He lost complete track of time scrolling through the photos—there were a lot of them, with a variety of models—and arguing with Charlotte about how bad an idea dating Zack was. He ended up grabbing his skating stuff in a rush, bolting to the car, and sticking to the speed limit only because he knew Katie would kill him more for getting a speeding ticket than for being late. He ran into the rink, sparing only a wave for Cal at the front desk, and dropped himself onto the benches closest to the ice as the giant clock ticked over to the top of the hour.
Katie approached as he dug through his bag for his skate guards, still out of breath.
“Are you okay?” she asked, pulling on her own gloves.
“What? Oh, yeah, I’m fine.”
Katie looked unconvinced, but she didn’t press. Aaron was thankful.
“Good,” she said. “Let’s start from the top of your short program, okay?” She brandished the remote for the rink’s sound system. “It’s time to make decisions about jump composition.”
Aaron wondered if Katie somehow knew he’d spent last night with Zack and was testing him on purpose, or if the universe just had the worst sense of humor. In the end, though, it didn’t matter. His run-through was choppy at best. When they moved on to trying out different jumps in different places, he couldn’t land anything, not even his old standby, the triple lutz. His attempt at a quad toe - triple toe combo ended with him sprawled halfway across the ice.
Katie stood there and watched him, the line of her mouth getting thinner every time he fell. Finally, he two-footed a triple sal, wobbled precariously and crashed onto his ass.
“Okay,” she said. “Break time. Before you break yourself.”
At the boards Aaron gulped water, as if that would somehow help him find stability, and pulled off his hoodie so he was just wearing a t-shirt.
“Aaron,” Katie said, looking up from her notebook.
Aaron ran his fingers through his disaster hair in the vain hope he might smooth it down somewhat. “Yes ma’am?”
“Charlotte has talked to you about training at other skating centers, right?”
“Um...some?” Aaron had no idea what this had to do with anything.
“I presume she’s told you all about the rules a lot of coaches have. Not only about how to work out and what to eat but who you can date. When and how you can have sex. With other people or yourself.”
“What makes you think I had sex?” Aaron blurted. His face, unhelpfully, was burning.
A quiver of amusement tugged at the corner of Katie’s mouth. “Did you look in a mirror before you left—wherever you left, this morning?”
“Why?” Aaron glanced down at himself. “Ah. I see.” Dotted across the upper part of his chest were numerous hickeys and other bruises. He could only imagine how many more were on his throat and jaw that he couldn’t see.
Katie continued as if he hadn’t interrupted. “Here, you will notice, we have no such rules. Because we are coaches, and we are here to help you, and we want you to have satisfying lives both on and off the ice. Right?”
“Right.” Aaron resisted the urge to pull his hoodie back on.
“To be clear, you can do whatever you want. In your own time. As long as it does not leave you splattered across my ice.”
“Er.” Aaron said. His face was on fire. He was fairly sure his hair was blushing.
“Whatever you did last night, restrain yourself in the future, okay? At least until after the Olympics.”
Aaron was sure his face did a thing at the word restrain. “The problem isn’t what I did last night,” he said before he could stop himself. Discretion was probably the better part of valor here, but he just couldn’t help himself.
“It’s not?” Katie looked wary.
“I mean yes, I hooked up with Zack, and you’re probably right that’s not a distraction I need but Charlotte got mad when I didn’t come home last night and googled him and showed me this morning and apparently he’s like, this really big bondage photographer and—” Aaron ran out of air and had to gulp some down. “Now I’m freaking out about a lot of things?
Katie took a deep breath. In for four seconds, hold for four seconds, out for eight seconds. Aaron recognized it because it was a breathing pattern she’d made all of them learn for regulating anxiety and stress. He bit his lip; she was trying not to kill someone.
“Skates off,” Katie said, slinging an arm around his shoulders and guiding him toward the door to the ice. “Let’s see if the yoga studio is free.”
THE YOGA STUDIO WAS one of the little rooms in the warren that made up the rink complex. It had probably been a conference room in a former life. Aaron appreciated the choice, because it meant he could sit on the floor, fold his chest to his knees, and make no eye contact whatsoever.
“What do you need?” Katie asked him. The fact that she was echoing what Zack had asked him a few hours ago didn’t help his equilibrium.
“Self-control and the ability to google?” he mumbled.
“Self-control isn’t your biggest problem, and we all could have googled. Do the pictures bother you?”
“No,” Aaron told his knees. “Not really. And I guess I don’t mind that I didn’t know. Everybody has hobbies. It’s just...distracting.”
“I can see why it might be, yes.”
“Also, I think I really like him,” Aaron confessed. “No matter what ridiculous thing I do or say, he just nods like it’s as unsurprising and miraculous as the sun rising and setting.”
Katie was silent for a moment.
Aaron hoped she wasn’t going to do the must-not-commit-murder breathing thing again. “I know I sound
