Matchpoint

by Gus Ralthocco

  On the other side of the backstage area, minutes before they had to go in, Caio caught a glimpse of the prez talking with Adônis and Elton. To his eyes, there was something about their dynamic that seemed off, with Elton more on the sidelines of their conversation while the prez had Adônis close to his ear. But Caio knew better than to pay attention to them. He was aware of the kind of damage that could come from there.

  “You ready?” Diego asked him.

  “Yeah,” Caio said. He could see in Diego’s eyes that they were together in that moment. They could do anything they wanted to.

  Soon they were called onto the court, and sunlight beat down on them. It was early in the afternoon, but the stands were full, either because there was a French team playing after them or because the Brazilian crowd was eager to watch this game. There were a lot of Brazilian flags in the stands. Some of them had the hashtag #pato in the corner, so Caio knew what the fans were going to chant during the game.

  The support of so many people using rainbow-flag bandanas and stickers on their clothes was also something he’d seen more and more in the latest games. The crowd that followed them around always showed up with those colors.

  Caio had nothing to hide, but he knew many people still felt like they did, and that was unfair to them. He still remembered the interview he gave after his first medal at the Olympics, where they mentioned his sexuality. Other media outlets tried to come to him for more on the matter, but Caio didn’t want to make his sexual orientation integral to his career.

  It was integral to his life, of course, but inside the court he was an athlete before all else. Perhaps he should have been more approachable, to serve as an example, but he disliked that kind of attention. That was Diego’s job, and he was skilled at it. Diego didn’t shy away from answering his fans about most things.

  But results are impossible to control. Someone who shifts away from the crowd runs the risk of getting singled out, and everything that happens in their career is dissected. It doesn’t matter what heights they reach, to some it would never be enough. And with so much to think about during the competition, it was hard to deal with that kind of pressure.

  At times, Caio felt guilty for not being a better gay man. But he’d also never hid behind a veneer to protect himself, and he didn’t lie about who he was, though he understood why some people would. Adônis did it because he wanted to stay in the Fed’s good graces.

  He tried to leave all of that behind when he stepped onto the court, assumed his position on the sand, and waited for the referee to blow the whistle. When they did, the ball flew from the other side of the net toward Diego, who didn’t have any problem defending their court. He sent the ball to Caio, but the pass was high, and instead of working on the attack with another touch, Caio spiked the ball to the other side. The Italians were caught off guard, and the ball fell to the sand.

  “Yes!” Diego exclaimed beside him. That was a point for Brazil, and the crowd cheered loudly.

  Next it was his turn to serve, and Caio focused on the place he wanted the ball to go to. He hit it to the back of the court, where there was a slight opening because Palermo had stepped forward. The man recovered quickly and got the ball, but the team needed to work around the not-so-good receive, while Diego and Caio prepared for defense on their side of the net.

  “Go to the front!” Diego snapped an order, but Caio was already on it, sensing that he could block the ball when it was set so close to the net.

  He jumped high and extended his arms. When Palermo hit it, the ball found a wall and headed back to the other side of the court. Caio blocked it at a perpendicular angle and it missed both players from the Italian team as the ball dropped dead to the sand again.

  The force of that blow to his arms left them sore for a moment, but he was properly warmed up. The bruises would appear in a day or two, but Caio was used to them.

  “That was great!” Diego came his way to congratulate him on the point.

  The first chants started in the crowd. Pa-to! Pa-to!

  When he turned to the stands, Caio swore he saw a duck in one of those posters amid pictures of him and Diego. Pato means duck in Portuguese, and it seemed like his fans thought that was funny. And Caio had to agree.

  After those first two points, the Italians got into the game, which soon evolved into a master class in athletic performance. It must have been a pleasure to the people in the stands, whatever team they were cheering for, to see everyone on the sand playing at their best. Each rally left the crowd on the edge of their seats, every impossible ball brought back to the game prompted screams of surprise and joy, and the players laid their entire careers on the sand.

  On the points Caio and Diego lost, the other team won because they played brilliantly. Not even the perfect ball could get them the point every time. In exchange, when they managed to score or up the rhythm of the game to surprise their opponents with a different ball and make them scramble to save it, Caio knew they were worthy of being there.

  All the teams were strong, all of them wanted to do their best to get to the finals, but only three out of twenty-four would reach the podium. Caio and Diego stepped closer to that goal when they won the first set, but they didn’t have the time to commemorate the win. In the next set, the Italians went after them like mad dogs, more ruthless than they’d been in the beginning, just like Caio expected they would.

  But Caio knew he and Diego could also play better in the second half.

  “Pay attention to your left side,” he told Diego when they lost one of the balls, marking a point for the Italian team.

  “Okay.” Diego huffed out an annoyed breath at having cost them a point.

  They couldn’t give up after a lost rally or they’d get nowhere in the sand. But they could come back from that to get back on track and win again, which is what Caio led them to in the next rally for a point.

  The second set was more difficult than the first, not only from a physical standpoint but also technically, because the strategies of each team were changing all the time.

  Caio was exhausted at the end of the second set, and Diego was too, but they were in front of the Italians, defending a lead that could give them the win.

  They reached the match point after a hard fight, and Diego got the ball to serve.

  As he stepped to the back of the court, Caio watched him. The referee gave the signal to start, and Caio took a deep breath as he heard Diego hit the ball and made it fly over his head toward the other side. Instead of forcing the serve, Diego simply patted the ball with controlled strength and let the Italian team form their attack as Caio and Diego prepared for defense.

  When the ball came at them, Caio extended a hand toward the sideline because the trajectory of the ball was curved to the inside of the court. He sent it forward to the net, although still on their side. Diego rushed to get the ball into play again so Caio could spike it to the other side. His hit didn’t get a good angle, and the Italians managed to save the ball and come back with an attack.

  This time their spike came burning toward Diego, who touched the ball with his hands joined in a dig. But instead of sending up so Caio could work on their attack, the ball went backward and over his head. Caio watched the movement, and right as the ball started to roll to the back of the court, he ran after it and almost hit the publicity boards as he threw himself to the sand and caught the ball on his closed fist.

  “Got it!” he grunted.

  The ball barely got any height, but Diego was following him and managed to send it flying backward to the other side with a strong pass. He wasn’t looking at the court when he did, but he shot the ball hard to the back, aiming for the middle of the lines on the other side so they could come back and defend.

  As the ball rose into the sky, Caio got back on his feet. He saw Diego running back to the court and the guys from the Italian team waiting for the ball to come down. It might have been a trick of the sun, or maybe the wind picked up right then, but the two players exten
ded their hands to get the ball, only for it to fall out of their reach. It was right in the middle of their court, and neither of them touched it.

  The Italians lost the game right there.

  “Oh my God!” Diego screamed beside him as he fell to the sand in a heap. Caio felt his heart stuttering inside his chest while he tried to confirm that they had indeed won the game. The line judge pointed to the court, and that was a win.

  “We won!” He knelt beside Diego, who rose from the ground and swiftly put his arms around Caio. They met in an embrace that could last forever, for all they cared.

  The noise from the crowd was deafening, and Caio swore he could hear Marina and Alice as the people chanted “Brazil! Brazil!” There was nothing like the atmosphere of the Olympic Games.

  Caio sensed some drops of moisture fall to his neck, and when he pulled away from Diego he saw him crying with a smile on his face. It was a moment to let it all go, so that’s what he did—he leaned down to kiss Diego on his forehead.

  “I think I love y-this,” Diego said. Caio felt time slow down, but words didn’t come out of his mouth, so he got up and offered a hand to Diego.

  “Come on. We have to greet the other guys.”

  Diego didn’t seem surprised that he didn’t get an answer to his statement.

  The Italians were desolate when they met at the net, but it wasn’t always about winning, and this was not their time. Caio led the way to greet the referees, and then he lifted his hands to clap for the crowd and thank them for the support.

  As he reached the mixed zone a few minutes later, Caio had to breathe out a couple of times to release some of the tension.

  “Congratulations on making it to the semifinals. We’re going to see a match between the two Brazilian teams, so what can we expect from that game?” one of the reporters asked. Not far from Caio, Diego was also caught up in questions about their game.

  “I think you saw that we came here to fight,” Caio told the reporter. “This is not an easy competition, and everyone wants to get that Olympic medal. I want it more than anything.”

  “You already have a silver, so now are you gunning for gold?”

  Caio nodded. “We want to go as far as we can. I would love to get the gold,” Caio said as he looked to the side and watched Diego smile to another camera and answer questions with an expertise he didn’t have days ago. But maybe he’d finally found balance, and Caio hoped he had something to do with that. “But to me, the most important thing is making a competition we can be proud of. And so far, I have no regrets.”

  “Thanks, Caio. You can go rest now,” the reporter offered him a smile, and Caio dipped his head in acknowledgment.

  He walked to the tunnel that led away from the arena and waited as Diego finished his own interview. Caio looked toward the crowd and found Alice waving at him. He waved back, but then his eyes caught something else. A few rows above his daughter, the president of the Federation, a few officials, and Adônis were watching them. Elton was nowhere to be found.

  Their faces were unreadable, but in that moment, Caio knew who he was fighting against and how important their next game was. When the prez turned to him, Caio could see his animosity. He wasn’t there to support them, no.

  Adônis had poisoned the Federation against him, but you could never make prejudice fester in infertile ground. Adônis must have an ally.

  Chapter Fifteen

  DIEGO watched from far away as Caio and Alice walked around the park, she on his shoulders. A world of people had their eyes on them, but they didn’t notice, and a part of Diego was almost jealous of the way some of the women and men glanced at Caio. But Diego was the one who shared a bed with him.

  There were a lot of rumors circulating with their hashtag. Diego scrolled through the list of theories and montages of him and Caio and tried to contain his laughter when he saw an image of his and Caio’s head edited onto the bodies of two ducks. It was brilliant, and he had to share it on Twitter, even though it would make the creator of that meme an overnight sensation.

  He shared some more montages until his parents and Marina came back from the restrooms and Caio and Alice joined them in the shade.

  “So what are we going to do now?” Alice asked, looking around eagerly. Caio put a hand on her shoulder to bring her close to him, but he glanced at Diego.

  “I was thinking ice cream?” Marina suggested. The afternoon sun was hot and the air stifling.

  “Yes to ice cream!” Alice always wanted ice cream.

  “I could go for one too,” added Roberta as she swiped a hand across her forehead. “There’s this place not too far from here, where we went the other day. It’s tucked away from the main streets. I’m sure we can get a table away from the people.”

  Her suggestion came at the right time, because a few Brazilian fans approached them to ask for pictures. Though Caio and Diego were tired, they complied.

  Before more people found them, they decided to depart from the Champ de Mars. It was a good thing the arena had special parking for those with Olympic passes, but they had to wait while Diego’s parents got to their rental.

  If they stayed around the arena, there was another game for the Brazilian teams that afternoon—Ágata and Maria against the Americans. But Diego was glad for this moment of downtime, away from the competition. He could apologize later for not watching the girls.

  In Marina’s car, they followed Júlio and Roberta to a secluded side street just a few blocks away from the Eiffel Tower, and miraculously, there was parking available in a nearby alley. When Marina parked, Diego grabbed his and Caio’s bag, and Caio took Alice by the hand.

  Diego was looking around for the ice cream place when Caio slipped his hand into Diego’s. Their eyes met as Alice looked at them, but she said nothing. Diego wasn’t sure what his parents would think of that. He wondered what picture the three of them painted.

  His parents waved at him from the other side of the street. They were in front of an unassuming red door right next to a big window, and Diego could see a few tables inside. At the back was a counter with all the colors of ice cream in the world to choose from. It looked like it had been carved into the old buildings around it. The shop had probably been passed down through generations of the same family.

  “Let’s go in. The owner is Portuguese, but he has family in Porto Alegre,” said his mom as she opened the door, ignoring the fact that Diego and Caio were holding hands.

  As they entered the shop, Diego’s mom and the owner greeted each other like old friends and then began a chaotic introduction of everyone until the owner, Paulo Augusto, could get everyone’s name right.

  “Let’s get you guys served, but first you, little miss.” The man pointed at Alice, the first in line, and everyone followed her.

  They each chose their ice cream, and Diego eyed the offerings, but when he placed his order and went to pay for it, Caio stopped him with a hand.

  “I’ll get yours,” Caio said, and without waiting a beat, he added, “Actually, I’m paying for everyone today, so get your fill of ice cream. We don’t know when this is going to happen again.”

  Marina snorted at that, and Alice did a small dance right next to her father, even though she wasn’t going to be paying for herself either way.

  “Are you sure, Caio?” Roberta asked, and the owner of the shop glanced at Caio with an expectant look as he waited.

  “Of course. It’s my treat.” Caio searched his wallet for a credit card.

  Roberta found Diego with her eyes, and though she said nothing, her raised eyebrow contained a few dozen questions. Would this become a thing? Should they get used to Caio in their lives in that capacity now? And did they get everything between them resolved?

  Diego felt his cheeks warm as he answered those questions in his mind. Yes, yes and, probably, yes.

  With everyone served, Caio had to foot a bill that was far too expensive for what they were going to eat, although it was a special occasion. They moved to a ba
nquette close to the front window, and Diego went to the corner of the booth, soon to be joined by Caio and Alice. Diego’s parents and Marina sat on the other side.

  Caio rested one of his arms at the back of Diego’s neck, and once again, Roberta glanced at them with a few questions in her eyes. Júlio elbowed her gently in the stomach and neither of them said a thing.

  “This is good,” commented Marina with an appreciative hum. “Can’t believe we didn’t come here sooner.”

  “It’s not like we weren’t busy,” said Diego. “But then, it feels like we’ve been getting ready for this since forever, and now it’s almost time to go home.”

  Beside him Caio nodded. The Closing Ceremony was to be held on Sunday, and he hoped they’d have only good memories of the Olympics, because the beach volleyball final was on Saturday.

  Looking back, although Diego had breathed in the Olympic spirit these past days, he hadn’t had the chance to see much of the other competitions, he was so focused on his own. He’d gone to a few venues with Alice, Caio, and Marina, and he’d seen a bunch of different people at the village—athletes from all over the world—and found a kind of camaraderie with them. It was all part of the experience, and Diego wasn’t going to unpack it right then.

  Instead, he enjoyed the ice cream and the company. He had all the important people in his life right beside him.

  “So,” Roberta started, drawing the attention of the table, though her gaze found Diego. “Are you happy here? Now?”

  The way she looked at him reminded Diego of when he first started to play with Caio, after his move away from the indoor courts. He’d thought the inside of the gym was his home back then, but he had changed.

  “I am, Mom,” he said, looking at her. The words were sincere, almost too sincere, but he liked the shy smile on Caio’s lips, which he caught from the corner of his eye.

  Marina made a gesture of wiping the sweat from her forehead and sighed in relief. “That’s great, because your mom here had a real talk with me back when you teamed up.”