On Thin Ice

My name's Nick Rossi, and I'm a 24-year old figure skater based in South London. Well, to be precise, I'm part of a pairs skating partnership. We were a highly successful team, finishing in the top three in the British Championships two years running. That was until the day I walked in on my partner – and fiancée – with a rival's cock in her mouth, and her tits in his hands. Not surprisingly, that ended my interest in the engagement, the skating partnership, and the entire sport for a while.

My coach, Sue Friedrichs, coaxed me back onto the ice. Sue's a veteran of skating, with a considerable reputation. She represented East Germany at the Olympics several hundred years ago, she's an international judge, and over the years she's coached loads of champions. She's knocking on in years now, semi-retired from coaching, but she made Lesley – my slut partner – and me her special project, and she was devastated when we split up. For a while I thought about carrying on solo, but my heart just wasn't in it. When you skate with a partner, and it works well, it's incredibly intimate: it's like you meld into a single entity. You know each other's thoughts, your hearts beat in unison, you breathe at the same time...take the partner away and it's as if part of your body has been cut off. That's partly why Lesley's betrayal had hurt me so deeply.

Sue and I were sitting morosely in the café at Streatham Ice Arena after one training session when she laid her hand over mine on the table, and said, "There's only one thing for it liebling – I'm just going to have to find you a new partner." I was torn by the idea. I love skating, and I would have hated to walk away from it like that. But Lesley and I had been skating together since we were 14, I wasn't sure if I could build another professional relationship with a new partner, just like that. Sue was adamant, though and three days later, when I arrived for training, she waved me over with a huge grin. "Nicky, I want you to come and meet someone." Taking my hand, she dragged me into the café, and towards a table where a small figure was hunched over a glass of cola. The girl stood as she saw us approaching. I'd noticed her gliding and pirouetting around the ice on occasions, but never actually met her. Sue put her arm around the girl's shoulders and said, "Nicky, this is Donna Hamilton. You two start getting to know each other while I get you a coffee." I sat, and the two of us nodded shyly to each other, then sat silent and embarrassed as Sue bustled off.

I surreptitiously studied Donna as she gazed down through the window of the café to the ice below, where the public session was just coming to an end for the day. She had very blonde hair, cut so that the ends curled inwards at just about the level of her jaw. Her face was kind of elfin: slightly arched eyebrows, one shade of blonde darker than her hair, eyes the colour of jade, cheeks which tapered inwards to a narrow chin with a dimple. She looked up and smiled at Sue as she returned, and thin lips parted to reveal sparkling teeth straight out of a toothpaste ad. We talked for a few minutes, and I learnt that Donna was 19 and had been a successful junior skater, but her career had stalled a bit and she was looking to move in a different direction. I started to tell her my background, and she interrupted, "Oh, I know all about you, I've even got a poster of you in my bedroom." She must have realised it made her sound a bit of a dork, because she immediately blushed bright scarlet, and became fascinated by the straw in her cola glass.

After a couple of minutes Sue took us down to the ice and told us to just fool around together a bit. As we stood side by side I realised we must look like a very odd couple. I'm six-feet-one, slim with dark Italian looks, whereas Donna was only five-two, pale and, although not chunky, had a decent pair of boobs sticking out under her pink jumper. We skated around each other for a while, then Sue got us to try out a few basic moves together: a couple of lifts, a few spins, that sort of thing. I didn't feel like we'd really clicked, but I recognised it was early days. After that we started practising together on the ice, but in my view things weren't getting any better. I frankly didn't think Donna had much personality and, basically, she just wasn't Lesley. Off the ice we did our fitness training separately, and we never spoke or saw each other outside our ice sessions. It didn't help that she still had a regular day job. I had been lucky in having a wealthy father who owned a chain of fruit and veg shops and, together with Sports Council sponsorship Lesley and I had received, it meant I could be a full-time skater. Without that sort of backing, Donna had never been able to give up her nine-to-five.

After a couple of weeks I told Sue I didn't think the partnership was working out. She disagreed. "Look, you don't have to be in love with the girl, you just have to skate with her. Technically you're quite good together, and that will improve. The only thing you're not doing between you is generating any warmth. That's all we need to work on." I wasn't convinced, but I grudgingly agreed to keep trying. Looking back now, I can see that it was all my fault – frankly, I behaved like a complete shit towards Donna. She regularly asked me if I'd like to have coffee together after our skating sessions, but I always told her I had to rush off. A few times I went for drinks with a group of the other regulars at the arena, male and female. Donna always hovered in the background, looking hopeful, but I never invited her. A month or so after we started training together she even invited me to her 20th birthday party and I lied that I had a prior engagement. At the time I was resentful at having been saddled with her, as I saw it, and I had no idea how much I was hurting her.

A couple of months into our partnership, Donna and I took part in a local competition, sort of an early warm-up for the season in earnest. It was an absolute disaster. For a start, neither of us were really happy with our music. Donna had suggested we go for a romantic theme, whereas I wanted something more upbeat, Fifties rock 'n' roll that we could really zing across the ice to. In the end we had compromised and included a bit of both. Rehearsals to the music seemed to go okay, but on the night Donna was so nervous I could almost hear her teeth chattering before we went out on the ice. I was wearing my usual billowing white shirt and tight black pants, while she wore a rather outdated sparkly pink dress, pretty much identical to those of several of the other competitors. The routine itself went reasonably well until a lift close to the end. I was slightly out of position, as a result of which Donna mistimed her jump into my arms. Instead of catching her, I got whacked in the face by her arse, and we landed in a crumpled heap on the ice. After that neither of us were concentrating, and the last couple of moves just fell apart. Other than the wild applause of our ever loyal parents, the half-filled arena was pretty much silent as we glided off the ice as quick as we could.

We went straight to the changing rooms, not waiting to hear our embarrassing scores, and ignoring the sympathetic looks from our fellow competitors. The error had been as much my fault as Donna's; we both knew that. But, when she started to apologise to me, tears in her eyes, I whirled to face her and snapped, "Don't even talk to me. Jesus Christ!" and stormed into the men's room, slamming the door. Then I slumped onto a bench, feeling as guilty as hell. Later that evening, in a café across the road from the venue, Sue brought us together to survey the wreck of our performance. Donna and I pointedly ignored each other, but I couldn't help noticing that her eyes were red-rimmed from crying, and her make-up was tear-streaked. She never seemed to smile much around me, but I had never seen her look more miserable than she did then.

Sue gave us both a long hard stare, then said, "The fall I'm not too worried about. We all know what went wrong, and that can be fixed. Until that you were the best. What worries me more is that the two of you were colder out there than the ice. You looked like two strangers who'd just met and decided to have one dance together. How can you expect the judges to warm to you if you don't generate any warmth? You both have good technical skills. What you have to realise is, technique only thirty per cent of success – at the top level everyone can pretty much do everything. The rest is what you put across to your audience." She reached across the table and took my right hand and Donna's left in hers, and gave us a smile. "Look at the greats – Rodnina and Zaitsev, Gordeyeva and Grinkov, Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo. They didn't just skate together – they caressed the judges, and each other. They made love on the ice. That's what set them apart from their rivals. That's what you have to try to find if this pairing has any future. And I believe it has."

What I realised was that all the pairs Sue had mentioned had been lovers – literally. My eyes flickered momentarily towards Donna, to see if she had also appreciated the implied suggestion from our coach. Yup, she was blushing as red as I was. On my way home that night, I resolved I would try to get to know Donna better, and to like her. The idea of anything more than that was beyond a joke.

My resolve lasted about 24 hours. At our next practise, Donna seemed morose and withdrawn, and terrified of making any mistakes in case it annoyed me. Consequently she held back on the ice, and things just didn't work. I did start to get angry, Donna became even more tense, and Sue started snapping at us. All in all, it was a lousy evening. Afterwards, to my total surprise given the way things had gone, Donna asked me if I'd like to go for a coffee. I told her I'd arranged to go to the pub with the usual crowd. With forced casualness, she replied, "Can I come?" I snorted a laugh and said I didn't think so. I started to walk past her, when her face creased up into a ball, and she burst into tears. Then she stamped her foot and squealed, "It's not fair!", before turning her face to the wall, sobbing.

I was stunned. Like a lot of blokes, I tend to feel uncomfortable around crying women. Hesitantly I put a hand on her shoulder and said her name. She shrugged me off angrily, and, in a muffled voice through hands covering her face, she said, "Go on, fuck off with your friends. It's pretty obvious I'm not one of them."

Suffused with guilt, I placed both my hands on her shoulders and turned her to face me. "God, Donna, if it means that much to you, you can come to the pub."

She sank into a convenient chair and, gradually calming down, gave a huge sigh. "Oh for Christ's sake, Nick. How the hell are we supposed to generate passion in the ice, as Sue would put it, if you don't even want to spend a minute with me off it? I don't know you, you're just this bloke I used to have a crush on, and who I skate with for a couple of hours a few nights a week. I don't want to go to your rotten pub, I wouldn't go now if you paid me. Go on, sod off, arsehole." She stared at me, her face red and angry. Feeling even more guilty, but not sure what to do, I turned and left. Somehow I'd lost interest in the pub though, and I made my way straight home.

Training over the next few days was understandably quite tense, yet somehow, both fiercely concentrating on our moves, the routine started to come together rather better. Nevertheless, I felt my dreams had been shattered. The oncoming winter was the big one in the four-yearly skating cycle – not only the European Championships and the Worlds, but the Olympic Games too. Only a year before I had imagined Lesley and myself winning the British title, and representing the country on the biggest stage in our sport. Now, I didn't really believe I was even going to make it to the British champs.

It was a few nights after our big row that, as I was leaving, I spotted Donna getting into a car. Previously she had taken the bus home, but on that evening a young guy, about Donna's age, met her outside the arena, gave her a peck on the cheek and opened the passenger door of his car for her before getting in and driving off. The next evening as I arrived for training he was dropping her off. I told myself he must be her brother, although I wasn't aware she had one. When he picked her up though, I soon revised that view. They sat in the car for several minutes before driving off, kissing, clearly with their tongues down each other's throats. I told myself it didn't mean a thing to me; after all, there was nothing whatsoever between Donna and me. I couldn't understand, therefore, why I lay awake for hours that night thinking about it, or why I woke up the next morning feeling furious, with the image of them snogging still in my mind.

It happened for the next few nights as well. Donna always made sure she left the arena about the same time as me, and they always sat eating each other's faces in laddo's car. The funny thing was, a couple of times as I walked past, pretending not to notice, I was aware that, even as she kissed the bloke, Donna's eyes were focussed over his shoulder, fixed on me like tracker beams, watching for a reaction from me.

The following night, during a break in training, I casually asked Donna who the guy was. Still panting slightly from the exertion of the routine we'd just done, she said, "Oh him, that's my boyfriend. His name's Michael." I told her I didn't know she had a boyfriend. She looked at me out of the corner of her eye. "I didn't know you were interested in my personal life. Anyway, I didn't until last week – have a boyfriend, I mean. But Michael works with me, and he's asked me out a few times. Last time I just said yes. After all, it's about time I had a bit of passion in my life." She seemed to be waiting for a reaction, but just then Sue came waddling round the arena, clapping her hands at us and clucking for us to stop slacking. That night, as Donna snogged Michael in the car, the cheeky cow actually raised her hand from his shoulder and gave me a wave with her fingers as I passed.

I had never felt more confused about my feelings. I didn't think I even liked Donna; yet I felt a burning jealousy of this Michael bloke. I had to talk to someone about it, and I finally chose my older sister. She's a married teacher, and talks more commonsense than anyone I know. After I'd explained the situation to her, she sat staring into space for a good thirty seconds before nodding and beginning to speak. "It could be that you're just jealous because Lesley did the dirty on you, and now Donna's got someone and you haven't. Or, it could be that deep down you think you'd really like Donna if you gave yourself the chance to know her, but you're scared to risk getting hurt again. And being a big macho Italiano, like Dad, you can't admit that to yourself. You said she's stopped asking you out for coffee; well, you ask her, see how she reacts. Even if she says no, at least it'll tell her you want to know her better, and she might think about it."

What Maria had said made sense to me, but I was more nervous at training the next night than I'd ever been for a competition. I couldn't understand why – after all, it was just coffee. As we warmed up on the ice I glided over to Donna, and casually asked if she fancied a drink after training. I felt my face flushing as she gave me a strange look, then said, "Michael's s'posed to be meeting me tonight, but...well, I suppose I could put him off, if you really want me to." Too nervous to speak, I nodded. Shrugging, Donna reached over onto a seat beside the ice and plucked her mobile phone out of her bag. She speed-dialled a number, then explained that Sue had asked us to stay late to discuss something, and would then run Donna home in her car.

All through training I watched Donna closely. She seemed to be preening, more self-assured somehow, and she kept giving me quirky little smiles. Afterwards, we went to a coffee bar in Streatham High Road. We talked about the routine, really talked about it for the first time, just the two of us, and I found I was enjoying myself. I cracked a little joke at one point, and Donna laughed as if it was the funniest thing she'd ever heard. Afterwards, I insisted in paying for a taxi for her. As she was about to get in, she rose up on her tiptoes and gave me a peck on the cheek. I felt myself flushing again as the cab disappeared into the night.

The next evening it was Donna who asked me for coffee. As we were sitting across the table from each other she told me hesitantly that she had an idea to change the routine. That took me by surprise, but as she drew pictures on a paper serviette, and talked through her idea, I started to get excited. It was a bit of a risk, changing things so close to the national champs, but it might just work. We arranged that the next night I would meet her out of work. I went with her to her home and her mother, who was a skilled seamstress, took measurements of my arms, chest, inside leg and so on. A few days later, Donna turned up at training wearing a woolly Bolivian hat, the flaps of which completely obscured her hair. She had a big bundle under her arm, wrapped in brown paper. She told Sue we wanted to experiment with something new. Our coach placed her hands on her hips, cocked one eyebrow, and said, "Oh yes? And this is something you didn't think you should maybe discuss with me first?"

Donna tried to look apologetic, but didn't really pull it off. "Sorry Sue. Look, just let us try it, and if it's rubbish we'll go back to the existing routine. Okay?" Sue agreed with ill grace, mumbling that at least the two of use seemed to be working together now. Even if it was behind her back. Donna and I rushed off to change. I emerged first, in my new costume. It was a cream coloured shirt, slit to halfway down my chest, covered by a low-cut brown leather jerkin. My legs were swathed in brown tights. All I was lacking was a bow and arrow, and I could just have emerged from Sherwood Forest! Sue gasped when she saw me, and we both stared at the passage to the changing rooms, awaiting Donna's entrance with interest.

It was well worth the wait. I immediately saw the reason she had hidden her hair from us. It had been styled very short and spiky, making her look even more elfin than before. Her costume was the green of the forest, a plunging V in her top showing just the amount of cleavage she could get away with in competition. She looked simply fabulous. Sue was beginning to look very interested in our idea – well, Donna's really. Donna glided over to the boom box we played our music on, and inserted a tape. We took up our usual starting positions, and Sue visibly jumped as the opening notes of the William Tell Overture blared out. That segued into a dreamy passage from Sheherazade, before returning to the breakneck pace of William Tell. We did our usual routine to it, and by the end Sue was on her feet, face flushed, clapping in time to the racing music! The standard moves didn't quite work to our new score, but we all knew with a bit of tweaking it could be a real success. That evening all three of us went to the coffee bar to celebrate what promised to be an exciting new development in our careers.

On the Thursday of that week Donna came in looking a bit down. I asked her what was up, and she said, "Michael's dumped me, because I spend so many evenings here. And because I wouldn't open my legs for him." The level of commitment our sport requires is one reason why so many people in it date each other, rather than outsiders.

I felt sorry for Donna; but I also saw an opportunity for myself. I had started in the last couple of weeks to acknowledge the feelings I was developing for my cute pixie partner. I slipped my arm round her shoulders, pulled her head to my chest like a sympathetic uncle and, as casually as I could manage, asked, "Well, d'you fancy doing something together this weekend? To cheer you up, sort of thing."