Go Figure

Chapter One

New Rink

I walked into Twin Oak Ice Rink and breathed in the fresh smell of bleach and paint.

I'm used to it, though, I've been figure-skating since I was seven-years-old. I'm fifteen now, but nothing has changed. As I brushed brown hair from my face, I sat my bag on one of the bleachers. I remembered when we moved here, to New York. I didn't want to leave my old friends, but I was willing to make a change, at least one change, since my mother had died.

I patted down my blue skating dress and sat. I then noticed the sound of blades hitting the ice, I looked up, and there was Toph Beifong! I had heard of her before, in a magazine, but I never imagined that I would see her in real life!

I grabbed my bag and ran down to the ice to take a better look at her. My eyes watched as she did a perfect Camel-Spin (Something I can't do!) and bring herself in to perform a flip jump. Amazing! I gasped as she flew into a Sit-spin.

"Wow!" I said. I guess that I caught her off-guard, because in the middle of her spin, she fell and slid on her butt.

"Aurgh!" She picked herself up, and then turned to me. "Who are you?"

"Uh, I'm Katara Whiteman…"

Toph skated over to me. "Well, Katara, you just made me screw up my spin,"

"I'm sorry, but you're just so amazing!" I saw her roll her eyes. "And, you're blind, aren't you?" I didn't want to be rude but the question just slipped out.

"Yeah, and that's why I never saw you coming," She blew at the thick black bangs that almost covered her eyes. She sat down beside me, "So what are you after?!"

"After?" I repeated. What was she talking about?

She rolled her eyes again. "Who sent you to come and spy on me?! Who do you work for?!"

"Nobody sent me!" I protested. "I just moved here!"

"Oh! Okay!" She said.

Then she started going through my bag. She is rude, isn't she?

"Hey!" I snatched up my bag. "What is wrong with you?!"

She stood up. "Why are you here?!"

I stood (I was taller than her!), "To skate! I'm not a spy!"

"How can I trust you?" She turned away from me.

"I never asked you to!" I threw my bag down, sat down also, and began rifling through it for my skates.

I looked up to see Toph grinning over me. "You got attitude, you know?" She leaned in to my face. "I'm Toph Beifong,"

"I know!" I was still pretty mad at her.

"Of course you do!" She flashed me a smile, got back on the ice, and continued skating.

She is so weird. I had found my skates, put them on, and began tying the laces. My skates were brand new and sparkling white, I cleaned them everyday since I had bought them last week. I looked to Toph again; her skates were green, to match her dress. They looked super expensive. With a heavy sigh I stood, and carefully walked toward Toph.

I felt a rush of excitement as I stepped onto the slippery ice. I quickly did a Layback spin to test out the unfamiliar quality. After finishing my spin I heard applause, but it wasn't from Toph.

I turned around to see a girl dressed in red with her black hair in two buns. She rolled her eyes as she dropped her things onto the ground. "That was pretty nice, for an amateur!"

Then Toph just burst with laughter.

I drooped my shoulders. "Is everyone here so mean?" I was beginning to reconsider my appreciation for my father when we moved here to New York.

"It was a joke," The strange girl continued walking. "Live through it."

Toph was finally recovering from laughing. "That's Mai; she runs the snack bar here."

Mai took a bow. "So, who are you?" She opened a door and disappeared behind it.

"I'm Katara Whiteman, I moved here from Florida!" I called to wherever Mai had gone. Shortly after she reappeared behind the snack bar counter.

"Well, welcome to the big city," Mai grinned. "Everyone here is mean," She turned away from me, signaling that our conversation was over.

Toph began to practice backwards cross-overs. "So, you up for the Regionals?" She asked.

The Regionals! I had forgotten! How come right before the most important skating competition in my life I move to the region of the best skater I have ever seen since Tonya Harding?!

"They say Toph's a shoo-in for First Place…" Mai pipes up. "But I've never seen you before,"

"Yeah, sugar queen; let's see what you've got!" Toph barks.

Sugar queen? "Oh alright," I say. I begin skating around to pace myself; finally I start with my favorite spin of all, a Camel Spin, and then come out into a backwards Spiral. I take a deep breathe, then, a double Toe-loop.

More applause as I come into a finish. But it wasn't Toph or Mai. I looked up, and there are three girls standing there giving me hateful looks. It wasn't them clapping, it was the woman standing behind them. Is everyone in New York so late?

"Very impressive!" The woman began to walk past the bleachers to me, with the three girls trailing. "How long have you been doing doubles?"

"About a year," The three girls finally took there eyes off of me to smooth there expensive skating dresses.

"Let me introduce myself, I'm Patricia, call me Trish," She turned to the girls behind her. "And these are Azula, Tylee, and On Ji."

Once they made there way down, Ms. Trish skated past me, along with Tylee and On Ji, but Azula stopped before passing. She stuck her hand out to me.

"Azula Hamill, pleasure to meet you." I shook her hand as she introduced herself; her fingernails were painted blood red, to match her dress.

"The Regional Competition is coming up, girls, from here on we have to work our hardest and dedicate our time to the rink. We'll start putting together your routines in about a week-and-a-half." Trish said to us.

She skated across the ice as if not even thinking about it. "We'll begin this lesson with practicing a simple Killian step sequence."

Pardon?

"Does anyone know what that is?"

"I do," Toph murmured.

"Toph, would you like to show everyone this sequence?" Trish asked.

"No I would not," Toph answered flatly.

Azula gave Toph a smirk. "I would," Then she skated in front of everyone and demonstrated the tricky footwork.

"Correct!" Trish praised as Azula flashed a smile. "The skater first does a forward progressive, followed by the right foot crossing in front to the outside edge and then the left foot is crossed behind to a forward inside edge." She demonstrated the moves Azula had, but slowly as she explained them. "Then, a Choctaw is done: the skater goes from the left forward inside edge to a right back outside edge. He then tucks the left foot behind on a back inside edge, followed by a short right back outside edge, a cross in front to the left back inside edge, and then a step forward to the right forward inside edge."

"Alright, now begin practicing." Trish clapped her hands twice, signaling for us to break off and do as told.

I skated off to a little area I had to myself and tried to reenact what I had just seen. Everything was so different from the way I had been taught back in Miami; everything was different in New York.

I threw myself in to the first set of tricky moves; I didn't get far when I heard Mai yell out, "Right foot crosses first, Katara!"

Great. My first day here and I'm getting yelled at by the snack bar-girl.

"I'm trying!" I yelled back. I tried again crossing my right foot over. "That makes much more sense!" Before I knew it Trish was coming over to me and helping me with the moves. She got behind me and positioned my arms.

Before I knew it I was doing the move correctly over and over again. "That's right, girls, arms out and breathe!" Trish directed.

Trish skated back and forth between the other girls and I, saying things like, "Good, breathe, arms out, you're doing great, we'll put that in your routine."

Suddenly, she clapped her hands loudly. "Girls, come, it's time to work on our entrances."

I new perfectly well what an entrance was. It was the set amount of moves between a step sequence and a jump or spin. I wasn't sure I knew that I could perform the moves right.

"Tylee," Trish said. "Could I see your Killian sequence, please?"

Tylee smiled and performed amazing footwork with exaggerated arms, and when she finished, she kept in her end position, waiting for the directions.

"Do you see the way she is holding her arms girls? From her posture, can you tell if she is about to perform a jump or a spin?" Trish asked us.

On Ji's hand shot up into the air. "She's about to do a jump!"

If this was the way Tylee performed her sequences, I thought I would love to see her perform a jump. And I was right. With a nod from Trish, Tylee strode out on her left foot and performed her three-turn. To see her vault into her jump took my breath away. She was so amazing. And in the air she spun one, two, three times! A triple flip! She landed on her right outside leg, wobbled, and then fell.

I was so surprised to here Azula snicker from behind me. Tylee didn't seem to mind, though, she just smiled, picked herself up, and skated back over to where she had been.

Trish turned to us. "From what you have just seen, ladies, what was wrong with the jump Tylee just displayed?"

I raised my hand. "Her posture during the rotation, ma'am, and her shoulder were hunched and her legs were slightly bent."

"Very good Katara!" Trish smiled at me. "Could you come and display a Killian entrance?"

I wanted to say no, like Toph, but I couldn't. I skated in front of everyone and displayed my Killian, did a quick Mohawk turn, and went into a Loop jump. I rotated in the air one, two times. A double Loop. I could've done better, but I didn't say so.

Trish applauded. "That, ladies, is how an entrance is supposed to look. Now practice your Killian entrances, then we'll take a break for lunch."

--

I was sitting on a booth chair in front of the snack bar. I saw Mai come over to me and Toph, who I was sitting next to.

"Hey, Katara," She said. "About this morning…"

"You don't have to apologize, I forgive you." I said while opening my water bottle.

Mai almost laughed. "I wasn't going to apologize, I was going to say that the Layback spin you did today was actually something close to good."

I was embarrassed. "Uh, thanks." I looked into her dark eyes and swore I had seen her before. She looked familiar, like one of those people on TV that you know, but you don't. You know?

"Everything is so different here in New York," I said quietly. "Almost better,"

"Yeah. What part of Florida did you come from anyway?" Toph asked.

"Miami."

The both nodded at each other. "So what made you trade that life for the big city?" Mai asked.

"I was ready for a change," I sipped some more water. "At my old rink, we took things slow. Here, the teaching is fast, but affective."

"Everything is fast here, Sugar queen."

What was with that name?

"Yeah, the only thing that is slow is the traffic on Friday," Mai said. Toph laughed at this, and that's when Azula came trotting over with On Ji and Tylee in tow.

"Speaking of slow, Katara, if you think that Loop today was it, you'd have to get better to be horrible." She and On Ji laughed and strode away with Tylee, and although she laughed too, Tylee didn't seem to get the joke.

"What was that for?" I asked to no one in particular.

Toph rolled her eyes. "Don't mind her, she's the slow one."

I nodded and took my first bite of my sandwhich.

A/N: What did you think? Was it any good? Yes/no/maybe? The review button is for judging the story, not me.