That way, he never had to worry that he had missed something.
By the third landing, his foot was killing him. But he was keeping it upright. He hadn’t ass passed or face-planted. And he was trying to make it look as if he was landing lightly, even if he felt like a fish flopping on a hook.
Digging deep, Caleb pushed to finish his round. He had three more tricks to do, and he was feeling pretty damn good about his speed, amplitude, and crispness, and just needed to stick the landings.
Up. Catch the board. Flip and twist. Down. Up. Down. Last one.
He was soaring and he knew it. His amplitude was amazing. If he could only stay on his feet when he hit, he could have this. The last trick was the triple cork, which was a trick that only one person had landed in Olympic history, and he’d managed it on his preliminary run so he knew performing it late in the routine like this would pull a lot of attention and a lot of points if he could land it, but it had sent more than one person to the hospital.
He knew he had the momentum to do it. He knew he had it, because this was one of those runs that was so crystal clean and so high that he could pull this off.
Up. One, two, three, full twists. Down. Stay on your feet, clench the abs and the ass. Stay upright. Slide smoothly into the waiting area to get his score.
Something snapped when Caleb landed. Something in his foot. Something that made him scream in agonizing pain. But he didn’t go down, and he made it look damn good. He pumped his arms in triumph as he coasted into the bottom of the course, the crowd going nuts and cheering for him. He knew the cameras would be on him, so he tried to keep his expression normal.
But something was broken. Really broken.
He did the whole arm pumping, cheering with the crowd, “Yeah I did it,” celebration. Then he bent in to unclip his board and landed on his butt.
He tried to stand so he could get his score. Tried to make it look like everything was cool, but when he struggled up, he fell back making a noise that sounded like a freight train trying to stop on a broken track. Pain shot from his foot all the way up into his groin, and there was no way he was going to get up without help.
Caleb looked around frantically and then found and waved at the guys who helped with the medical team, letting them know he needed assistance.
Fuck that hurt.
The two medics came running over, both of them squatting down to ask him what was going on. And he grunted, “It’s my foot; it’s fucked up.”
“Let’s get that boot you took off and put it back on so we can take you to the med tent.”
“Get me up, I need to wait for my score.”
They each just took one side of him and hauled him to his feet, and he stood there with one foot dangling. The pain was so intense he thought he might pass out. One of his buddies got cleared to jog out and grab his board. “Where do you want me to take this? To the village?”
“Just get it to my coach.” His breath kept hitching in his chest, and he sucked in a huge lungful of air through his nose, then blew it out a few seconds later.
The announcer called out his score, and the crowd went nuts because he was a full two points ahead of the guy who was about to get the silver medal.
He had won his gold.
Was it crazy that he only wished that Hawk was here to share it with him?
When Hawk got back downto Milan, a couple of days passed in a total blur of hockey games he had to work, and he stumbled to bed at night in the hotel, exhausted from having to be on and having to talk to people and act nice all damn day.
He totally missed Caleb’s gold medal round, even on the live feed, and it took him a while to catch up that night. When he saw the news ticker that Caleb was hurt, he wasn’t sure what he needed to do. Fear roiled in his gut because what if Caleb was badly injured, but he couldn’t make it up toLivigno and back in time to get up in the morning and start his next round of games.
And he didn’t know if he should text or call anyway. They’d left things in a weird spot, and Hawk felt like shit because he wasn’t mad at Caleb. He was scared and worried, and pretty much what he had feared happening had happened with Caleb getting hurt, but it wasn’t a deal-breaker.
It wasn’t a deal-breaker at all.
Finally, when he got a lunch break the day after the gold medal round and ceremony for Caleb, he texted.
Hey, are you okay?
I am stuck in my room here at the Livigno village and kind of going nuts.
Hawk was gratified at how quickly Caleb texted him back.
Can I call?