《Instrumental》37 - Cold as ice

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The girls skated in circles, the rink wasn't too busy but there were a lot of very accomplished skaters there. Amazingly Mae was one of them, she moved rhythmically to the thumping beat, spinning and jumping in time, Heather was almost as good but she was sticking close to Brian. Although the boy could skate, he wasn't good enough to dance like Mae was doing and Heather wasn't leaving him on his own much.

Jo was struggling, each of her friends were taking turns holding her hands and guiding her around the rink, normally one person holding each hand. Susan was right, she was pretty good, good enough to slowly skate backwards holding Jo's hands whenever it was her turn. Jo had insisted she not waste the whole night babysitting her and was enjoying watching her girlfriend dancing and turning on the ice.

"You two are amazing," Anne said when it was her turn to help Jo, "You both look so happy together."

"I think if you weren't trying to keep it secret you two would look just as happy." Jo suggested in a low voice, "make sure you dance with her tonight, no one will notice, see, everyone is dancing and holding hands with other girls."

Anne looked around and right enough, all the girls were dancing with each other. "Thanks," she said sincerely, "I'll do that as soon as someone takes over."

"Hey, I think I'm good enough now to go one lap of the rink on my own, go." She gave Anne a little shove, wobbling about precariously in the process.

Anne looked at her and, seeing she was skating okay, nodded, gliding off across the cold ice to find Abby. Jo spotted her girlfriend dancing with Mae, the two were doing moves she couldn't dream of, she couldn't imagine anyone being that comfortable on the slippery ice.

As she was watching she got distracted and didn't notice someone come twirling in from her left, they collided and Jo sailed across the ice on her stomach. People gave her and the other casualty a wide berth, trusting them to sort themselves out.

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The girl who had collided with her got to her feet and said "oops" in a sarcastic tone of voice then skated away, leaving Jo fumbling about trying to regain her feet.

Kelly came over and helped her up, "You okay?" She asked, making sure she was steady on her feet.

"I don't think that was an accident." She said and as she did Susan skidded across the ice on her bum at the other side of the rink. "I think we're being targeted."

She hadn't recognised the girl who knocked her over, she probably couldn't even pick her out of the other dancers on the ice. "Let's go see if Susans okay."

Susan and Mae had stopped dancing and were holding the side of the rink, "did you see that? She came out of nowhere." Susan asked as they joined them.

"I only caught the aftermath, Kelly was helping me up from my own collision. I don't know if I'm being paranoid but she didn't sound sorry."

As they were talking they saw Anne take a tumble on the ice, taking about four other skaters down with her. "That can't be a coincidence!" They made their way over to Anne and Abby.

"Did you see who did it?" Jo asked once they had all gathered round.

"No, I just got bumped as I was overextended, why?"

"Jo thinks people are intentionally knocking us down. It is a bit odd, three of us in a row." As she said that their last two friends arrived, looking a little flushed.

"This is good fun, pretty tiring though." Brian said, still holding Heather's hand.

"We're just trying to work out whether people were intentionally knocking us down." They were looking at the faces of the people whizzing past, trying to identify anyone they knew.

"I don't recognise anyone, are you sure it wasn't a coincidence?" Heather asked.

"No, not for certain but perhaps we should stick together in larger groups for a bit."

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They split into two groups of four and nothing happened for a number of laps, the friends being very diligent in looking out for each other. When they eventually broke apart almost instantly Susan went sailing on her stomach.

"I saw that, someone pushed her but I lost her in the crowd." Brian said as they were helping Susan up.

"I'm done. I'm going to talk to the management." Jo declared, their group moved off the ice and clumsily made their way to the booth where they had gotten their skates.

"Hi, do you guys have a recording of what happens on the ice? My friends and I are being harassed by someone."

The spotty teenager behind the counter grunted and said something unintelligible into his walkie talkie.

When the manager eventually arrived he was a mountain of a man, imposing in height, stature and girth. Surprisingly though, he was very understanding when the girls explained the issue.

He spent about twenty minutes looking through the footage on camera before he returned, USB stick in hand.

“Well, it’s not completely clean cut from the footage but it certainly looks like there may be one girl deliberately tripping you up.” He handed the stick to Jo, “You dont see her face and the quality is pretty bad so I doubt it's enough to make it a police matter but perhaps you can take it to the school, just bring me back the stick when you're done.”

“Just now though, how about I come out on the ice and watch to see if I can spot something happening? If so I can drag them off the ice and chuck them out for you.”

The girls discussed this and decided taking it to the principal may be better than involving the police in what they would likely see as a school yard dispute.

The big man made his way onto the ice, he skated a few leisurely laps of the rink before Susan and Mae casually returned. They had decided as a group that there was no need for them all to return and the rest surreptitiously watched from a safe distance.

After a few slow twirls around the ice, the two experienced skaters started to do more adventurous moves, it almost looked like rock and roll dancing. They were really getting into it when a girl in a white jacket and scarf over her mouth rocketed in, the girls had obviously been paying attention however and they split apart at the last moment causing their assailant to fly straight into the side of the rink having expected to pass most of her momentum to Susan and Mae.

Within seconds the manager had swooped in and accosted the girl, as he dragged her bodily off the ice the scarf came down and it became obvious it was indeed Tanya.

"I bet she heard me invite Brian, we were just up the stairs weren't we?" Heather asked.

"Yeah, her or one of her cronies." Brian agreed. "I guess we can get back on the ice now, crisis averted!"

They didn't wait to see what happened to the girl, instead returning to the rink and making sure to have a good time.

Once they were all thoroughly cold and tired they went to return their boots. In the back room they could see Tanya sitting in a chair, the towering manager behind his desk watching her.

"What's happening?" Anne asked the spotty boy behind the counter.

"He called her parents, they're going to collect her. I think he's banning her from the rink too." The boy croaked, sounding like his voice was in the process of breaking.

"Cool, can you possibly thank the manager for me? I don't want to go in there just now but we appreciate everything he did."

"Sure." The boy nodded, taking the skates and spraying disinfectant into them.

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