"Is there anything, in particular, that's weighing on your mind?" Sasha asked her.

"Yes. Are you trying to steal my new mother?" echoed through her head. She's not oblivious to the tension between her father's girlfriend and her coach,

"If I can't win at an East EU meet on beam, am I ever going to win at anything, ever again?"

"Why do you think Emily Kmetko is better than me when I put in twice the work and I get better results?"

And most importantly, if Payson or Emily needed the slightest bit of your attention or Kaylie was back at the Rock, would you be here eating cereal and helping me get over my psychological issues in the morning?"

For the longest time, Lauren Tanner was just another gymnast. Sixteen is the age when the wheat is cut from the chaff and unlike Payson Keeler Lauren lacks the immediately obvious proof that she has what it never had 'a moment' with Lauren the way he has with Kaylie or Emily either. They wormed their way into his heart and gained his attention through heartfelt routines and teary hugs. They needed him. That warrented his attention.

Lauren hasn't. She has her own problems (he isn't unaware that his gymnasts are teenage girls no matter what the rules and their bodies might say) but she rarely drags them onto the gym floor in a way he needs to address. Her attitude at nationals warrented attention, but before he could follow up she was wiping the floor with a beam that knocked the rest of the field out of the park.

She's slippery and he's never really known what to think of her. Being Steve Tanner's daughter had always been an impediment to bonding. He'd always thought the one advantage of teenage girls is that they're awful at hiding their emotions so at least you know when they're upset over something. He'd managed to hide his emotional distress over loosing M.J. right up until he'd severed his ACL and won a handful of medals and it scared him any of his gymnasts managing to do that, but as far as he knew, Lauren had recovered from her brief fling with Carter Anderson without any major scratches (and wasn't it a surprise to have her come into his office and declare that).

Lauren has never had a serious back injury, a job or an eating disorder (that he knows about). When he does find out anything about her, its second hand. Days after she lost her mother and he had Payson on his brain, Summer dropped into conversation how tragic it was that Lauren had to lose her mother a third time after drugs and her father's scheming. Yes, that would have been useful to know at nationals, but its past and he gets only ten seconds to play emotional leaning post before she's sticking the top routine for bars on her worst apparatus. She makes the world team no problems, or at least with no problems he can see (and isn't that half the reason he leaves?)

Lauren might not be kissing coaches, stealing drugs or starving herself but he's sure there are issues there. The longer he knows Lauren Tanner he knows that girls as capable as her, can't be as blatant as she sometimes appears. He has no doubt she is just as capable as the other girls at getting into these messes but she has an adoring father (and potentially a new stepmother) so she doesn't want or need her coach bailing her out like the others do.

When she comes to Romania she's clear. There was no breaching of trust in his betrayal, there was a breaching of contract. She makes the terms for his return clear and jumps on a train with plenty of time to spare. He's a good coach and she wants him back, but she wants him back because he's a good coach not because him leaving has caused a deep chasm in her chest, the way it clearly has with Payson and Emily.

Then she stands in front of him and says she didn't think he noticed her.

Which, yes, was true, in the sense that he didn't feel the need to single her out. At the very least he'd noticed that for a spoilt princess she was a determined one who doesn't let outside distractions impact her gymnastics. Somehow, in positioning herself in between Payson's rigidity and Kaylie's fragile approach to life, her moderation slipped into a perception of medicocrity instead of balance. But there was nothing medicore about her bars routine lately, nor her beam against the Russian with the ridiculous haircut. Sasha knew that once the pomp of this 'secret weapon' died down, Lauren would be there too pick through the pieces much like he knew that by the Olympics Genji Cho would've burnt out leaving the beam title free for the taking.

Then she had the twisties and he felt something in his chest clench with shame when she says "you want me to train with you, in here, alone?"

She's nothing like Payson and protests the repetition of skills until he challenegs her "do you feel safe?"

She does, evidently, because she lands it no problems and once again the problem is solved without him knowing about the problem beforehand. Then she's crying and finally he's witnessing Lauren Tanner's problems manifest first hand.

He's hesitant to touch her ("with you, alone?" echoes through his head) but she's sniffling and suddenly it's clear that Lauren's issues are as simple as the average teenaged gymnast. Clearly she has never spent any time in a gymnastics camp where being singled out meant public humiliation in front of your teammates. Gymnasts fighting for his favour was something he really needed to start recognising.

She throws her full front layout again, and then a few other tumbling passes. He congratulates her after each one (suddenly more aware of the need for recognition) but she doesn't react any differently than she has before.

Its only when Payson walks in, quickly followed by a collection of juniors with the first class of the day that he realised somewhere between hugging him (for what, he thinks, might be the first time ever) and the other gymnasts arriving, she's removed all evidence of any emotion except for the tear stains on his shirt.

She trains well. She trains hard (almost as hard as Payson) but with the excitement of the NGO official showing up and then Emily disappearing he doesn't speak to her the rest of the day until he manages to call out to her.

"Lauren!" Her head snaps around with headphones dangling from her ears. "good work today but if you're going to win on beam in Rio you'll need a routine that can handle Genji Cho and the ridiculous Ivanka girl."

She waits for further clarification. "We start upping your DOD tomorrow. It needs to be ready by national team practice."

Emily Kmetko leaves and a large part of him thinks it's for the best. As much as he liked her, there are a lot of girls with talent (he was coaching four of them) and not all of them are going to make it. At least it happened now, when he has time to replace her, but he knows this, on top of the Payson scandal and Kaylie's eating disorder will reflect badly on The Rock.

Then he gets a call from the national committee. A tape has been sent in anonomously. He's been cleared of any wrong doing. The national committee doesn't apologise (they were acting in the best interest of the girls) but there's certainly an apologetic tone in the chairmen's voice when he tells Sasha's he's the head coach going to Rio.

He has a fleeting thought that this might not be a coincidence. It's been an eventful week. Perhaps it was Kaylie (she had every reason at the time to want to get rid of the coach concerned over her shrinking weight) and now she's almost recovered (apparently). Perhaps it was Lauren or Emily, one making amends at the beginning of a new partnership, one making amends as she throws in the towel.

He's not stupid. He knows the tape came from the Rock and it was the elite girls (along with the parents' board and all that) who had the most at stake with Sasha the individual rather than the Rock staff as a whole. He doesn't want to know but it finally feels like he really is back in control of the Rock.

Kim Keeler suprises him with the unwanted news the girls (his girls) are over two hours away and probably wont make practice tomorrow but then he sees them, gathered around a fire and expressing just as much faith as Summer has but in the Parthanon of gymnastics. Their gods are made as well as worshipped and while he's sure Payson will become one, Lauren and Kaylie could be the next Svetlana or Nadia as well.

Four was too many. Even in the magnificent seven, gymnasts got lost. But his three girls? These three girls? He could take these three girls all the way. There were three positions on an Olympic podium and while he knew they couldn't occupy them at the same time (except for team) he knew then that they were all going there and he was taking them.

Lauren still doesn't have all the answers. She's not sure if she wants to ask the questions.

"Why didn't you want to marry my father straight away?

Is it only now Emily's gone you're recognising me?

What happens if Ellen Beals wants too out me?

It's that last one that grates most because Lauren Tanner has lost things before. This time she knows (unlike when her mother left and she suspected) that it will be all her fault, but her Dad and Summer are there and she'd been in the middle when Sasha (Coach for Rio!) had hugged the team. At least for the night she's surrounded by her family (in all shapes), with the stars above her and her happiest memories around her.

Bring it on.