Chapter 77: Something To Grab For

They landed in San Jose on a Saturday afternoon for their second World Championships. Their practices started on a Sunday, and their competition was Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday.

They were not in their room an hour, when there was a knock at the door. "Hi, Liz!" Sophia greeted her.

"Hiya, Soph. Hi, Warren!" She ran over to him and wrapped him in a bear hug. "I'm so happy you're here."

"So am I," he grinned at her.

"We're all getting together in the hotel restaurant for supper, a whole bunch of us. Six o'clock. Everyone starts practice tomorrow, so we unwind a little tonight. And you guys have to be there," Liz informed them.

"Sounds great!" Sophia agreed.

They walked in to be greeted by an impressive array of skating talent. Evan Pogdar was the first to greet them as they walked in.

"Ev. Thanks for all the support. It was appreciated more than you know," Warren told him.

"Aah, it's nothing."

"It wasn't nothing, trust me. Too bad you don't get to skate."

"I'm glad I don't get to skate. You earned the spot. Remember what I said, though--three spots next year!"

"Aye aye sir."

They continued into the room, being waylaid by well wishers at every turn. They finally grabbed a table with Jack Garrison and his wife, Chris Arsenault, and Liz Cushman.

"Varren, Dahling!" It was world champion Olga Bradochkina.

"Olga! Dobriy vyecher! Kak Dela?"

"Ochen khorosho, moy drug, a tyi?

"Ni plokho, maya podruga Olga, spacibo."(*)

"Ah, Varren," Olga switched to her accented English, "is good to see you here. After that horrible thing..."

"It's over, Olga. I'm here."

"Is good thing. You feel good?"

"Yes, I do. Pretty much all healed. Ready to go and kick your ass!"

Olga cracked up laughing. "Tenth to first, Varren? You dream big like Siberia, yes?"

"Yes! Nope, it's just good to be here. I just want to skate."

"Good. I vill be vatching."

"Nice to see you, Olga."

"You also, dahling. Do svidanya."

"She is a trip and a half, that lady," Jack opined.

"That she is. The phrase 'her bark is worse than her bite' should have been invented for her," Warren agreed. "Underneath the bluster that the TV audience sees, she's a dear."

They greeted other friends, and chatted with the folks at their table into the night.

"I hate early morning practices," Warren grumbled, as they stepped onto the ice at 7am.

"You never were a morning person, Snugglebear," Sophia said.

"Well, yeah."

"It's not that early, though, you know. It's 9am in Wisconsin."

"True. Still too damn early." Warren looked up in the stands. "There's a lot of people here for an early morning, early week ice dance practice, isn't there?"

"Yeah. The French are on this practice though." Sophia was talking about Nicole Borisina and Michel Dravouche, fourth in the world last year and poised to move up. "They've been attracting a lot of attention. And Steve and Sharon are here, too, and they're the National Champions."

It was a free dance practice. Sophia and Warren watched the other couples run through their free dance. They were second-to-last to skate. The French, Nicholas and Coleman, and some other teams skated before them. They noticed that, if the crowd were here to see the French, or Steve and Sharon, they didn't seem to pay much attention when they were skating.

"How you feel?" Sophia asked him as they prepared to run through their program.

"Ask me after I've had about three more cups of coffee."

"No time for that, sweetie, we're on," Sophia giggled at him.

"Next to skate, representing the United States of America, Sophia Daniels and Warren Kelleher," the rink announcer intoned.

Sophia noticed it first. The applause. The cheering. A group of teenage girls yelled "WE LOVE YOU WARREN!!!"

"Oh my God," Sophia realized. "They're here for us."

Warren couldn't speak. All he could do was grin and blush.

"Can you skate in the face of all this adoration, my dear?" Sophia smirked.

That brought him back down to the ice. "I think I can manage," he grinned. The music for their Sinatra program started, and they flew through it almost perfectly. They never stopped smiling, and the folks in the stands never stopped cheering.

It was like that all week. Every practice, there was more people there, apparently to support Warren and Sophia. There was even a decent crowd for the compulsory dances, which is unheard of.

"You see what I told you?" Sophia told him in their room one night after they had discussed it. "You chose love over hate. You chose hope over despair. And you're getting it all back."

"And then some," Warren agreed, a little teary-eyed at the thought. "I'm so glad you kicked my ass into getting back on the ice, Pookie."

"You just remember that," she smiled at him.

Politics is an ever-present reality in ice dance. It reared its head in the compulsories.

At Worlds, there are three different judging panels. One for the first compulsory, a completely different one for the second compulsory, and a third one--drawn from the first two--for the original dance and free dance.

The first compulsory went almost to form. The first seven places were exactly where they had been at last years' Worlds: the two Russian pairs one and two, the Canadians third, the French fourth, the Germans fifth, Nicholas and Coleman sixth, and the Italians seventh. Warren and Sophia finished eighth, and were thrilled.

However, there was some maneuvering with the judges for the second compulsory. This panel included the Russian, French, Italian, and German judges, and they found a fifth to work with to control the panel. The two Russian teams were still one-two in the second compulsory, but the Italians and Germans were three-four, with the Canadians down to fifth. The Italians were put in sixth, with Nicholas and Coleman dumped down to eighth. The unwitting beneficiaries of this skullduggery were Sophia and Warren, who were placed seventh, above the perceived "greater threat" of Nicholas and Coleman.

This irony was not lost on either Sophia or Warren. Neither was another--this was the Golden Waltz. "From eighth at Nationals to seventh at Worlds. Nice thing, this bloc judging, eh?" Warren laughed.

"Good thing I didn't fall down!" Sophia cracked.

The judging panel for the original dance and free dance must have disappointed the conspirators. Only the French and the Italians were drawn for the third panel. Both the Americans and Canadians were on it, plus a bunch of judges representing nations with no big stake in the outcome. It was rumored that strong efforts by the French to form a coalition fell on deaf ears.

Sophia and Warren were in the middle of the pack, in terms of skate order, for the OD. They were after the second Russians and the Germans, but before all the rest of the teams above them. They knew that mattered, but not as much as some fans seemed to think it did. They just wanted to skate well. They knew the program was a winner, especially after seeing the parade of typical march music that most of the other teams were skating to. They knew their upbeat pop song would grab the crowd, at least.

Little did they know, until they stepped on the ice, that there was no need to grab the crowd. The house was packed, and when their names were announced, it erupted.

"Oh my God," said Warren, looking incredulously into the stands, disbelieving.

"It really is something," Sophia. The loud applause and cheering didn't let up until they had maneuvered into their starting position.

"Let's give 'em something to cheer about," Warren said.

"Damn straight," Sophia agreed.

The music started. If they had attacked this program at Nationals--well, then, here, they grabbed it by the throat and strangled it until it surrendered. They went at the program like two people possessed. It was intense, and furious, and altogether fantastic. The crowd hammered their hands together on every beat, spurring them on. Their usual smiles were replaced by expressions of furious intensity--especially for Warren, who was seemingly trying to use the power of the adoring crowd to purge himself of two months of pain with two and a half minutes of skating. It worked. When they finished, the crowd went nuts--but the loudest scream came from down on the ice, from Warren, who let out a bellow as he raised his hands above his head in a moment of glorious triumph. The crowd roared its approval.