Chapter 21: The Edge of Trust
The chill from the dawn session lingered in Amber’s bones all day, a pleasant, unfamiliar ache that felt more honest than the razor-sharp pain of a triple loop landing. She moved through her compulsory media appearances and a light off-ice training session on autopilot. The gold medal was in her suitcase. She’d taken it off the nightstand, its cool weight feeling less like an achievement and more like a door closing.
Alysa noticed. “You’re somewhere else,” she said as they walked back to the village for lunch, their boots crunching on salted paths.
“Just tired.”
“You were gone before sunrise. Your bed was made. Military tight, like always.” Alysa bumped her shoulder. “Spill.”
Amber watched a ski team jog by in matching sweats. “I went to the snowboard cross venue. Watched some training.”
Alysa’s eyebrows shot up. “Figure skater at the dirtbag circus. Next you’ll have a tattoo.”
The joke fell flat. Amber stopped walking. “Do you and Isabeau have plans tonight?”
“For the men’s downhill? Yeah, we’re gonna watch at the big screen in the plaza. Why? You finally wanna hang out with the cool kids?”
“Something like that.” Amber took a breath. “I was thinking we could go watch the women’s snowboard cross finals. In person.”
Alysa’s teasing expression softened into genuine surprise. “Really? You hate the cold. And the… chaos.”
“I know.” Amber couldn’t explain it. The deal. You let go, you cheer. “It could be fun. A change.”
“Alright,” Alysa said slowly, a smile creeping back. “I’ll drag Isabeau. She’ll complain about the smell of weed the whole time. This should be good.”
By 7:30 PM, the snowboard cross venue was a pulsating heart of noise and colored light. The course was a brutalist poem in snow: a steep, narrow gully of banked turns, rolling bumps, and huge, tabletop jumps. Speaker stacks blared a raw mix of grunge and electronica. The air was a cocktail of diesel from the snowcats, icy pine, and the palpable, sweaty thrill of a crowd braving the freezing night.
Amber, bundled in a thick team parka, felt absurdly out of place. Alysa and Isabeau were on either side of her, arguing about the best viewing spot. She wasn’t listening. Her eyes scanned the athlete holding area near the start gate, a fenced-off zone of nervous energy and last-minute adjustments.
She saw her.
Y/n was a study in focused stillness amidst the chaos. She had her board resting against her hip, one foot in a binding, headphones on. She was staring at the first turn of the course, her jaw working slightly. Then, as if sensing the stare, she turned. Her eyes found Amber’s through the scrim of chain-link and distance.
Y/n pulled off her headphones. She didn’t smile. She just gave a single, slow nod.
The compulsion to go over there was a physical pull in Amber’s chest. She made her way along the spectator fence, ignoring Alysa’s confused call, until she was as close as she could get.
Y/n skated over, the hard plastic of her board clacking against the ice. Up close, the pre-race intensity coming off her was like a heat haze. It wasn’t the playful, teasing energy from the dawn. This was something raw and untouchable.
“You came,” Y/n said. Her voice was low, almost lost under the crowd’s roar for the previous heat.
“I brought the cool kids,” Amber said, gesturing vaguely behind her.
“Good.” Y/n’s gaze was unwavering. “The deal. You let go, you cheer, and then you decide what happens after the Games.” She leaned a little closer, her hand coming up to rest not on Amber’s arm, but on the cold metal fence between them, their fingers almost touching. “But I need to know—are you really going to let yourself want something?”
The question was a direct hit. Amber’s heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic tempo that had nothing to do with athletic performance. It was the fear of the bunny slope all over again, the terror of leaning forward into the unknown.
“I’m trying,” Amber breathed, the words snatched away by a gust of wind.
Y/n’s eyes softened, just for a second. “Then bring Alysa and Isabeau. Use them. Let them ease the tension. And let go.” Her hand slid from the fence to briefly press against Amber’s parka, right at her waist, a touch so sure and fleeting it might have been imagined. “You do that, and once I’m done with the podium, the media, all that shit… then you tell me what you want. Right there. I’ll abide by our deal. Okay?”
Amber could only nod, her throat tight.
“Okay.” Y/n slapped the fence once, a sharp, final sound. “Now go watch me work.”
The next fifteen minutes were a blur of loudspeaker announcements, flashing lights, and the terrifying, beautiful violence of the sport. Four riders per heat, barreling down the course almost on top of each other. It wasn’t about grace. It was about line, aggression, and a sheer refusal to yield.
Y/n’s heat came up. In the start gate, she looked like a different person from the woman who’d patiently taught snowboarding that morning. She was all coiled power, her eyes fixed on the drop. The buzzer screamed.
They exploded out of the gate.
Y/n got a middling start, third out of four into the first turn. Amber’s nails dug into her own palms. On the first roller, Y/n took a tight inside line, her board skimming perilously close to the Austrian rider beside her. They bumped, a jarring clatter of board on board, and Y/n gained an inch. She carried that inch into the first big jump, launching silent and clean while the Austrian landed sketchy, losing speed.
By the second banked turn, Y/n was in second. The French leader was three board-lengths ahead. The crowd was a monolithic roar. Amber found she was standing, she was screaming, her voice raw and unfamiliar in her own ears. Alysa was yelling next to her, Isabeau was actually jumping up and down.
The final jump approached, a last chance to make a pass. The French rider took a conservative line. Y/n, seeing it, went wider, carrying more speed into the lip. It was a reckless, all-or-nothing move. She soared past the French rider in the air, a phantom passing a ghost, and landed with a impact that looked brutal, her knees absorbing the force like pistons. She fought the landing, wobbled for one heart-stopping second, then carved hard across the finish line.
First.
The sound was apocalyptic. Y/n spun around at the bottom, throwing her head back, a primal yell tearing from her throat that was swallowed by the noise. She unstrapped, grabbed her board, and hoisted it over her head.
Amber’s body was trembling. She wasn’t cold. She was electric.
The finals were a formality and a coronation. Y/n took the lead from the first turn and never relinquished it, riding with a fearless, fluid command that transformed the chaotic track into her own personal roadmap. When she crossed the line for gold, the victory was so decisive it felt inevitable.
Amber watched it all, the cheers of her friends ringing in her ears, but from a distance. She was inside the feeling, that terrifying, exhilarating lean forward. She was letting go.
The medal ceremony was a flash of flags and anthem. The media scrum was a wall of microphones and camera flashes. Amber waited, her pulse a steady, anxious drumbeat. Alysa and Isabeau, sensing something, had drifted off to get hot chocolate.
Finally, the lights around the mixed zone started to shut off. The crowds thinned, heading for buses and bars. The cold seeped back in, now that the adrenaline of the event was fading.
Y/n emerged from a side exit, alone. The gold medal was shoved into the pocket of her team jacket. She looked drained, the intense focus replaced by a deep, satisfied fatigue. She scanned the nearly empty plaza and saw Amber waiting under a lone security light.
She walked over, her boots making soft prints in the fresh snow. They stood there for a moment, the only sound the distant hum of generators and the crunch of a snow plow far away.
“You cheered,” Y/n said quietly. A statement.
“I did.”
“And?” Y/n’s green eyes were dark in the low light, waiting. “What do you want, Amber?”
The world narrowed to the space between them, to the ghost of a touch at her waist, to the memory of falling and laughing in the dawn snow. The safe path was behind her, a well-groomed trail of predictable victories and controlled landings.
Amber took the step, closing the distance. She didn’t plan it. She just reacted.
“This,” she said, her voice steady now, sure. And she kissed her.
It wasn’t graceful. It was cold lips and the faint taste of salted sweat and victory. It was clumsy and real. Y/n’s hand came up, cradling the back of Amber’s head, her fingers tangling in the platinum hair, pulling her closer. The kiss deepened, a raw, hungry thing that held the exhaustion of two lifelong climbs and the terrifying thrill of a first drop.
When they broke apart, breathing clouds of vapor that merged in the air, Y/n rested her forehead against Amber’s.
“Okay,” Y/n murmured, the word a promise against Amber’s lips. “That’s a start.”