Heart of Gold: An MM Gymnastics Sports Romance

Chapter 17

There’s a rip the size of a one-ruble coin on Sasha’s right palm, a bright red circle of blood with a flap of skin still hanging over it. Sasha takes a picture, angling his hand to get a closeup, and then sends it to Danny, glancing around first to make sure no one’s watching.

Luckily, the men’s senior locker room is in a state of cheerful chaos, with music blasting and cologne spraying in every direction. The athletes from Moscow are in especially high spirits, since they’ve been given permission to go home after tonight’s reception in the city; they’ll have a whole day off tomorrow before they need to report back to Round Lake on Monday.

Putting down his phone, Sasha grabs a pair of nail clippers from his locker and starts cutting back the dead skin. He shouldn’t have gone for that last set on high bar, trying to get his Cassina; he keeps catching it one-handed, peeling off the bar into the pit. Now he’ll be paying for it in an hour, wincing whenever someone shakes his hand—which will happen a lot, since the reception is in honor of the recently announced worlds team.

This time, Sasha’s name was called right after Kirill’s, both of them joining Ilya, Oleg, and two other seniors on the six-person delegation headed to Glasgow. Since he’d placed fifth at the Russian Cup in September, Sasha wasn’t exactly surprised, but he’d still felt relieved—especially since the Americans had decided their men’s team in August, and Danny’s name was first on the list.

He’s trying not to think too much about the fact that they’ll be in the same country in just a few weeks, because he doesn’t want to be distracted during training; but the closer they get to worlds, the longer he lies awake at night, his pulse racing as he imagines their reunion. He’s never been this excited for a competition before, not even the Olympics, and he knows it has nothing to do with gymnastics and everything to do with Danny.

“I talked to Tanya last night,” Kirill says, sitting down on the bench next to Sasha.

“Okay?” Sasha barely glances up from bandaging his rip. Tanya is Kirill’s latest girlfriend, although maybe “girlfriend” isn’t the right word, since all they seem to do is have sex and pose for Instagram photos; as far as Sasha can tell, they’re not even exclusive.

“Her friend Olga just broke up with her boyfriend.” Kirill pulls out his phone and shows Sasha a picture of a brunette on the beach, her smile as bright as her yellow bikini. “Tanya thinks you two would get along. Maybe after worlds, we can all go out for drinks?”

“Oh,” Sasha says, trying not to sound completely unenthusiastic. “Uh, thanks, but… I should focus on training. She’s pretty, though.”

Kirill laughs. “‘Focus on training’? Really? If she’s not your type, that’s fine.”

“Sorry.” Sasha looks down, pretending to check the bandage on his hand. He can feel his cheeks turning red, and he hopes Kirill thinks he’s just embarrassed about rejecting Tanya’s friend.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll tell her you’re not interested.” Kirill puts away his phone, then changes the subject. “By the way, can we stop somewhere after the reception? I want to get some of that wine your mom was talking about.”

“You know you don’t have to do that.” Kirill’s staying with Sasha and Alina tonight, instead of going to his parents’ apartment, but they’re long past any gift-bringing formalities.

“I know,” Kirill says, shrugging. “But I want to.”

They scout out a few places on the bus ride into the city, and Kirill starts making calls, trying to see if any of the stores have what he’s looking for. While he’s busy, Sasha can’t resist checking his notifications, even though Danny probably hasn’t seen his text yet. He’s at the US Olympic Training Center in some state called Colorado, where the American men are preparing together for worlds, and they just started their morning practice half an hour ago.

But their phone policy must be a lot more relaxed than the one at Round Lake, because Danny’s already responded.

Danny:High bar strikes again!!

Danny:At least you were doing something legit

Danny:Guess how I got this

Sasha winces at the picture of Danny’s foot, half of his big toenail missing and blood dripping everywhere.

Danny:I tripped on the stairs

Danny:

Sasha can’t help it: he laughs, then has to stifle the sound with a cough before Kirill glances over. He quickly types out a reply, keeping his phone tilted towards the wall of the bus.

Sasha:Sorry

Sasha:Stairs are very difficult

He’s tempted to ask how, exactly, Danny managed to trip on the stairs when he routinely performs intricate feats of gymnastics, but he has a feeling that the answer will be very long-winded and involve at least three different tangents. So instead he goes into his notes app, adding “tripped on stairs” to the list he’s now keeping of things to discuss with Danny during their next phone call.

When Danny had first suggested calling each other, Sasha had thought he meant maybe once or twice between the American Cup and worlds. He’s not quite sure how it became once or twice a month, Danny ringing him every other Sunday unless he has a competition, but he still finds himself heading back to his dorm early on those evenings, inventing excuses to avoid hanging out with his teammates.

Danny does most of the talking, which is fine with Sasha, because then he doesn’t have to worry about keeping the conversation going. Danny tells him about the skills he’s working on, what he did over the weekend, and how much he loves his dogs, and Sasha says things like “Mmhm” and “Really?” and “Wow,” and it’s easy. Easier than he’d thought it would be, lying in bed and listening to Danny, like playing a podcast before falling asleep.

But in between his stories, Danny also has questions for Sasha, about his training, his family, his hobbies—and he somehow remembers all of Sasha’s answers, even the things Sasha forgets telling him. He’ll randomly ask about Alina’s annoying new coworker, or the stray cat lurking around the apartment building; and when they’d both gotten part-time jobs over the summer, coaching at their home gyms, he knew all the names of Sasha’s students by July.

It’s embarrassing, because Sasha can’t even keep Danny’s teammates straight, never mind his students. Danny will say, “Oh, guess what, my mom got the job,” and Sasha will realize he didn’t ask how her interview went, and he doesn’t actually remember what the job was, either. So now he tries to write things down, and look at his list before Danny calls—which is pretty pathetic, but it’s still better than feeling like an asshole.

“Okay, got it,” Kirill says, hanging up from one of the stores. “As long as we’re there by eleven, we’re good.”

Sasha slides his phone back into his pocket. “Thank you. She’ll be really happy.”

Kirill smiles, then nudges him. “Just a few more hours.”

“Yeah.” Sasha sighs as he thinks about the evening ahead. “Just a few more hours.”

*

The reception for the worlds team is at the Ministry of Sports headquarters, a sprawling yellow mansion in the Basmanny District near the heart of Moscow. The first time Sasha had attended an event here, he’d been in awe of the building and all the government officials inside; now he dreads each and every occasion that brings him back for another night of endless speeches, mediocre food, and stilted conversation with people who look over his shoulder while they’re talking to him.

Kirill’s much better at schmoozing, or at least pretending to, and after dinner he starts making the rounds, introducing himself to each speaker and thanking them for their remarks. Sasha hovers by the dessert table, trying to avoid eye contact with anyone while he listens to Ilya and Oleg argue over how much honey cake they can eat without ruining their diets (“Honey is healthy sugar,” Ilya keeps insisting).

Unfortunately for Sasha, the dessert table doesn’t provide as much refuge as he’d hoped, and he gets sucked into back-to-back exchanges with two officials who recognize him from the last worlds reception. One of them thinks he’s Ilya, which is fair enough, since Sasha can’t remember his name at all; the other spends so long talking about the importance of inspiring Russian youth through sport that Sasha is genuinely exhausted when the conversation ends, even though all he did was nod.

Once the official finally wanders away, he checks the time on his phone. It’s almost nine, which means that Danny’s just getting out of his morning practice, the rest of the day ahead of him. Sasha wonders if the American gymnasts ever have to meet with their government, too, and he smiles as he imagines it—Danny talking the ear off of some poor politician, pulling out his phone to show them pictures of his dogs.

“Sasha.” Ilya taps him on the shoulder, then points into the crowd. “Kirill wants you.”

Sasha looks up and sees Kirill waving him over, deep in conversation with some official or other. He sighs a little, because Kirill’s always trying to get him to network, always trying to introduce him to someone; and he knows he should appreciate it more, but he’d honestly rather do another round of Cassinas on his ripped hand than go over there and make small talk with a stranger.

As he draws closer, however, he realizes that the person Kirill’s talking to isn’t a stranger—it’s Vadim Petrovich Ustinov from the Russian Olympic Committee.

“May I introduce my teammate?” Kirill says when Sasha joins them. “This is Aleksandr Ishkhani.”

Sasha shakes hands with Vadim, barely managing not to wince as the other man squeezes right into his bandage.

“Ishkhani,” Vadim repeats. Dark eyes flick up and down, narrowing as they assess Sasha. “That’s one of those Armenian patronymics, isn’t it?”

His nostrils flare when he says “Armenian,” and Sasha sees Kirill tense beside him. He tries not to react, keeping his voice as neutral as possible. “Yes, sir.”

“But Sasha’s Russian,” Kirill interjects, glancing nervously at Sasha. “He grew up right here in—”

“My ex-wife is Armenian.” Vadim gives a theatrical shudder. “Her whole family, too. Miserable people. Can’t get a single one of them to do an honest day’s work.”

Something shuts off inside of Sasha, soft and silent as the flicking of a switch; Kirill looks like he’s been slapped across the face.

“Sasha’s a very hard worker, sir,” he stammers, trying to salvage the conversation. Sasha wants to tell him to stop, that it’s pointless, but he doesn’t even feel like he’s in his own body anymore. “He just placed fifth at the Russian Cup, and at the European Championships he—”

“Excellent, excellent,” Vadim cuts him off. “Well, it sounds like you’re much more useful than my ex-wife,” he tells Sasha, though his smile never reaches his eyes. “Kirill, why don’t you come with me, there’s someone I’d like you to meet…”

Kirill tries to look back at Sasha as Vadim steers him away, but Sasha just shakes his head—it’s not his friend’s fault. He turns around and walks in the opposite direction, tugging at his tie, feeling more rattled than he wants to admit. These days, whenever someone complains about Armenians around him, it’s usually a new teammate who isn’t aware of his background; but once Kirill’s in their face, asking what the fuck they just said, they’re at least a little embarrassed.

It’s a lot rarer for someone to look at him the way Vadim had, like he’s a stain on their favorite shirt.

“Sasha? What’s wrong?”

Without realizing it, he’s wound up back at the dessert table, and Ilya and Oleg are staring at him.

“Nothing,” he says, but neither of them are buying it, so finally he explains, “Kirill just introduced me to Vadim Petrovich. Apparently he doesn’t like Armenians.”

Ilya and Oleg wince, although Oleg doesn’t seem surprised. “Yeah… I’m guessing Kirill never saw those texts.”

“What texts?” Ilya asks through a mouthful of honey cake.

“With him and his ex-wife.” Oleg hesitates, glancing at Sasha before he takes out his phone. After a minute of searching online, he pulls up some screenshots from a sports blog and passes the phone to Sasha. “Someone leaked them during the divorce. They’re pretty nasty.”

“Oh, shit,” Ilya says, peering over Sasha’s shoulder.

It’s worse than that. Words like bitch and monkey and armyashka leap from the screen, followed by threats to have the woman and her entire family deported. Each text is more vile than the last, and after the first few, Sasha stops scrolling. He hands the phone back to Oleg, his throat dry as he wonders just how many of those words were running through Vadim’s mind when Kirill introduced them.

“But… he didn’t say anything to you, right?” Ilya asks in a hushed voice. “You’re Armenian, too.”

“He’s not that Armenian,” Oleg says, like Sasha isn’t standing right there, and that’s when Sasha decides he’s had enough.

He doesn’t want to be here anymore—not at this dessert table with Ilya and Oleg and their pity, and not in whatever corner Kirill’s going to pull him into as soon as he can get away from Vadim. Kirill will be swearing as much as apologizing, full of fury and indignation; and Sasha can’t handle that right now, not when the word armyashka is stitching itself into his skin.

“I’m going to the bathroom,” he lies.

The mansion is stiflingly hot, and it takes him forever to find an exit; by the time he escapes through a side door, his undershirt is damp with sweat, his tie crumpled up in his fist. He stands there for a moment, taking deep, gulping breaths until the tightness in his lungs starts to recede. Moving away from the door, he finds a spot in the shadows and leans against the wall, wishing he could just go home already.

He has a sudden urge to call his mother, which is ridiculous—he’s not a ten-year-old boy attending his first camp at Round Lake, crying into his pillow at night because of all the coaches and trainers yelling at him. And besides, even though he’ll be seeing her in a couple of hours, he already knows he’s not going to tell her what happened, and he’s going to make Kirill promise not to mention it, either. He doesn’t want her worrying about something she can’t fix.

So instead of calling her, he opens a game of solitaire on his phone, only to close it after a few moves. He tells himself he’s not going to look at those texts again, and then he does, pulling up the website Oleg had found and scrolling through them one at a time, feeling worse and worse the more he reads—

Danny: Making friends

A few seconds later, Sasha receives a photo of Danny, laughing as a dog licks his face. He’s outdoors, the sun shining down on him, a yellow leaf in his windswept hair; he looks like the happiest person in the world, and Sasha’s never wanted to be somewhere else so badly.

Without thinking, he presses the call button.