallel to the ice. This death spiral was too slow and John's hip touched down, skidding them to a stop.
John lay flat on the ice and spread-eagled his arms with a laugh.
Rodney reached with left to give him a hand up, and batted him away when John tried to take his right instead. "No, no. I suspect my right arm's three inches longer and now we need to balance them." He shook and rubbed his right hand in elaborate dismay.
John nodded, smirking. "Both arms can go to your knees."
"It's a good thing I got out of pairs, because at this rate I'll be able to touch my toes without bending over."
John rolled gently forward, skates apart. He rubbed the ice shavings out of his hair like a dog coming out of the rain, then tried to finger comb it flat.
Rodney drew John in by the hips, chin hooked over his shoulder.
They breathed to a stop. Rodney ran his hands up and down John's arms to warm up and then laced his hands together over John's stomach. He butted his head against John's cheek – John snorted and smiled – and mumbled into his collar, "So. Are we all set now?"
John let out a deep breath. "I think I can sleep."
That wasn't really an answer, Rodney noticed. He skated over to get John's music out of the CD player while John sat down to unlace his skates. Tapping the CD case on his palm, Rodney sighed and said to aloud himself, "Yes, well. That makes one of us."
~*~*~
John stared, star struck, skating a slow circuit of the arena. He kicked one foot out to settle his skate and then lazily stroked, arms loose at his sides.
He was on the same ice as Kyle Fletcher. The first warm-up group.
Fletcher was short, with floppy hair that fell in his eyes when he dipped down and bounced up in a Cossack dance step, then tipped sideways into a one-footed off-center spin as he cut through the center. He came back, frowning in concentration as he made a few casual sweeps. Then he stroked up some speed, dodging through the other skaters to skim along the outer edge of the rink, as graceful and delicate as a gazelle. He moved across ice as easily as breathing.
John bobbled as something smacked him on the back of the head. He blinked, bug-eyed, and searched around -- to find Rodney's leather glove at his feet. "Shep-pard!" Rodney shouted, making the name into two words. "Wake up out there!"
John swooped in a circle and scooped it up, flinging it back. "No littering." He missed and it hit the boards, bouncing onto the ice.
But John shook himself and began to power around the rink, shaking off glimpses of Fletcher setting up for a jump; Jeff Kulka weaving through looping footwork; he passed between the kid, Elijah Wong, and David Bellamy, carving to the left around them, his t-shirt and track pants billowing.
The kid (punk kid, John called him in his mind, though he wasn't admitting that out loud) broke his footwork when John cut across his line. John stroked in a wide curve, his arms stretched to either side and rising.
Second place, huh? John shifted into a spread eagle, arms high, his skates pointed away from each other drawing a thin, sharp line. He shifted to the back skate, gathering his shoulders as he stepped forward -- and pushed himself into the air, twisting in a triple axel, landing in a spray of ice and smug expression. He rested his hands on his hips as he glided away. His gaze slanted past Elijah, not missing how Kulka cut across the kid's back trail, burning up the ice around him in killer fast footwork.
Kyle Fletcher continued as if in his own world.
"There is one minute remaining in this warm up...."
John pushed himself up into an easy single, landing it solid, then pushed again into a second single, his leg like a spring, landing firm. And up once again, and again, in a steady series of jumps, practicing his landings.
"Gentlemen, this warm up is completed."
He slid in a long scraping line to stop by the boards. Rodney handed him a tissue without asking. John blew his nose, then traded him the dirty tissue for a bottle of water and took a quick swallow, letting out a breath.
"Skating first is Christian Yong-Suk, to be followed by David Bellamy."
Yong-Suk, a short, stocky skater with solid shoulders, swept his hands through spiked black hair and moved with slinky rock star confidence to take his mark. The other skaters parted to give him right of way, continuing their practice in a desultory manner.
The music to Aladdin began in a swirl of violins.
John resisted the urge to watch as Yong-Suk bent sideways, snaking his arms like a magician, then dropped the pose to skip a section that was obviously meant to be a jump, skating lazily, hands on his hips, head down. Then Yong-Suk powered up to grab the music again at another section of choreography – okay, so John was watching.
He gave Rodney a guilty glance, but Rodney's eyes were on Yong-Suk as well, and who could blame him? Yong-Suk was a riveting performer, if notorious for his crap concentration. There was one Sectional where some pigeons had gotten into the rink and fluttered around the rafters. You'd think the music would have drowned them out, but a pissed off Yong-Suk blamed his falls and a spin that traveled like he was skating along a thirty-degree grade on those damned pigeons.
Watching Yong-Suk glare at a couple of chatty fans as he whisked by (they were loud, but not that loud), John finally believed it. He'd be in trouble if someone so much as coughed at the wrong time.
John coughed into his fist and put aside certain ideas as too evil to contemplate, though he grinned to himself. It wasn't a way he wanted to win -- even if it would be all too easy. Getting back to work, John began his swirling circular step sequence. It was impossible to skate anything else to Aladdin's whirling runs.
Off to the side, the doughy-faced Elijah Wong had stopped his own practice, executing a leap in time with Yong-Suk's music. Elijah had that unfinished look of a high school kid, arms thin and rubbery, his features soft. And yes, he was ad-libbing to Yong-Suk's music, not quite crossing the line to take over right of way.
The crowd clapped as Elijah executed a perfect triple-triple combination. Yong-Suk stumbled heavily out of his own jump.
John checked over his shoulder and was startled to found himself meeting Jeff Kulka's cynical glance. They both turned to Elijah, who was now back at work on his own arching turns. John's smile thinned as he pumped up some speed.
He skated forward, curved, swung his leg out, back, around, and then stabbed the ice, pushing from the gut, arms in tight – two, three, four – yes! The crowd gasped as he landed the quad in a ringing hiss.
He had everyone's attention now as they clapped, elated. His gaze skimmed the audience as if the kid were insignificant; hard-eyed, his smile firm. John hummed the drum line of his freeskate music and went back to executing the opening backward spin of his program, dragging his leg along the ice behind himself.
Yong-Suk struck his final pose.
"Christian Yong-Suk's program is four minutes and forty seconds long."
The crowd clapped as Yong-Suk bowed once, then skated over to his coach, who made soothing gestures.
"Skating next is David Bellamy, to be followed by Elijah Wong."
Bellamy, a dreamy blond -- and John meant that in every sense of the word -- floated on one skate to center ice.
A burly man in dreadlocks stood rink-side in the front row, forearms leaned across the boards. John recognized Ronon and skated over to him, cutting a quick glance at Rodney to see if he had any more gloves to throw.
Ronon waved his badge at John, looking pleased. "You didn't tell me this thing was, like, a backstage pass."
"Yeah, you're my personal guest," John said. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Rodney working his way around the rink, his head lowered like a bull, shoulders hunched and furious.
"Cool." Ronon indicated the other skaters with a flick of his chin. "What was that all about?"
"Skaters don't trash talk." John smirked.
"Uh-huh." Ronon glanced over his shoulder, shifting around until both elbows were planted on the boards behind him. "Don't look now but I think mom's onto you."
"I'm sorry, am I interrupting your little tete-a-tete?" Rodney stormed up. "Is it time for tea and crumpets now that you've finished your utterly moronic, juvenile antics?" He turned on Ronon. "You! Get away from him, you Rastafarian hippie freak! You may not believe that it's possible but if you distract him further, I will find a way to give you bad karma. And you!" He whirled to face John, lowering his voice. "I will gladly turn you over my knee if that's what it takes to light a fire under your ass."
"Kinky," Ronon commented mildly.
"Rodney, it's all part of the game—" John began with a sarcastic tilt of his head, but Rodney interrupted. He thrust his watch in John's face, fist clenched.
"Thirteen hours and forty-six minutes." Rodney let his words hang in the air, glaring and stern. "That's how much time you have."
John came abruptly down from the euphoria of being in the first group. Without another word, sketching a small apologetic wave at Ronon, he dug into the ice, bending his head to his most complicated section of footwork.
[Previous][Next]
skinscript and I will be busting our tails on the choreography this weekend. The story in one file up to an earlier chapter: Out Of Bounds.
Title: Out Of Bounds
Author: Icarus
Rating: NC-17 overall
Pairing: John/Rodney
Summary: "Let me guess. Your brain's revving like a squirrel on amphetamines."
A/N: Thank you once again to the beta team,
rabidfan and roaringmice (skating consultant), tingler, and now skinscript (choreographer). Previously in Out Of Bounds: Known more for his jumps than his artistry, figure skater John Sheppard hires ex-skating champion and "artiste" Rodney McKay to be his coach. Their teasing friendship warms into something more. After a year of training and preparation... the U.S. Championships.
[Previous][Next]
Out Of Bounds
by Icarus
The pinging clatter of something plastic dropped on tile and a soft curse made Rodney squeeze his eyes shut, squirm under the blankets, then blink, mumbling, "Marlowe was Shakespeare, I'm sure of it..." He came to, befuddled. The knowledge that it had been John's voice, and that he himself had been half awake for a while from the bright stripe of light under the door percolated through Rodney's consciousness.
He sat up and rubbed sore eyelids with the back of his hand, pinched the bridge of his nose, then threw the covers off with a sniff. He glanced at the glowing numbers on the alarm clock. After ten. So much for turning in early. He staggered over to the bathroom in a T-shirt and underwear and popped the door open.
John was sitting on the closed toilet seat, still dressed. Rodney could have sworn they had a competition tomorrow -- no, no, he was absolutely certain that they had a competition tomorrow, a vitally important one that required, among other minor essentials, sleep.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to wake you," John said with a cringe. He looked and sounded far too alert. His hair stood out in an uncontrolled mess, like he'd run his hands through it.
Rodney folded his arms and nearly missed the doorjamb he attempted to lean against. "Let me guess. Your brain's revving like a squirrel on amphetamines."
"What?" John's eyes were bloodshot. His chin tipped down. "Yeah, something like that."
"This might seem like a stretch, but I'm thinking actual sleep will solve that problem. If you'll just lie down—"
John made a frustrated noise and dropped his head to his hands in his lap.
"You need to be well-rested, to spoil before the race—"
"Rodney!" John clutched at his hair. He gave Rodney a baleful glance, his voice cracking as he said, "Just ... go back to snoring, all right? I'll deal with this my own way."
"I don't snore—" Important matters like slander came first. "—And studies have proved that overused muscles—" Rodney stopped when John's narrow glare turned murderous. He twiddled his fingertips together as his argument collapsed. Rodney may not like to admit being wrong, but he certainly could recognize when he was or else he’d never be such an accomplished skater. "That's not working for you, is it?" he asked, wilting.
"No." John looked away toward the tile wall. "It never has."
Of course Rodney would be the first to acknowledge that although he was an outstanding technical coach, the ins and outs of his students' various quirks, neuroses, and – yes – psychoses generally escaped him. But he'd been fairly confident that he understood one John Sheppard, if only by dint of proximity and the massive amounts of time they spent together.
He was floored to discover that he'd been wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong, about something as crucial as John's training regime immediately before competitions.
Rodney started thinking very, very rapidly. "Stay here," he said, stabbing a finger at John.
He didn't wait to see if John followed directions but grabbed his robe off the back of the bathroom door, fumbled his arms into uncooperative sleeves, then aimed himself at the telephone. He could dial the number without even thinking about it. He sagged back onto the bed for a few moments of blissful snoozing while it rang, a soft, distant sound.
"Hello?" said Radek's puzzled voice. Glassware clinked and there was the sound of dinner party laughter in the background.
Rodney force-blinked himself awake. "I need your help."
Twenty minutes later, Rodney had sent John to fetch coffee—since he had energy he might as well make himself useful—and the phone rang back. Rodney had the dresser lamp on by now and had pulled on a sweater and his nearest available trousers (moderately clean). "Uh-huh, uh-uh—great." He scribbled down the address and directions.
"Oh, and Rodney? Maddy wants to meet you."
"Yes, yes." Rodney waved that annoyance away.
"And you're doing her benefit next year."
"What?!" Rodney snapped, sitting on the bed to put on his shoes. John stepped in, a steaming cup of coffee in hand. He stared at Rodney as if he'd grown an extra head or two. "I asked for your help, not to sell my soul to the devil!"
"The blood is dry on the contract," Radek said, calm and merciless. "Whether you accept her help now or not, you are still doing it."
Rodney grumbled, "She was probably plotting this all along..." and hung up on him. He seized the coffee and felt the gentle burn down his throat. Finally awake, he remembered John, who was watching him with a wary flicker in his eyes.
"What I do for you...." Rodney groaned. He set down the cup, seized John's costume from the armchair at threw it at him. "Get dressed here. It'll save us time."
Rodney took it as proof that he had John well-trained, because John started getting into costume before he asked, "Where are we going?"
"You'll see."
John had assumed they were going to a rink, so he was surprised when Rodney turned down a residential driveway that was almost hidden between enormous pine trees. The car rolled almost silently along smooth blacktop. After several minutes they passed a small cottage on the right and then, catching a glimpse of a much larger house through the trees on the left, they turned towards a greenhouse.
Rodney pulled up to it and killed the lights.
"Now be quiet. Maddy said she'd leave it unlocked but the last thing we need is Yvonne mistaking us for a couple of burglars. Hopefully she remembered to disable any alarm systems or we're going to have a lot of explaining to do to some nice, brutish American police officers."
"Yvonne lives here?"
"Of course not! This is the gym. Radek tells me she lives in that cottage house we passed."
"She never mentioned being filthy rich." John frowned. He stepped out of the car, the door squeaking as he shut it.
"You are disturbingly obtuse." His door slamming sounded too loud in the quiet pines. The air was still. "Just what do you think 'has done a lot for figure skating' means? And why have you been sucking up to them? Not that it hasn't proved useful tonight."
"I haven't been sucking up to anyone," John muttered to his shoes.
By then Rodney had led John to a sliding glass door. It rumble-glided open at a tug and Rodney let them in. John looked around at stands of trees and the dusting of snow they could see through the walls of the cold oval-shaped room. The moon was overhead, blurred through silvery clouds. Rodney slid his hands along the far wall until he found a light switch, giving a triumphant little, "Ha!"
The fluorescents flickered to life overhead.
It was the outdoor rink John had always imagined, only under glass. John stood gape-jawed, not sure whether he should feel really lucky, or robbed, since Yvonne had been using his rink all along.
"It's hardly bigger than a puddle," Rodney was saying behind John as he stripped off his coat, clicking on more lights, "but you're used to that."
John settled on lucky, with a smothered guilty wish that he and Yvonne had become closer friends. He couldn't justify it now because he could never be sure of his motives.
"What are you standing there for?" Rodney snapped his fingers at John in rapid succession. "Skates!"
Rodney yanked on his own skates, which looked absurd with his corduroy pants, actually beating John onto the ice. "Come on, let's get this over with."
Looking around, John wanted to savor this. He tugged laces tight as Rodney put the CD in with a rattling click. "Hang on, hang on...."
He dusted ice dust off the trailing strands of his costume and tested the surface beneath his feet with little side to side sweeps. The ice was frozen solid enough for hockey, difficult to get a bite into. It would force Yvonne to work her edges hard. If John hadn't known Yvonne's mom was a former skater, he would have guessed it now.
Rodney skated backward in front of John. The drums of his long program music played a little too softly, but John could get why they didn't want to draw attention. He skated a warm up lap, ignoring Rodney at center ice.
"Now give it to me," Rodney said, giving up the center spot with two little pushes. "Pretend this is the arena. I'm right here."
John ducked his head into the backward spin, not quite in time with the beat, his back leg outstretched behind him. He circled his arms inward, spun about sharply to come out of the circle, head and shoulders dipped low as he picked up speed around the little rink.
Then with the sudden snap of the music, he bounced, both feet off the ice. Rodney flowed along the inside circle as John set himself up for his first jump, looking over his shoulder. He turned with his landing leg leading, then pushed up into the triple axel, getting more distance than expected. He landed with a jolt to the ankles. John twisted around, arms pulled in for the second jump, landing that with his chest too far forward.
Rodney yelled, "Too big!" He was still following at speed. He crossed one skate over the other to slow down.
"It's never too big." John grinned. But he slouched with his hands on his thighs and curved around the ice. He decided to restart his run-through from the top and began plotting his marks on this smaller rink. "This time I'm going all the way," he called out. "No stops."
"I'll believe it when I see it," Rodney sniffed.
After forty minutes and three complete run-throughs the session had degenerated into goofing off. Rodney had his toe-pick planted, forward knee bent, their hands grip-locked as he swung John around in a slowing spiral pattern, lowering him almost parallel to the ice. This death spiral was too slow and John's hip touched down, skidding them to a stop.
John lay flat on the ice and spread-eagled his arms with a laugh.
Rodney reached with left to give him a hand up, and batted him away when John tried to take his right instead. "No, no. I suspect my right arm's three inches longer and now we need to balance them." He shook and rubbed his right hand in elaborate dismay.
John nodded, smirking. "Both arms can go to your knees."
"It's a good thing I got out of pairs, because at this rate I'll be able to touch my toes without bending over."
John rolled gently forward, skates apart. He rubbed the ice shavings out of his hair like a dog coming out of the rain, then tried to finger comb it flat.
Rodney drew John in by the hips, chin hooked over his shoulder.
They breathed to a stop. Rodney ran his hands up and down John's arms to warm up and then laced his hands together over John's stomach. He butted his head against John's cheek – John snorted and smiled – and mumbled into his collar, "So. Are we all set now?"
John let out a deep breath. "I think I can sleep."
That wasn't really an answer, Rodney noticed. He skated over to get John's music out of the CD player while John sat down to unlace his skates. Tapping the CD case on his palm, Rodney sighed and said to aloud himself, "Yes, well. That makes one of us."
John stared, star struck, skating a slow circuit of the arena. He kicked one foot out to settle his skate and then lazily stroked, arms loose at his sides.
He was on the same ice as Kyle Fletcher. The first warm-up group.
Fletcher was short, with floppy hair that fell in his eyes when he dipped down and bounced up in a Cossack dance step, then tipped sideways into a one-footed off-center spin as he cut through the center. He came back, frowning in concentration as he made a few casual sweeps. Then he stroked up some speed, dodging through the other skaters to skim along the outer edge of the rink, as graceful and delicate as a gazelle. He moved across ice as easily as breathing.
John bobbled as something smacked him on the back of the head. He blinked, bug-eyed, and searched around -- to find Rodney's leather glove at his feet. "Shep-pard!" Rodney shouted, making the name into two words. "Wake up out there!"
John swooped in a circle and scooped it up, flinging it back. "No littering." He missed and it hit the boards, bouncing onto the ice.
But John shook himself and began to power around the rink, shaking off glimpses of Fletcher setting up for a jump; Jeff Kulka weaving through looping footwork; he passed between the kid, Elijah Wong, and David Bellamy, carving to the left around them, his t-shirt and track pants billowing.
The kid (punk kid, John called him in his mind, though he wasn't admitting that out loud) broke his footwork when John cut across his line. John stroked in a wide curve, his arms stretched to either side and rising.
Second place, huh? John shifted into a spread eagle, arms high, his skates pointed away from each other drawing a thin, sharp line. He shifted to the back skate, gathering his shoulders as he stepped forward -- and pushed himself into the air, twisting in a triple axel, landing in a spray of ice and smug expression. He rested his hands on his hips as he glided away. His gaze slanted past Elijah, not missing how Kulka cut across the kid's back trail, burning up the ice around him in killer fast footwork.
Kyle Fletcher continued as if in his own world.
"There is one minute remaining in this warm up...."
John pushed himself up into an easy single, landing it solid, then pushed again into a second single, his leg like a spring, landing firm. And up once again, and again, in a steady series of jumps, practicing his landings.
"Gentlemen, this warm up is completed."
He slid in a long scraping line to stop by the boards. Rodney handed him a tissue without asking. John blew his nose, then traded him the dirty tissue for a bottle of water and took a quick swallow, letting out a breath.
"Skating first is Christian Yong-Suk, to be followed by David Bellamy."
Yong-Suk, a short, stocky skater with solid shoulders, swept his hands through spiked black hair and moved with slinky rock star confidence to take his mark. The other skaters parted to give him right of way, continuing their practice in a desultory manner.
The music to Aladdin began in a swirl of violins.
John resisted the urge to watch as Yong-Suk bent sideways, snaking his arms like a magician, then dropped the pose to skip a section that was obviously meant to be a jump, skating lazily, hands on his hips, head down. Then Yong-Suk powered up to grab the music again at another section of choreography – okay, so John was watching.
He gave Rodney a guilty glance, but Rodney's eyes were on Yong-Suk as well, and who could blame him? Yong-Suk was a riveting performer, if notorious for his crap concentration. There was one Sectional where some pigeons had gotten into the rink and fluttered around the rafters. You'd think the music would have drowned them out, but a pissed off Yong-Suk blamed his falls and a spin that traveled like he was skating along a thirty-degree grade on those damned pigeons.
Watching Yong-Suk glare at a couple of chatty fans as he whisked by (they were loud, but not that loud), John finally believed it. He'd be in trouble if someone so much as coughed at the wrong time.
John coughed into his fist and put aside certain ideas as too evil to contemplate, though he grinned to himself. It wasn't a way he wanted to win -- even if it would be all too easy. Getting back to work, John began his swirling circular step sequence. It was impossible to skate anything else to Aladdin's whirling runs.
Off to the side, the doughy-faced Elijah Wong had stopped his own practice, executing a leap in time with Yong-Suk's music. Elijah had that unfinished look of a high school kid, arms thin and rubbery, his features soft. And yes, he was ad-libbing to Yong-Suk's music, not quite crossing the line to take over right of way.
The crowd clapped as Elijah executed a perfect triple-triple combination. Yong-Suk stumbled heavily out of his own jump.
John checked over his shoulder and was startled to found himself meeting Jeff Kulka's cynical glance. They both turned to Elijah, who was now back at work on his own arching turns. John's smile thinned as he pumped up some speed.
He skated forward, curved, swung his leg out, back, around, and then stabbed the ice, pushing from the gut, arms in tight – two, three, four – yes! The crowd gasped as he landed the quad in a ringing hiss.
He had everyone's attention now as they clapped, elated. His gaze skimmed the audience as if the kid were insignificant; hard-eyed, his smile firm. John hummed the drum line of his freeskate music and went back to executing the opening backward spin of his program, dragging his leg along the ice behind himself.
Yong-Suk struck his final pose.
"Christian Yong-Suk's program is four minutes and forty seconds long."
The crowd clapped as Yong-Suk bowed once, then skated over to his coach, who made soothing gestures.
"Skating next is David Bellamy, to be followed by Elijah Wong."
Bellamy, a dreamy blond -- and John meant that in every sense of the word -- floated on one skate to center ice.
A burly man in dreadlocks stood rink-side in the front row, forearms leaned across the boards. John recognized Ronon and skated over to him, cutting a quick glance at Rodney to see if he had any more gloves to throw.
Ronon waved his badge at John, looking pleased. "You didn't tell me this thing was, like, a backstage pass."
"Yeah, you're my personal guest," John said. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Rodney working his way around the rink, his head lowered like a bull, shoulders hunched and furious.
"Cool." Ronon indicated the other skaters with a flick of his chin. "What was that all about?"
"Skaters don't trash talk." John smirked.
"Uh-huh." Ronon glanced over his shoulder, shifting around until both elbows were planted on the boards behind him. "Don't look now but I think mom's onto you."
"I'm sorry, am I interrupting your little tete-a-tete?" Rodney stormed up. "Is it time for tea and crumpets now that you've finished your utterly moronic, juvenile antics?" He turned on Ronon. "You! Get away from him, you Rastafarian hippie freak! You may not believe that it's possible but if you distract him further, I will find a way to give you bad karma. And you!" He whirled to face John, lowering his voice. "I will gladly turn you over my knee if that's what it takes to light a fire under your ass."
"Kinky," Ronon commented mildly.
"Rodney, it's all part of the game—" John began with a sarcastic tilt of his head, but Rodney interrupted. He thrust his watch in John's face, fist clenched.
"Thirteen hours and forty-six minutes." Rodney let his words hang in the air, glaring and stern. "That's how much time you have."
John came abruptly down from the euphoria of being in the first group. Without another word, sketching a small apologetic wave at Ronon, he dug into the ice, bending his head to his most complicated section of footwork.
[Previous][Next]
no subject
Date: 2009-05-17 02:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-17 04:35 pm (UTC)