Chuck Versus Thin Ice
By Steampunk . Chuckster
Summary: On the doorstep of the Olympics, top American curler Sarah Walker has lost her mixed doubles partner and her boyfriend in one fell swoop. Her coaches throw newbie Team U.S.A. curler Chuck Bartowski onto her team and thrust them into the Olympics, hanging America's curling hopes on two people who only have a short amount of time to learn to trust one another.
A/N: I justtttt...Y'all are bonkers with these reviews. I appreciate each and every one of you. Truly.
Disclaimer: I don't own this show. I don't own the characters in this show.
"It's all right. Just pull it together, make those shots really count, and you can make a comeback," Coach Diane Beckman was saying, and even though Sarah Walker was listening, she was only half-listening.
Maybe the pebbles on the ice were different and it was affecting the roll of the rocks after bouncing. That was probably it.
Or maybe the South Koreans had hosting these Olympic games down to a science, and the pebbling was just fine, and the actual problem was their luck, or, more likely, they were putting too much weight into their throws. Nearly every roll had been too thick, none of their rocks stopping where they needed them to stop, and that had left the Canadians up six points to USA's one in the first four Ends.
Their chance at getting into the final match was slipping through their fingers and she was trying not to lose focus. The game wasn't over but it was hard not to let it get under her skin that they had gotten themselves into such a bad spot.
"Sarah."
She lifted her head from where it had slumped as she sat on the bench with her elbows propped on her thighs. Beckman knelt down in front of her and she met her gaze.
"Two years ago at that bonspiel in Oslo, the team was down by seven points in the sixth End. Jane and Alexandra were arguing. You were snapping at Alexandra for trying to take the game into her own hands and failing miserably. It was a damn mess. Remember that?" Sarah nodded. "You removed that woman's head from her own ass, though, forced the other girls to work as a team, and you threw the most majestic game I've ever seen in my life to come away with top prize in that tournament. I've never seen a team steal that many points in a row like that. Scoring nine points in four Ends…It was insane."
Sarah smirked a little. "You telling me to channel that Sarah now?"
Beckman shook her head. "I'm reminding you of what's possible, of what you're capable of."
"Yeah, but this isn't amateur hour. We're curling against the top mixed doubles team in the world, not a random Norwegian women's team from two years ago." She sent her coach a wry look.
"Hey, stop with the pessimism. Yeah, you're five points down. So suck it up and score some points in the next four Ends. Maybe you'll win, maybe you'll lose, but I'll be damned if my team doesn't at least try." She gave Sarah a hard look and earned a nod.
"You're right. It isn't like me to throw in the towel like this. Especially not so early. Sorry, coach."
"Don't apologize to me. I'm not your partner. Chuck is." The redhead gave her a significant look. "And I picked him to be your partner for a reason, remember."
Sarah flicked her gaze up to rest on Chuck as he conferred with Graham, probably talking angles or some other analysis. Because that was his thing, wasn't it? He didn't give up. He didn't throw in the towel. He was thinking, calculating, figuring out how to bring them back from the brink of defeat.
She smiled, then turned said smile to Becks. "I've been properly chastised. I'm gonna get my head in the game."
What she really needed to do was chill out. She'd never played a curling match at this high of a level and it was messing with her confidence and making her nervous. She needed to breathe and remember she was good at this sport, that she had the best partner she could ask for. And she needed to remember why she played this sport.
"Can I have a minute with Chuck?"
Beckman gave her knee a reassuring squeeze and stood to her full height, wandering over to Graham and Chuck, thumping Chuck on the back, and gesturing for Graham to leave the curlers alone for the last moments before they headed out onto the ice again for the second half.
Sarah curled her finger for Chuck to join her and she stood as he sidled up in front of her.
"When I was a little kid, my mom put me in ballet first. I was pretty good, had the perfect body structure for it, but I hated it. Then we did basketball because I was tall, but I hated how often the ball came flying at my face. I liked my face too much." She snorted. "Every sport I tried, I ended up not liking it for whatever reason." She shook her head. "But then my parents divorced and I chose to go with my dad to a totally new place on the other side of the country. I was maybe eight or nine, my dad left me at this ice rink with an old friend of his while he, um…" She halted for a moment, then tucked hair behind her ear and continued. "While he was on a job. And all we did all day was curl. I've never been a cryer, even as a kid I never threw tantrums, but I did that night when my dad took me away from that ice sheet. He had to forcibly pry the broom from my hand and throw me over his shoulder. He was not happy. To say the least. But curling just—It got inside of me. And I realized it was the first time I allowed myself to just have fun. Nobody was yelling at me to stand up straight, nobody was throwing things at my face or kicking me. There were no outside forces. Curling was about me, my own decisions, my own ideas, my own performance. I dictated what happened. Even on a team, I controlled myself."
She huffed and had to resist hooking her finger through the belt loop of his pants the way she wanted to. It was getting just a bit harder to keep the small intimate gestures to herself, things that would alert others to the fact that she and Chuck weren't just partners, or even just friends.
"For the past few years, I let myself be controlled by outside forces. The press, Bryce, public opinion, promotions, and sponsorships. And it didn't make me love what I do any less, but it—it's stifled me, I think. I honestly think it has. I need to find what originally made curling a part of me, why it's in my blood." She met his gaze that was so intent on her, and she felt he was listening to her almost eagerly. And she suddenly wondered at just how little he knew about her personal life, in spite of them living together for the past two months.
"Well…" He licked his lips slowly. "I'd like to help. What can I do?"
"I know that the next four Ends are extremely important. What we do will either send us to a final match for gold or silver, or to a consolation match for a bronze medal. This is really big, Chuck. But do you think you can push everything else away for the next hour, hour and a half? I mean, the Twitter stuff, the publicity, the Bryce thing…Everything else that isn't this game and what we do together. Even, um, even the thing that keeps happening with us behind closed doors. Can you put that aside? All of it? And just focus on curling?"
He nodded. "Yeah. I can." He paused, shifting his weight a bit. "As long as, um, as long as we can come back to it after…I mean, the thing…the last thing you just talked about."
Sarah beamed at him, melting just a little. "Oh, that's not going anywhere. We're definitely still doing that."
She wasn't sure anyone could stop them.
He grinned. "Good." Then he glanced over his shoulder as the attendant came into the room. "Go time. Let's do this."
-oooo-
He'd been so confident walking back out onto that ice, head held high in spite of being down by five points. And he'd curled his heart out. He'd felt that same energy from Sarah.
But there'd been too much ground to make up, and neither of them had seemed capable of the comeback necessary, even working together.
And so here they sat hours later, Chuck on his bed, Sarah on hers, the room silent. He felt how tense the air was. He'd told himself in the middle of the last End that in spite of the loss he saw coming, it wouldn't really matter for them. Maybe gold and silver wasn't meant to be, and that was okay, because they were still okay, and this thing between them was still…
Well, whatever it was, it was still.
And he'd felt confident and okay with everything until they actually had to concede and shake the Canadians' hands. It was then that the almost debilitating disappointment hit him, and he and Sarah sat next to each other on the bench, not talking or sharing in their commiserations. Just wallowing in the same space.
Sarah had wrecked Team Canada with a filthy shot that stole four points in the fifth End, but all their opponents had to do was score three points to end up with nine, and Chuck and Sarah couldn't get enough to win with their six points total.
He felt the weight of it on his shoulders, though neither of them were solely to blame for the loss. Their shots were too thick in the first half and they just couldn't make up for it in the second.
It happened to the best teams.
But it sucked it happened to them, right then, on this stage, with the whole of America—the world even—watching.
He'd done something stupid during their quiet dinner alone—McDonald's at the table in their apartment, the one by the window so that they could look at the view of the mountains outside.
While Sarah had her phone out to probably text her mom, he'd pulled Twitter up. It was so stupid. A lot of "just what I expected would happen" hot takes, stuff about them not being the type of curlers who could ever get to the top at the highest level. One person had gotten hundreds of retweets and likes when she said that Sarah's career was fizzling without Bryce as her partner, and of course she'd added "Uggghhh but I love listening to Bryce's voice, tho. What a quandary!" With most responses agreeing—"If only he could curl with Sarah and commentate his own matches!"—and some saying it was less about the partner and more about Sarah losing confidence in her curling without her boyfriend as her partner. Only a handful told them to chill out, that this was the furthest a U.S. curling team had ever gotten in the Olympics. A few rabid "Bartowsker" supporters became even louder, in spite of the loss. It was a mess, and he eventually slammed his phone down to continue eating his damn fries.
The anger and annoyance had waned, and now he was left with thoughts not of curling, but of Sarah. They'd talked about how their connection wasn't just about curling, that it was about something more, that it was about them. Not making it into the final match sucked, but he knew that didn't mean she was done with him, with this…whatever it was.
That said, he hated the tension he felt, the look on her face when he peeked over at her. She sat with her legs pulled up against her chest, chin resting on her knees, and she just frowned into the corner. He could tell she was lost in her own thoughts, and he didn't mind the silences that sometimes fell between them, as long as they were comfortable. This one didn't feel comfortable. At least, not to him.
Sarah was upset, he knew. Not with him. And probably not even with herself. Just…upset. He understood that. He was also upset. Disappointed. Forlorn. All of that.
And the only way he knew to ease that was to deal with it, talk about it. It was what he and Ellie had done to deal with their parents, with each other, with other things that happened—his accident, his decision to quit skiing, Jill's betrayal.
He wanted to reassure Sarah, make her feel okay again.
So he turned from where he sat propped against the headboard of the bed, legs tucked under the covers, and he eyed her for a long moment, finally speaking up. "Hey…You doin' okay?"
She seemed to jump a little at the sound of his voice breaking the silence, but then she glanced over and gave him a small but genuine smile. "Yeeaaah, I'm okay. Just disappointed, you know?"
"Mm. Me, too." He paused. "We've lost before, but somehow this one feels worse."
"I'm glad it's not just me."
"Nah. It isn't." Taking a deep breath, he threw the covers off his legs and swung around to sit up, feet on the floor beside his bed as he peered over at her. "For a bit there, when you got those four points in the fifth End, I really thought we were gonna do it. Like, stereotypical sports movie miracle comeback."
She snorted softly. "Unfortunately, this isn't a movie."
"Nope. And we didn't win."
"Nope," she chirped, raising her eyebrows and smiling bitterly.
Chuck felt the need to be close to her then, touch her, have his arms around her. He'd gotten his hopes up and the loss felt worse because of it. And if he was honest with himself, he could use the comfort of having her arms around him. Or at the very least, he'd like to hold her hand, as cheesy as he felt for thinking that.
So he got up and crossed to her bed, sitting to face her and putting his hand on her calf, squeezing comfortingly. Neither of them said anything as she lifted her shy gaze up to meet his.
Then she blushed a little and looked apologetic, reluctant even. "Chuck, I-I'm sorry. You know I really enjoy it a lot when we…are together. But I'm just—I don't think I'm in the mood tonight. I'm bummed and I just don't…" She winced, putting her hand over his, apology all over her face. "I'm sorry. I hope that's okay."
He blinked in surprise, then cleared his throat and sat back. "No, I—Of course. Of course that's—I mean, it wasn't—Yeah no, I get it completely." He pulled his hand out from under hers and slowly rose to his feet beside her bed again. That hadn't been why he'd come to sit on her bed. Sex hadn't been anywhere close to the forefront of his mind. He just sought her presence, the comfort of having her near. He didn't need—and hadn't expected—sex.
"I'm sorry." She looked embarrassed, the air between them was awkward again, or maybe…more awkward. He was embarrassed now, too.
"No, don't be, Sarah. Please." He smiled and reached out for her hand, which she gave him willingly, smiling haltingly up at him.
But as he walked back to his bed, he realized her first thought when he came and sat next to her was that he was there to initiate that heat between them, seduce her maybe, so they'd end up tangled together under the covers again, like they'd done a number of times now. He'd only sought comfort, though…
And maybe that meant they weren't on the same page about what this was between them.
God, this was probably the worst possible timing. But he wanted to make things clear, once and for all. He didn't want to keep wondering if this was a relationship or just a physical thing. What did she want from him? What did he want from her? What were they doing here?
Because he'd sat down next to her wanting to reassure her, support her—all things you did for the person you were in a relationship with, he realized. But she'd thought he'd come to her for sex again. Was this mostly physical for her? He wouldn't blame her for feeling that way, considering how often they fell into bed together since that first time a few nights ago. The heat between them was immeasurable. And he felt electricity crashing through him when she touched him in those quiet moments, when they were alone.
But this felt like more to him. She was more to him than the sensations she made him feel when they were having sex. And he felt like she needed to know he felt that way.
So he stopped before he got to his bed and spun on his heel to face her again. "Sarah, I-I need you to know that I didn't just come over there because I wanted to have sex. I mean, I'm not saying I'd say no if it happened, but sex wasn't even on my mind. We just lost an important match and I sort of just wanted to comfort you." He furrowed his brow. "And, uh, I thought it'd be comforting for me, too."
Sarah's eyes widened a bit and she shifted to face him head on. "Oh."
That seemed to genuinely surprise her, and he tried not to let it bum him out. He just had to use his words and ask her bluntly and stop making assumptions about what she felt or what she thought.
"Sorry," she said. And he saw some of the tension ease out of her shoulders as she huffed and shook her head, smiling softly. "I misread. You can, um…You can sit here again. If you want." She winced.
Chuck gave his partner a crooked grin and then moved to sit next to her again. This time she was the one who took his hand, and she even lifted their intertwined hands between them and bobbed her eyebrows as though to say, See? Look what I just did.
He chuckled at her, shaking his head, insanely charmed by how cute she was sometimes. He wondered if this was something she let others see. Because before he became her partner, before the move to San Jose, she'd seemed a lot more straight-laced. Not that he'd had the opportunity to talk to her much then. She'd felt so…off-limits. A veteran, in a relationship with Bryce, another veteran.
Sarah laughed with him and he ducked his head, squeezing her hand.
He sobered a little then and carefully lifted his gaze to look at her through his eyelashes. "Sarah, I know this probably isn't the best time for this because we just lost our chance to get a gold medal a few hours ago and we're both pretty bummed about it…but, uh…um…"
"What is it?" she asked, tilting her head.
He shook his head then cleared his throat and nodded, making his mind up.
"We're having sex."
Her eyebrows nearly went up to her hairline. "That's…true."
"Well, it's great. I love it. I'd like to do more of it. Yeah…" She bit her bottom lip and smiled just slightly, obviously unsure of where he was going with this. He didn't blame her. "But I also want to know what your intentions are. With me." Chuck frowned deeply and shook his head. "God, I'm sorry. I sound like an angry weird nineteen-fifties dad talking to his daughter's prom date at the door." Bless her for laughing at that because he was struggling. "I'm so sorry. I just mean, what is this to you? I mean…us? What do you want from this? What do you want us to be?"
He let her take her time as she looked off to the side, mulling it over. He'd caught her off guard he knew, and he felt bad, but this felt like an important conversation that needed to be had before he accidentally got in too deep only to find out she was wading in shallow waters. Or something.
She finally spoke, her voice quiet and tentative.
"I thought we agreed we were going to do this behind doors."
"No, we did. We did."
"Because if people knew about us being more than partners—"
"That." He pointed at her, interrupting. "Right there. What does that mean to you? When you say we're more than partners?" He shook his head. "I'm sorry, I'm so not being clear. At all." He scooted closer to her and took her hand in both of his, leaning in and catching her blue eyes with his brown ones. "We've agreed it would be an insane distraction from curling if people besides us knew about it. I'm completely onboard. We have a medal to win tomorrow and your women's team has the tournament after that. Nobody can know about us. But I guess what I'm saying is that I-I'd like to know about us. What I mean is, I'd like to know what we are to you."
He cleared his throat when she just stared at him with wide eyes for a few moments."And I guess to expand on that, when all of this is over…the Olympics, I mean…what are your thoughts about us then? I know, on the plane you said one day at a time. But that was before we let ourselves have this. Before we slept together." Chuck huffed and hung his head. "This is a big conversation and I'm sure you don't want to have it after tonight. We can always put it off until—"
"No."
He blinked and looked at her with a "Hnn?"
"You're right. We shouldn't be putting this off. We've slept together and I-I told you that night after the first time it happened that this was different. I meant that. And there's a reason why I keep diving into bed with you over and over again. Besides that it feels really good," she flirted. He blushed. "I like being with you. Being around you. Spending time in the same place as you." She giggled and reached up with her free hand to play with the sleeve of the T-shirt he wore. "Look, I'm serious about keeping those social media fans of ours—and, uh, especially the non-fans—in the dark about this thing between us."
"Me, too." He shivered theatrically. "But you said 'this thing between us'. What is this thing? What do you want it to be? Honestly."
"Chuck, I wanna date you."
He felt like he was sitting on nothing at all. Air. Just air. He'd heard her right. She wanted to date him. He was speechless, because what could he say to that? She said it so quickly and so readily and were his ears ringing?
"What that's gonna look like once we get home from PyeongChang and we're back in our apartment in San Jose, I have no freaking clue. But I feel like that's something that…we can figure out." Sarah tilted her chin down and looked at him a bit shyly through her eyelashes.
"Oh my God and here I thought all you wanted was my body and my fresh curling skills," he let out in a quick rambled breath.
Sarah threw her head back with a laugh and climbed up onto her knees, crawling over to him and slipping her arms around his neck, leaning in for a slow kiss. He immediately slid his own arms around her and pulled her into his lap, kissing her back as she giggled against his lips.
When she pulled back, he let her see his slow, dreamy smile. But when he opened his eyes, she was frowning a little, her brow furrowed in question. "Wait, what did you think this was for me? Did you really think I was going to just drop you like a hot potato when we got back to San Jose?"
He blinked. "Um. No?"
"You did, didn't you?" She reared back, her jaw going slack.
"No, no…I didn't. Really. I just didn't make any assumptions at all. I didn't want to think it was one way and then find out it was another way and get…" His voice died as he searched for the word.
"Hurt?" She dropped her gaze to her lap. "I get that."
"I didn't want you to think I expected anything."
"Why shouldn't you expect something?"
He didn't know how to answer that, so he just blinked at her again.
Sarah crawled off of his lap, putting a bit of distance between them, and she just stared for a second. "Chuck, I told you this was different."
"Right, different from what you had with Bryce."
"No, just different. From everything." She nibbled on her lip. "This hasn't just been sex. You've felt that, right? If this was just about sex I never would have told you…" Sarah stopped herself and raised an eyebrow. "Anything."
Chuck scooted a bit closer. "I didn't think that. I just didn't know what it was. I'm sorry. I was just trying to be…I dunno, respectful of what you wanted."
"Jesus, Chuck! Do you ever think of yourself?"
"Um."
"Seriously. I appreciate that you respect me so much, but God, what do I have to do to make you understand that I want this to be a relationship?"
Chuck grinned, showing just about all of his teeth. "Well, um…That did it."
She giggled and looked at the ceiling for a moment, before lowering her gaze and sending him an amused and slightly self-deprecating look. "So what you're saying is…using words really helped, huh?" She rolled her eyes at herself. "I'm sorry. I don't communicate with words usually."
"You've said plenty to me. I mean, we have talked a lot. You told me—Oh, and that's exactly your point, isn't it? I'm so incredibly clueless, oh my God." He dropped his chin to his chest and groaned, thunking himself in the temple with the heel of his palm.
Sarah full on laughed and he felt her arms wrap around his shoulders, pulling him in so that he sort of fell against her, and she plopped back against her pillows, still holding onto him.
"So, to use more words," he said after a few moments of shared laughter, "since I feel like we need to just tie it with a bow…We're dating now. Right? You're my partner, roommate, and girlfriend?" He pulled back and sent her a hopeful look, hovering over her."Yeah." She shrugged one shoulder and smiled quietly. "But we need to keep all of this under wraps still. That hasn't changed."
But Chuck was already gone.
He flew to his feet beside the bed and leapt up into the air with his fists over his head. "Yesssssss! Ha ha haaaaaa!" He spun on his heel to face her again and beamed, pumping his fist again and doing a squirmy celebration dance.
Sarah laughed, pushing herself to sit up against the headboard. "Wow, way to play it cool, Bartowski," she said with teasing sarcasm, a massive smile on her face. He could easily read how pleased she was by his reaction, though, and he genuinely had no shame about it.
He continued doing more dances, then did a bit of a Muhammad Ali punch combo. "Girl, I'm not messing around with that play it cool bullshit. We're behind doors. I'm stoked and I don't care if you know it." He stopped and pointed towards the door then. "When we get out there, though, I'm gonna be cool. Super cool. The coolest. I promise. In here, I am your boyfriend. We are dating. We are in a relationship. And I have the biggest ego I've ever had ever in my whole life ever."
"Ever?" she teased.
"EVER." He did a hero pose then. "We're going to win tomorrow. You know how I know that?"
"How?" she giggled, and she truly looked like she was about to burst from happiness. It made him feel like he could fly right out of the window.
"We've put everything out on the table. All our feelings, what we want. And I feel so confident and free. You want me, which just…" He gave her a dreamy look instead of finishing his thought. "And I definitely want you. And we both want to win. And there's just no way Norway is going into that game feeling this damn good. MAN, I just wish I'd had the damn guts to come to you last night or earlier today and have this conversation. Because if I'd felt like this going into that semi, I would've whooped Canada so hard."Sarah raised an eyebrow and a sudden look came over her face. He didn't know much about Sarah Walker, top curler on the U.S. team. But he recognized that look. He'd seen it a few times before. The adrenaline of this whole last half hour or so of his life hit him like a ton of bricks so suddenly he nearly lost his footing and fell on his ass. But he held his ground and watched her as she climbed up onto her knees and put her hands on her hips. "You're that confident, huh?"
"Oh, yeah."
"I did that?"
"Yep."
She crooked her finger for him to come closer, smirking mischievously. "C'mere."
Chuck Bartowksi immediately complied, crawling back onto the bed and mimicking her pose on his knees, their chests just an inch or two apart.
"I really wanna make sure we win tomorrow," she said quietly, a serious look on her face. "Don't you?"
"Yes," he said with an emphatic nod.
"I feel it necessary to do whatever I can to give you as much confidence as possible going into it. I mean, I want to make sure you feel really good."
"I like that idea."
"Yeah?"
"Mhm…" He made a teasingly questioning face then, playing along. "How do you plan on accomplishing this, partner?"
"How do you think?" she asked in a flat voice.
'Uhhh…I can go…get the whiteboard."
"No."
"We can go over some strategy," he continued as though he hadn't heard her, still playing clueless.
"Mm mm."
"Watch some video footage."
"Absolutely not." She chuckled and went for the hem of his shirt, pulling it off in one, impressive movement as he was forced to lift his arms over his head. Her fingers made an appreciative pattern down his chest and abs as she bit her lip…a bit hungrily, he thought. And this was already getting off to a roaring start.
She grabbed him by his face and kissed him. Yep, there was the hunger. It lit a flame in his lower stomach and he kissed her back just as hungrily, whimpering when her fingers went straight for the drawstring of his pajama pants.
He broke the kiss. "I thought you said—oh wow you went right for it…" His eyelids fluttered as she touched him there. "Y-You said you didn't want sex tonight."
"I changed my mind."
Chuck squealed in surprise as she swung him around and slammed him onto his back on the mattress…kind of hard…swinging a leg over to straddle him and looking down at him with her hands on his shoulders, pinning him there. "Oh. I see. Well, I love to see a woman who knows what she wants."
Her giggle was almost predatory. "You haven't seen anything yet…"
She was right.
He really, really hadn't.
-oooo-
How many times was she going to be rudely awoken while she was here in PyeongChang for the Olympics? Sure, maybe sleeping in wasn't something an Olympic athlete should be doing while they were actually at the Olympics. There was always more training, working out, more training…
But damn it, between her coaches knocking on her door at the crack of dawn practically—okay, fine, eight o'clock—and people's phones buzzing and beeping…Or was that an alarm? It wasn't an alarm. They hadn't set an alarm…
"Why are you moving?" she grumbled as she felt Chuck's body shift against hers. He ignored her and she felt the cool air in the room sweep in between their bodies as he pushed himself up onto his elbows. "Chuuuuuck," she whined. "Unless it's eight PM and we're missing our bronze medal match, ignore whatever the hell that is."
He just chuckled, not getting out of bed like she feared he might. She cracked her eyes open and watched as he reached over to grab his cell phone and look at it. "Who's calling you at this ridiculously early hour?" she asked.
"Well, first of all, it's almost ten o'clock."
"Oh." She blinked. "Still."
"And secondly, I think this might be the number Hannah gave me." He winced, peeking at her with a careful look in his eyes.
She was awake.
"Why the hell is she calling you the morning of your bronze medal match? Is she on something?" Then she frowned as she realized exactly what the snowboarder was on. The man currently still half on top of her, wearing nothing but boxers. Her frown deepened a bit. She couldn't help it.
"Should I answer it?" he asked, looking down at her, then back at the phone he held in his hand.
"You're asking me? You're on your own with this, buster. But just remember you're taken."
"Right, taken but not allowed to tell anyone that I'm taken so what do I do…?"
"Try something like 'I'm not interested'." She shrugged and made a 'duh!' face.
"That's mean! And what if she doesn't think that's a good enough excuse and keeps pursuing me?"
Sarah scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Welcome to my world." He sent her a questioning look and she smiled at how cute he was, patting him placatingly on his backside a few times. "Nothing. Just tell her you aren't interested, but in a nice way."
"Too late, it went to voicemail." He sounded relieved.
"Well, you can't avoid her forever."
"Easy for you to say, you don't have someone knocking at your door for a booty call," he said, a small amount of genuine frustration in his voice as he set his phone down again and lowered himself back to the mattress, his head on her pillow.
She snorted. "Yeah, because I gave him Beckman's room number."That got Chuck to laugh. "Oh, yeah! Maybe I can send her to Graham." Then he shivered. "Nah, she's a nice person. And she doesn't mean any harm. We slept together last time and it's pretty fair for her to think we might do it again this time."
"But you're not going to." She lifted an eyebrow.
"Of course I'm not. That—That goes without saying, Sarah."
"Yeah, for us. But she might need you to say it."
His phone buzzed and made a soft beep sound. "That'll be her voicemail."
"Listen to it."
"I'll, uh…later."
All she had to do was give him a look and he groaned and rolled over to grab his phone again. "I'm not letting you hear it, though."
She giggled. "It's your message, I'm not gonna make you put it on speaker phone or anything." When he looked at her with a small smile, she sunk a bit deeper into the covers and smiled back. "Don't worry, Chuck. I'm not gonna be that kind of girlfriend."
The smile on his face grew to goofy proportions and he sighed dreamily, making her laugh at his antics. "Sarah Walker, let me just tell you that you could literally be any kind of girlfriend and I still will have scored big time in the girlfriend department. BIG TIME," he emphasized again, rolling onto his back with that grin of his and just blinking at the ceiling.
She laughed again. "Listen to your message."
"Oh."
He pulled it up and pressed his phone to his ear. She watched his profile closely as he listened, hearing the higher tones of a woman's voice, but not hearing what she was saying. She was sincere about what she'd told Chuck, though. It was his message, and even though she was his girlfriend, she had no business expecting him to let her hear it.
But then a wince came over his face and he groaned, pulling the phone away. "God, listen." He thrusted the phone at her.
"Oh. Okay. I, uh, I didn't think this was gonna be a thing but I'll listen if you want me to."
"I don't care," he groused, frowning.
She tried not to be too eager about pressing play and putting it to her ear to listen, because she did want to hear what the snowboarder wanted to say in the message. Chuck had more self-preservation than to let her listen if it was something bad, something…more private. Who knew what kind of person Hannah Yee was? Maybe she called men and said sex things into their phones. Everyone was different.
But this wasn't a sex thing, she realized as she listened. It was just a woman who'd had a great time four years ago and was wondering if he'd want to grab a bite to eat together or maybe drinks. She ended it with a good luck getting that bronze medal, and a promise not to bother him again until after his event was over.
She carefully set his phone on his chest.
"She does seem nice," Sarah said with a shrug.
"She is."
"And she seems legitimately interested and not just in sex."
He winced. "Gah, can you not?"
"Seriously?" she laughed. "After everything we've done to each other in this bed—and in that bed—oh, and the shower—"
"I get it," he interrupted, completely deadpan. "I just mean it's…" He sighed. "It's weird talking about this with you after we just started, like, dating last night."
"Ummm…" She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. "I'm pretty sure we've been dating since our wins against Russia and Finland, when we shagged each other mercilessly in your bed. You were just a little slow on the uptake." She beamed at him, sticking her tongue through her teeth.
'I—You—That—" He huffed. "Damn it, you're right. In my defense, though…"
"If you even say one thing about my being out of your league, even something barely related to that, I'll be pissed at you," Sarah interrupted, pointing at him. "Don't."
He shut his mouth and mimed zipping it.
"Good."
"All I'm saying is I didn't come here for that. I'm not in PyeongChang because I was super stoked to, for lack of a better phrase, get some hiney."
"Really?" She made a dubious face. "You couldn't come up with a better phrase than that?"
"Sh. I'm trying to be serious."
"You just said hiney, though, so how serious can you really be?"
"Stop being so cheeky," he said through clenched teeth, and she wasn't prepared to feel his fingers pinch her right on her backside over the cotton of her pajama pants. She jumped and gasped, looking down at him, half affronted and half amused. She couldn't believe he'd had the guts to do that.
She smiled and winced a little, easing herself against him and propping herself on her elbows on either side of him to look down into his face. "I woke up feeling a little mischievous. I'll try to dial it back. I promise."
"Nooo, I like that. Just like…table it for a second, and then you can bring it back. Yeaah. I like that idea…" He grinned, his nose wrinkling, and she giggled with a "Deal."
Chuck sobered a bit and slung and arm over her lower back. "I was in my early twenties when I went to Sochi, I didn't have a girlfriend, I was going to the Olympics, and I was bursting with ego. Not to mention, there's…I dunno, there's something about ski jump—the whole hurtling yourself off a ramp hundreds of feet in the air with nothin' but a skintight suit, skis, and a helmet—that makes you kind of, um, confident. That coupled with youth and immaturity…"
Sarah tried really hard not to let her amusement show, but he really was so adorable. She looked him up when he was first picked to be her partner and discovered that he'd graduated from Stanford only five years earlier, which made him twenty-seven now, and twenty-three in Sochi. He was really overselling the whole immaturity thing but she was letting it slide.
"My event took precedence, obviously, but it was only the one event, so I also came to the Olympics thinking, I dunno, maybe I might have sex. It was something the guys talked about. I mean, and girls, too. Guys and girls. And it was talked about a lot, so…" He shrugged.
"You went to Sochi to jump and to get laid."
He laughed and rolled his eyes. "A'right fine. Jesus, woman."She giggled. "It's okay. Jane's, like, a few years shy of forty and she's apparently not above the whole getting laid at the Olympics thing."
"But that's the thing," he said, pushing himself up to lean a little more against the headboard. She followed him and continued cuddling, liking the pattern he was making with his fingers under her shirt and along her hip. She sighed when he got right back to it. "I didn't come to PyeongChang for that. I came to curl."
She bit her lip in amusement.
"What?"
"Nothing. I'm being serious. No mischief."
"Tell me." He bumped her with his hip, his amber-colored eyes sparkling a little.
"I came to curl," she snarled. "It struck me as really funny at that moment."
He chuckled. "What? I really did come to curl! I came here for curling," he said, phrasing it a lot better this time, she thought. "And I came for you. To help you. For me. To prove myself. And mostly I came for us. I feel like we have a lot of naysayers and I came here to prove they're all wrong. And stupid."
She grinned, giggling through her nose. "Well said."
"Thank you. So yeah, I'm not here to get laid, not even as a second priority. Or third. It wasn't even on the docket, to be honest with you."
"Mmm, but laid you were," she pronounced in her best English fanfare.
He broke down in a giggle-fit and she just watched, enjoying it so damn much. When he sobered up, he shook his head. "This was not how I expected this to turn out."
She raised her eyebrows. "Me, neither. But you aren't gonna find me complaining about it."
"Uh, if I ever complain about this, take me to my sister. She's a neurosurgeon. She'll be able to tell you that my brain is broken."
She giggled. "Deal."
"The point is, Sarah, because I do have a point to all of this… I think she needs to know the truth and that is that I was different four years ago. I had different priorities. I was there for myself, to compete the best I could, see the town, get my kicks…"
"Pull," she interjected, making a fist and pulling her elbow back a few times, teasingly thrusting into him and biting her lip.
"OH MY GOD, STOP!" he cried out, laughing as he pushed her off of him. "Morgan is a great wingman, really, and that is why he lies about me pulling but it's such a lie! I made out with, like, three women in Sochi. And then that one night with Hannah. That was it, oh my God!"
She laughed and held up both hands in surrender. "Okay, okay! You didn't pull! Got it!"
"Jesusss." He shook his head, still grinning as he plopped back down and accepted her back into his embrace. "This is different, Sarah. This feels more serious, like I have a lot more to gain and a lot more to lose. I don't want to sleep with anybody, I don't want sex."
"Could'a fooled me."
He sent her a warning look and she shrunk a bit, wincing.
"That's what I'll tell her. It'll be fine. She'll get that."
"There ya go. You gonna call her back?"
Chuck scoffed. "Ha. No. Not todaaay!"
She rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Your funeral, funny guy."
"Hey."
"Oooh, sorry." She made an oops face. "I know I'm being mischievous this morning but I honestly didn't do that one on purpose."
"I believe you," he said, narrowing his eyes in suspicion still. "But I do require you use one of those ways I told you about, you know, to make me like that nickname a lot better…Since we're here an' all."
A slow smirk grew over her face. "Is that so, Mister Didn't Come To PyeongChang To Get Laid?"
He just grinned at her, and there was something a bit naughty about that grin, about the sparkle in his eye, the way he bit his lip. Then he threw his weight to the side and turned them both over, pinning her to the bed.
"Way number one…" he growled, and he immediately disappeared beneath the sheets, sliding down her body.
Her eyes popped a few moments later. "Oh! …Funny guyyy…"
A/N: So Sarah's misplaced her chill. Not sure it ever even made it onto the plane with her, so...we probably won't be seeing it anytime soon. (wink)
-SC