by Robin Lovett
“It’s good for us that I’m going home.” Caroline rubs her belly. “But Gary, well—he made his decision when he lied about why he left so early for Milan.”
“He lied?”
“He admitted it last night. They went to see a ‘doctor’.” Her air quotes are accusatory and sarcastic.
“What’s wrong with that?”
Her eyes grow wide. “You knew? Terrence told you?”
“He was injured, it made sense.”
Her lip curls. “And what’s so much better about the doctors in Milan than here in Nice? Didn’t you think of that?”
It is odd, now she mentions it, but her meanness prickles my defenses. “How was I supposed to know any different?” I wish now I had done some volunteering at the hospital. Maybe I would understand what she’s implying.
“There’s only one kind of doctor that cyclists go to see near Milan.” She glances at her suitcases. “Gary promised he’d never go. He broke that promise.”
Her tone makes doubt twine in my belly. “What doctor did they go see?”
“Luigi Bugatti. But if you ask Terrence, he’ll lie.”
I can’t decide if she’s giving me vital information or if she’s overreacting, the same way she’s done to Terrence. “Why would Terrence lie about a doctor?”
She doesn’t answer me. My knees bounce.
The race unfolds on the TV, the riders reaching their final approach to San Remo. A gaggle of BG jerseys lead the main group. “That’s them,” I say.
“They’ve been staying together all day.”
“That’s good, right? Terrence’s leg must be doing well.”
She scoffs. “Of course.”
Frustrated by her elusiveness, I ask, “What’s so bad about this doctor?”
“I’ve been thinking of going home since I got pregnant.” She looks at me, her mouth downturned. “I didn’t want it to be like this. I wanted to stay with him.” Her lips quiver, her eyes darting. “In spite of everything. I do love him.” She caresses her belly. “This one may be a surprise, but I’m still grateful he’s coming.”
“It’s a boy?”
She nods with a private smile, even under the tear leaking over her cheek.
The TV announcers murmur, but I can only see Caroline. “I know you’ll miss Gary, but it’s good you’re going home.”
“I don’t want to leave him.” She wipes her eyes. “Maybe it’s good he made the decision for us.”
I sit forward in my seat. “It doesn’t have to be the end. He’ll come home to you when he can. Gary’s a good guy. He’ll make it right.” I locate the tissues and hand her the box. I don’t want to probe for more information about this doctor, but I need to know.
“I know.” She fidgets with a tissue. “There’s a laptop in my room. You should Google Bugatti for yourself.”
“Isn’t it the name of a fancy car?”
“You’ll have to type in Luigi and cycling to find him.”
I jump off the couch and run for her computer. I bring it back into the room. I don’t want to know who this doctor is. If it’s bad enough to make Caroline leave—I hope my suspicions of what she’s implying are wrong.
After I type the keywords in the search engine, articles leap on the page about Dr. Bugatti. A physician and cycling coach who, two years ago, was convicted and fined for the illegal trafficking of performance-enhancing drugs.
“No.” My eyes fall closed.
It can’t be true. Terrence wouldn’t. Neither would Gary. I would believe it of Sergio and Coach, but—
If Terrence’s contract was threatened by the team owner, he wouldn’t have had a choice. Well, there’s always a choice, but money means so much to him, how far would he go to keep his paycheck?
I won’t be poor like I was growing up.
Fuck.
“Is this what he’s been hiding from me?” I whisper. “Why he’s been pushing me away and…” My voice breaks. I don’t want it to be true. I would rather it be because he didn’t want me anymore.
Caroline nods. “I think so.”
“You’ve suspected this. For months.” I remember her warnings, her questions, her badgering, and how I judged her for it.
“I suspected it.”
I read more of the article. “But the doctor was convicted. He can’t still be in business. They’d throw him in jail.”
Caroline shrugs.
On the TV, with one kilometer left in the race, five BG jerseys line up behind each other, dominating the front of the peloton. Over a hundred riders struggle on their wheels. In a choreographed dance, one BG rider drops off the front. The next one in line charges into his place, pedals as hard as he can, taking the wind for his teammates for as many minutes as he can, then, wasted, he drops too. Caroline’s right, the team is racing in a single unit.
They’re artistic, musical in their synchronization. These men working in an assembly line, all for Terrence. It’s inspiring. It’s…
All for the money?
It can’t be. There’s too much passion in these men for it to be only about a paycheck.
When they reach the final one hundred meters, only two blue riders are left: Gary leading Terrence.
“Do you think they might do it?” I fidget. Is it wrong that I still want them to win?
“Of course they’d win this one. How convenient.” Caroline’s voice broils with sarcasm.
The camera zooms in, and the announcers begin the final, adrenaline-pumping call to the finish. I’m too focused on Gary and Terrence to notice what they’re saying. They round a corner past a stationary camera with blurring speed. Their chests press low to the handlebars, their teeth bared and grimacing.
Then, on cue, at the ten-meters-to-go flag, Gary veers off and Terrence lets loose his final kick to the line. The force of his power, the strength of his will, the explosion of his body—it’s intoxicating. Four other sprinters battle in vain, jockeying around him, their struggle futile. As though fueled by wind, flying by wing, Terrence surges and blasts over the line, bike lengths ahead of the others. His arms flexed high in triumph, his mouth wide and screaming.
“Oh my God!” I can’t help cheering and clapping. The ecstatic expression on Terrence’s face, I could look at it every day. He’s on top of the world, the people at his feet.
The camera follows “Terror Braker” into the crowd. Gary rushes behind him, and the two embrace like the brothers they are in life, if not in blood. Their foreheads meet, and they clasp shoulders in a ritual born of racing partners.
“They won!” I cry, and see Caroline frozen on the couch, straight-faced and somber. If they won because they doped, Terrence might not pass the drug tests.
He’d never risk that—he could lose his whole career. It means too much to him. I don’t believe it. She’s wrong.
She sneers at the television screen. “There’s the man we have to thank for it.”
“Who?” I scrutinize the TV screen.
“The dark-haired guy, slapping Terrence on the back. That’s Sergio. And the bald guy with the gut, that’s their coach.” The two men I’ve heard so much about but never met look satisfied, ecstatic.
The crowd crushes around Terrence, and he’s lost to the mob of cameras. The next time he appears, he’s floating onto the podium in his sneakers and team kit.
I have to cover my mouth to hide my smile. I can’t stop it. This extraordinary man I’ve known—he can’t be a fraud. That I know.
He holds the bouquet and the trophy, and I’m so elated for him I want to scream. He wanted this so badly, and the smile beaming from him is the brightest since he won in Nice over a month ago.
The models come forward, each kissing him on the cheek, and he throws the bouquet into the crowd with that impish grin. The last time he threw that bouquet was to me.
The
y bring out the giant champagne bottle, and Terrence sprays the crowd with the bubbling white foam. Him doing that in Nice was arousing to witness, but I didn’t understand why.
Now I do.
He’s just having fun, I tell myself, it doesn’t mean anything. The cameras devour him in his winner’s euphoria. Then, in a truly bad boy moment, he turns the champagne on the models and splashes them in their faces.
That wouldn’t be so bad, if not for the expression on his face. It’s so sexed that my jaw hangs. I’ve seen that look before when we’re alone, naked, in bed. And now he has it onstage, in front of cameras, while spraying a bunch of models with his fizzing champagne.
It makes me think of him spraying me with something else.
My lip curls, and I feel a bit sick.
It’s for show. He’s told me before, he doesn’t do models. I know this. I need to chill.
He reaches behind one model and pinches her ass.
My lungs close. It’s like that YouTube video I watched of him weeks ago, where he frenched that random girl on the side of the road.
“It’s nothing personal,” Caroline says. “He’s never happier than when he’s winning. He’s married to it. Even if he could commit, he’d never be around. You’d always be his second favorite.”
I inhale. “Do you really believe that?” Perhaps she is commiserating with me, but I don’t need her to shove the truth in my face.
“Why do you think I’m going home tomorrow?” she says. “Gary will be supportive of this child, but the bike will always come before the baby or me. And I can’t live with that. Their Bugatti visit just confirms it.”
I glare back at the television.
He’s changed me so much. I thought he’d changed, too, that we’d changed each other. My insides cinch like a vise, wrenching at the place that’s been tender since Terrence told me he needed me.
It was an easy confession born in weakness and fear, not a declaration of longevity.
Bitterness taints my misery, making me doubt even the good stuff.
On the screen, he shuffles through a mob of partiers tossing streamers and screaming college girls wearing low-cut tank tops. One girl hands him a pen, and he does that thing.
He signs his name across the top of her cleavage.
I can’t watch.
His voicemail said he’d come back, win or lose. What he really meant was, if I lose I’ll come back to you. If I win, well, it’s been fun. I’m ashamed now I believed him.
I shouldn’t be sad. I shouldn’t want to be with a creep guy who signs his name on a girl’s tits.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t give you better news,” Caroline says. “If it means anything, he cared more about you than any girl I’ve seen him with.”
My shoulders release. She’s being genuine, and I realize that she’s been warning me since her twice-a-month comment. She never believed Terrence would commit to me. But neither did I. It’s only ever been a physical relationship.
He taught me to have orgasms. I should be grateful, not hurt. The raw hole in my heart won’t listen, though. It pulses at me like a gaping wound.
I pat her shoulder on my way to the door. “Thanks, Caroline. Have a safe trip home, and good luck with the birth of your baby.”
“Thanks.” She gives a nervous smile.
I pass my bike in the hall and can’t take it with me. I don’t want to ride it anymore. My joy in riding it is polluted.
I believed he cared.
So naïve.
Back in my apartment, I curl into my lonely bed and cry like a girl over a stupid guy.
Chapter Thirty-One
I bolt awake. It’s dark. The clock says two a.m.
“Aurelia!”
Someone’s screaming my name. Outside.
I fumble with the bed covers, and the voice cries again, “Lia, it’s me! Open up!”
I’m dreaming, delusional. I knee across my bed and toggle the window open.
“Aurelia!” Terrence stands on the cobbles two stories below my window. I can’t see his face, backlit by the street lamp.
“Terrence?” I whisper loudly.
“Let me up!” His voice echoes off the buildings.
“Sh!” If he woke me, he’s woken the neighbors. “What are you doing here?” My eyes are puffy from crying, my limbs lethargic and my brain foggy from sleep.
He steps closer. “I won the race!”
“I know.” I remember him roaring across the line, him spraying models with champagne.
He bounces on his toes. “Can I come up? I came home to see you!” Excitement enriches his voice. He’s begging to tell me about his amazing day.
“Wait.” My sleepy brain clicks. “You came home from San Remo in the middle of the night to see me?”
“Duh! Now open the door!”
A stranger shouts from a window. “Zut alors! Let him in so we can sleep!”
A chain reaction of somersaults flips from my toes through my gut to my heart and up my throat. It bubbles out my mouth in a screech. He won the race, then came home to me. “I’m coming.”
I retreat into my room and, not bothering with shoes or real clothes, I run down the stairs in my PJs. I turn the knob, and he pushes through the door before I can open it. He hugs and kisses me.
“I won, Lia!” His lips mash over my face. “Can you believe it?” He loops his arms around my legs and brings me level with his face.
I brace my hands on his shoulders, and I kiss him back, soaking up his elation. I can barely breathe between kisses, and it’s lovely. He’s here. Traitorous giggles escape my mouth.
He came all this way, for me.
He palms my bottom, urges my legs around his hips and carries me up the stairs.
“Terrence, I’m heavy.” I cling to him like a monkey, squeezing his neck and hooking my ankles at his back.
“Never.” He rushes to the second floor, into my open apartment, and kicks the door closed behind him.
“You’re crazy.”
“I wanted to see you.” He dumps us on my bed.
I squeal, delighted. “Aren’t you supposed to be at parties?”
I can’t see his face in the dark, but he sounds impetuous. “I haven’t slept next to you in eleven days. I won their goddamn race, now I want you.”
It has been eleven nights. He’s been counting too. A smile stretches my mouth so wide my cheeks strain. “But how did you get here? Did you steal someone’s car?” My brain is still reviving from sleep, and I’m not certain this is real.
“Hopped on the train and ran from the station.”
“You ran here? After racing today?” The train station is over twenty blocks away, on the far side of the boulevard. He wins the longest one-day race of the season and then runs here.
He stills, gentling his fingers over my cheeks. “It wasn’t enough. Winning the race wasn’t enough.”
“But you were so happy on the podium. I thought—” I bite my tongue, ashamed now of what I thought and what I almost let Caroline convince me of—not just the girls, but the doping. All of it.
Terrence never lies.
“You thought what?”
“You were just—with the models and the girls.”
“It was all for show.” Air gushes from him, and he hugs me flush to his chest. “Lia.” The longing in his voice is thick and palpable. “How can I convince you?” He massages my nape. “After I won, I couldn’t shake this feeling. I looked everywhere, the trophies, the cameras, the team—all of it. I thought, there’s more, there’s something missing. Something I need so I can breathe!”
“What?”
“On my phone. After the interviews. Your picture. You climbed the Col d’Èze by yourself!”
“Yeah, but it wasn’t the top.”
“It’s as good as. The best
view point. The very top is in the trees and you can’t see anything.” He brushes my shoulders. “I wish I’d been there. I saw that picture of you and—”
“And?”
He cups my face. “It’s you, Lia. More than winning, it’s you. I think—” He rests his forehead on mine. “I’m in love with you.”
Oh my.
His kisses soothe me, a creamy meeting of lips, without the frenzy, a pure declaration. And I believe him.
He left the race, left behind the press, the sponsors, the parties thrown in his name—he skipped them all because he wanted me.
He rode the train in the middle of the night and showed up at my window, yelling my name.
He loves me.
A burn simmers in my belly and quakes through my limbs, vibrating and bubbling through my skin. There’s nowhere left for the burn to go, except through my hands and my mouth into him.
I turn him onto the bed and land on top of him. I tear at his shirt, wanting it gone. I want to touch him. I want us skin to skin.
My shirt and bra, I toss to the floor. Our bare chests meet, my nipples tickling on his skin. My tongue masters his mouth. I give it free will and pour into him all the burning inside me.
His pants, I tug at them, wanting them off.
“Wow, did I say the magic words?” He sits up.
“Yes.” It’s true, but it’s not just the words. It’s the actions that give his words meaning.
I can’t remember why I held off sex before. All I know is, I want him in me now more than I want my next breath.
I slide my pajama bottoms off, and I’m naked underneath. Though, in the dark, Terrence can’t see me. I pull his jeans down and take his boxers with them.
“Oh, hey. Okay,” he says.
I crawl on all fours over him. “Do you have a condom?”
His breath stops. Saying nothing, he reaches for the lamp and switches it on. The muted yellow glow makes us both squint in the brightness.
His lips part. “Lia, I—” He gulps; his gaze moves over my naked skin, my curves, my sexiest parts. He’s seen it all before but never all at once.
He schools his eyes to mine. “I didn’t come here for sex. I came home for you. You know that?”