“For what we started.”
College recruiters descended with contracts and promises. Butch accepted a full scholarship for football and track. Helen chose gymnastics and tennis at a rival university.
For the first time in their lives, no one woke them before dawn. No one measured their food. No one called them names. The freedom was disorienting.
Butch found himself rising at 4:00 a.m. anyway. Helen counted calories without thinking. They both searched for the edge of pain that had once defined them.
When practices felt too easy, Butch doubled them. When coaches insisted Helen rest, she stayed late.
“You’re overtraining,” her coach warned.
“I’m fine,” she replied.
In private, they began experimenting with the formulas Vladim had left behind. The notebooks were meticulous. Ratios. Timetables. Adjustments. He had built a system.
“Do we destroy this?” Helen asked over the phone one night. Butch stared at the open journal on his desk.
“If we do, everything he did was for nothing.”
“And if we don’t?”
He didn’t answer.
Success came swiftly. Butch broke conference records as a freshman. Helen qualified for nationals.
Commentators praised their discipline. Their intensity.
“They’re machines,” one analyst said admiringly. The word felt like an inheritance.
Butch began mentoring younger teammates, pushing them beyond exhaustion.
“You can give more,” he insisted.
When one collapsed during drills, Butch felt a flicker of something—guilt? Or irritation?
“Get up,” he said, echoing a voice he knew too well.
Helen, meanwhile, developed a reputation for relentless perfection. She corrected teammates mid-routine. Critiqued posture, timing, breathing.
“Relax,” a fellow gymnast laughed once. Helen blinked, confused.
“Why?”
Late one night, she stood alone in the gymnasium and caught her reflection in the mirrored wall. Her body was sculpted, powerful, almost severe. Her eyes were unfamiliar. She heard her father’s voice as clearly as if he stood behind her.
Superior.
She realized with a cold clarity that she had not escaped him. She had absorbed him.
The first major scandal erupted during Butch’s junior year. A routine drug test flagged anomalies. The university launched an investigation.
Butch sat in a sterile office, hands clasped, listening to administrators use words like “irregularities” and “policy violations.” He thought of the metal case in his dorm closet.
“Have you taken any performance-enhancing substances?” they asked. He imagined Vladim’s expression. Emotion is for fools. Numbers tell the truth.
“Yes,” Butch said.
The confession detonated across campus. Headlines shifted tone.