WINDMILLS

The dining room is alive with the buzz of a Saturday evening. Crystal-clear glasses filled with wine reflect the gleaming lights of the chandeliers overhead; the wait staff bustles around the floor, maintaining a cheerful professionalism despite the activity spinning all around them.

Jason and Courtney have been seated at a small table towards the center of the restaurant. There they sit sipping the wine that neither has quite grown to love yet, working on the elegantly presented plates of food that sit before them.

Courtney finishes swallowing her latest bite and says, "I hope she meets someone. She needs to get over Alex."

"I know," Jason agrees. "There's no reason for her to be so hung up on him. It's not like they were even that serious to begin with."

"That's what I told her. She kind of just went off about how no one's ever interested enough to get into a serious relationship with her."

"It's not like she has much reason to be so insecure."

"I try to tell her that," Courtney says. "I think it just goes in one ear and out the other. It's 'cause she measures herself against everyone else. Since she spends so much time with us, it's like she thinks she has to be in a relationship as serious as ours at this point in her life."

Jason takes another sip of the wine. "It'll happen for her eventually. Meanwhile, she's got this awesome job, but she hardly ever talks about it. She's got lots going for her."

"I just wish she would believe that," Courtney sighs. "Who knows, maybe she'll find someone at the party."

"Maybe." Jason picks up his fork and simply looks at it for a moment. "Okay, not to totally change the subject on you--"

"But you're gonna do it anyway," she smiles.

"Exactly. I've been thinking ... Don't we kinda need to figure out what we're gonna do after this year? With skating, I mean."

Courtney's expression indicates that the matter has been on her mind, as well. "Yeah, we do. I'm just ... I don't know."

"What?"

She shrugs quickly but the words that follow pour out very slowly. "It feels like we've been competing in Junior forever. We were all set to go to Nationals a couple of years ago ..."

"And then all that stuff with Shannon happened." Jason groans inwardly. Shannon Parish is the last person he wanted to think about tonight.

"Yeah. And the thing is, I wanna get to Nationals. I wanna make it that far in Junior before we move up to Senior, otherwise I won't feel confident about competing as a Senior pair, you know?"

"Totally, yeah."

"But what if for some reason we don't make it this year? What do we do then?"

The possibility creases Jason's face with concern. "I dunno. I'd like to think that it'll just happen and things will go according to plan. But I guess we know it doesn't work like that."

"Not so much, no." Courtney wraps both her hands around the body of the wine glass. "We're getting kinda old to be Juniors."

"I know. This really has to be the year. But if it doesn't happen ..."

"Then maybe it's not gonna happen at all."

He nods reluctantly. "Yeah. So I was thinking ... If we don't do as well as we'd like in competition this season -- maybe we should just take the Senior test anyway."

"And that would be the end of it?"

"I don't know about that. But at least we'd have the test done. If we wanted to compete as Seniors in a year or two, we could. But I want that test, Court. I don't wanna let this fizzle out and then not have the time or the energy or the skill left to pass it."

"I know. I want it, too. I want us to have it -- we've passed all of our other tests together, and we need to get this last one."

"My thoughts exactly. So it's settled, then? Regardless of how competition goes this year, we take our Senior test at the end of the season?"

Courtney hesitates in agreeing, but the idea sends a tingle of excitement through her, a tingle too great to ignore. "Yep."

"Awesome." Jason's smile finally starts to return, washing over his face like it had been bottled up and just got spilled out. "I can't wait to share this with you, Court."

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