I’ve never seen the back office before and I don’t think students are normally allowed in. It’s shabby and cozy with an exciting air of secrecy. There are scraps of costumes and extra pairs of worn practice shoes piled in the corner, a box of the T-shirts the team wears. G sits on the carpet with his back resting against a large, overstuffed, ramshackle sofa. There’s a bottle of whiskey and two glasses beside him. I gingerly sit down next to him, slipping my heels off of my pleasantly aching feet. He pours me a glass without asking.

We’ve just spent over an hour with our cheeks pressed up against one another’s, but that was with the veil of the dance shrouding us. Sitting here with him now feels nearly postcoital, a fog of intimacy hanging over us still. Sometimes after Luke and I had sex, he would lie there on his back and, without warning, all of his fears would come tumbling out in a steady stream: he’d be a failure, he’d let everyone down, underneath everything, he was a fraud who’d convinced everyone he was a champion, and that sooner or later the truth would come out. These confessions were notable in their rarity; on the slope and in the start house and at the foot of the hill and the bar and the gym and on television, Luke was cocksure and brash. He was always the only thing that stood between him and being the best: he’d never quite shaken off the rebellious streak he’d developed after his parents’ divorce. I remembered Blair and me physically dragging him from bars in Park City when he started looking for someone to fight. But once I’d seen the soft underside of his arrogant veneer, I knew it was there all the time. Fragments would suddenly reveal themselves to me, even in a roomful of people. I knew too that I was the only one who could see it. I could never only be his friend after that.

I sip the whiskey. G stares down into his glass.

“You were good tonight,” he says quietly, turning toward me with a hint of a smile. “You’ve had a breakthrough.”

I try not to let how thrilled I am show. “It felt different tonight.”

“Tell me,” G says, letting his head fall back. His eyelids always look a little heavy, like he’s being lulled by some music only he can hear.

“It’s hard to put into words.”

“Try,” he says, “for me.” He puts his hand on my bare knee.