It take a few more months before I get the all clear, I am actually allowed to skate, I haven’t touched my painkillers in two weeks and except for the idea of an emergency I am not expected to need them again. I guess if I had another bad fall I might, but even that doesn’t prevent me from wanting to skate. I think my mother doesn’t approve but when she sees how giddy I am when I ask for my board back she hands it over without any resistance. I can’t help but hug Scarlet, in a lot of ways she is worn out, not just worse for wear but something more. I guess she is my mirror, what I have become, battered and broken. No if I am going to skate this isn’t the way and I leave her at home when I go out.

I walk into an old skate shop an ageing man is sitting at the counter reading a magazine.

“Hey, do you have any Celia Roberts boards? Maybe Vert Sect ones?” I ask innocently

“I might have some in the back-” he looks up, “Cel? Is that you?”

“You caught me Stanley,” and he rushed to hug me.

“It has been so long, look at you walking into my shop like nothing has changed, do you really need a new board are you just catching up with old friends?”

“Both actually,”

“You know I did keep one or two aside in case you ever returned. Come, come,” he leads me to the backroom and after a bit of moving some boxes he opens one to reveal a few of my decals. I honestly have missed the style, “I take it you want your usual trucks and wheels?”

“If you still stock them,”

“What kind of shop do you take this for? Of course I stock them,” he casually throws me the trucks and wheels, he still remembers after all this time and I am on the verge of tears, “I will quickly put this together for you just like when you first walked in here,” He grabs them back and it doesn’t take long before he hands me the completed board, I am crying slightly now, I try and hide it by getting some pads and a helmet but I can’t stop by the time I place them on the counter.

“On the house, honestly you have made my day, when I saw you after your accident you were so empty I struggled on how to handle you, you had lost so much and now it feels like the girl who came in here for her birthday is back and about to make a name for herself again,”

I don’t actually rush to leave, while every fibre of my being is screaming at me to skate I have missed this. Hanging out with someone I actively care about. Someone who knows my skater world. I catch up on a lot of the news of the old crew.

Casper is still doing well, he didn’t pull a Randall Mull, he is sticking to competitions. He is making a name for himself and the medals are starting to come in much more consistently. Adrian skates casually and teaches kids how to skate safely in his free time. He wants to open a private skatepark and needed to build up cash so he is working a boring job with shit hours. Ryan actually opened a skate shop in the next town over as a sort of franchise of Stanley’s one. Skating has been doing well without me and business is going strong enough he keeps a roof over his head and food on the table without worries. He still skates but doesn’t dream of the world that Casper and I were part of, his legacy is the next generation just like Adrian. They keep in contact with each other but Casper travels so much he is a nightmare to reach or plan anything with. Soon there isn’t much worth sharing and I am getting itchy enough feet that Stanley kicks me out and says to get skating already.

With the pads and helmet on I casually skate to the skatepark. It doesn’t feel strange in the slightest, skating is just who I am. Why would I feel anything else. This board needs a name. Shadow, I think that fits, the dark theme and how I feel like she is my shadow, or at least she will be with how much I plan to skate. I soon reach the skatepark. It hasn’t changed much, just a bit more graffiti. Home at last after so many years but not a single face I recognise.

“Look at the girly trying to look cool,” one of the guys say as I look around, “need more pads? Maybe one between your legs,” I ignore him, I can see all the signs that he is someone that has hardly skated. How he stands on the board, how he doesn’t seem to actually do anything after standing and soon sits back down, clearly just here to hang out and look cool. Well I think skaters are cool, but he isn’t a skater. It is time to be in my element.

It is busy enough I would have a long wait for the halfpipe so I just skate a little street, ollie over something small, no problems there. Next I kickflip over something and still no problems but I hold off from the varial flip. I don’t feel like I am struggling but my confidence is gone.

“Dude she seems to actually be a skater,” someone comments.

“Who fucking cares? She is likely just doing it for attention,” Pad poser replies. I finally get a turn on the halfpipe. I drop in without an issue, my muscles complain slightly but they know how things go, I still have my muscle memory after all these years. I keep it simple again, not pushing beyond a 360 aerial. I am so tempted to try my personal trick I never got to use in the competition but I think that would be too much and I don’t want to break my board in with that sort of stress just yet.