Chapter 150: National Recognition

Wednesday, June 20, 1984

Cammie was again up early and had made breakfast for everyone. Mel was the last one to make it downstairs to breakfast, though it was obvious she’d taken a shower and thus might have been up for a while.

We pretty much just hung out until two, mostly talking about the house. The remodel was well in hand. Furniture was not, and we would need to do some work there sooner or later. We had plenty, but it wasn’t necessarily what we wanted long-term.

At two we loaded everything up that we needed for Nationals and set out on the road. Most of the group was arriving in San Antonio tonight.

Housing was interesting. There wasn’t anywhere near enough hotel space near Trinity University to hold everyone, but Trinity had plenty of dorm space that was empty for the summer.

They allowed schools to specify how much space they needed, so we were able to add enough space to hold a few extra people. We were somewhere between bending and breaking a few rules, but we had made a career of that.

We wouldn’t check in there until Thursday, though. Tonight we would be at the Hilton, a familiar destination for some of us.

The drive over to San Antonio was uneventful, as was check-in at the Hilton. The six of us hung out in our rooms for a bit, then went down to the lobby and waited for the others to arrive.

By six, everyone in the Memorial group had gathered in the Hilton lobby. Steffie and her husband had been the last to arrive. She said they’d gotten stuck behind a wreck during the drive over to San Antonio.

We all walked over to the Tower of the Americas together. The Chart House was relatively narrow (being a rotating restaurant), but they’d promised they could arrange a table for a group of our size. There’s no way we could’ve gotten seated there without the reservation, at least not without a pretty large tip to the maître d’!

Steffie and Meg were officially pretending that Mel and Sheila were staying somewhere else during Nationals, but certainly knew the truth. As long as it didn’t become a problem, it’d be fine.

We all caught up a bit along the way and once we were seated. The biggest questions were about our trip. Everyone wanted to know where we’d been, who we’d seen, and what we’d done. Disney got a lot of attention, but many of the Study Group gang were just as interested in how Curtis and Marsha were doing.

The subject of how we’d do at Nationals came up again and again. No one was making any bold predictions, not even so much as ‘of course we’ll break.’ I was certain that we all expected to break. That was reasonable, given how we’d done at ToC. We had to be considered favorites to at least break.

Beyond that? We all knew it took both luck and skill. I’d been the first in our group to say it so clearly, but once it was said, it was obvious, and both Meg and Steffie had embraced it as a way to approach the subject with new students. You can’t win repeatedly unless you put in the work, but putting in the work isn’t a guarantee of success in a competitive event, and certainly not relative to others who’ve put in about the same amount of work.

We’d pretty much gotten the breaks before. Would we this time? If so, great! If not, none of us were going to be crushed. For most of us, our ToC wins were a great consolation prize (and maybe meant more than Nationals), and Jaya had two more tries (plus, hopefully, ToC finally adding LD to their events).

Late in the dinner, Paige made the announcement that we’d all decided was hers to make, since she’d made so many announcements over the years. Cammie could have, too, but Cammie was in the dark about this one.

“Everyone!” Paige said. “We bought all of you a present!”

Ryan looked skeptical, and I couldn’t blame him for that.

Paige caught it, and said, “Even you, Ryan!”

Everyone laughed, particularly Steffie.

Paige pulled out the bag she’d been carrying, which looked like (and was) an oversized handbag, and pulled out a nested collection of Mickey Mouse hats.

The laughter started immediately as she started handing them out to each person, showing off the name as she did.

I couldn’t tell if Mel or Sheila blushed more, but Sheila showed it more given her complexion.

Some of them were clearly trying to put their hats away, but Paige stopped that.

“No hiding! Hats on heads! I’ve already asked our server to take our picture in a bit, and that means with your hat!”

“I cannot allow photographic evidence of this to exist,” Amit said, but the grin on his face put the lie to that.

Jaya elbowed him in the ribs. “If I can, you can!” she said, putting her hat on.

“Yes, dear,” Amit said, putting his hat on, too. That got a good laugh.

Sheila elbowed him, though.

“Dear?” she said.

“She’s my dear sister, isn’t she?” Amit said, deadpan.

“Objection withdrawn,” Sheila said.

We wore them for about ten minutes, until the server took a few pictures of us all on Paige’s disposable camera, and then put them away. Paige was clear that we had to keep the hats, and that there would be a group picture, including any trophies anyone won, and with our hats.

Meg said, “Too bad we can’t get these in the yearbook!”

That got everyone discussing whether that would’ve been a good thing or a bad thing in terms of encouraging underclassmen to join either program next year.

Despite the objections, I knew all of these people, and it was clear that everyone was happy to be in the Mickey Mouse club. We just weren’t the sort of sober-minded, always serious people who this might offend. I could see people like that doing well — Ted Seiler had been more like that than not, and even when I liked him it would’ve been difficult to imagine him wearing one of these hats, unless pressed to it — but they would have trouble fitting into either team now. They might — I’d seen people embrace exactly that sort of ‘misfit’ — but they might not, too. At minimum, they’d have to be self-aware enough to know that people were laughing at them as well as with them.

After dinner, we walked back to the Hilton, then hung out in the lobby until ten, when everyone split up and headed to bed. We would only have two rounds tomorrow, but that was enough to make us want to get to bed before it got too late.

Jas and I decided that we didn’t need every minute of sleep, so we took advantage of the bed fairly enthusiastically. After tonight, we would probably abstain for at least a few days.

After we’d finished, we snuggled up, my arm around Jas, her head on my chest. I stroked her back gently.

“I got spoiled on the trip,” she said, giggling. “And at the house.”

“We’re going to be very spoiled soon enough,” I said.

She grinned and nodded.

“We’re very lucky, and I mean ... well ... it’s everything. Not just you being here!” she said, giggling. “More than that. Understanding, supportive parents with means; great friends; talent; and so on and so forth. We’re just really very lucky. Like you’ve said, that’s not enough, but it’s necessary for us to be here now.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Luck, and hard work, and then more luck, and here we are.”

“This feels weird to me. I mean, that I’m here. Maybe it’s just the impostor syndrome talking, but it’s weird saying I’m at this level. I’m really not doubting it, but it’s just ... weird.”

I nodded. “Me, too. For me, it could twist itself into a negative.”

“Because you didn’t do it the first time?”

“Because I didn’t even come close, maybe. But, then, that wasn’t me. First-life me had potential, but not perspective. He was lazy and unmotivated. Angie and I talked about it, and she’s feeling it even worse.”

Jas nodded, her cheek nuzzling against my chest a bit. “Yeah. We’ve talked. She’s got some issues with how her first life got away from her, which is totally understandable. And ... honestly ... well, it’s kinda like you said. I think I’d have seen those struggles more and more, and they don’t make sense at face value. Even with her father dying unexpectedly and Sharon being a total bitch, her life has been great for four years and everything in it says she can do what she’s doing. You have to know that she also didn’t do it for it to really make sense. And, if I’d seen her struggle, I’d have either decided she had a big secret or was really fucked up. Which ... heck ... maybe she is really fucked up, but not at all in the way I’d have guessed.”

“Yeah. I think this is going to keep receding as we go forward. The more we’re just ‘us’ — and I think we are, mostly, now — the less we have to deal with having been someone else. The stuff is still there, but it’s not going to torpedo us. That said — not ditching Jane anytime soon. It helps that we have someone to call if we find ourselves needing to be talked off a ledge.”

Jas giggled. “No ledges!”

“Metaphorically speaking. I think the last thing either of us would ever be is suicidal. We know that we’re blessed in having a second chance, and we know we don’t want a third one. This one has to count.”

“Still!” she said, still giggling. Then she blew a raspberry on my chest.

“Gonna kick ass tomorrow?”

She nodded. “We’re rusty, but everyone’s rusty. We’ll knock the rust off fast.”

“Yeah. That’s how Cammie and I feel.”

“We’d better get some sleep.”

“We should,” I said, squeezing her a bit. “I love you very much.”

“I love you, too!” she said, then leaned up for a kiss, which I happily gave her.

We snuggled in a bit tighter and were asleep quickly.

Thursday, June 21, 1984

We arrived at Trinity around noon. There weren’t many cars in the parking areas reserved for competitors, but that was expected — aside from a relatively small number of people, most teams would arrive by taxi from the airport.

We took our belongings to the student center, where we met Steffie and Meg. They checked us in and issued room assignments to everyone. Presumably they’d intentionally put us all next to each other, but either way, it worked out that way. Meg and Steffie, meanwhile, had their own rooms, but they were on a different floor, likely with other coaches.