I fell asleep last night wondering whether to end this. You know, just discontinue these notes, march right over to your place, and announce, "It was me. I wrote the letters. Now are you going to tell me how you feel, or what?"
"If I knew who you were, maybe," Ross murmured to the sheet of stationary. If talking to yourself was a sign of mental illness, then he was surely going insane. Over the past week, he'd spent more time talking to inanimate objects than was good for him.
He turned the envelope over in his hands. There was no doubt about it - the envelope Laura had dropped at the rink yesterday was definitely identical to this one. But did it mean... could it mean...?
"Let's not jump to conclusions," Julie had said as soon as Laura was out of earshot. "Those envelopes could be part of a mass-produced Hallmark set. Several million people across North America could have some!"
"But her!" he'd exclaimed in response. "One of three solid suspects, and she just happens to have the same stationary? That's too much of a coincidence."
"Strange things happen sometimes," she'd countered, her voice dropping. He still
wondered what that change of tone had meant...
But then I thought about it, and realized I'd already come this far... I might as well
finish what I'd started. I've always done it before... finish what I started, or at least done
everything I could to try. Why stop now?
He'd come a long way, too. Confusion. Realization. Denial. Acceptance. One
more step to go. One more leap to finish what he'd started.
The last step was always the hardest. The step from good to great, from silver to
gold... from friend to lover?
They were so close to finding out who his secret admirer was, and suddenly, he
was realizing he didn't care. Sure, he still wanted to know, just to satisfy his manic
curiousity, but it wasn't about finding her anymore. It was about secrets. It was about
confessions. It was about love. Three things his admirer seemed to have figured out...
three things about which he had some of his own figuring out to do.
So, you now have to put up with me and my notes for a few more days. Disappointed?
Or do you already know who I am and wonder why the heck I don't just give it up and show
myself? I keep thinking I've already given myself away several times, but who knows...
That same red envelope, on the floor in the rink lobby. Dropped by a girl he'd
skated on the same ice with many times, but still didn't know all that well. She was an
acquaintance, and they'd had conversations, but friends... he didn't know whether
he'd call her that. In fact, he was friendlier with Laura's partner, Ilia.
But who knew? Maybe Julie was right. Maybe strange things did happen
sometimes. Maybe for some reason, Laura Robinson had decided she was in love with
him and was too scared to say anything about it. He couldn't imagine how or why,
but it wasn't any stranger than the Melissa theory.
And again, he just couldn't fathom it. Him and Laura? Nuh-uh. Whoever
it was, Laura, someone else... he couldn't force himself to love her back. He winced.
After all this, the letter-writer would have to be let down gently, because there was only
one girl out there to whom he knew he could give the answer this Mystery Girl wanted to
hear.
No one ever said love was easy, he reminded himself.
But was it all worth it in the end?
"Tell him... don't tell him... tell him... don't tell him."
Julie absentmindedly tore the petals off a daisy she'd just plucked from a vase on her kitchen table, murmuring the mindless refrain as she did.
To tell or not to tell... that was the question. Julie smiled in spite of herself at her lame Shakespearean pun. Should she or shouldn't she? Keep writing or just do it? Suffer through another five days of rivals and hiding her emotions, or let it all out?
The Laura thing was just the worst possible coincidence that could've happened to her. Not only had she inadvertantly created rivals for herself, just when she'd gotten rid of Melissa, but now one of those rivals just happened to prove herself a very plausible suspect.
"She just had to have the same stationary, didn't she?" she groaned aloud, giving up her meticulous petal tearing and violently ripping the flower to shreds. "How stupid was I to use Hallmark paper that is probably the most popular Valentine's Day set they have?"
She looked down at the pathetically destroyed daisy and shook her head, gathering up the remaining scraps and tossing them in the garbage can.
I'm sitting here ripping up flowers, she thought. This is stupid. This is all just really, really pathetic.
She paced in the kitchen, restlessly unable to sit still and think. Carry out the plan, or drop it? She was getting incredibly impatient... two weeks had never before seemed so long. She wanted so much, and she wanted it now.
But rushing never solved anything, did it? she reasoned. If I let go now, I'll just make a mess of things... might as well stay calm. Patience is a virtue...
"Waiting sucks," she grumbled to herself.
Virtue or not, being patient was extremely frustrating sometimes.
“Quick, it must be quick!” Marina Kosolova called out as her prize pupils skated by, working on a particularly difficult footwork sequence. “1, 2, 3, 4... sharp! The arms, they must be in line, everything together...”
“Okay, we’re somewhere between horrendous and decent,” Julie decided, trying to catch her breath as they came to a stop for what seemed like the hundredth time.
“You must pick up the speed,” their coach told them as they skated over to the boards to get a drink of water. “Without the speed, it will not work. One step missed and all is lost.”
“Want us to try it again?” Ross questioned, wiping the sweat off his brow. “Once more?”
“No, we will work on this section more tomorrow,” Marina decided after a moment’s contemplation. “We will work on the slow section now, no?”
“Sure,” Julie agreed. “Coming, Ross?”
“Yup.” They skated back out to centre ice, and as the soft, dreamy music of the slow portion of their freedance filled the rink, they began to perform.
Marina eyed her students with some suspicion. Both partners, especially Julianne, had not been themselves lately. The most she’d been able to get out of the girl was that hurried, whispered agreement two days ago when she’d asked her if it was a romantic entanglement of some sort... when she’d asked her if she was “waiting for someone”.
Watching them carefully, she was beginning to have a strong hunch as to just who Julie was waiting for. Lately, they’d been skating this romantic section of the program with such natural ease that she’d wondered what on earth could’ve inspired the sudden artistic turnaround. Where before, they’d pulled away when they got too close, they now lingered. Where Julie used to laugh and tease her partner about being too stiff, she was now sinking against him with the dreamiest of smiles and looking like she never wanted him to let go... and there were no more complaints about stiffness, because all the awkwardness, all the artificiality, was gone. It was real.
The seasoned coach sighed. It was obvious. Somewhere along the line, Julie, the dominating, independent, critical girl she was used to seeing on the ice, had turned into this dreamy, smiling girl who looked willing to surrender to her partner at the feel of one soft touch. As strange as it seemed, Julianne Torrance was in love.
And her partner, who Marina had always suspected harboured some feelings for Julie that went beyond friendship, looked like he’d fallen just as hard. Only Ross was not the problem here. She’d already spoken to Julie, already drawn out part of her confession... she’d have to see if she could get the rest of the story.
“Okay, is enough for today!” At the sound of their coach’s familiar words, Julie and Ross heaved sighs of exhaustion and slowly skated around the rink, cooling off from the long practice.
“Practice at seven tomorrow?” Julie asked Marina, skating over to the boards.
“Seven?” Ross overheard and came to join them. “As in seven a.m.? What for?”
“Because we aren’t gonna be here on Thursday and Friday, remember?” Julie responded.
“Huh?” He was very confused. “Why aren’t we gonna be here on Thursday and Friday?”
“Oh, honestly, Ross, don’t you remember anything?” his partner asked in mild exasperation. “We’re going to Montreal.”
“We are?” He was looked more lost by the second. “Um, dare I ask why?”
“Because Protectors is having a thing,” Julie explained slowly, referring to Protectors Insurance, one of their key sponsors. “Don’t you remember, I told you about it weeks ago?”
“A thing? What kind of a ‘thing’?” he inquired warily.
“You know, a thing,” Julie repeated. “One of those big black-tie sponsor events for something or the other. We’re the star power.”
“Aw, man!” He made a horrible face. “You mean, like, we have to drive all the way there, and get dressed up and everything?”
“Uh huh.” Julie was already off ice and slipping her skate guards on as she spoke. “It’s on Thursday, so I figure we’ll drive up there, get dressed, go to the thing, and then drive back. We’ll probably be back sometime in the middle of Friday morning if we do that, but we’ll be too tired for early practice, so I figure we might as well count on skipping it.”
An idea suddenly sprung into Ross’s mind.
“Hey,” he commented casually. “You wanna drive up there together? I mean, if we’re gonna do all the driving in one day, at least we can get some sleep half the time if we take turns driving...”
Drive up there together? A panic signal flashed in Julie’s mind, but she fiercely shoved it aside.
“Sure, why not?” she agreed. “Makes sense to me.”
In a car, alone, with Ross, for that long? her screaming mind asked her. Are you crazy, girl?
Trying to push all doubts aside, she stood up and pushed her limp hair out of her face.
“So we’ll make plans tomorrow, ‘kay?” she said to her partner. “I’m gonna go get dressed and leave now.”
“See if you can find out anything more about... you know,” he said discreetly, mouthing the word “Laura!” behind their coach’s back.
“Uh... yeah, I’ll try,” Julie muttered, and without another look back, she disappeared.
As she watched her student’s strange reaction, Marina nodded understandingly. To at least one person, Julie’s odd behavior was finally starting to make sense.
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