by Freya North
Cat’s eyes are trained on a large screen relaying pictures of the peloton live.
There’s Stefano and Carlos and Vasily, the maillot vert, the maillot à pois, the maillot jaune, riding amicably side by side just ahead of the bunch, chatting to the Tour’s director Jean Marie LeBlanc who’s handing them a glass of champagne from the window of his red Fiat. See them each have a celebratory if abstemious sip. In the 1960s, when the Tour passed through towns, the riders would leap from their bikes and rampage through bars, grabbing people’s drinks regardless of what they were, food from plates, anything that could be eaten or imbibed. It was an honour to have a Tour cyclist snatch your refreshments. The bar owners would then send the bills to the Tour organizers. Shit, but I’m going off on dreamy tangents to escape from the situation in hand. That He is here. Fuck, I’ve capitalized him. I’d rather watch the big screen though.
‘Cat?’
‘Um?’
‘I was on for a Hollywood-style reunion. I’m out here after all – hoping my gesture speaks a thousand words.’
‘What?’
No! Don’t step towards me. Don’t look at me longingly, lovingly. Don’t let me go back. Don’t make me. Don’t be the person who says ‘See! It was all a dream’.
‘Let’s give it another go.’
‘No!’
The vehemence of Cat’s response staggers both of them.
‘Are you shagging someone else, then?’ he asks, pulling himself upright and fixing her with the familiar look that can instantly make her shudder and shrink and her blood chill.
‘I have to work,’ she pleads.
I have to run! Go forwards to what I now know and believe in. Not tiptoe backwards.
‘Where are you staying?’
I can’t believe I’ve just told him. Walk away.
‘And you’re working there too?’
I can’t believe I’ve just nodded. Run.
‘I’ll come by later. We’ll talk. Try to sort things out. OK?’
And he’s going. And Cat is swaying on the spot, unable to keep tears at bay. She lets them fall but fixes her gaze on the large screen as if watching the beautiful sport of cycling is the sole provenance of her emotion.
‘Jesus!’ Alex exclaimed when Cat returned to the salle de pressé. ‘You told us you’d be emotional but you didn’t warn us what it would do to your face.’
Josh tipped his head and regarded her. ‘There aren’t even any cyclists on the Champs-Elysées yet,’ he reasoned, instinctively sensing that Cat was in some kind of torment. ‘See, they’re arriving just now. Cool! Chris Boardman is off the front.’ Cat stared at the screen, lips aquiver, whilst her two colleagues observed her and winced at their impotence to do absolutely anything about her tangible distress. Josh knew that if he put out the supportive hand he so wanted to, Cat would possibly fall to pieces.
‘Have you seen that thing down the corridor?’ he asked instead, manipulatively ambiguous, voice easy. She shook her head a little more slowly than her body was shaking.
‘You must see it, come on, I’ll take you there.’
Obediently, Cat followed Josh. Tactfully, Alex stayed put and stared witheringly at any of the press men daring to stare.
Josh walked ahead of her before stopping just after the corridor turned a corner. He gave thanks for the fact that no one was around. He faced her, his head tipped gently to one side. His eyes implored her to trust him. And how she did. Josh Piper. Her colleague. Her friend. This time tomorrow he’d be on the opposite side of London to her.
‘Josh,’ she croaked.
‘There there,’ Josh soothed, having chosen those precise words with utmost care, ‘what’s up?’
‘What am I going to do,’ she whispered, ‘without you, without all of this?’
‘You’ll have it again in Spain,’ Josh encouraged, ‘at the Vuelta.’
‘But I haven’t heard from Maillot,’ Cat said, knowing that she was straying away from confiding the true reason for her distress. She sniffed and snorted, gave a little cough and dabbed her tongue against the mix of tears and snot forming a viscous moustache. Josh tucked her hair behind her ear, a touching gesture which made her feel safe. ‘It’s not Maillot,’ she said very slowly, ‘it’s Him.’
‘Who?’ Josh asked, because why ever would he consider that Cat’s ex-boyfriend, from whom she’d come to the Tour hoping to recuperate, from whom she truly thought she had moved on, was currently in Paris and intruding into the depths of her being, jeopardizing the confidence and security she had recently found.
‘Who No Longer Exists,’ Cat said quietly, ‘Him.’
Josh faltered, this was not what he was expecting and he felt rather ill-equipped to help. ‘Jesus,’ he said, ‘what does he want?’
‘Me,’ Cat shrugged.
All Josh really knew about the man was that he had hurt Cat very deeply. ‘How do you feel?’ he asked measuredly.
‘Bewildered,’ Cat defined.
Josh regarded her. Much as he liked Ben, he knew what he had to ask next. ‘Do you want him?’
After a loaded pause, Cat shoot her head slowly. ‘No,’ she said, ‘but he’s here and he’s an obstruction.’
Josh frowned.
‘He’s a horrible symbol of very unhappy times, and a harbinger of back home,’ she continued. ‘Though the last few months were terrible – communication was impossible – and the final throes were quite vicious, I had five years with him and did love him very much.’ She looked out of the window. Paris. A little overcast. They’ll be on the Champs-Elysées now.
‘Still?’ Josh asked.
‘Once,’ Cat replied. She was speaking clearly if softly. ‘Eventually, the reason for us to be together, all the elements that once were so loved, were simply no longer known. I was wrong for him. He was increasingly mean to me. I was clinging to all that had been and, in an ideal world, all that we’d hoped for. He wanted out. I was so low I was convinced an unhappy life with him was preferable to all the uncertainties I’d face in a life on my own.’
‘Your self-esteem was decimated,’ Josh said.
Cat snorted. Then she was still. Finally she nodded. ‘When someone scolds you enough, you end up believing it.’
‘And yet you’re confused now you’ve seen him again?’
Cat shrugged. ‘He’s come to find me. There were good times.’
‘Do you love him still?’
‘I love still the idea of it all.’
‘Ben?’ Josh asked, a tiny thought zipping into his mind that poor Ben might have been but rebound fodder.
‘I am in love with Ben,’ Cat declared. ‘For me, he symbolizes everything that my future should be about. Through him, I got my bounce back.’ She sighed. ‘It’s just my past isn’t merely haunting me today, it has thrust itself across the path of my journey forward.’
Her eyes darted and she reached for Josh’s shirt, giving it an absent-minded tug. ‘My strength feels sapped,’ she said, ‘my mind is in a knot.’
‘Don’t let him do this to you,’ Josh said fairly sternly, pressing for a lift which he didn’t want, ‘you owe it to yourself. And us.’
Cat nodded for Josh while her brow twitched for herself. ‘Ben?’ she whispered. ‘Ought I to pull back now?’
‘Pull back?’ Josh said, amazed. ‘From Ben? Why would you want to do that?’
‘I have to meet him tonight,’ Cat said, oily tears smudging her eyes.
‘Ben?’
‘No. Him.’
A lift arrived, its doors sweeping open, and Josh and Cat automatically entered.
‘Not pulling back carries great risks,’ Cat explained whilst Josh selected the fifteenth floor for some unknown but uncontested reason. ‘If I don’t pull out,’ Cat said softly but lucidly, ‘I lay myself bare to even the possibility of future hurt. That, for me, is reason enough.’
‘Cat McCabe,’ said Josh, leaning against the wall of the lift, ‘you are way too strong to be so appallingly feeble. Don’t pull out.
I don’t want you to. It would be very, very wrong. Ben is a lovely guy and he adores you. You would jeopardize so much if you don’t go for it.’ He watched her concentrating on the buttons of the floors, could sense that she was fighting tears. ‘What exactly would you achieve?’ Josh posed. Cat gave him no answer so he gave her the only one possible. ‘Big bloody deal,’ he said, ‘that on your deathbed, aged ninety-seven or whatever, you could concede that you made it through the rest of your life never having been hurt again.’ He gave her a gentle punch on the shoulder. ‘You have too much to give – and with your generosity, your great propensity for friendship and love, it’s inevitable that you draw people to you and that you’ll receive back what you provide.’
The lift arrived at the requested floor. Josh and Cat stood stationary, regarding the corridor on view. The doors closed by themselves, as if misuse was an occupational hazard. Cat sucked her bottom lip thoughtfully and then pressed for the floor from which they’d come. She looked at Josh a little bashfully.
‘I know,’ she whispered, ‘I wouldn’t feel vulnerable if I wasn’t involved. The fact that I’m involved, unequivocally, is alternately exhilarating and absolutely terrifying. Ben will be so far away. Missing him is going to hurt.’
‘Well,’ Josh said measuredly, ‘I can’t see your dilemma. Someone in love with you but far away. Someone who was mean to you but is near by.’
‘Near by?’ Cat whispered. ‘He’s in fucking Paris.’ Alarm criss-crossed her face. ‘Today. He wants me this evening.’
‘Fuck him,’ said Josh, ushering her out of the lift lest they should find themselves next stop in the bowels of the hotel via the lift with a mind of its own. ‘You’re coming out with us,’ Josh ordered, ‘it’s our last night too. Do you think we’re happy about having to let you go? About the end of a phenomenal three weeks? Another memorable Tour de France?’
‘I have to feel good about my past if I’m to greet the future,’ Cat said, ‘maybe I need closure.’
‘You sound like Oprah fucking Winfrey,’ Josh said.
‘Of course I’d rather he wasn’t here,’ Cat said, just before they arrived at the salle de pressé, ‘but he is and I’m having to deal with it. There must be a reason. I don’t know what. I’m terrified about seeing him tonight. But I have to. Will I be OK?’
‘If you’re not, there’s a posse of us who will gladly deck the bastard,’ Josh said. His triteness, blended with affection, making Cat smile at last. ‘Now, journaliste McCabe, you have your final report to write. Here – blow.’ Josh held out a handkerchief and dutifully, Cat blew her nose sonorously into it. Unflinchingly, Josh tucked it, sodden, back into his pocket. He had loads of washing to take home tomorrow as it was. And anyway, it’s one friend’s duty to wipe away the tears of another.
Rachel McEwen was at the team vehicles in the Place de la Concorde, using half her brain to double-check she had plenty of everything whilst using the other half to make lists of items to audit, order and pack in the coming weeks of racing. She was aware that someone stood near by, watching her, but she was used to this and presumed it to be a fan hopeful of a free baseball cap or bidon. When her name was breathed huskily, with the ‘R’ rolled around leisurely at the back of the throat, the ‘1’ licked from tongue to teeth, she knew instinctively to whom the voice belonged.
‘Monsieur Le Grand,’ she said courteously, ‘ça va?’
‘Bien. Jules – please,’ he replied, swiping away the sides of his jacket as he slipped his hands into his trouser pockets. ‘I have something for you, Rachel,’ he said with great mystery, savouring her name on his tongue as if it was an oyster. From one pocket, he brought out a small package and gave it to Rachel, coming close within her personal space and changing the air around her from heavy with embrocation to scented with an inordinate amount of Gucci aftershave.
‘For me?’ Rachel asked, wondering what and why.
‘Open,’ he commanded, his eyes fixed on the package, ‘please.’
His gift, rather predictably, was Chanel Eau de Parfum. An ostentatiously large bottle. ‘Call it a bribe,’ he shrugged, ‘but I want you to come and work for me, for Système Vipère. I make you this offer because I respect you as a soigneur. I give you this gift because I respect you as a woman.’
Och, what a load of tosh, Rachel thought to herself whilst smiling sweetly out loud, wait till I tell Cat.
‘Jules,’ she said, ‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘Shh,’ he said on the verge of seductively placing his index finger against Rachel’s lips, which parted flabbergasted whilst her eyes danced in disbelief. ‘Just consider it.’
With that he was gone. But he’d been gone from the Système Vipère vehicles long enough for the Zucca directeur and chief mechanic to have paid a visit to André Ferrette. They did not flatter him with expensive scent or guttural overtones. They merely reasoned that, as he and their soigneur were now an item, wouldn’t it be great for everyone concerned if he came over to work for Zucca MV?
The last laps of the Champs-Elysées. The last minutes of the race. The closing metres of the Tour de France. The peloton stream around the circuit wowing the crowds. The pace is fast and during the laps opportunists regularly pelt off the front, driving the crowds wild in the process. Though the likelihood of a Stage win by such riders, from so far out, is minuscule, the attention they attract curries great favour with their sponsors too, most of them ensconced in VIP enclosures.
With three laps to go, Hunter Dean from US Megapac pumps away from the bunch not just to taste glory and do his sponsor proud, but to savour precisely where he is and where he has been and just what he has achieved to be here, on heaven’s cobbled paving of the Champs-Elysées, ahead of the peloton of the Tour de France. Three weeks ago, the crowds at Delaunay Le Beau had sent him on his way; a superfit rider with a golden tan, hope in his legs and a goal in his soul. The crowds in Paris welcome him home; a rider unfathomably fit, his face thinner, his limbs more sinewy, lighter by a fair few kilos, intensely bronzed if slightly grimy from the city streets. The hope in his legs and the goal in his soul have been tested to the limit but the self-belief that continues to pump through his system with every beat of his heart is what ultimately has brought him here. As he cycles in front of the bunch, he wants to cry. He can’t wait to be on his knees, kissing the cobbles; an image he has called upon frequently over the past three weeks when his body threatened to give up and his mind said no way, no more, I can’t. You can, Hunter, you did.
If L’Alpe D’Huez is mecca for the grimpeurs, the climbers, then the Champs-Elysées is the equivalent for the sprinters. Consequently, Carlos Jesu Velasquez rides along safe in the centre of the bunch, hissing and clicking in the polka dot jersey. Massimo Lipari rides nearby, bolstered by the fact that he is as much a hero for being vanquished as he would be were he wearing polka dots. There will be many people waiting for him at home, there will be a party in the local bar where the world will be put to rights and the Tour de France rerun to the outcome they would have preferred. And there will be plenty of signorine to soothe him, who will be desperate to stroke his ego and caress his brave body. A woman at the start this morning had touched his shaved chin and made wonderful innuendos about bare cheeks.
Into the penultimate lap, the sprinters’ teams start to organize themselves. Stefano Sassetta seeks out Jesper Lomers and cycles silently alongside him. The riders regard each other. Jesper nods. Stefano nods too. Then Jesper’s congenial smile is countered by Stefano’s huge and affable grin. The Dutchman congratulates the Italian maillot vert.
‘Next year I have to fight hard, hey? To keep it?’ Stefano says reverentially, whistling and shaking his head at the prophesied effort of it all again.
‘He wins it who deserves it,’ Jesper replies with equanimity.
Stefano nods and places his hand between Jesper’s shoulder blades. ‘I may have the green jersey,’ he says, ‘but if you are crowned the most beautiful thighs of the peloton again, I will fucking
kill you!’
Jesper laughs. He loves all this. The camaraderie. This family. This burgeoning sense of euphoria and relief that has been earned tenfold from the effort of the last three weeks. ‘Let’s race,’ he says, allowing his lead-out men to guide him through the bunch.
Vasily Jawlensky and Fabian Ducasse ride side by side in truce and mutual respect. Vasily is about to win the Tour de France by a paltry 31 seconds. He ensures Fabian rides a wheel ahead, that he rides a pedal turn behind. Fabian accepts the gesture with good grace. They don’t fight for the final line, they cross it together, a photofinish of the two greatest professional road-race cyclists in the world. Their soigneurs are soon upon them, skipping wet flannels up and down their bodies, but the two men just want to hug each other silently right there in the centre of the media scrum; regardless of how this impedes their soigneurs’ jobs, blind to the barrage of photographers, deaf to the presse firing questions in various languages. Vasily Jawlensky has won the Tour de France, having cycled 3,761.8 kilometres in twenty days, in 91 hours 27 minutes and 44 seconds. Fabian Ducasse took a second over half a minute longer. The Lantern Rouge of the Tour cycled for an extra 3 hours 2 minutes and 39 seconds.
Did Cat cry when Stuart O’Grady took the final Stage win just ahead of Stefano Sassetta and Robbie McEwen? Did she cry when Vasily and Stefano and Carlos Jesu took to the podium? Did she cry when the riders cycled in their teams a final lap of honour? Did she cry when the TV monitors in the salle de pressé were dismantled for the last time? Did she cry when she was handed the final sheets of race results? Did she cry when she placed the last full stop at the end of her final report for the Guardian? What do you think?
She’s dried her eyes, washed her face and donned sunglasses for the sake of anyone who might catch a fright when catching sight of her. She goes to the foyer to check on Ben’s room number. She doesn’t need to. He’s there and, joy of joy, so is Luca.
‘The Babe!’ Luca proclaims, looking far odder for his jeans, trainers and denim shirt than he does for having his arm in a sling.
