Chapter 20
CHAPTER
TWENTY
The morning of my first Olympic Games, I wake up lying back-to-back with my best friend.
My boyfriend. Our spines rest against each other, and I leave my eyes closed as I focus until our breathing is synced up.
I imagine a loop, air moving from his lungs to mine and back again, sustaining us, connecting us.
“Are you awake?” Austin’s voice is quiet, but it doesn’t have that sleepy quality from yesterday. He’s been up for a bit.
“Yeah,” I say, rolling over so I can kiss his shoulder. Or that’s the plan, but when I roll, so does he, onto his back, with his phone held over his face.
“We have a problem,” he says, then flips the phone in my direction. My eyes are still bleary from sleep and I have to rub them a few times to get them to focus, but when I do, I see me and Austin, standing side by side, looking kinda derpy in our matching team jackets.
“Oh hey,” I say, taking the phone and sitting up. “Did the interview go live?”
“No. I mean yes. But it’s . . . it’s not .
. .” He doesn’t need to explain. I scroll farther down and there’s another picture from the interview.
We’re lying in the snow, face to face. Holy shit, that’s hot.
Like even someone who didn’t know our story might look at it and go “those two boys aren’t totally straight and possibly also want to do dirty things to each other behind closed doors.
” Or else you’d think we’re just really good friends, but you’d have to be willfully ignorant to stick to that story.
I snort. “Funny they included that part. I thought they’d cut it after .
. .” The thought dies on my tongue. There’s another block of text, but below that is a picture not from the interview.
It’s the two of us, in our regular training wear, face to face and mouth to mouth.
No matter how an observer might have interpreted the previous picture, there’s no chance anyone could deny that in this one we’re kissing.
The bottom corner of the picture is cut off at a weird angle, until I realize I’m looking at the white edge of that flap I thought was so conveniently protecting us from prying eyes outside the gear tent yesterday.
“Oh shit.” I sit up quickly, zooming in the picture. The resolution isn’t great. Definitely taken by someone with a cellphone and not a professional. But there’s no question about what we’re doing. No one would believe we were having a really intense conversation.
“Yeah,” Austin says.
I scroll back up to the top of the article, to the title I didn’t see above the first utterly harmless picture.
Canada’s Ski-Crossed Lovers: Who Will Win?
I bet someone in the news room is real proud of coming up with that one.
My heart hammers in my throat as I read through the article.
It’s all there. Well, the publicly available details anyway.
Austin’s accident. My terrible season and last-minute fluke qualification.
Then it talks about how we were spotted making out during practice, and how media members noticed palpable chemistry during an interview.
“Fucking Ray and Chantale,” I growl, throwing the blanket off as I get out of bed and rummage through my stuff for clothes.
“Where are you going?” Austin asks, rising too.
“I’m going to find those two shithead influencer wannabes and tell them exactly what they can do with their ‘content.’ Are you coming or not?”
“Zed. Wait.”
I’m not waiting. Why the fuck would I wait? This is our private lives. They don’t get to splash it around for other people to gawk at.
I hop up and down, trying to get my shoes on. Austin’s standing by the bed, wearing only his underwear and one of my T-shirts.
“Let’s go,” I say, stomping into my shoes. I mash the heel cup down, but I don’t care.
“Cedric,” Austin says, not following. “Bear. Stop.”
I do. I’m shaking with rage, but at his use of the private name, my hand stops on the doorknob. I look over my shoulder at him. He’s still rumpled. Austin rubs the scar from the surgery to repair his shattered wrist.
Finally, he says, “It’s the Olympics. Our Olympics.”
The air rushes out of me. I sag. “Fuck.”
He comes up behind me, wrapping his arms around my body, holding me close until my breathing slows. He kisses the back of my neck.
“Let me get some fresh clothes. We’ll go find Ivan. Maybe Tara. We’ll figure this out. But we’ve also got to get ready for race time.”
This was not how any of it was supposed to go. But I step back, letting Austin pull the door open. Then we both jump, because Matthieu is there, hand raised like he was about to knock.
“Oh,” he says, sounding surprised. “You’re awake. Did you . . . did you see the . . .”
“Yeah,” I say, as Austin pushes past him, heading down the hall to his room. I take more steps back and slump onto the edge of my mattress.
Matthieu enters the room and lets the door close behind him.
“I’m sorry,” he says, standing a few feet away. “People don’t think. They forget we’re really people. They were only thinking about themselves. About the views those pictures would get.”
I shake my head. Now that my anger is subsiding, something like cold fear settles in my guts.
“I don’t have time for this today. We had a plan. We’ve always had a plan, and this—” I gesture at my phone, which is still lying on its charger by my bedside. “How am I supposed to win today when that’s . . . out there?”
Matthieu snorts. “You’re not going to win.”
My head snaps up. “What?”
His smile is crooked and his eyes are bright. “I’m going to win. That part was never in question.”
I laugh in spite of myself, then flop down on the bed, rubbing my eyes.
“Fuck. It’s been a mess since last year, but that . . . That was private.”
“You and Austin have never been subtle.” Matthieu sits on his bed, the one he hasn’t slept in for the last two nights, and probably won’t sleep in again before we finally leave Italy. He’s a good teammate.
My sigh is heavy as I pull myself back up to sitting. “What do we do? What do I do? I don’t want to deal with that. Not today.”
“Then don’t.” He shrugs.
“But it’s . . . it’s everywhere.” I pick up my phone, but even the sight of the notifications on the lock screen is enough to turn my insides to acid, so I put it down again. Social media tags. Text messages. How am I supposed to ignore that?
Matthieu holds out his hand. “Give me that.” I do. He tucks it into the drawer of his bedside table. “I’ll give it back after the race.”
I want to protest. Tell him I don’t need him to protect me. That I can handle it. But the way my hands are still shaking says maybe a little help wouldn’t be so bad.
He must see the decision on my face, because he nods. “Good. Now put the rest of it away. Let people say and think what they want. You know what to do. You’ve trained for this. You know how to make these thoughts a problem for another time. Today is for racing and only for racing.”
The longer he speaks, the heavier his accent gets, and I expect him to launch into a passionate speech fully in French any second now. That is, until a fresh knock comes at the door, interrupting him. It’s Austin, with Tara and Ivan standing behind him, glowering like twin thunderstorms.
“I found them in the hall,” he says, entering without further explanation.
“I’ll let you talk,” Matthieu says, leaving again.
There are a few seconds of awkward silence as the rest of us get settled. Ivan takes the single chair by the hotel room’s desk. Austin and I sit side by side on my bed. Tara paces in tight circles.
“You don’t have to worry about any of this,” she says.
“Kind of hard not to,” Austin says.
“She’s right.” Ivan looks like he wants to punch something, and leans back in his chair while he folds his arms over his chest to control himself. “This is her job to deal with. Today your only job is to race.”
He sounds like Matthieu. They’re probably right. What do we know? This is Matthieu’s third games, and Ivan’s raced in and coached at least ten. If they say this isn’t our fight, we should listen.
“I’ve got it under control,” Tara says. She has her phone out, texting furiously.
“I’ve sent calls out to the Olympic Committee press office.
The Chef de Mission. I sent someone down to the CSBC media hub to ask them what the goddamn fucking hell made them think that this bullshit clickbait horsesh .
. .” She presses her lips together, giving us a guilty glance.
Then she straightens, pulling her shirt down at the waist and smoothing over the front.
At first glance, she’s pressed and polished as always this morning.
Only on closer inspection, her ponytail is lopsided, and while she’s got some makeup around her eyes, it looks like it was scribbled on in a hurry instead of the usual painstaking application she must undertake most mornings.
“Sorry. I have it handled. I’ve already requested extra security to keep the media away from the athlete’s village and during pre-race warm ups.
If anyone approaches you, all you say is ‘no comment.’ Understand? ”
We both nod. But a thought tugs at the back of my mind.
“Don’t you want to know if it’s true?” I put my hand on Austin’s thigh and he wraps his fingers around mine. We look up at Tara, a united front. We won’t hide. We were never hiding. But we also weren’t very smart about the whole thing.
Ivan coughs, but when I glance back at him, he’s trying and failing to hide a smile. Tara rolls her eyes, still jabbing at her phone.
“Of course it’s true. Anyone who has ever seen the two of you together wouldn’t doubt that for a second.
You just have really terrible timing. But don’t worry.
I’ve got your back. Don’t say anything to anyone and do your best. I’ll see you after seeding.
” Then she holds her phone to her ear, and her voice echoes after her as she walks out to the hall and disappears.
“Roland? It’s Tara. Yeah, I know. That’s what I’m calling about. Listen . . .”
“I told you I wanted to tell you after the games,” Austin mutters, staring down at his hands.
“You blabbed your secret last year,” I remind him.
Ivan stands, the action requiring a long, tired grunt as he rises. He’s undoubtedly thinking he doesn’t get paid enough to deal with our bullshit. Not today especially, but never on any day, really.
“Should I go get Adiola?” he asks. We both shake our heads.
She’s not going to tell me anything I don’t already know.
We’ve been over this before. Maybe not this this.
But the bigger part of her job, when she’s not talking me through my guilt and mixed-up feelings about Austin’s accident, is helping us learn all about compartmentalization and how to stay focused on racing even when there are a million other things going on in our lives.
To the best of my knowledge, no one’s ever been revealed kissing in national media before, but I know guys who have raced the day after a bad fall or after they get the news a loved one has passed away.
This is no different. Focus on the job at hand.
Deal with everything else on another day.
Ivan gives us a stoic nod. He’s taught us well. Done everything to prepare us and give us the resources to not only get through today, but kick ass in the process.
“I’ll see you downstairs for breakfast,” he says, then leaves us alone to get ready for our Olympic morning.