Here is a long chapter for you guys! Heads up the action is coming soon. If I get at least 40 reviews for this chapter I will combine my ideas for the next two chapters into one super long chapter- I'm talking minimum 3000 words, so r and r. Two readers got the date right so I will now reveal what it is. Rm. 118 stood for January 18 which is from both Twilight and New Moon where Bella met Edward. Congrats to those readers and you will be seeing them soon. Oh by the way GO PHILLIES!

Meg

Ok I was a complete idiot! A complete idiot who was in way over her head. Yeah I was in shape, but this was insane. I was holding my own in the conditioning, and I had always been flexible even for a gymnast, so I was doing ok in the flexibility exercises, but there was a problem with all of my focus on getting back into shape; I hadn't worked on form as much as I needed to, and it was beginning to show. Going it without a coach probably didn't help either. And there were certain things that I just didn't have. I would probably have been fine if I had had more time and could work through everything more, but I didn't have that option.

"Isabella! NO wobble! Again!"

I took a few steps to the middle of the beam, flattening my hips, I leapt forward into a front flip, then without stopping, I flipped backwards twice in a flowing continuous movement. One back handspring into a back handspring layout. Still in motion, I leapt up into a split toe touch. I landed in one smooth motion, my left big toe twitching slightly to keep my balance.

"Isabella you still wobble! Again!"

I stared at her incredulously. What wobble? My toe? That wasn't a wobble that could barely even be called a twitch.

"Now!"

"Alright, alright," I muttered under my breath, too quiet for her to hear.

Again I completed the difficult combination. This time all of the toes on my left foot had to strain to keep my balance.

"You wobble! I told you no wobble! The judges will take off points!" Marta called out. "Do it again!"

I did as I was told. Or I tried anyway. It was on the first of my back handsprings that I slid from the beam. In a catlike movement, I twisted so I landed on my feet instead of my side.

I started to remount the beam and then stopped. I wasn't injured or anything, I had jammed my toe on my landing, but that was nothing. I just was feeling trapped. It was like nothing I did was good enough, and I just kept getting worse.

"Try again Isabella!" Marta called.

"No," I answered quietly.

"I said try again," she came closer to me.

"I can't!"

"What do you mean you can't? Either try again or run laps until you are ready to try again!"

"I think I will take the laps," I told her matter of factly, grabbing my hoodie and my sneakers from where they lay next to my bag, and storming to the doors.

I threw on my socks and shoes, and pulled my hoodie quickly over my head, before jogging towards the trail head. I wished I had brought my iPod, but a few seconds later decided it didn't matter anyway. I was pounding my way through the woods; my feet beating an angry beat. I was pushing myself a little hard from anger though. After a few minutes my temper calmed a little and so did my pace, until it was a reasonable tempo.

Despite the oversized hoodie that I had 'borrowed' from Jake, I was beginning to feel the cold. The cool late winter/early spring air was wreaking havoc on the parts of my legs exposed by my shorts. Still I didn't let that deter me, I kept running until I felt no trace of anger, and was just running for the joy of running.

Eventually I had to take a break though. I boosted myself up on a humongous fallen log, and walked along it, as though it was a beam. I knew I needed to get back, and I knew exactly what would happen when I did. I would get back up on that beam, and do that trick as many times as Marta told me to. That was what I was supposed to and with the committee coming tomorrow and the next day to pick the team; this was not the time to rebel.

With a sigh, I hopped of my makeshift balance beam. The running path I had taken was circuitous, so I wasn't too far from the gym. I made fast time of the mile or so back.

I made my way quietly back inside where I knew the three hour nightly session was almost finished. I had left more than halfway through, so there was probably only about a half hour left.

"Ah Bella," Marta called. "To the beam."

I knew this would happen, and I knew that I was wrong, so I meekly made my way over to the balance beam she had indicated as everyone else stopped their training and gathered around to see what would become of me.

"Full routine, no wobbles," she quietly instructed me.

With that I felt a spark of anger. Only unlike before, it was not a bad spark, it was a motivator.

I mounted the beam using the Swan mount that I had created. The rest of my routine was different from the one I had competed in London, but there was a few of the same components and it was almost as difficult.

I went through each move, my intensity growing. When it came to the combination that had given my trouble, I didn't even hesitate, but knocked it out perfectly. I felt all of my frustration from the last few days pouring out of my and pushing me further. It wasn't the best routine that I had ever done, but it was the best one that I had completed since… well since the Olympics.

After my stuck dismount, I raised my arms in a flourishing salute. I smiled right at Tanya whose smug smile had wiped off her face as her jaw dropped.

"Beautiful!" Marta proclaimed. "There is the spark I wanted. Before little errors, no spark. Now spark outweigh wobbles!"

With those words, she dismissed us. Most of the girls instantly filed out to dinner or back to their rooms, but I stayed where I was staring at the beam.

"Bells you coming?" Kaity called to me from the doors.

"Nah, I'll catch up to you," I told her not looking away from the beam.

I mounted the beam again and just stood there trying to recapture the spark that I had felt just a few minutes before.

Soon I was the only one left in the gym. I stood there for an indeterminable amount of time. My body started to tire, but still I stayed. I tried to just let go of everything else and focus, but I still couldn't forget. No matter how hard I tried.

"Bella?" a soft voice asked.

I glanced around to see Bela Karolyi standing a few feet away. I noticed then that tears had been silently slipping down my cheeks without my permission or knowledge.

I looked straight at him too tired to be ashamed that he had seen me cry. It was funny I never used to cry; now crying seemed to be the only thing I was good at.

He took one look at me and silently beckoned for me to follow him. I slid off the beam and put on the shoes and jacket that he handed me.

He led me outside. We walked for awhile and I was wondering where we were heading when he stopped. I looked at the wall in front of us. It was the Gymnastics Walk of Fame wall. I knew my name was on there a few times, but he had led me straight to the one with the most meaning; my Olympic brick.

I read the inscription on it: Isabella Swan

2012 Olympics

Team gold

Gold AA, Gold BB, Gold FX, Bronze UB

"This says you are a champion, now it is up to you. You proved to the world once that you were the best, but can you do it again. There is nothing holding you back but yourself," Bela told me. He gestured to a gaggle of little girls in leotards clutching autographs in their hands.

"You see those girls? Every one of those girls dreams to be you. Not just because of the gold medals around your neck, but because you are the best. You are enviable because of your dedication, your successes, and most important because of your spirit. You live and breathe gymnastics, it isn't just a job or a sport for you, it is who you are and that is what everyone sees when you perform. Or at least it was until recently. That was why Marta has been pushing you. You didn't have a wobble, but you didn't have anything else either and that is worse."

I barely spared a moment of indignation for Marta's unnecessary torture, before his words sunk in. He was right, the only thing holding myself back was me, the only thing clinging desperately to what could have been was me.

Bela led me back to the gym and to the center of the floor area. "Handstand."

But there was something bothering me. "Bela…"

"No, no talk. Just do."

I did a handstand and held it.

"It's all about the basics. Mental and physical," he told me. "First handstand, now walkover."

I did a walkover.

"Handstand, and limber.

"Bela…"

But he just gave me a look. I did the handstand, but then instead of lowering one leg then the other to the floor, I lowered both at the same time in a limber.

"Now cartwheel."

I didn't even try to argue this time. I did exactly what he said. Then he moved me onto round offs, a cartwheel where both of my legs joined in the air and landed together.

We went on this way for some time; one basic move would lead into a slightly more complicated form. Finally he deemed me perfect.

"Beautiful, just beautiful. See those clean lines, the perfect form?" he had me look in the mirror at my perfectly extended split. "The basics. Remember the basics and you will be on that team for sure."

This time I didn't let him quiet my concerns. "Bela. I can't. I can't be on the team."

"And why not? Do you know something I do not know my little swan?"

"It's the whole weight thing," I muttered looking down shamefully.

"Ah yes that. But you worked on it. And it is getting better no? I have watched, but I am not concerned there is always an exception. Just show the committee you are the champion that you were last summer, and all will be fine," he assured me in his botched English.

With that he left. I grabbed my bag and clothes deep in thought.

I was still deep in thought as I walked in the door to my room, a fruit salad snagged from the already closed kitchen in my hands.

Kaity R was lying on her bed reading a gossip magazine. She looked up as I walked in.

"You okay?" she asked. "I know today had to be tough."

"Yeah. I'm okay," I told her, and for the first time in a long time it wasn't really a lie.

She seemed to understand, and promptly changed the subject.

"I am so writing into 17 Magazine and complaining."

She held up the magazine so I could see the page she was looking at.

It was titled: Find Your Perfect Fit, and was about jeans.

They have all these body types, and I don't fit a single one. They have pear, tall, petite, hourglass, and a billion others, but not a single athletic one."

"Yeah well most people don't have muscles that Arnold Schwarzenegger would be jealous of," I told her.

We just looked at each other and burst into laughter. The rest of the night we spent as teenagers, not elite athletes, not international competitors, but average teenage girls; giggling over silly things, and talking about everything under the sun. a couple of the other gymnasts who hadn't been poisoned by Tanya joined us to swap stories. It was like a party, there was even an embarrassing video of a choreographed dance that I made a mental note to find and delete later.

It was great blowing off steam, but later as I laid in my bed listening to Kaity's steady breathing, my mind returned to my earlier thoughts. Bela had said to go back to my basics…. Suddenly something sparked. I started out with dance, and I learned my basics in the dance studio rather than the gym, but how could I apply that to my routines. Sure I had dance elements, but somehow I think Bela was trying to tell me something else… or maybe to use my dance elements more. But how would dance help my tumbling? I eventually fell asleep, but my subconscious was still puzzling it out, because when I woke up I had a plan in place.