With one squeeze of my fingers I lowered back to sitting, swinging one leg through the other and using a one handed back walkover to stand.

Flourish and pizazz ended my movements by a flick of each hand, and my chin pressed high toward the ceiling. It’s one of the hardest things for a new gymnast to learn, not looking down at a narrow piece of footing that all but screams at you to.

But that wasn’t the way to succeed, the way to feel steady and at home. The key was moving on four inches just as you would on the forty foot floor.

I danced my way to the end up the line and pulled my feet together and my arms over my head. With one breath and swing, I set back into my back handspring layout layout series.

Each skill ended with my feet resolutely on the surface, no bobbles or balance checks to speak of. The routine flew by, each moment blurring into the next as if I was performing it in my own gym for Nik’s eyes alone.

With only the dismount left, I tapped a foot to the end of the Beam behind me and gulped one breath. Roughly sixteen feet extended out in front of me, waiting to be eaten up by precision and skill and a blind-eye type of courage.

One foot in front of the other I moved into my round off back handspring combination and sprang off the end, looking to the sky in thanks when both feet landed on the ground and didn’t move.

A sense of accomplishment rained down on me along with the noise of the crowd, but what stood out more than anything was the sound of Nik’s ecstatic voice.

“Yes! Hell yes, Cal!”

I caught the sight of another fist pump as I rounded the Beam to the stairs, launching myself off of them and into his waiting arms. He hugged me big before letting me go and looking excitedly into my eyes.

“You did it,” he said simply.

“We don’t know the score yet,” I reasoned, knowing that anything was possible and that feeling didn’t always translate into score. And the feeling had been nearly legendary. Knowing Nik was watching me, knowing he was invested in my success and happiness and everything that came from the two together, I had totally peacocked the shit out of it.

But Nik was insistent, arguing, “You didn’t see what I just saw, Cal. I know the goddamn score.”

I looked to the score strip as I heard my name called over the loudspeaker, the flash of the fifteen point four nearly bringing me to the floor.

I knew my total score for the two days prior to this event, and I knew the standings of all the other gymnasts around me. A fifteen point four meant I had placed second overall.

Disbelief buoyed my heart and leadened my brain, the discrepancy between what I thought was possible and what was making me nearly come out of my skin.

Adrenaline surged when I accepted it, and I couldn’t help but squeal as it all set in.

“Oh my God,” I shrieked.

Nik nodded, a smile practically reshaping the features of his face.

I wanted to stay in that moment and take it in, but a flurry of activity separated us, pulling me toward the center of the arena and the ceremony that ultimately named me as an Olympic Team member.

I searched for Nik as it was happening, eager to see his face some more and share in the news, but the crowd swallowed him up and completely thwarted my efforts.

It amazed me how two things could go hand in hand so well together and at the same time be the cause of one of the most monstrous internal wars of my life.

The Coach and The Career.

Two things destined to go together.

But the way I wanted it wasn’t as intended.

Two weeks back in the gym with Nik passed like the speed of light, and the eve of leaving for camp came before I knew it.

I tried my best to rush through every day in the gym just to get to the nights. Time when Nik and I would tumble together like always, touches and kisses in between, and flirting all the way through.

Every day I felt a burn, a fire that ate at everything I knew, setting it ablaze and threatening to make me rebuild.

I thought I would be scared of the flames, the memories sure to burn down, trapped in place that couldn’t get out or be saved. I thought the heat of it as it encroached would make me cower in fear, that the change would feel unwelcome and cumbersome in an effort to start over.

Instead, the danger felt like opportunity, a chance to burn it all down and start over in a way that rarely existed.

Sure, material memories would be gone and my routine would change, but the world I created might have a chance to be bigger and better and all-together more well-built from the beginning.

Gymnastics was the old house, and Nik was the new. Both felt like home in some ways, but while gymnastics was built on opportunity and the dreams of my parents, my feelings for Nik felt mined straight from the deepest tunnels within me.

So when he asked me to go to the beach with him that night, I knew there was nothing I’d rather do.

Not pack for camp or spend time with my parents. Not dream about the coaches and gymnasts I would meet or the opportunities I would be given.

That night, all I wanted was him.

My hands sank deeper into the cotton covered flesh of his abdomen, and the muscles tightened noticeably in reaction.

His hand cracked the throttle to slow us as we pulled off on to the path and made our way to the back of the dune.

I pressed my cheek harder into his back and inhaled his scent mixed with ocean like a drug. The sea and the salt clung to my skin and his, and the humidity of the night made my clothes feel sticky.

Nik helped me from the bike before pulling my hand to his chest. “I can’t believe you leave for camp tomorrow.”

His words were congratulatory but sullen, the mix sounding funny to my ears. I understood perfectly though, the very feeling swimming and swirling in my own gut at ten times the power.

I didn’t know how to make choices or decisions, and part of me felt like it should be easy to have both.

And if it had just been me and Nik in the world, it probably would have been. But it wasn’t just us, the circus that was everyone else hanging out conveniently just on the periphery.

Nik helped me climb to the top of the dune, standing patiently in silence as my brain ran circles around itself for long minutes. When I made no move to touch, no move to speak, no move to engage whatsoever, he finally sought to find out why.

“What’s going on, my little Pea?”

I shook my head at the nickname but smiled at the affection behind it.

“I just…I don’t know. I can’t shake all of this inner turmoil, I guess.”

“What’s bothering you?” he asked softly, pulling me to sit down next to him.

Lightning bugs danced peacefully in front of us, and the sound of the ocean sang out a lullaby.

I sank into the comfort of it and him, leaning over to rest my head on my shoulder as I spoke.

“Everything,” I answered truthfully. I hadn’t only become this torn up recently. I’d always struggled with indecision and the demons in my mind. I’d just been covering it up a hell of a lot better.

“Can you describe it?”

He didn’t scoff or tease or make me feel like a statement so broad was a joke.

He greased the path and eased the way, and he made talking about something I’d never even considered talking about before feel like the most natural thing in the world.

He made me feel open.

Scared the moment would pass, I forced myself to get it all out fast, practically piling one word on top of another until I got to the end.

“I don’t take deep, heavy breaths just before sleep pulls me under. I think deep, heavy thoughts that cloud my dreams, awaken my mind, and muddy the blood in my veins. I feel insecure and unworthy and cyclically self-deprecating. Who am I to complain? Who am I to get trapped in the confines of my own head? I’m unbelievably blessed.”