Chapter 115 At exactly three o'clock, the ice rink lights...
At exactly three o'clock, the ice rink lights went out, and darkness instantly enveloped the area. Ren Xiyao stood in the center, gazing at the faint moonlight outside the window, and slowly took off her helmet.
Stepping out of the ice rink, the sky was already turning a pale white. Carrying my heavy ice skate bag, I walked along the empty street, my shadow stretched long by the streetlights. My phone vibrated; I initially thought it was a doping test notification, but the screen displayed "Coach Zhang."
His finger paused for a moment, then swiped to answer the call.
"Hello, Xiyao?" The voice on the other end of the phone was that of the head coach of Longcheng Club, sounding heavy with fatigue and hesitation. He was the old coach who had watched her grow up, and he and Coach Wang were the oldest members of the club. He had been her head coach since Ren Xiyao switched sports, and he had spent his life studying the angle of the skates and the center of gravity on the curves.
"Coach Zhang," Ren Xiyao's voice was hoarse, having not spoken for a long time, "you're still not asleep so late?"
"I just finished watching the video of your World Championships last year," Coach Zhang paused, then suddenly raised his voice, sounding anxious: "The suspension... and the situation in Beijing, don't worry, I..."
He stopped mid-sentence. Ren Xiyao could imagine him frowning, his hands unconsciously rubbing his knees, just like when he couldn't think of anything to say during a big meeting.
"I..." Coach Zhang began again, his voice lowered, tinged with unconscious embarrassment: "The team just had a meeting, and they said... you're now under close observation, so the club... can't directly intervene. And the other players... we... can only..."
Ren Xiyao leaned against the cold iron gate of the ice rink, listening to the breathing on the other end of the phone. She understood. Coach Zhang had wanted to say, "I'll help you figure something out," "Come back to Harbin," "I'll argue with the higher-ups," words she had spoken when she broke her leg at fifteen and was almost marginalized at seventeen. But this time, he swallowed his words.
“I understand, Coach Zhang.” Ren Xiyao’s voice was very soft: “The club is already in a difficult situation. I’ve already let Coach Wang down. Don’t make things worse for me. There are other people in the club, like Lin Shan and Sister Xu.”
Longcheng Club started late, with the new ice rink only built a few years ago. Yet, it has produced four all-around champions. These coaches have dedicated their lives to the ice rink, preferring to understand ice skating rather than focusing on the intricacies of the sport.
But what's the use of "slipping through"?
This wasn't the first time Ren Xiyao had witnessed something like this. The year she switched sports, her senior teammate, who had won a gold medal in a World Cup event, was eliminated from the selection trials because he refused to be poached by the Lan Hai Club, and retired at the age of twenty-three. That day, her senior teammate sat on the ice rink for the entire afternoon, with Coach Zhang accompanying him. The two grown men smoked in front of the empty ice rink, without saying a word.
She was young then and didn't understand why top skaters would fall in unseen places. Until the captain, and now it's her turn. She suddenly wants to call the captain and ask her what she was thinking when she was suspended for more than 400 days, framed, marginalized, ostracized, and had both hands broken.
Places like Longcheng can polish rough gems, but they can't protect them from being stolen. Those who only understand ice skates and speed are oblivious to the hidden dangers lurking in the cracks of the rules, and don't understand how a subtle hint can crush a career. Places like Lanhai Club, on the other hand, can protect the light, understanding the rules, connections, and resources, but they don't care whether the stone itself has brilliance; they only care about paving the way for themselves.
“Purely skating spots can’t protect people, and places that can protect people aren’t pure,” Ren Xiyao said softly into the phone, as if explaining, yet also as if arguing.
Coach Zhang remained silent for a long time, so long that Ren Xiyao thought the call had ended, before she heard him whisper, "I'm sorry, Yao'er."
"It's okay." Ren Xiyao smiled, her eyes glistening with tears. "I can still skate."
I got into the back seat of the taxi, gave them the name of the hotel, and leaned against the window with my eyes closed.
Images of the ice rink flashed through my mind at dawn: an empty rink, with only the sound of her footsteps and the clatter of her skates. She practiced several sets of cornering accelerations, without opponents, without competition, without tactical coordination, and without anyone shouting "Watch your line!" It was like a madman punching the air.
Short track speed skating is never a solo sport. Even in individual events, it requires teammates for practice, coaches to give tactical instructions, team doctors to monitor performance, and equipment coaches to oversee the skates. Its allure lies in the lightning-fast collisions and battles, in the milliseconds-timed victories, in the struggles on turns, the battles against the air currents on straightaways, and even in the eye-to-eye confrontations. Now, it feels like living in The Truman Show, performing prescribed maneuvers at a set time and place, without even encountering a worthy opponent.
What's this?
She took out her phone and scrolled to a photo in her album: last year at the ice rink, she and her teammates had just finished an internal test match, huddled together, covered in sweat, while Coach Zhang held up his phone to take the picture. Although the ice rink in the photo was old, the light in everyone's eyes was brighter than the rink lights.
She stared at the photo for a long time until the taxi stopped in front of the hotel. The driver glanced at her a couple more times, perhaps finding the girl a little strange.
Reaching the hotel entrance, she stopped and looked up at the barely bright sky. In the reflection of the hotel's glass doors, her hair was disheveled, and there were faint dark circles under her eyes. She looked like an ordinary person who had been worn down by life, nothing like Ren Xiyao, who exuded confidence on the ice rink.
I recalled what Coach Zhang said at the end of his phone call: "If all else fails... come back. The ice rink here will always have a spot reserved for you."
She knew it was just a consolation. That place couldn't protect her, yet she still longed for home, for the ice that had nurtured her for so many years. But she was stuck there, unable to leave. Like her predecessors, like those who might come after her in the future, the glory they won on the ice with all their might was gradually eroded by the undercurrents beneath.
This sobering sense of desolation is colder than the suspension itself.
In August, on the other side of the world, Kwon Ji-yong, who was rehearsing for a tour in a European city, suddenly felt a sharp, unexpected pain in his heart. It was a completely unpredictable feeling of suffocation; in that instant, his face turned deathly pale, and he was drenched in cold sweat. He instinctively clutched his chest, staggered a few steps, and almost fell off the platform.
"GD xi! Are you alright?" The backup dancers and staff around him were startled and immediately surrounded him.
Kwon Ji-yong waved his hand, took a deep breath, and tried to calm the churning pain in his chest. The panic and palpitations came so quickly and intensely; however, the intense tour of the past few days, severe sleep deprivation, and extremely suppressed emotions had already pushed his body and mind to the brink of collapse.
"It's nothing... I'm probably just a little tired." He forced a pale smile and said in a hoarse voice.
The staff didn't dare to neglect him and immediately helped him backstage to rest, handing him their usual nitroglycerin pills and warm water. During these days of non-stop touring, he was barely holding on with various medications and his strong willpower. Before each performance, he needed to wait in the backstage area for a while, using all his strength to transform the exhausted, nearly collapsed Kwon Ji-yong into the radiant, commanding G-Dragon.
The sudden angina seemed to subside after taking the medication, but the inexplicable panic and anxiety lingered in his mind like an inescapable dark cloud.
The day after her suspension, she got a gym membership. Commercial ice rinks only allow time from 1 a.m. to 3 a.m., enough to complete basic skating but not enough to practice contact. So she had to work hard on her physical fitness: core strength and endurance. These were the only things she could hold onto and she dared not let go of them.
The team's original physical training plan was 3 sets of 15 weighted squats, 90 seconds per set of planks, and 3000-meter interval running in 12 minutes... Now she doubled all of them until her lungs burned and her throat tasted rusty.
She wanted to eat more, but as soon as her chopsticks touched the food, it felt like a stone was stuck in her stomach, and nausea surged up. During the strictest period of scrutiny, she didn't eat properly for three days, and it eventually became an instinctive resistance. Until one early morning, after practicing turns on the ice rink, she suddenly felt dizzy, her helmet hit the barrier, and her knees ached. When she got up, her reflection on the ice was pale, and the speed skating suit that had once fit her perfectly was now loose and wobbly.
She called the team's psychologist seven times. The first six times the line was busy, but on the seventh call, the doctor only said briefly, "Consultation for suspended players is temporarily suspended..." before hanging up. Finally, she checked with the best mental health center in Beijing herself. The doctor diagnosed her with "anorexia nervosa" and "moderate insomnia," prescribed medication, and recommended a therapist. Taking half a pill before bed helped her sleep more soundly; the therapist listened attentively. It was there for the first time that she spoke about the ice rink and the unfinished conversation with Coach Zhang, about the club's reluctance to act, and tears streamed down her face. These past few days, she had told her family and friends she was "fine," but here she couldn't hold back anymore.
Peace is always fleeting.
The sharp beeping of doping test results kept ringing in her pocket; this was the fifth time this month: two surprise tests by the International Skating Union, one at 4 a.m. and the other right after she changed into her workout clothes; last week, she was stopped at the supermarket while buying water, and the cashier stared at her in fright.
When the testing personnel arrived, she was drinking water and chewing on an energy bar. The nurse looked at the prominent veins on her arm and asked, "Are you an athlete? You look too thin."
She didn't speak, only staring at the blood being put into the tube, wondering if it was her own blood, and why she couldn't feel anything.
After the test, she couldn't stand up; her head was buzzing. Yesterday at the ice rink, after a turn, she suddenly felt dizzy and fell against the barrier. In that instant, a thought flashed through her mind: If this continues, will I just give up? This thought sent chills down her spine, forcing her to wash her face. Just as she recovered, her phone rang again. She answered; it was the ice rink: "Ms. Ren, they say the ice rink is undergoing equipment maintenance today, and the early morning session is canceled."
Ren Xiyao was taken aback: "Cancelled? There was no prior notice."
"Miss, we can refund your money if you gave us this last-minute notice."
She's been feeling utterly exhausted these days, so much so that she doesn't even know what expression to wear. It's either maintenance or ice repair; she's lucky if she gets scheduled for four times a week. What is she supposed to do when ice athletes can't skate? Push herself to exhaustion in the gym? Or spend her nights in the hotel counting the patterns on the ceiling until dawn?
She ordered a bowl of congee, but felt extremely dizzy while picking it up, so she went into a convenience store and bought an energy drink, gulping it down. Leaning against the shelf, watching the pedestrians outside the glass door, she couldn't understand how things had turned out this way. At the beginning of the year, she was a top-ranked player, a key member of the national team, with almost all the resources focused on players like her. How come now, standing on a strange street with an ice-cold drink, a peaceful meal, a good night's sleep, and an undisturbed training session have all become luxuries?
The steaming white porridge sipped slowly. Her phone vibrated; it was a doping test notification from China, reminding her that there might be a test next week and to keep her phone on. She was truly exhausted, her bones felt stiff.
Flipping through her training notebook, she wrote, "3 sets of squats today (planned 4 sets), completed plank, 3000 meters not finished (interrupted by a surprise inspection)... dizziness twice, need to add carbs. Ice rink cancelled, rescheduled for tomorrow."
She paused, pen in hand, and closed the notebook.
There's nothing more to write. All that's left is to endure...
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
