Young Writers Society

Chapter 11:

We stepped through the threshold of my house. I instantly felt the intense scent of smoke reach my nostrils. My eyes widened. I ran to the kitchen: there was nothing there. I twisted my head around in all sorts of directions rapidly. My eyes came to rest on Crystall, grinning and pointing towards the garden. My heart almost stopped.

I dashed out, expecting some sort of inferno burning down my beautiful garden - the scent was intense enough to suggest that. Opening the glass door violently, my eyes came to rest on… Caen.

“Oh, hi there,” he said, sitting comfortably on a bench under the wisteria frame. In his mouth, he held a piece of half-burnt paper like a cigarette - which seemed to resemble an envelope. Meanwhile, in his hand, he held a large fervid flame. Caen’s face was brightened by the exact same grin as Crystall’s before. “What’s all the commotion about?” he asked, still smiling.

I was unsure whether I should explode with rage or be relieved.

“Wha…” I began.

“I’m burning your fan mail.”

I think you know what I chose from the two options above.

“Just what the fuck are you doing, you son of a fucking bitch?!” I screamed.

“Jeez, I’m only burning the bad ones,” he replied calmly.

“You read through my fan mail?!”

“Hey, I did all of this because Crystall and I didn’t want to see you crying anymore because of those letters.”

Once again, I was wavering between two emotions: further anger - they were still burning stuff addressed to me - and infinite gratitude.

“It’s true,” Crystall called from behind me. I turned back to see him smiling clemently, as usual. I think you know what I chose from the two options above.

“Thank you so much guys…” I said, as I looked back and forth; from Crystall to Caen. “You’re the best…”

“We know we are,” Caen said. He and Crystall chuckled. Suddenly, Caen’s tone became more serious. “I thought you might want to have this,” he handed me a specific letter from the table next to him. The letter’s message was quite proleptic through one image on the envelope: the ISU logo.

***

A few days later, we were at Stansted airport: me, Nate and Crystall. Around the departure gate, we were supposed to meet Elizabeth and her coach: Bonnie Justine. Of course, it didn’t take me long to notice Eliza’s shining ginger hair. I began barging through the crowd shamelessly on my journey to Eliza. As soon as I came up behind her, I tapped her right shoulder and moved to the left. As Eliza turned her head to the right, I gave her a little push to spook her a bit. I may or may not have did it a little too well.

“You idiot!” Eliza screamed in fear. She turned back to me and hugged me - nearly strangling me to death. It was probably an attempt to get back at me, but I accepted it with open arms. “It’s so great to see you again, Kat!” she said. I loathed that nickname, but Eliza was annoying enough to ignore me.

“Awesome to… See you too…” I struggled to speak as she ‘lightly’ embraced me. “Could you, like… Let me go…”

“Oh! Yeah, of course!” she let go of me and went to talk with Nate. I moved on to Mrs Justine. She was towered over me, she was just over 6 and a half foot tall. Her long brown bangs almost reached her hazel brown eyes.

“Mrs Justine…!” I said, smiling, yet failing to not sound intimidated. “We haven’t seen each other in a while…”

“Yes, it has been quite a while,” Mrs Justine replied. I will only call someone I know by their title if they are utterly terrifying or they deserve my respect. Mrs Justine fulfills both.

“So, how has Eliza been in training?” I asked curiously.

“Oh, Eliza has been amazing;” she said, smiling proudly. “She managed to get the hang of the triple Axel recently.”

I gasped in awe. Not just because the situation required me to do it, but also because I was very happy with every bit of Eliza’s progress. At the same time, it was quite sad too: Eliza was twenty-one and her skating career was coming to a close. She gave me her number though, so we’ll always be in contact.

“That’s awesome!” As I said this, I was playfully surprised from behind, as Eliza jumped on my back.

“Katrina!” she said, “You never told me you had a boyfriend!”

My smile was gone in an instant.

“About that-” I began, but Nate and Crystall cut me off.

“Hello, Mrs Justine!” Nate called, he kissed her hand like they were some stereotypical royal figures, and she simply giggled flirtatiously.

“H- Hello Mrs Justine,” Crystall said shyly. I wasn’t that surprised: she’s more terrifying than all horror movies put together.

“And you are this boyfriend?” Mrs Justine asked.

“Y-yes, madam,” Crystall replied, trying to smile through his fear.

Anyway, we decided to make our way to the gates. Eliza and I went a bit ahead of the others so I could tell her something.

“What is it, Kat?” she asked, confused.

“Eliza,” I began, struggling to suppress my anger, “Call me that one more time and I swear I’ll make it the last time a word comes out of your mouth.”

“Jeez, calm down,” she said, “Can you get the point already?”

That’s where my confidence fell like the Berlin Wall.

“Well… You see… Crystall isn’t…”

“Katrina, if you don’t want the others to hear, you better hurry up!” Eliza said ‘encouragingly’, looking behind her.

I began breathing quickly and heavily, until I finally managed to spit it out:

“Crystall is a centaur!”

Eliza looked at me with the ‘you need a psychiatrist’ look.

“Just what the fuck are you on?” Eliza laughed. “He looks perfectly normal to me.”

“Eliza,” I looked at her. I was almost sad that she didn’t take me seriously.

“I know that face,” she said, “I’m sorry, Katrina. We’ll try to discuss it on the plane. C’mon,” she reached out her hand to me with a friendly smile. I grabbed it spontaneously, and we ran to find the Crystall, Nate and Mrs Justine.

***

A long while later, we were getting comfortable in the plane. Crystall, Elizabeth and I sat in the same row of three seats, while Nate and Mrs Justine sat in the row next to us. Luckily for them, they had one seat free for the entire flight, so at least they had some room. The plane itself wasn’t particularly crowded, but neither was it empty. The cabin crew finished their safety demonstration and soon, we were off to Germany. I sat closest to the window. I stared out of it, down at all the buildings and large fields below. I always loved flying because of the great bird’s eye view you got when the plane took off and when it landed.

Of course, I did end up bringing up the subject of Crystall’s identity.

“So, Eliza…” I began awkwardly. “Remember back at Stansted…”

“Yeah, yeah,” she replied with a smile. “I remember.”

“Remember what?” Crystall asked, slowly turning his head towards me.

“Well… You see…” I honestly hated being in situations like this, but I couldn’t help but be shy at this subject.

“Basically,” Eliza explained, “Katrina revealed to me that you are someone special,” she winked after she said that. I couldn’t help but admire her care for not making it explicit.

Crystall wasn’t as happy.

“Please promise me you won’t tell anyone!” he whispered desperately. Eliza continued to smile clemently.

“I won’t tell them if they have a gun to my head.”

“Well then!” I said, beginning an attempt to change the subject. “How do you think we’ll do at the Opening Gala?”

“I’m sure it’ll be great. We’ve still got two days to practise and there’s an ice rink not far from the hotel we’re staying at. That’s very convenient.” Eliza replied.

“I wonder who that new guy, Francis Dean, will be. I hope he’s quite witty. Maybe a bit attractive...” I started slipping off into the world of fantasy.

“I bet he’ll be some Irish bloke,” Eliza laughed. “You’re English, I’m Scottish, Charles and Amelia are of Welsh descent, we’re going to need a leprechaun at some point!”

“What’s a leprechaun?” Crystall asked, tilting his head. I looked around for a bit, trying to find the simplest way to explain the concept of Irish people to him. Until I saw this one guy.

I knew instantly that he was English. His hair was done in that stereotypical, cringey mushy-curtain-quiff thing. Not gonna lie, I was on the verge of bringing out my breakfast the same way it came in. He wore a ‘Team GB’ jumper, jeans and white Nike shoes. I’ll admit, I wore pretty much the same thing, but with black Adidas shoes, but it suited me much better. He sat on the end of the row diagonally in front of us, two girls were seated next to him, taking about fifty selfies a second.

The boy got up from his seat slowly, as if to draw suspense - and it worked: I was praying to every deity in existence to make sure he wouldn’t speak to us. But then, I forgot not everyone has spare time to grant wishes.

“Hey,” he said. My gut twisted. “You guys are going to see the Rostelecom Cup too?”

“Yes we are,” I said, faking a smile. “Which skater do you support?”

“Oh, I’m not going to be watching: I’ll be skating.”

That hit me hard. Very hard. Crystall and Eliza leaned out of their seats and gazed at him.

“You’ll be what?” Crystall asked, disbelieving.

“What’s your name?” Eliza demanded.

“My name’s Francis Dean. And you are?”

Author's Note:

Hi!! I'm alive! And I'll try to be as alive as I can. I'm more than happy to hear what you want to see in future chapters so I can keep improving this story for you guys! Thank you for reading!