Chapter Twelve: Mohawks

At around 11:00 AM, Jean wakes up to his phone buzzing. He stares at it for a moment, not lifting his head from the pillow and confused about what's happening before finally reaching out and slowly wrapping his hand around it. He pulls it to himself, yawning and letting his eyes adjust to the light of the screen.

Snap from Marco.

He slides open the notification and waits for snapchat to load. Tapping on the snap, it opens to show a video Marco had sent him. First was Marco's feet, tapping against each other in his skates, and then the camera switched to show Marco's freckled face. He smiles and gave the camera a thumbs up, and then the snap ended. Jean chuckled, and then he realized he needed to get out of bed and head straight for the TV. Marco's group would be beginning warm up shortly. He quickly took a selfie giving Marco a thumbs up and adding a "good luck! love u nerd" caption to send to Marco.

Popping out of bed - a little too quickly, causing a small coughing fit - he tore off his sweatpants and begins searching his messy bedroom for a clean pair of pants and a shirt. After the typical sniff test on a few shirts, he slides one on and quickly pulls on the nearest pair of jeans.

Bolting down the stairs, he heads straight for the TV.
"Jean!" he hears his mother yell from the kitchen, but he doesn't stop. Instead, he catapults himself over the couch, landing swiftly on it and reaches for the remote. He coughs a few more times as he turns on the TV and flips to the channel featuring all of the Olympic coverage and pounds on his chest. He feels something swat his shoulder. Glancing behind himself, his mother is standing there, one hand on her hip and the other holding a stirring spoon.

"What?" he asks innocently, turning his attention back to the TV.

"You were just put on a new medication. What do you think you're doing, running around the house like a mad man?" she asks, exasperated.

"Marco's almost on," he says, setting the remote down on the coffee table. "Can't miss it."

"That's no reason to risk a trip to the hospital," she sighs. "And look - he's not even on the ice yet. You easily could have walked."

Jean grunts, neither in agreement or disagreement. He supposes going to the hospital would've sucked ass, since he would definitely miss Marco skating. On the other hand, running a few feet shouldn't kill him (he hopes).

He hears his mother sigh again behind him, and then footsteps retreating back into the kitchen. The announcer on the TV introduces the final group of skaters to warm up for the men's short, which happens to include Marco. Jean pushes himself to the edge of his seat, watching his boyfriend take the ice.

He glides smoothly across, doing a lap forward to warm up. Jean can see from the look on Marco's face that he's concentrating hard to push through each element while he has the chance. Jean catches himself holding his breath and slowly exhales. No matter how stressed he is, he really can't afford to do that right now. Blacking out now could be the worst possible time yet.

The announcer calls the warm up, and the skaters leave the ice. Jean watches as Marco's coach hands him his guards and obviously is giving him some advice. With a very serious look on his face, Marco nods and places the guards onto his blades. He looks like he's in the zone.

Jean knows the anticipation sitting low in his stomach must be nothing compared to what Marco's feeling, but there's no stopping the nerves causing him to sweat despite not moving from his rigid position in the middle of the couch. The first skater seems to skate a relatively clean program, but Jean can't really focus much. How could anyone do this? He had never felt so stressed out in his life, and he wasn't even doing anything.

The crowd roars to life and Marco swallows. It's time.

His coach leads him back to the rink and he watches the first skater leave the ice and quickly hug his coach. Marco had watched the program in the so called 'waiting room', and this guy looked pretty solid. Being one of the last skaters of the event, Marco knows he has to give it his all. He has to put on a memorable performance and stick out if he wants a chance at standing on the podium by the end of the games.

Hanji's fingers grip his shoulder, giving him a tight squeeze. Glancing behind himself and at her, she flashes a determined smile. The previous skater is headed for the kiss and cry, so Marco quickly slips off his guards and hands them to Hanji. He steps onto the ice and does a few slaloms to warm his legs back up. Checking the giant screen above his head, the skater who went before him still hasn't received his scores. He decides to do one last triple flip before it's really his turn.

The jump has a solid, clean landing, but Marco can't shake the nervous energy pumping through his veins.

And then - "The final score for the short program comes to 86.04, putting him in-"

Marco tunes out the noise around him, heading straight to Hanji on the boards.

"Okay, Marco," she says, her voice calm as she cups his hands in hers, "I need you to go out there and do what you always do. This competition isn't any different from the others. Have fun with it, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and you'll regret it if you don't smile through the whole thing. You know yourself, once the music starts, the nerves will all melt away."

With a nod and one final hand squeeze, Marco turns towards the ice again. His heart beating all too quickly in his throat, he prepares himself.

"And now-" Marco strokes forwards, one arm swooping up and out "-representing the United States of America-" his other arm mimics the motion and pushes once more into a one foot glide "-Marco Bodt!" The crowd roars to life once again, cheers coming from every direction. Marco's arms fall to his side and he takes a deep breath, heading towards his starting spot. If he can skate well here, he stands a chance of going on the the free skating event and, if he's good enough, a spot on the podium. He comes to a stop, his eyes scanning over the crowd. He moves his feet, one toepick in the ice. He raises one arm into the air, almost like it's outstretched to receive a high five. And with that, his eyes lingering on a particularly large freckle on the back if his hand, his music starts.

With a quick backwards pivot around, he speeds off from the middle of the rink. These few crossovers need to gain him plenty of speed - then comes the footwork - and then his first jump of the program. He needs to land this if he wants a chance at that gold medal. One more crossover, step forward, push into a three turn, toepick -

He's in the air. His arms tightly press against his chest, legs crossing, he uses whatever force he has to get this flip to rotate four times. Come on, he thinks, feeling himself starting to check out. His blade touches down on the ice, and he feels a burst of energy replace the nerves that have been pumping through his body. A clean quad at the Olympics? Marco lets out a laugh and fists pumps, listing to the crowd's insane reaction to his success.

Fists raised in the air, Marco's face adorns an ear to ear smile. He goes quickly through his bowing motions, shaking with adrenaline, and waves. As he skates towards the boards, where Hanji is absolutely beaming at him, he leans down to grab one of the stuffed animals that had been thrown to him. It was a puppy plushie, and he couldn't help but smile more, if that was possible. He knew Jean was back in Michigan, probably watching him pick up this dog, but it could still be a cute gift, right?

Stepping off the ice, Hanji hands him his guard once again. Marco puts half of his effort into slipping them on and the other half into hugging Hanji. He had never felt an adrenaline rush quite like this before and he knew he didn't want it to go away anytime soon. Who knew he could fall in love with skating again? And at the Olympics, no less?

Marco and Hanji are shuffled towards the kiss and cry. Both with face splitting grins, they take a seat. Marco waves at the camera and blows a few kisses and making a heart with his hands. "This was for all of you guys! Thanks so much for your support mom and dad! And shout out to Jean! Wish you were here!"

He leans back, turning towards Hanji, who has her hand resting on his back. She's still smiling, but she's nervously eyeing the large screen situated above the ice, which currently shows the two of them sitting in the kiss and cry. A small sliver of the screen turns blue and suddenly Marco feels his heart drop into his stomach. Scores begin to appear on the screen. He holds his breath, clutching the seat. His score is high, but will it be enough? Does he have any deductions?

"The final score for Marco Bodt is 100.38 after the short program. This puts him in first place, and is his season's best. It also sets a new world record."

Marco can feel himself moving, but he doesn't really know what's happening. He's standing, jumping, hugging Hanji. The crowd is louder than its been all night. He can hear his blood pump in his ears. It's almost like the world is moving in slow motion.

After the remaining three skaters, Marco finished in second place behind Yuzuru Hanyu, who finished with a score of 101.45. He's fully aware that he needs to rest tonight and not celebrate his high score, since the men's long is tomorrow. Tugging his skates from his feet, he reaches into his bag to see tons of messages flooding onto his phone. Of course, the only ones he really cares about are from Jean. He has about fifty snaps from his, which start with a selfie captioned "I'm about to send you all of my reactions to your program so I don't pee myself". He laughs, tapping through them. The final one is incredibly blurry, but he can make out the image is of Jean jumping up off the couch. It's captioned "WORLD RECORD HELL YEAH".

Marco sends him a selfie in return with the caption, "need a nap".