Chapter 5
Rio de Janeiro—a tourist’s trove of emerald green mountains, pearly white beaches, and sapphire blue waters, nature’s crown jewels gathered and gleaming beneath the outstretched arms of Christ the Redeemer.
But Russia, like every other nation now descending on Brazil, is here for just one thing.
Gold.
The only sightseeing Sasha and his teammates get to do is in the Olympic Village, walking around their very first day—pointing out all the flags on the apartment buildings, taking pictures in front of the rings, trying to guess what sports people are competing in based on their body types.
The fun lasts for about an hour, and then their coaches make them go to bed early because they have practice the next morning.
The days pass in a blur of air-conditioned buses to and from the training hall.
Sasha works just as hard as the others, sweating through turn after turn on each apparatus, and tries not to think about how pointless it probably is.
At night, they’re all too tired to do much besides trudge to the dining station for dinner—Ilya moaning with envy as they pass the lines in front of the McDonald’s tent—and then back to their lodgings in time for curfew.
(Sasha does manage, though, to sneak into the US building for a quick tour of Danny’s room.
He doesn’t register much of it except an American flag fluttering as the door swings shut behind them, a blanket covered in dog hair that Danny shoves aside before going down on him, and the cracks in the ceiling he counts through the stars in his eyes.)
The Games kick off with the Opening Ceremony, which none of the Russian gymnasts attend—qualifications start the next day, and no one wants to march in a four-hour parade the night before a meet.
Instead, they watch it on a giant television in one of the athletes’ lounges, and Sasha spends most of the show texting Danny, who’s doing the same thing with his teammates.
The festivities are still continuing when they retire to their rooms. Kirill falls asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow, but Sasha lies awake for a long time, listening to the echo of distant fireworks and the shouting and singing in the Village.
A few feet away from him, the Russian team warmups are folded over the back of a chair, ready for Kirill to put on tomorrow; in the glow of a streetlamp, Sasha can just make out the Olympic flame embroidered on the sleeve.
He closes his eyes and rolls over to face the wall.
*
“Kirill, how do you feel about the team qualifying in third today?”
The mixed zone in the Rio Olympic Arena is one of the loudest, most uncomfortable places Sasha has ever been in, including the dive bar Kirill dragged him to on his eighteenth birthday.
It reminds him of a cattle chute, the athletes being herded through a maze of fences as reporters on the other side prod at them with microphones, salivating for a sound bite.
Luckily, he’s well out of harm’s way, having been directed to another cordoned-off aisle for the non-competing personnel exiting the arena.
Even though he’s supposed to keep moving, he’s been lingering behind Kirill, feigning interest in his friend’s interviews when what he really wants is a glimpse of Danny.
“We’re in a good position,” Kirill tells the woman from Match TV, their government’s sports channel.
He’s using what Sasha still thinks of as his talking-to-the-adults voice, even though they’re both adults now themselves.
“We made a few mistakes, but we’ll fix them before the final.
We just need to stay focused and keep training.
China and Japan have very strong teams, and we want to make sure we can beat them. ”
“What about the Americans?”
As if on cue, said Americans arrive at the mixed zone, and the noise in the corridor doubles from all their whooping and back-slapping. Danny’s right in the middle of it, flushed and grinning under Matt Miller’s arm, a smear of chalk on his forehead.
“Bro, we fucking nailed that shit,” Matt declares, his voice carrying across the hall and interrupting several interviews. “We’re so getting French fries after this.”
Kirill responds to the Match TV reporter in curt, clipped sentences, clearly hoping to wrap up before the Americans get any closer.
Sasha might have told him not to worry—Danny’s unlikely to spend fewer than five minutes with any given reporter, and there’s a whole crowd of them clamoring for his attention—but then, to his surprise, Danny starts jogging in their direction.
“Kevin Landy, what’s up?”
He stops in front of a red-haired reporter a few feet away from Kirill, just around a corner in the fences.
From what Sasha can understand of the inane, fist-bumping pleasantries that follow, it seems that Kevin interviewed him for an article once, years ago, and Kevin’s flattered Danny even remembers him.
“All right, what do you got for me, Kevin?” Danny finally asks, and then he smiles and nods at Kirill, whose shoulders stiffen as he looks back at the Match TV reporter.
“Well, let’s start with the team—you guys qualified in second, right behind China. How does that feel?”
“Oh, man, we’re so pumped.” Danny beams, and Sasha has to bite back a smile of his own.
“Like, we were just going out there and supporting each other and having a good time, and the crowd really responded to that, so it was, like, all this energy and it was just, like, a really positive experience. So now we gotta keep the flow going for finals and see if we can get some hardware for Team USA.”
Sasha can’t see Kirill’s face, but it’s clear from his posture that Danny’s pissing him off as well as distracting him; the Match TV reporter has to ask again for his thoughts on qualifying to the all-around and vault finals.
“I’m, uh, satisfied with the results,” Kirill replies, struggling to regain his bearings. “I wanted to make floor, but, uh, I had some problems with my, um, second pass—”
“Now, you made the all-around, of course,” Kevin says to Danny at the same time; Sasha’s starting to get a headache from the effort of listening to both conversations, Russian and English ricocheting in his brain.
“But you also qualified in first for the high bar final. How does it feel to beat the great Kohei Uchimura and the Flying Dutchman?”
Danny laughs at the reference to Epke Zonderland, the defending gold medalist from London.
“I’m just really excited to be competing with those guys.
I mean, the thing with gymnastics is, like, sometimes it’s just, like, who’s having the better day, right?
And today it was me, but the other guys are definitely gonna bring it in the final, so I can’t be, like, resting on my florals, you know? ”
Jesus Christ. If Danny wins the gold next week—and after seeing his routine today, Sasha thinks he might—the first words out of his mouth will probably be a compliment to someone else. It’s objectively annoying, and it shouldn’t make Sasha want to kiss him the way it does.
There’s some more back and forth about qualifications in each interview, until eventually the Match TV reporter asks Kirill, “How are you liking Brazil?”
Kirill starts to shrug, then thinks better of it. “The Olympic Village is very nice. We’ll probably go and see the statue once we’re finished competing, but we’re too busy right now.”
“Dude, Brazil’s amazing,” Danny tells Kevin a few seconds later. “We went to the beach last week and people were just, like, so nice to us. Like, we had little kids showing us their handstands and cartwheels, it was awesome.”
“Any luck with the women?” Kevin jokes, and Sasha rolls his eyes.
Everyone here seems obsessed with Brazilian women, or at least the idea of them, that they’re somehow better than women in other countries.
During breaks at the gym, Ilya and Oleg swipe incessantly through dating apps and Instagram profiles, Kirill leaning over their shoulders if he spots a blonde, and Sasha’s getting tired of saying “wow” or “nice” when they show him the pictures.
He assumes Danny joins in when his teammates have these conversations, although he’s never asked, because he’s not sure he wants to know.
Sometimes, when he thinks about how much Danny’s given up by dating him instead of a girl—like a relationship he can be honest about with his parents, and even certain kinds of sex—he can’t help but wonder if Danny misses those things, if one day he’ll decide it isn’t worth it anymore.
But right now, Danny’s laughing awkwardly at Kevin’s question, like he’d rather be somewhere else. “Uh, no, uh, a few of the guys were trying it, but, uh, I think we were a little too short for the ladies.”
“The eternal struggle of the male gymnast,” Kevin quips.
“Totally. But hey, you know what?” Danny recovers, his easygoing smile back in place. “There’s a lot of people here in the Village, a lot of different countries… and can I be honest?”
He leans forward, like he’s about to share a secret, and Kevin readies his pen.
“I’m actually kind of into the Russians.”
Sasha stares at Danny, stunned by his audacity. There’s no fucking way he just said that to a reporter.
“I can see it,” Kevin says, humoring Danny. “They’ve got a serious, sexy vibe going.”
And that’s when Danny glances up, his blue eyes sparkling as they pass over Kirill and land directly on Sasha—whose breath catches in his throat as he realizes Danny’s known this whole time that he’s been there, watching.
“Yeah.” A sly grin tugs at Danny’s lips. “Exactly.”