Maya is waiting for me at the boards at 5:55 a.m. with two paper coffees steaming in the cold air, and she pushes one across the rubber matting toward me with the tip of her finger.
"One for you," she says, grinning. "Black. No sugar. Like your soul."
I take it and the heat burns straight through my cold hands and wakes up my fingers. "Thanks."
"You look tired," she says, tilting her head and studying my face in that way she does, like she can see straight through me. "Roommate keep you up?"
"No," I lie, fast, because my throat gets tight when I think about last night and Roman in the dark asking why I left Russia.
She raises one eyebrow, unconvinced. "Liar. You have that look. The 'I stayed up thinking about a boy' look."
"I wasn't thinking about a boy," I say, too fast, and the coffee almost sloshes over the rim.
"Sure," she says, grinning wider. "Whatever you say, Viktor."
We step onto the ice and Coach Dubois isn't here yet and the Oval is ours for five whole minutes, just the hum of the lights and the sound of our blades, and the cold bites at my cheeks in a good way.
"Okay," Maya says, clapping her gloved hands together, the sound sharp. "I have an idea. Since my partner quit to become a lawyer and your partner never existed, we should skate together."
I stop in the middle of a glide. "What?"
"Not pairs," she says quickly, holding both hands up. "God no. I'm not lifting you and you're not lifting me. We'd both die and Coach would kill us. I mean footwork. Side by side. Synchronized. Like ice dance but without the romance and the sequins."
I have never skated with anyone, not really, because in Saint Petersburg I was always alone, always the kid in the corner with taped boots and holes in his laces while everyone else had partners, and the thought of matching someone else step for step makes my stomach drop.
"I don't know how," I say, and my voice sounds smaller than I want it to.
"You know how to skate," she says, like it is that simple. "That's literally it. We just do it at the same time. It'll be fun. It'll be good for your edges. Coach will love it."
I think about saying no because my whole life has been shoulders back and chin down and mouth shut and make yourself small enough that nobody notices you, and then I think about Roman in our room last night saying you're good in that rough quiet voice, and I think about Maya saying we're going to be friends like it was already decided, and I think about Mama on the phone whispering be free, Viktor, and something loosens in my chest.
"Okay," I say.
She squeals, actually squeals, loud enough to echo off the glass. "Yes! Okay, first, we need music. Something not boring. Something with a beat."
She pulls out her phone and balances it on the boards and plays a song I don't know, fast and English, a woman singing about running and not looking back, and the sound is tinny in the big empty rink.
We try, and the first time I go left when she goes right and we almost crash into each other and both have to grab the boards laughing, and the second time I am half a beat behind and I can hear my blades dragging, and the third time we match, not perfect but close enough that our breathing lines up, and the fourth time we are in sync, my edges and her edges and my three turn and her three turn, side by side, not touching, but moving like one person with four legs, and it feels strange, not bad strange, good strange, like someone finally sees me on the ice instead of looking through me.
Coach Dubois walks in at 6:10 with her coffee, and she sees us and she stops dead by the door and she just watches with her arms crossed, and we finish the sequence and stop at the boards breathing hard, our chests heaving and our cheeks red from cold.
She doesn't say anything for a long time, just looks at us, and then she says, "Again."
We do it again, and my legs burn and my bad ankle throbs, but I don't care.
At 7:00 the hockey team comes in loud, their sticks clattering, and Roman is at the front with his helmet under his arm, and he sees me and Maya leaning on the boards laughing and out of breath with our foreheads almost touching, and he stops so fast his team almost runs into him behind him.
Maya waves, bright and unbothered. "Morning, boys!"
Roman nods once. He doesn't smile and he doesn't frown, he just looks at me, his eyes holding mine for a second too long, and I feel heat crawl up the back of my neck, and I look away first and stare down at my laces.
At lunch Maya and Jamal and Priya and I sit at our table by the window, and I am eating a real sandwich with turkey and cheese, not just a banana, and it tastes like something normal people eat, and Roman and his team sit at the table right next to ours, loud on purpose, and I try not to look over.
My phone buzzes in my pocket against my thigh.
Roman: you and Maya looked good this morning.
I stare at the text and my heart does a strange little kick against my ribs because he watched and he noticed and he cared enough to say it. I type back with thumbs that feel clumsy: thanks.
A second later: Roman: you're teaching her your footwork?
I look over at Maya laughing at something Jamal said, her head thrown back, and I feel something warm and protective move in my chest, so I type: she's teaching me how to not be alone.
Three dots appear, then they disappear, then they come back, then they disappear again, and no reply ever comes, and I put my phone face down on the table and my stomach feels hollow for no reason I can name.
After class I go back to the room and Roman is there doing push-ups on the floor, shirt off, sweating, his back muscles moving under his skin, and he sees me in the doorway and stops mid-push-up and sits up, breathing hard.
"Hey," he says.
"Hey," I say back, and I drop my bag by my bed.
He wipes his face with his shirt, and his hair is damp. "You and Maya. You're… partners now?"
"Just footwork," I say fast. "For fun."
"Right." He stands up and he is close, too close, and I can smell his sweat, not bad, just clean and salty and him, and it makes my head feel light. "Cool. She's nice."
"Yeah," I say, and I step back because my heart is beating too fast.
He looks at me for a second longer, then looks away. "I'm going to shower."
He grabs his towel and goes into the bathroom and the door closes and the water turns on loud, and I sit on my bed and I take out my phone because I need something to do with my hands.
Dima: UPDATE??? DID YOU AND HOCKEY BOY KISS YET???
I type: no, and I can feel myself smiling small despite everything.
Dima: BOO. BORING.
At 8:00 p.m. there is a knock on the door, not the beep of a key card but a real knock, and I open it and it is Maya in flannel pajamas with snowmen on them, holding a big tub of chocolate ice cream that is already melting down the sides.
"Emergency friend meeting," she says, very serious. "Jamal and Priya are already in the lounge. You coming?"
I look back at the room and Roman is on his bed with his headphones on, playing his game, the blue light flickering across his face.
"Yeah," I say. "Let me get my shoes."
Roman takes his headphones off. "Where you going?"
"Friends," I say, and the word feels easier in my mouth now.
He nods, and something soft moves across his face. "Cool. Have fun."
I close the door behind me.
The lounge is on our floor and it smells like popcorn and old couch, and Jamal and Priya are already there on the sagging couch sharing the ice cream straight from the tub with two spoons.
"You're late," Priya says, pointing her spoon at me, her eyelids glittering gold. "We started without you."
"Rude," Maya says, sitting down and pulling me down next to her so our shoulders touch.
We talk for two hours about skating and about school and about boys, and Priya asks me if I have a boyfriend back in Russia and I say no, and she asks if I want one here and I say I don't know, and she winks slow and says "You will," and my face gets hot, and Jamal asks about my ankle and I show him the tape wrapped tight and black around the bone and he whistles low. "That's nasty, man. You need to rest it."
"I can't," I say, and the words come out before I can stop them. "Because if I stop, I'll fall behind, and if I fall behind, I'll get sent home."
No one says anything for a second and the room goes quiet except for the hum of the vending machine, and then Maya bumps my shoulder hard with hers. "You're not going home. You're stuck with us now, sorry."
I smile and it feels real and wide and it stretches muscles in my face I do not use often.
At 10:30 I go back to the room and Roman is in bed with the lights off, his phone in his hand lighting up his face blue.
"Hey," he whispers into the dark.
"Hey," I whisper back, closing the door soft.
"Good night with your friends?"
"Yeah," I say, kicking off my shoes. "Good."
He is quiet for a second and I can hear him breathing. Then: "I'm glad you have friends."
I get into bed and pull the blanket up to my chin and it smells like laundry detergent. "Thanks."
"Viktor?"
"Yeah?"
"Can I ask you something?"
My stomach tightens. "Okay."
"Why did you leave Russia?"
The question hits me right in the chest, hard and sudden, because no one has asked me that, not Maya, not Jamal, not Priya, not even Coach, and I think about Papa drunk and yelling and the ripped letter on the kitchen floor and the night I left with a bag tied shut with a shoelace because I had nothing else.
"Because I had to," I say, quiet, because it is the only true answer I have.
He doesn't push and he doesn't ask for more, he just says, "Okay," soft and accepting, and we lie in the dark and I listen to him breathe.
"Roman?" I say after a while, my voice barely there.
"Yeah?"
"Why did you ask?"
He is quiet for a long time, so long I think he fell asleep, and then he says, "Because I want to know you," and his voice is low and honest in the dark.
My heart kicks hard against my ribs, once, twice. "Okay," I say.
"Okay," he repeats.
I close my eyes and I fall asleep to the sound of his breathing, slow and even, and it feels safe.
At 4:29 a.m. I wake up before the alarm, like always, and Roman is asleep on his back with his mouth open a little, and I get up quiet so I don't wake him, and I go to the Oval in the dark and the cold.
Maya is already there lacing her skates, her breath making clouds.
"Ready, partner?" she asks, looking up and smiling.
I nod and I feel my own mouth pull up at the corners. "Ready."