Chapter 15
FIFTEEN
LANZ
I yank the zipper to my chin and give myself a look in the locker room mirror. The jacket's perfect. There's nothing wrong with it.
Pristine white, not so much as a smudge of dirt or a yellow sweat ring around the neck. Double reinforced seams. And on the back, Dell’Acqua USA, in the standard height blue letters. Made to exactly my specifications and shipped in from Italy.
It's also way too fucking big.
“Shit,” I murmur under my breath. I pluck at the side seams, pulling it away from my body.
There's a good inch, maybe two, of slack on either side, and the shoulders and sleeves look deflated, wrinkled to the point where I probably wouldn't pass the armorer's check. The tight fit’s for a reason.
Folds in the fabric can catch a blade tip, bend it dangerously, snap, all kinds of things.
The material is supposed to be flexible but strong, supple but impenetrable. Armor, or close to.
But right now, it'll do nothing but entangle me.
“Shit,” I say again. I chew my lip and tug down on the neck zipper a little.
I'm not sure it even matters. Not sure I can think ahead to, what, next season?
Another bout? It all seems like some sort of ridiculous impossibility.
Like the sport of fencing is truly the last thing we need to worry about right now.
And yet, I can't help it. Kai had mentioned some of the new gear was in, and I wanted to get mine.
Even in the middle of a literal dark night of the soul.
Because of all the things I really like about my life that I enjoy and care about, fencing is up there.
Always has been, probably always will be, until the day I die.
I pull the zipper back up and go out into the salle.
Kai's put all the weapons together in a completely random order so I can't even tell if there's anything spec to me.
I like a pretty whippy blade for foil, because I like a back flick now and again—call it showing off, but if you're on the smaller side, relatively speaking, it's good to be fast. Sabre's probably my worst, and from what I can tell, Kai's only put together his own weapons for that one anyway, so…
I run a finger along the handles, brushing across them idly, and finally select an epee.
It's quiet in the salle. No practice scheduled, obviously. Everyone else doing…anything else, I suppose. The windows are dark, but either my eyes are adjusting or there’s enough residual light that I can see okay.
I wrap my fingers around the grip, brace my knuckle against the bell guard, shake out my wrist, go on guard, toe the line.
Few advances, few retreats, getting back into the motions of it.
I just always figured I'd be fencing for the rest of my life, and I guess I will. But I thought there would be more to it. That, I don't know, one day I'd retire, obviously from college, and then maybe coach, teach people, set up some kind of school, maybe with another epeeist, too…
“Hey.”
I jump at the voice at the bottom of the stairs. It's Cal. I close my eyes and go lax briefly. Of course it is.
“Kit came in,” he says, nodding at me.
I nod back. “Just giving it a test run.”
“Mm-hmm.” His lips are firm together, his arms crossed.
“Yours is probably in there too,” I say, nodding at the locker room, a way to get him to stop staring at me.
It works, I guess, because he strides through the doorway and out of sight. I shake my wrist a little, as if I'm going to keep drilling, but my focus is shot. Now all I can think about is him in there, unpacking his jacket, smoothing it out, maybe taking off his shirt, pulling the whites on—
Then I blink and my daydream comes to life as Cal returns, fully dressed.
“Not bad,” he says, extending his arms, giving his shoulders a test roll.
“Of course it's not bad,” I say.
Cal smirks, although it doesn't quite reach his eyes.
“You know what I mean,” he mutters. Too quickly, he goes from studying his own sleeves and zipper to me, again, to what is probably too obvious—that I look terrible, that I'm disappearing, that there is nothing he can do and I wish he would stop acting or pretending like it's worth caring.
But he doesn't say anything. Just walks to the weapons. Picks out an epee. French grip. Finds his mask. He lifts them both.
“You wanna?”
It'd be strange to say no, I guess. I'm not sure I have the stamina to win a touch, let alone a bout, but…
“Sure,” I say. I retrieve the mask I'd left on the bench. Slip it over my head.
Cal does the same, testing out the weapon in his hand, adjusting his glove, choking down so that he's gripping it barely by the pommel. Bastard. With his wingspan and the two extra inches he gets from that, he can basically stand there and extend his arm and win every point.
Suddenly my mind flashes back to months ago. A year and change, really. The two of us here in the salle.
“Take this one,” I told him. “It'll be better.”
Cal frowned and took the weapon from my hand. “Why? What's the difference?”
“The grip,” I said. “You're what, like six-four?”
“Six-five,” he murmured.
“Yeah, so, and you're all arms. I mean, look at you.” And I did look at him, maybe a little bit too long.
Then forced my eyes to the handle of the weapon.
“Hold it here.” I demonstrated, wrapping my thumb and forefinger around the pommel so that the metal knob of it was just barely nestled under the base of my thumb.
“It'll give you crazy reach. The muscles worked are different, and you won't have as much point control, but if you get to the other guy first…”
“Yeah, sure.” Cal nodded. His broad fingers slipped between my palm and the handle. No gloves on, just skin. And probably lingered a little too long there, too.
“Lanz?” Cal is saying. He lunges forward, flicking a toe touch against the front of my shoe to get my attention. “You ready? Or what?”
“Um, yeah.” I go on guard. “I’m good.”
It's lazy, slow. No, I'm lazy. Or slow. I can't get my feet to move, can't make my arms move except a half second too slowly. Cal easily goes for my shoulder, bypassing my loop-the-loop of a parry eight, which is sloppy and the wrong move besides. What am I doing?
Easily, we reset. Go again. I advance first this time, close the distance, but it's like I'm not paying attention, distracted, and all he does is extend his arm.
Touch. The blade point drills itself in right over my heart.
“You okay?” Cal says. It's a good thing I can't really see his eyes through the masks.
“Fine,” I all but spit.
We reset, on guard. Then Cal slackens. He points at my back leg with the tip of his blade. “Angle out more,” he says. “Your foot. You want your center of gravity—”
“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter, but I do as he says.
He's good, I think. Not just a good fencer, but a good strategist. A good coach, even.
I guess I could say he learned from the best, but that'd be taking too much credit.
He could probably train someone better than I could at this point. If they needed a new alternate—
When they need a new alternate.
The push of metal against my hip. Touch.
I lower my blade, shake my head. “Sorry,” I say. “I'm just not really…” I don't know how to finish the sentence. In the mood? Any good anymore? At my physical peak?
“Yeah, no,” comes Cal's voice, oddly light. “It's fine.” He shrugs. “Just wanted to, you know, give the kit a spin. I think it'll work.”
“You look good,” I say. Not sure exactly how I mean the compliment. Form-wise, I guess. That's all I can bear to think about, I think.
“Yeah?” Cal asks, shucking off his mask. He's not really sweating, but his cheeks are flushed.
I nod. I don't take off my own mask, for some reason.
Just pretend to adjust the bib. Flatten the tongue a little against my head, even though it fits perfectly fine.
“You ever think about coaching?” I ask, now pretending to mess with my glove, which fits like…
well, a glove. But I don't really want to look Cal in the eye.
“What?” Cal says. “Oh, sure, I guess. I mean, eventually? I don't really know. I sort of figured…” He looks around the salle, one hand on his hip, the other holding his weapon. “I figured this was it forever.”
“Nothing's forever,” I say, a little bit sharply.
Cal looks taken aback. “I just meant—”
“No, no, I know what you meant,” I interrupt. “Maybe you should think about it is all. Coaching. You'd maybe want to work more on the other two weapons, but…” I bite the inside of my cheek. “You could train someone up.”
Cal's silent a long moment. I rest my blade point against the toe of my shoe, bend it outward for no real reason—it’s brand new, the curve is fine.
“Lanz—” he starts.
“What?” I say, almost too quickly, and Cal's eyes widen.
“What are you talking about?” he says softly.
“I'm just saying you could coach,” I say tersely. “I'm saying—
“No, not about coaching,” Cal says. “What are you… what's going on?” His voice breaks. I stare at the floor, bending my blade again and again.
“Nothing's going on,” I say. “I mean, besides, you know…” I gesture fruitlessly around. “Everything. All of this.”
“With you,” Cal says. “You're…”
“You didn’t have to buy me flowers.”
I don't know why I say it just then. I don't even really mind, in theory.
But something about the gesture hurts. Hurts my heart.
Not in a literal sense, not in the way that's actually physically killing me, but emotionally.
Like…like I don't want him to be doing nice things for me.
To be caring about me. To be putting any of that energy into what is ultimately a black hole. Not Cal.
“I know that,” Cal murmurs. “I mean, that's the thing with flowers, right? You never have to get them. They're just for decoration, to be nice.”
“Well, don't be,” I say. “Don’t be nice.” Now, finally, I lift my head, and the look on Cal's face is somewhere between disgust and disbelief.
“What the hell is going on with you?” he says, and the tightness of his voice combined with the borderline swear word shocks me a little out of my posture.
“You're being cranky and angry at me. With Gwenna, even.
You're collapsing in the kitchen. You're like…skin and bone,” he says pointedly, eyeing the baggy whites hanging off my shoulders.
“I am not,” I mutter.
“Lanz, come on.” Cal extends his sword arm, pointing at me with the blade, and out of instinct, I lift my own weapon and parry, parry so hard I knock his blade to the ground. Cal gapes.
“Just stop asking,” I say. “Stop asking questions, all right?”
“I would if you'd actually answer any,” Cal says. His eyes are shining behind his glasses, and I swear I can see the faintest tremble in his jaw.
“Would you quit it with the savior complex?” I say. “I know you just want to be the knight in shining armor for everyone and save the day, but some things are just not saveable.”
There's a long, pulsing silence. I rip off my mask, suddenly frantic for fresh air.
“That's not true,” Cal says steadily. “Don't say things like that. That's not—”
“Oh, it’s true.” I feel very mean, very ugly, and I don’t care.
“No offense, Cal? But grow up. I know, I know, we're all here in service of the Lord and the honor of a loving God, but, like, come on.
Not everything can turn out okay in the end, you know?
That's life. You can't save everyone. Not even God can save everyone.”
“But…” Cal looks like I’ve kicked him in the stomach. “Lanz, that’s not—”
“Then why doesn’t He?” I shout. “Jesus.” I shake my head, vibrating with sudden anger, and I breathe out hard through my nostrils, once. “Fuck!”
My voice reverberates around the salle, and I chuck my epee at the ground, where it rattles against Cal's.
Cal just stares. Stares and stares and stares. Mutters something too low for me to hear.
“What?” I say, the word straining with exhaustion and anger. “What, Callahan?”
“Nothing,” he says. “Nothing. Just…” He lifts his head, looks dead into my eyes, like he’s searching for something. “I don't even recognize you anymore.”