Disclaimer: I don't own Payson Keeler or Sasha Belov or any of the characters from Make It or Break It.
THE ANGEL
She is blonde, petite, with a slightly curvier body than she would ultimately prefer –- and definitely different from her fellow gymnasts.
She's beautiful, even when she doesn't feel 'girly enough', because that job is Kaylie's.
She's sassy, though she'd much rather Lauren kept that title.
She's not the great promise of raw talent that Emily is.
She highly doubts she's even the best athlete in her family –- Becca has fun at what she does but gymnastics do not make up her entire life.
The one thing that truly sets her apart is her determination, her belief that she is the best. And she is.
She isn't –- and has never been –- boastful. Even when people around her might roll their eyes upon hearing it, her one and only focus has always been her future. The Olympics. She speaks of them as if it were a fact, that she IS going, but she doesn't stop to glorify herself or talk excessively about her routines.
Her entire life, it's all led up to this. All of her training, her injuries, her moving from one state to anothers, it all comes down to these few defining moments. And to that one defining man, the only one who could have ever brought Payson Keeler –- the new empowered artistic gymnast –- back. Sasha Belov. She spoke oftoof him with reverence in her voice, the first time their her eyes were met with his figure across the room. He merely looked back at the girl who was daring enough to ask himher him to stay, and picked her apart from the rest.
Then again, she's always been a bit of a rebel. Not with her training, no, she's never slacked off in that, but she's always pushed her boundaries, tested her limits. Been too close to the breaking point, far too many times.
She'd known her body better than anyone else could, so it's a dark moment in her life when she's afraid. Of her reactions, of anything failing her again. He brings her back from that. She is like the Phoenix, reborn from her own ashes to rise again.
She's never thought of herself as special, not in any aspects of her life but gymnastics, and even that was taken away from her. He gave her back the confidence she needed, the one thing she'd thought she would never lose, and the unwavering trust he deposits in her is her ultimate strengthht.
Payson Keeler sticks that landing with on one footleg, and she smiles because she knows that she owns the world, then and there. He watches from afar, tears are in his eyes as she salutes the judges, then turns towards her friends, her teammates.
'You did it,' his eyes scream, then, once she looks his way. She's crying a little, too.
'We did this, Sasha,' hers say, the smile never wavering. And he walks closer to help her, his arm around her, this one miraculous girl. The one powerful, artistic athlete, who came back from a possibly career-ending injury, and has surpassed everyone's expectations but his own. He'd always known that she, of all people, could do it.
In that one moment, in her last vault, he swears he almost saw her fly.