Oliva
Legacy Name: Oliva

"Are you sure you won't come with us this time?" Emily asks her. Someone always asks her. "It's good for your career, you know."

Oliva finishes buttoning up her coat, a sleek wool in a pale blue-green. "I know, it's just...I have other commitments."

"Sometimes I wonder what it is you get up to while we're at the clubs," Emily says. "It's not something that's going to get us all in trouble or anything, is it?"

She can't help but smile a little. "No, it's nothing like that."

"So you're going to night school and one day you're going to show us all up with your Harvard law degree?" Emily jokes. "Seriously, that happened once, Eric was so mad."

Eric is their manager, one of the higher-ups at the modelling agency.

"Why was he mad about that?"

"Because Angela was his biggest client and made him crazy money, which he doesn't get now that she's out suing people or whatever." Emily checks her make-up one last time in her compact's mirror. "Okay. I'm off to that new place downtown, and you probably have to get to...wherever it is you're going."

"You're right. Tell the girls I said hi and I'll see you all tomorrow?"

"You got it."

Oliva waits until Emily is safely tucked away in one of the agency's cars before heading out herself, practically running as to avoid being late. Nadia hates it when she's late.

Luckily, the rink isn't too far from the modelling agency's building, and she makes it just in time, Nadia bursting into the locker room right as Oliva finishes lacing up her skates. And then she's out on the ice, skating laps to warm up, running the drills that Nadia shouts at her from the bench.

Oliva models because she's good at it, because it uses some of the same skills as figure skating ─ grace, poise, a steady hand when applying liquid eyeliner ─ but skating is her passion. It has been ever since she was little, watching the Winter Olympics from her spot on the rug in front of the television, and she stumbled into modelling a few years back as a way to help pay for lessons from a real coach like Nadia.

"Oletchka," Nadia calls once Oliva's finished running through her newest routine. Oliva smiles; Nadia only calls her by that fake-Russian nickname when she's doing well. "Your routine today? Flawless. Triple axel much better than before. You are ready."

"Ready? For the ─ Really?"

Nadia nods once, sharply. "We enter you into competition for get to World Championships. No more skating under fake names at locals."

Oliva grabs her coach in a hug, then celebrates with a few more of her best jumps.

She may not show up to the agency with a law degree, but she might show up with a gold medal.

Paula

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