You never really know, do you? You never know anyone, not really. Twenty-four was pretty young to get married, when you think about it. They seemed fine. It was all a shock.

—Things are fucked up, man, Ace said to Miles one night. Miles just happened to be there, quiet and passive, inviting and reassuring.

—Skating? Miles asked, confused.

—No, man. With Belle. Fucked up. She’s not happy. I’m not happy. Things just seemed to go all wrong.

—Oh. Miles guessed that Ace was drunk.

—Yeah. Exactly, Ace nodded. It’s bad. I don’t know what to do. I want to fix it but I don’t know how to fix it. I don’t wanna lose her, man.

—Yeah, Miles said.

—Shit yeah. That’s right. I’m lost, man.

Miles didn’t know what you were meant to do. Ace was very upset. And yes, definitely drunk. The problem was his relationship with Belle. Miles was full and squeezed with Ace’s emotion. Like being in the middle seat.

—I need to work it out. We can work it out. It’ll be okay. Everything’s gonna be okay.

—Yeah, okay.

—Yeah.

—Yeah.

—Okay.

—Yeah. Miles tried to smile but wasn’t confident that it worked.

They sat in silence for a long time. But Ace’s emotions still squeezed Miles. Miles tried to think of skating, rail grinding footwork variations.

Ace didn’t know how to put it into words. He was capable until he was hopeless, triumphant until he was conquered, adored and admired, despised and derided. When Belle looked at him, she was just so disappointed, distant, critical, cold.

Ace’s next overseas tour, Miles was there too, skating to qualify. The crowds were immense –little kids, hungry to see them, copy them, touch them, absorb them. Replace them.

Belle was cold when he left. She had this way of insinuating, of infusing, of implying. That everything was dead, doomed, disappointing, damned. She had this way of making everything mean something more than it did. Or maybe it did? He didn’t know what was true anymore. He felt scooped out and goose-bumped when he got on the plane.

—How you goin, Miles? Ace asked after Day 1 of the comp.

This was just warm-up for the pros like him. But it was qualifiers for the rest, like Miles.

—I qualified. I fell once. That was wrong, Miles said quietly, looking at Ace’s left ear as he spoke.

—Good effort, Miles! Blew ‘em away?

—I don’t know. Miles’ brow furrowed.

They sat in silence in the grandstand, both clutching Berry Fanta, aluminium crackling in their fingers. The sun was setting slowly, a soft Berry Fanta light over the grounds. Ace slurped the furry acid fizz and sucked it back, pulling the science flavouring over his tongue.

—Belle hates me, I think.

Miles didn’t say anything. Ace didn’t say anything. Miles thought about his run today from another angle.

—She’s given up. It’s over. I’m sure.

—Oh, Miles said. That’s hard, he experimented.

—Fuck man, yes. Really hard.

—Oh. Fuck, Miles imitated confidently. He felt squeezed.

Ace didn’t say anything, squeezing his Fanta. His eyes crumpled, then his mouth. He breathed out with a shiver.

—I don’t know what to do, Miles. I can’t do anything. I don’t know.

He turned and looked with his whole face at Miles’ whole face.

Miles tried to look at his eyes, looked at his forehead instead. Miles looked away and thought through his line for tomorrow, detail by detail, foot by foot, faster, then slomo, then from a bird’s eye view. Ace pleaded at Miles’ vacant face for a few seconds more, then dropped his own face in his hands and let a sob escape. He pressed his fingers into his eyeballs and into his temples. Remembered photos. Their wedding. Dates at restaurants, holidays at Sea World, in Noosa. He let the misery slosh around him in a sensual flow. At the ebb of the sadness he opened his eyes, peered through his fingers at his sneakers on the grandstand boards and talked in a muffle.

—I’m two people. I can’t keep being two people. I can’t be awesome and awful anymore.

Miles felt bad. What are you supposed to do. Thought about his run, as if he were looking directly up from under the ground.

—It’d be easier – I dunno. It’d be better. I sometimes think. I just wanna die.

Miles heard it. Knew what it meant. The sentence surrounded him, squashed him, made him dizzy.

—What? That’s not good, he said, authoritatively, looking at Ace with academic puzzlement.

Ace wanted something from Miles but he didn’t know what. Because when he thought about his flat and his bedroom and his life and his kitchen and Belle, everything was fake. Like a still life of dried flowers or a model display home. Empty and evil. He’d be lost in that. Sucked into that fake, waxworks deadness. He’d be fucked. He needed something to save him from the airlessness.

—She hates me. I say the wrong thing and I don’t know what I’ve said wrong. It’s broken and it’s gonna be broken forever. What happened to the good times? Maybe there were none, like she says. But how come I didn’t notice? How come I didn’t realise? Maybe I’m just fucked. Maybe Belle’s right? I dunno. Maybe I should just stop trying. Maybe I should give up.

When they heard about how Ace had jumped from the top of his apartment block, Miles didn’t know what do. So he skated more, slept less, stopped eating pretty much everything for a few months, except for mie goreng, spent a lot of time on assembling and re-assembling his favourite puzzles. He lost twelve kilograms and he stopped talking, pretty much. His skating really improved during that season though.