Two years later – 9th grade
December, 1979

 

 

What a fantastic night Fred and I just had. I know it sounds braggadocious, but we were great! That was the best time we ever skated that routine together, and it was in front of all those people at the Civic Arena.

I keep thinking about how it all began. It was during Christmas break two years ago when Fred and I went skating together at the mill pond all those times. I enjoyed it so much that I asked Mom and Dad if I could start taking lessons too, like Fred did. They said yes, and Mom started driving me to lessons in Pittsburgh on Saturday mornings. In fact, we carpooled on alternate Saturdays with Fred and his mom because he took his lessons then too.

I improved a lot that first year and practiced whenever I could. I think it was Fred’s mom who suggested that we might make a good ice dancing team together. Fred and I both loved the idea. His mom said that we should probably take some ballroom dance lessons together first, before attempting ice dancing, because they are so similar.

There was a dance studio right in Butler that was run by Mrs. Reid, and we started taking dance lessons together from her. We took lessons after school on Wednesdays for about five months and learned a whole bunch of dance steps like the waltz, and foxtrot, and tango, and cha-cha. We both liked them a lot, and it was good preparation for ice dancing lessons, which we began taking after that.

In addition to our individual lessons on Saturday mornings, we stayed around for ice dancing lessons together. We began with basic dance moves, but then our teacher started putting together routines for us.

Ice dancing routines take a lot of practice. Our moms couldn’t spend a huge amount of time away from home in Pittsburgh, so we found a place closer to home at the ice rink at Butler County Community College.

Fred and I would ride our bikes there on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday afternoons when the college would let us skate for a couple of hours. We’d been working on “Scheherazade,” and our teacher gave us a tape of the music that they would put on for us, and we would practice together for about two and a half hours on each of those days and again at our lessons on Saturdays. By three months, we had it down pat and jumped at the chance to perform when our teacher mentioned that we could participate in an exhibition at the Civic Arena right after Christmas.

The only problem was that my glasses had a tendency to slip down my nose when doing some of the spins, so Mom and Dad agreed to let me get contact lenses. I had just gotten them right at the beginning of Christmas break, and it took a week or so to get used to them, but I skated with them the last few days before the exhibition, and it went well.

Our moms really got into it too and designed our costumes for us. My costume consisted of a long dress with slits all the way up my legs and a transparent fabric over my belly like you’d see on a belly-dancer. I wore my hair up in a turban and had on makeup. I liked the way I looked without glasses. When Fred saw me, he just stared.

“Wow, Abby! You have a really good figure. You look breathless.”

He reddened a little when he said it. I think he meant breath-taking, but I got the point. I had never really thought about my figure before. Also, he had always known me wearing glasses, but I could tell he really liked seeing me without them.

We were a little nervous because we had never performed for a big crowd, but we knew the routine so well that we weren’t all that worried about messing it up.

It came off beautifully! We had skated our hearts out, and the audience cheered and cheered for us. We were so proud of ourselves. When we skated over to sit down after our performance, I thought I might have seen Dana Padgett and her mom up in the stands, but when I looked around a little later, they weren’t there. Maybe it wasn’t them.

When the performance was over, we went into the locker rooms and changed into some nice clothes, since our parents and my grandpa were going to take us out to dinner. I put on a really pretty, short dress that Mom and I had bought a couple of days ago. Fred came out wearing a dark suit.

After that we met at a fancy restaurant a few blocks away. I had never eaten lobster before, so that’s what I ordered. I loved it! We had chocolate mousse for dessert, and I loved that too.

After dinner, we all walked back to our cars. Fred and I kind of lagged behind and held hands on the way. We stopped together in the parking lot, out of sight of the others, to hug each other, and then kiss goodnight.

We have been kissing for a while now. I guess you could call us boyfriend and girlfriend; we really like each other. On the way home, I couldn’t stop thinking about the magical day we had just spent.

 

 

The day after New Year’s, on January 2nd, Fred and I went skating together at the mill pond. I had gotten some cute, tight green corduroy pants for Christmas, and I wore those with my new, white winter coat with a belt around the waist. I am starting to dress a little more stylishly now. I still wore the long, white and green cap he had given me two Christmases ago.

There was a speaker system now, and they played music while folks skated around the mill pond. We were having a good time skating together and even doing parts of our ice dancing routine when we spotted Dana, Jody, and Marla coming our way.

“Let’s just ignore them,” I said to Fred, but they skated right over to us, and Dana said, “Hiya, Shabby. Hi, F-F-F-Fred.”

Jody grabbed the pom-pom of my hat and pulled it off, then threw it down on the ice.

“Real m-mature, J-Jody,” Fred said as he reached down, picked it up, and gave it back to me. Why don’t you just g-g-g… leave!”

“Okay, kids, we’ll g-g-g-leave. You have a g-g-g-swell time together!” said Jody as they skated away, laughing.

“Jerks,” said Fred as I stood there, pulling my cap back on.

“Numbskulls,” I said.

“Morons!”

“Buffoons!”

They couldn’t hear us, but we laughed as we called them more and more names. It was a favorite game of ours. We started skating again.

It was a few minutes later, when I was doing a layback spin, that all of a sudden, my free leg crashed into something, and I started falling. My arms went immediately down to break my fall, and I came down hard on my left wrist. We heard a snap, and the pain shot into my arm.

Fred rushed over to see how I was. We looked at my wrist, and it looked dented in. I knew it was broken. I started crying because it really hurt.

Fred charged over to Dana, Jody, and Marla, who were all gathered around and laughing. He had seen Dana skating backwards, pretending not to see where she was going when she skated right into me.

He screamed at them, “Look what you did, you idiots! She’s broken her wrist now because you thought it was funny to crash into her! You’ve always been jealous of her because she’s smarter than you, and nicer than you, and she’s even prettier than you! She doesn’t care about that, but I know you do, you worthless twits. Now scram before I come and kick your little asses!”

Everybody just stopped skating then and gaped at this scene. The girls were speechless. I stopped crying and just stared at Fred in amazement. Then I even smiled. I couldn’t get over how he stood up for me and let those girls have it. The look on their faces was priceless. They seemed to slink away after that.

Fred helped me up and off the ice. People were clapping for him. There was a pay phone down a ways, and he called my mom to come pick us up.

She drove me right to an orthopedist’s office, and he x-rayed my wrist. He confirmed that it was indeed broken and put me in a cast that went up above my elbow, which was bent at a 90-degree angle. I would have to wear it for about six weeks. That put an end to skating for a while.