A hush swept over the stadium when Ami Mizuno began her warm up before her round.  Everyone had known that she and Asuka Akiyama had been the best of friends, and that her reasons for having learnt how to skate was because of him. In a way, like most of the other young skaters who had place him in their hearts as their ultimate goal and hoped to impress him to love them through their skating. It had always seem that his heart was set somewhere else, although he had never confirmed or denied the rumor.

    In Ami’s Set Performances, she had skated the movements perfectly, but the general critique was the lack of emotion shown. She gained a high score for technicalities, but the expression of her emotions was the most important criteria for next part. After all, it was named “Expression in Song I”, although there were two judgements, and off the three parts that were to be judged, Set Performance was judged as 20%, while Expression in Song I was 30%, and Expression in Song II was 50%.  Although she had managed to get straight 5.8’s in the Set Performances, nothing was firmly in her grasp.
    Last time in the trials, she had swept the judges and the audience off her feet, although she had lacked the experience. Her expressions were not quite fully developed then, but this time, even though she had more experience, the expression was going to be a problem. Everyone who had seen her Set Performances held the belief that nothing could improve it in such a short time. Unless, Asuka Akiyama reappeared, but that was as likely as asking the God himself to come down and skate with her in the doubles.

    The media was in all toes, waiting for a sudden withdrawal from her, yet they were also interested to see how she would perform. Whether she would live up to the expectations of the trials, or just fade away like a shrinking violet when the ‘crunch’ came was the most frequently asked question between the station broadcaster, and the on-scene journalist. No one knew the answer. They knew that she could overcome the most formidable obstacles, and had done so before, but whether this was too large a hurdle… they would have to wait and see.
    The most anticipated Doubles Skating team of Asuka and Ami was not to be, and the frontrunner in the Men’s Skating had disappeared, Ami Mizuno, although not the frontrunner, was definitely the leader of all the challengers to Akiko Watanebe’s firm grasp on the Crown.
    They all wondered how it would affect her performance, she had starred in the trials, yet without the person who she said had made it all happen for her, how would she be able to skate? Those who had seen her skate at the trials and saw her triumph now saw her dispirited form, dutifully jumping without the grace that they had once seen. They sympathized with her because they all understood, or thought that they did, what it was like to have the inspiration taken away, like the light at the end of the tunnel when you were in the middle of it. They wondered whether or not she would break down, now THAT would be the story of the century, a skater having an emotional breakdown in the middle of the competition.
    Before the competition had begun, they had taken a minute of silence to honor and remember Asuka, who could be either dead or alive. No one knew. The only fact on their anxious little hands was that he just had gone, disappeared into thin air. All the skaters stood in the rink for that minute, bowing their heads as a chilling haunt of darkness evaded the ceremony. A video of him skating at last year’s All-Japan was played during that time. Many young teenage girls had cried, while the other’s hearts silently bled. A young promising life take away at its prime, the pride of the nation was gone.

    Ami Mizuno quietly skated back to the sides, she knew that her warm up had not been particularly spectacular, in fact, dull could not sufficiently describe the spiritless of the jumps in those few minutes or in the previous round. Sensei Narai did not reprimand her, but she knew that it wasn’t good enough. Something had to be done to change it, she wasn’t sure quite how to introduce it. She had promised herself, Asuka, and Sensei Narai, that she would win, win something, now, the moment came for her to prove her words, yet she had no idea how she was going to prove it.
    She still had some time to think, think about what was uppermost on her mind, what it was that she wanted to express in what she was skating. She hardly knew what she was doing, everything that she did was an instinct, merely an old practice that she knew she had to do, but now, not knowing why. She had smiled, greeted, shaken hands with others, but everything flew straight past her. She didn’t remember whom she had greeted, or who had been introduced.
Her previous Set Performance, a set of movements for her to perform, scored mainly on her technicalities had been fantastic, technically. But in order to win, she had to do more than just skate on ice. Ice skating was like writing a book, the white ice was there, ready for you to tell a story. The words are given, everyone knows those words, but it is the way that you express the story, the way you write it that makes a best selling author. Not the complexity of the words, nor the technicalities, like spelling or grammar. It was the story line, the emotions evoked afterwards.

    Sensei Narai did not say a word as Ami returned into the changing rooms to wait her turn in the competition. The fact was, she had been glad to see her pupil appear, and not play a disappearing trick on her like Asuka had often played when he wasn't happy. She understood Ami’s feelings, and felt for her no matter how much she tried to shield it from the rest of the world. So far, Ami hadn’t alluded to Asuka at all, she had asked that her mother sit with her friends sit in the audience, and did not speak to anyone. She had wanted to speak to no well-wishers, or sympathisers. In fact, she had hardly spoken since she had arrived, only greeting the other competitors and then sitting by herself in the corner, daydreaming. Ami had kept up a hard yet cheerful face to cover the feelings that she held inside, and did not share the pain even to her own mother.
    Sensei Narai did not know the chances of Ami winning, if she was determined to hide her feelings, her skating would be nothing more than a routine of set, robotic movements. But also, if Ami was determined enough to win, she was sure that her pupil would. She didn’t know if skating would help Ami, it could sadden her tremendously, but there was also the possibility that skating was her therapy. To help her remember her best friend whose image would forever be enthroned on a unique spot on the ice, and deal with the hurt of losing this friend.

    Ami was determined to win, but she hadn’t yet gathered up her thoughts as to what she wanted to do. Swan Lake, she thought… Asuka bought her to see Swan Lake, why? To see the beauty of dance, and to learn to express herself through dance… now, all she had to figure out was what she wanted to say. She had a bit more than four minutes to tell the world all that she had to say. Asuka… this dance had to be about him, because everything that she would be doing on the vast white landscape of ice would be a tribute to him. She had to tell the world what he had meant to her.
    She knew that she couldn’t express sorrow, it would have been the last thing that Asuka would have wanted. He had said, “continue as if nothing happened’’. How could she go on as if nothing had happened? Did he seriously believe that his presence in her life had never made a single impact? If he had not disappeared, what would she be feeling now? What would he want to say to the world right now? What would he want to be remembered as in her mind and everyone else’s? What would she be doing at this exact moment? Talking to him, receiving best wishes from her mother, her friends… and him… if only he was here with her…
    She held out her hand and looked at the charred medal in her hand, turning it over she kissed the medal softly. “Where are you Asuka?”…

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