1. Lucas
Lucas
LONDON
“No! No! No!” Cassandra yelled at me for what seemed like the fifth time in five minutes. I was on the pommel horse and apparently, I wasn’t performing to her standards. “Your transitions are getting sloppy, Lucas. How many times have I told you that?”
I finished the flair sequence I was on and dismounted. “Too many to count,” I muttered.
But she must’ve heard me. “You’re gonna keep counting, Lucas. Because I’ll keep saying it until you get it right.” I felt my eyes roll before I could stop them and she barked, “Again!”
She worked me on the horse until my arms were jelly and she could tell.
I was really getting sloppy when she finally told me to take a break.
I knew not to complain about the intensity.
That only made it worse with her. After almost four years, I knew what not to do around her.
Complaining was one of those things, and talking about anything personal was another.
I headed over to the bench, wiped the sweat off my brow and armpits with a towel, and alternated sips between Gatorade and water.
Ty jogged over to me. “Is it safe?” he joked.
I looked behind him. “Probably not for long.” Cassandra was on her phone. “How’s it going, Ty?”
“That’s ‘Coach Ty’ to you, bro.”
“Ah yes. I still don’t understand how you manipulated Woodward into giving you that kind of authority, Assistant Coach Ty.”
“My natural charm?”
“You certainly put the ass in assistant.”
“Or maybe he wanted someone around with Olympic experience besides you and Cam?”
I watched his face change when he realized he said the name. And even from a hundred feet away, it’s like Cassandra heard it too because she was heading towards us. Ty seemed to sense it, turning to meet her face to face.
“Coach Marudas.”
“Coach Hale, I’d appreciate you not distracting Lucas during our training sessions.”
“Didn’t mean any harm. Just chatting, one Olympian to another.” Ty stepped back, hands raised in surrender. Cassandra could be such a hardass. And right when I almost felt like a normal human being, too.
“Cassie! Can I see you for a few minutes?” Woodward beckoned from across the arena.
She hated being called Cassie. I thought Coach called her that on purpose, but I wasn’t sure.
“Yes, sir,” she replied, turning to me. “I’ll be right back, Lucas. We’ll work on the high bar next.”
As she walked over to Coach, I was so thankful to him at that moment. Ty sat down next to me, exhaling loudly. “So, she’s still being a super bummer all the time?”
“Bummer is the nice way to describe it.”
“Sorry, bro,” Ty said, putting his arm on my shoulder.
He was trying to comfort me, to be a friend. But his touch felt nice and I couldn’t help but sigh and lean into it. “That feels nice, Ty.”
“I’m honored to assist in any way. It’s part of my job. And while I pinch-hit for your team, this body is reserved for someone else.” He gave my back a pat and withdrew his arm.
I smirked. “Got it. How is Declan, by the way?”
I looked over at him and recognized the feelings behind his expression when he answered, “He’s great. Flying into Heathrow in a few days. I’m really excit-” He cut himself off and looked guiltily at me.
“It’s okay, Ty. You can talk about Declan. It’s been years. I’ve moved on.”
“I don’t buy that for one minute. And based on how you reacted to my arm on your shoulder, it’s been a while, bro. Your hands can’t replace him and a Fleshjack doesn’t count either.”
I scoffed because he was right. “What am I supposed to do? You’ve met Cassandra. She’s always around. And how the hell do you know what a Fleshjack is?”
“Bro, I was in the closet before, not under a rock. Plus, Declan’s been expanding my repertoire.”
“And your vocabulary too, apparently.”
“Yeah, yeah. He’s the smart one. Blah blah blah. My brothers have the same jokes.”
“So, my sex tutorial helped?”
“Uh, yeah. It did.” Ty smirked, his cheeks growing pink. “But to get back to the more pressing issue, are you going to talk to him? If you’re really over him, I’ll drop it, but I don’t think you are. I know how rough that first year was. Feelings that strong don’t just disappear.”
And he was right. I wasn’t over him. At all.
I had written him so many emails and just never sent them.
Half afraid that they wouldn’t be enough, and half afraid my parents would see them.
I was so paranoid that first year. I spiraled into depression and only came out of it when Ty finally intervened and helped me find a therapist.
“I’m not over him, Ty,” I admitted, leaning forward, my chin resting on my hands. “But what if he’s over me?”
“You won’t know unless you talk to him.”
“You were there for nationals the year after the Olympics. I thought Cassandra and Noah were going to come to blows and Cam was just trying to walk past me. She won’t let me near him.”
“I remember,” Ty replied. “But maybe we can get you two alone now that we’re back at the Olympics?”
“I’m not staying in the village this time. My parents put me and Cassandra up in a two-bedroom suite at the Waldorf.”
“I guess I should’ve figured.”
“Yeah.”
After a few minutes of silence, I asked, “What do you think of the new guys, Coach Ty?”
He smirked, knowing I was changing the subject, and pointed at Alex on the rings. “Well, I think he’ll be fine. He won the championship last month, remember?”
“I remember, you ass.”
Alexander Chen, one of the alternates from Brisbane, had really improved in the last few years.
Overall, our team was stronger than last time.
The last three national champions were on it: Cam, myself and Alex, in that order.
Alex had actually won the last two. I came in second to him just last month. Cam was right behind me in third.
“Sorry, sorry, I know it’s still raw.”
“And the kids?”
“Kids?” Ty asked. “Really, Luke? Colton’s twenty-two and Orion’s twenty. They’re both older than you were at your first Olympics.”
“Well, O feels like a kid brother, and Colton is…” I paused.
“Cam’s best friend?”
Well, shit. I sighed. “Did you have to say it out loud, Ty?”
“Well, they are,” he admitted.
And then I asked a question I knew I didn’t want answered. “Do you think they’re more than that?”
Ty paused before saying, “I don’t know, Luke. I think that’s something you need to ask him.”
“Colton?!”
“No, Luke,” he said, rubbing his forehead. “Cam.”
Cam. Just hearing his name so much in the last few minutes made it feel like a lifetime ago and not just four years.
I hadn’t spoken to him that entire time.
Well, other than on-camera pleasantries to maintain the facade of sportsmanship.
I wondered if Cam felt as disgusted by the fakeness as I did when all I wanted to do was grab his face and kiss him and tell him how sorry I was for being such a coward.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, pushing thoughts of the past aside.
“Well, he has to get here first. Where is he?”
“Don’t say that too loudly. Coach Crabbypants will come back over here and yell at me,” Ty said, glancing at Cassandra. “And I don’t know. Coach said something about a delayed flight.”
“Do you think Colton’s gay?”
“Man, you still have it bad for Cam.”
“No shit, Ty.”
“I’m sorry, bro. I don’t know about Colton. It wasn’t in the team dossier I received.”
“Dossier?”
“It was a joke, Luke. Man, you are all twisted up.” He noticed Cassandra had finished talking to Coach and was headed back over to us. “Catch ya later, Luke. Hang in there.”
“Let’s go, Lucas. High bar!”
I put my water down, stood up, and jogged over. It was time to get back to work.
Before my arms could quite hit jelly level again, Cassandra waved me off, congratulating me on my improvements and going over her plan for the rest of the week.
We had six more days until the opening ceremony.
I wasn’t surprised her plan was training, training, and more training.
I imagined the relaxed attitude of Coach didn’t sit well with her.
Before he dismissed us for the day, Coach called us over for a pep talk.
“Well, most of the team is here now, but Cam should join us by tomorrow. I just wanted to reiterate to those of you new to the Olympics that Luke and Cam are the senior members of the team, so if you have questions or need some advice and you’d prefer getting it from a peer as opposed to a coach, they’ve offered to act as mentors for you.
They have been to the Olympics before and Tyler here has as well, so feel free to pick their brains as much as they’ll let you.
That’s all for today. Thanks for your hard work.
I know it will pay off. We’ll see you back here tomorrow, same time. ”
I gathered my stuff, grabbed my bag, and headed for the locker room.
I already felt the tension leaving my body.
Cassandra couldn’t follow me in here. Some controversy at the last Olympics revised the rules.
I guess women had been allowed in the men’s locker rooms in previous games, but it changed after someone argued that since male coaches weren’t allowed in the women’s locker room, the reverse situation shouldn’t be allowed.
And now it wasn’t. Even though I thought barring any coach from their athlete was ridiculous, I was very thankful they had changed the policy.
It was practically the only time I was Cassandra-free.
“Mentor, huh?” O asked, as he stripped off his shirt and threw it in his locker.
It was hard not to notice his sculpted chest directly above perhaps the tightest set of abdominals on the team. Jesus, I needed sex. I shouldn’t be having these thoughts about O. He was practically a kid.
“Something like that.” I smiled.