Chapter 31
Leesa
I showed up to the press conference before the women’s Tour de Suisse with eyes like sandpaper and a body that believed it was one in the morning – local time in Denver, where I’d just flown in from. No one would have any questions for me anyway. They only wanted to talk to Lori.
I only hoped I stayed mostly out of the shot.
I’d swiped on some eye make-up but, given my barely five hours of uncomfortable sleep last night, I couldn’t say whether I’d achieved Taylor Swift or Amy Winehouse.
My hair was an oily mess, but I couldn’t wash it because I hadn’t had time for it to dry.
A blow-dryer always resulted in spongy frizz instead of the complex curls I had to work hard to maintain.
As I hoped, the questions passed me by and my job was simply to make sure Lori didn’t look as though she had no friends – not that we were friends exactly. It was more begrudging respect between us, which I’d learned not to analyse.
I would never understand these Gallaghers.
Speaking of Gallaghers, I thought for a moment it was just my scratchy eyes, but a blink and a rub proved I wasn’t imagining it: there was Colin, lounging against the back wall with his usual laid-back stoop.
The men’s race was ongoing and he really should have been resting before today’s stage.
His gaze flickered over me and away again quickly, making me worried I had something on my face.
‘A question for Leesa Kubicka!’
Huh? I blinked wildly to try to switch my brain on as the reporter continued speaking.
‘I understand you competed in the Unbound gravel race in the United States last week and were awarded the “mud prize”. Can you tell us about that?’
‘I’m sorry, what?’ My brain was racing ahead of my sluggish body. ‘I mean, I was at Unbound, yes.’ The scrappy fight of gravel racing had always brought me alive. ‘But I’m not sure what prize you’re talking about.’
‘Oh.’ The reporter glanced down at her phone. ‘It just says here: “Leesa crossed the line with her face and body totally caked in mud, earning the coveted ‘mud prize’.”’
‘Where is that?’ My media training – from the team and also from the marketing degree I was slowly completing – deserted me.
‘It’s on your Wikipedia page,’ the reporter admitted sheepishly.
‘Oh, I—’ Another huh? was all my brain could manage at first. Then, in my peripheral vision, I noticed Colin shifting against the wall and, when I glanced at him, he was looking right at me, his tongue tucked into his cheek as he visibly swallowed a laugh.
I should have known. He wouldn’t have been here without someone to humiliate and, as usual, it was me. I’d been proud of finishing that notoriously tough race, but he’d made it all about the mud, the childish idiot.
‘I think someone thought it would be funny to update my Wikipedia page with something that doesn’t exist,’ I managed to reply, sparing Colin only a brief, sharp glance.
The reporter gave an awkward laugh. ‘Sounds like you had a big fan watching your race.’
A fan? Yeah, right.