by Robin Lovett
Italy for three weeks. With him. Italia. He’s inviting me to travel with him. It’s all I’ve wanted for weeks. “How’d you know?”
“Know what?”
“That I wanted to go to Italy with you?”
He holds my hand. “I’m still forgiving myself for leaving you when I went to Milan last week. I wish I could give us time together that’s not a bike race.” He massages my palm. “Maybe in the fall after the racing season ends we can take a real vacation together.”
It’s the first time he’s mentioned us in a long-term plan, beyond our weeks here. The fall is months away. He’s still seeing us together then. Contentment releases tight places in my chest I didn’t know were blocked.
But the practical side of this plan is impossible. “I could never afford to go to Italy. I’m living off of you for food as it is.”
“You could be a soigneur. Work for the team. They’ll pay for your hotel. You’ll even get a paycheck.”
“A job?”
“Yes.”
“What would I do? You’ll be racing.”
“Regular team errands like prep lunches. I need your help with the press.”
I saw a replay of his interview after he won San Remo. He cheered, crying out to his teammates so many times he didn’t answer a single question. He does need help with that.
“You focus me,” he says. “You ground me. Having you find this stuff.” He nods at the bag of syringes. “I know you’re mad, and I wish you didn’t have to know about it, but I feel better. Having you with me, knowing I can talk to you—” He kisses my forehead. “I love you.”
It’s the first time he’s said it during daylight. We’ve both said it at night, but hearing him say it outside of the bedroom affects me more.
He says, “This racing stuff—it’s getting harder. After San Remo, when all I could think about was getting back to you…I’m having trouble imagining going to these races without you.”
I want to be with him. I can make money doing it. “I’ve never been to Italy.”
A smile lights his eyes. “I know. And I want to show it to you. The race goes through the most beautiful things. The coast, the mountains. The people, the food. Even if you don’t come for me, come to see it. You’ll love it.”
I want to be excited, to leap and accept him with no hesitation, but there are other things. “My parents. I have to get a job at the hospital at home. I can’t put it off anymore.” The idea sounds like the worst sort of torture. After living in paradise with him, I don’t know how I’ll survive working in a hospital full-time.
“A hospital? Why?”
I tell him what I’ve avoided telling him. “I’m supposed to be applying to medical school.”
“Medical school?”
“I was pre-med in college.”
“I thought you were a French person, student, studier, whatever.” The confusion marring his brow drifts to his eyes, and he looks at me like he’s never seen me before.
“My parents expect me to be a doctor.” I rush the words, trying to explain.
“Oh.” His head droops. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“Because I hate talking about it. I think about it as little as possible.”
“You didn’t tell me because I’m too stupid to understand.”
I gag on my tongue. “Ng—no. That’s not—Terrence, I would never—”
“I thought I knew you.”
“You do know me. This is something my parents want. It’s not me. It has nothing to do with me.”
“Fuck your parents. You’re an adult. They can’t make you go to medical school. What about you? I thought you wanted to get a Ph.D. in French literature.”
I love that he values my dreams. I wish my family felt the same. “You don’t understand. My parents left the Philippines so that I could have a good education and get a good job.”
“You’re right, I don’t understand. How is being a French teacher not a good job?”
“They expect me to make lots of money. I can’t do that teaching French. I can’t disappoint them. They’re my family. It doesn’t matter how much I want something else. I can’t ruin their dreams like that. They gave up their whole lives so I could have this chance.”
The dread of going to med school fills my veins like tar, but my need to please them is far stronger.
And there’s the Fulbright part. “It’s a condition of my assistantship. I have to go home after it’s over.”
He shakes his head. “I thought you’d changed. I thought you’d learned to do things you want to do, not what other people expect you to do.” He turns away from me. “It’s three weeks, Lia. You can still go to med school after.”
The way he leaves the kitchen, I feel like I’ve rejected him. Choosing to go home instead of going to Italy with him—I’m giving up on us.
I’ve known him for less than two months. I can’t defy a lifetime of my parents’ dreams for him.
He’s right. I’ve learned so much about who I am and what I want. Fitting the new me into the expectations of my parents will be like shoving a square peg in a round hole. I won’t fit anymore. And if I try, it’ll require painful re-shaping.
I don’t know how to handle this: go to Italy or not, defy my parents or not, leave Terrence or not.
I do the one thing that helps—I go for a ride.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Saying goodbye to my students, during my final week of teaching, is harder than I expect. As hard as this experience has been for me, I thought I’d be relieved to tell them goodbye; but I give them a final survey for the class, and some of their comments move me. One says she’s grateful to me for pushing her to learn more, even though it was hard work. Another says he liked the fun unit on pop culture. And one said she liked knowing more about the assumptions we make about people based on looks.
Despite everything, I like teaching. I might like it more teaching French in my own country. Whether I get a Ph.D. or not, being a French teacher would be a great job.
Too bad my parents don’t agree.
I go through my nightly ritual, digging through my stack of books under Terrence’s bed, trying to decide what to read. He’s asleep. Once I find a book, I’ll snuggle beside him. Then he’ll lay his head on my shoulder, and I’ll read until I fall asleep with him.
I don’t want this to be over. I want this new ritual for more than nine days. Longer than three weeks in Italy. I want it forever.
I checked on my Fulbright status. My visa ends in thirty days.
But on my bike ride I thought, even if I do go with him to Italy, I’ll still have to go home without him. He’ll go on racing in Europe. It would only prolong the inevitable.
Behind my stack of romantique novels, I knock over Terrence’s mountain of cycling magazines. They spill in a river of glossy paper onto the floor, and I groan, piling them up again. But my thumb hits a book.
A thick hardcover, a veritable tome with a dusty, tattered brown jacket. I pick it up and run my fingers over the faded title.
Proust. Remembrance of Things Past.
Weird.
I haven’t picked up this book in weeks. Mine’s back in my apartment with sticky notes in it. This is a different, much older edition, very worn, very used. And it’s in English. I didn’t put this here.
“Terrence?” I whisper.
“Mmm?” He doesn’t open his eyes.
“What’s this?” I hold up the book.
His eyes flutter open, and a tired laugh bubbles up his throat. “I bought it a while ago,” he mutters sleepily. “Thought I’d try to see what you liked about it.”
I open the cover, and the dusty smell that only comes from a used bookstore emanates off the pages. “Where did you get this? You couldn’t have found an English translation here in Nice.”
He yawns. “I found a us
ed bookstore in Paris on the way to a race.”
He went searching for this. Terrence, my cyclist, bought Proust.
I whisper, “You read this for me?”
He rolls toward me. “I wouldn’t say I read it, but I paged through it some. Enough to know I’m nothing like that guy you admire so much.” He’s got that vulnerable expression again, the insecure one. “I’m sorry I pushed you about medical school. I don’t want you to forget about your dreams. But being a doctor is a great thing. You can do anything, Lia, and you’ll be really good at it.”
He doesn’t say it, but I hear it in his voice. He thinks he’s good for one thing: cycling. He doesn’t think a girl who can be a doctor wants anything to do with him.
He twists his fingers in the bed sheets. “I told you before we started this thing between us.”
“What?”
“When you go home, we’ll be over.” He shrugs like it’s no big deal, but the corners of his mouth quiver. “Don’t worry about the Italy thing.”
“No.” I kiss his hand. “Going to Italy is exactly what I want. And you knew it. You see me better than anyone has ever seen me. You know me, want to know me, and have known me better—better than I’ve known myself sometimes.”
He kisses my hand back. “You’re worth knowing. I won’t forget it.” He bites his lip and takes a deep breath. “You. I won’t forget you.”
I kiss him. And kiss him. And kiss him. “This time with you has been so—I—I don’t want to leave you. I don’t want to go home.”
He rests his forehead against mine and whispers, “Then don’t.” His voice twists in anguish.
“But even if I go with you to Italy, what happens after? I’ll still have to go home. You’ll still be here in Europe.”
He lifts his head. “I have to be at the US championships after the Giro. I could come visit you.” The excitement in his face is a naïve denial. I know it. He knows it.
“But how long is that for? A week at most. You’re back in Europe for the rest of the racing season.”
He sits up and clasps my hands. “Lots of couples make this work. American pros in Europe have wives and families at home. We could—” He scratches his head and looks away, nervous. “I’m not saying we get married or anything, but you could join me for the Tour de France in July. I know you’d love to spend three weeks travelling through France.”
“I’m not allowed back to France for two years after I’m done here.”
“That’s stupid.”
“It’s an ambassador thing. I’m supposed to go home and share what I’ve learned about French culture with the community.”
“Well…in the fall. Maybe I can come train in the States, be near you for a couple of months.”
“I’ll distract you from your racing. You don’t want that.”
“I don’t?” His face scrunches like I’ve said the most confusing thing he’s ever heard. “Racing isn’t living. You balance me. You focus me. I think clearer when you’re around. I race better with you around.”
“No, you don’t.” He’s only won two races.
“Okay, maybe not race better, but without you, my life is nothing but racing.” He hugs me and whispers in my hair. “Don’t go, Lia. You turn my world.”
I sigh and melt. My romantic cyclist. My poetic American jock. He’s right, I’m an adult. I don’t want to spend my summer at home working in a hospital. My parents will be angry, but they can’t kidnap me. I’d be making a paycheck, working for Terrence’s team.
“Don’t worry about the rest right now,” he says. “Let’s just do Italy. I’ll visit you at the end of May, and we’ll go from there.”
I don’t need to overanalyze this, to plan it all and make it perfect. I want to be with him. He wants to be with me. We’ll find a way.
“This isn’t a one shot, no returns deal,” he says. “You change your mind anytime and go home. And go to medical school, or teach, or whatever.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?” He pulls back and holds my shoulders.
A smile creeps across my mouth and spreads to his. “Okay, I’ll come to Italy with you.”
“Ha, ha!” He laughs and pulls me to him, tumbling us onto the bed. He rains kisses on my face. “Viva Italia! With my Lia. You’ll love it there. I promise.”
I kiss his nose and trace his lips. “Italy will be great, but being with you will be better. You know why?”
“Why?”
“You turn my world too.”
Epilogue
Terrence
She’s coming with me. Why?
I won’t question it.
A hole in my heart craves her—a hole that’s never craved anything before. She’s filled it…and I never thought…
She’s a whole world to me, and I can never leave her.
I’ll take her to Italy. Show her wonders she’s never seen. I can give her that. I have the money to give her everything she wants. She doesn’t have to be a doctor if she doesn’t want. Everything she needs is with me.
Or I want it to be.
It isn’t. She has things—loves things that I can never have. Intelligence and words that are foreign to me, and I can’t give her in my pathetic excuses to keep her.
But I am more man than she has ever had. I can teach her what she needs and give her what she desires, even the desires she can’t admit she has.
This season of racing will be mine. Every trophy, every title, and once I’m on top, she won’t care. She won’t leave me like Caroline left Gary.
Once I’ve won it all, she’ll understand why I lied to her.
About the Author
Robin Lovett loves writing romance to avoid the more unsavory things in life, like housework and day jobs. She frequently writes with her cat in her lap, while overdosing on mochas to feed her chocolate and coffee addictions.
When not writing or reading, you can find her cycling with her husband or obsessing over the sport of professional cycling, including the spandex.
You can also find her on Twitter @LovettRomance, and on her website: www.romancelovett.com.
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
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Racing to You
Copyright © 2016 by Robin Lovett
ISBN: 978-1-61923-541-0
Edited by Laura Elliott
Cover by Syd Gill Designs
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: July 2016