Going for Gold

by Ivy Smoak

  Oh my God. I laughed out loud. I shook my head and looked across the court. There was no way Gabriela fucking Santos was beating me again.

  And she didn't. We won the first game by three points, despite the fact that the refs were making awful calls. Coach Hammond's face was bright red from yelling so much.

  As we switched sides, Gabriela walked by me. "Looks like your boyfriend's here," she said with a huge smile on her face.

  Again, I couldn't think of anything witty to say to her. We had just beat her in the first game, and she was still the one crawling under my skin. Was she trying to have sex with Bryce too or something? I looked up at the stands to see what Bryce was doing. Instead, I saw Chris taking a seat a few rows in front of Bryce. He was wearing a Team Brazil T-shirt. He had a bouquet of flowers in his hand, like he already knew Gabriela was going to win.

  Are you fucking kidding me? Traitor!

  My first serve of the game went right into the net. The rest of the game wasn't much better. None of my bumps seemed to hit the mark. And every single one of Kristen's spikes went right at Gabriela's face. The only problem was that Gabriela was good, and all she had to do was take one step back and bump it perfectly to their setter.

  "That was in!" Coach Hammond yelled at one of the refs. "Do you need fucking glasses?!"

  We lost by 10 points.

  "What the hell was that?" Coach Hammond said as we made our way off the court. "I knew practicing for that stupid tiebreaker would throw you two off your game," she said, directly at me and Kristen. "And if you two would get your heads in the game, you wouldn't even need the tiebreaker. Focus on the game. All of you!"

  I had never seen her this upset before. I ran back onto the court. Coach Hammond's wrath was enough to make me focus. It was exactly what I needed. Gabriela and Chris were both awful people. Who cared what they did together? I liked Bryce. I really liked Bryce. I took a deep breath. And I needed this money. I needed to win gold. Coach Hammond was right. Now my head was officially in the game.

  But even with me playing better, it didn't seem to matter. It was almost like the game was rigged. The line judges were blowing easy calls, all in Brazil's favor.

  "It was like a foot in!" Nina yelled after her serve was called out. "What are you talking about?"

  The ref lifted out a yellow card from his pocket.

  "This is such bullshit," she mumbled. The ref gave her a warning look. One more wrong move and she'd be ejected from the game.

  We started hitting all our shots directly into the middle of the court to avoid bad calls. And eventually we got up by two points to win the third game. We were leading the match, two games to one.

  I took a huge sip of water. All we needed to do was win one more game. Then gold was ours. Coach Hammond was having a heated discussion with the refs instead of lecturing us. Which probably meant she thought they deserved her wrath more than we did.

  I closed my eyes for a second and just listened to the crowd. This might be the last volleyball game I ever played. At least at this level. I wasn't sure I could ever give it up completely. The crowd's excitement was electric. It revved me up even more. We're going to win.

  The ref blew the whistle and I ran back onto the court.

  "Ow!"

  I snapped my head around. Jess, our inside hitter was on the ground holding her elbow.

  Coach Hammond was already kneeling next to her. "They spilled water over here!" she screamed, pointing at the other side of the court.

  The coach from Brazil walked over and put her hand on her hip. "None of my girls did that."

  The closest ref came over to evaluate the situation. "One of your own players could have spilled that," he said.

  Meanwhile, Jess started sobbing. She was clearly in a lot of pain. An athletic trainer knelt down next to her. Jess winced when she lifted her arm.

  "This is a delay of game," the ref said.

  What the hell? One of our best players had just gotten hurt. And maybe sabotaged. And we were the ones delaying the game?

  Coach Hammond shook her head. "Fine." She motioned for Jess's backup to get on the court. Unfortunately Jess's backup wasn't nearly as good. All of us seemed a little shaken. I was still probably the most off my game. The game was close again, but this time Brazil pulled off the win.

  I shook my head as I walked off the court. We were tied two to two. It all came down to one last game.

  "Girls," Coach Hammond said. "You all know what this game means. It's not just a gold for you. It's a gold for Team USA. It brings us out on top. And we are not the ones that are going to lose bragging rights for the USA. Not on my watch. The refs clearly favor Brazil. So we hit every ball toward the center. Do it for Jess. Do it for yourselves. Do it for whoever you want, just get it done."

  We all nodded and put our hands in. "Team USA!" we yelled at the top our lungs. I ran back onto the court.

  The cheers from the crowd reverberated through me. My heart seemed to beat to the rhythm of the cheers. I looked up at Bryce in the stands. He was on his feet waving his sign in the air, cheering. I smiled and got ready for the first serve.

  Bump, set, spike...perfection. After several minutes, we were up by three points. I looked over at Gabriela and smiled, hopefully mimicking that fake smile that she always gave me.

  She locked eyes with me and smiled back. And then she winked at me.

  Why the fuck is she winking at me? She's just messing with me. She's just trying to get in my head.

  I dove and missed my next dig. Fuck.

  The next play, I was able to get it to the setter. Nina spiked the ball from behind the middle of the net, perfectly toward the back corner. It skimmed the Brazilian player's arm before landing outside the lines.

  Kristen high-fived Nina.

  The ref pulled his arms to his shoulders, signaling that the ball was out.

  "Come on!" Nina yelled and tapped her right hand against her left wrist. "She touched it! It only went out because she touched it!" She pointed toward the player who had clearly touched it. The girl shrugged her shoulders innocently.

  The ref pulled out his red card and blew the whistle.

  "This is bullshit!" Nina yelled. "Coach, do something!"

  But there was nothing that Coach Hammond could do. She called for a time out. "I told you to hit it toward the center!" she yelled at Nina.

  "It was a perfect shot, and you know it." Nina grabbed her water bottle off the bench. "This game is fucking rigged!" Nina shouted. She was quickly escorted back to the locker room.

  Is was one thing to lose Jess, but Nina was our best server and it was her turn to serve next. Which meant a backup was going to take her place. Nina would have brought us the rest of the way. She would have served us to victory.

  "Kelsey, get over here," Coach Hammond said. Kelsey got off the bench. "You're taking Nina's place."

  "But I'm not a middle hitter."

  "Yeah, but you're the best backup server we have."

  "But I play in the back row." She looked so nervous.

  "You'll be fine."

  Except it wasn't fine. I ended up having to dig twice as many balls without Nina there to help block at the net. But eventually we got the ball back.

  Kelsey's first serve went straight into the net.

  "It's okay." I gave her a high five anyway. I needed to help calm her jitters or we were going to lose this thing. Besides, I had lost a serve in one of the games today too.

  I didn't even realize that it was Gabriela's turn to serve. I took a deep breath. We just needed to get the ball back and tie it up again. I bumped the ball almost perfectly to our setter, but Jess's backup spiked it out of bounds.

  Shit. Gabriela served the ball again. I stepped to the left, but stopped. It was going out.

  The ref put his hands forward, signaling that the ball was in.

  "What the hell?!" Coach Hammond screamed "That was out!"

  Luckily she was the one yelling. I bit my tongue. The last thing I needed was to
be ejected. I glanced up at the scoreboard. I hadn't realized that Brazil was one point away from winning. I swallowed hard. You got this.

  Gabriela served the ball and time seemed to slow. If Jess had still been in, she would have stepped back and gotten the ball. But her backup stayed glued to the next.

  No. I dove forward, my stomach sliding against the floor. The ball landed an inch in front of my hand.

  The crowd erupted in cheers. For Brazil.

  Everything suddenly felt cold. I tried to stand up, but my legs gave out. I collapsed on the court, tears streaming down my cheeks. I lost. It was my fault that we lost.

  I heard Coach Hammond throw her clipboard on the floor. I felt Kristen wrap her arms around me. She was sobbing almost as loudly as me.

  The roar of the crowd was suddenly deafening. Everyone seemed to be cheering for their home team. The sound echoed around in my head.

  This is all my fault.

  The next thing I knew, our whole team was standing on the podium, getting our silver medals. But I couldn't seem to stop crying. I didn't want silver. Silver wasn't enough money for the bakery. Silver wasn't enough to beat Gabriela. Silver wasn't good enough. It wasn't gold.

  They started playing the Brazilian national anthem. The medal was heavy around my neck. I felt like I couldn't breathe. I needed to get out of there.

  Seeing Gabriela on the gold medal podium just made it worse. She towered above me. She was always towering above me.

  As soon as the music stopped, Gabriela jumped down to the silver podium and gave me an apologetic hug. "How does it feel to always come in second place?" she whispered.

  I just stood there, frozen, thinking about how badly I wanted to punch Gabriela in the face.

  "I'm guessing not good?" she continued. "I wouldn't really know. I'll have to take your word for it. I've never lost something so important before." She let go of me, winked, and turned back to her teammates.

  My throat felt dry. I wanted to have some great comeback, but I didn't have anything to say. It was worse than not good. It felt awful. It felt like I was drowning. I needed air. I couldn't breathe. I stumbled off the back of the platform and ran around the crowd toward the exit.

  And I ran straight into Bryce.

  His arms immediately wrapped around me. I pressed my face against his chest and breathed in his familiar scent. It was better than fresh air.

  Bryce didn't say anything. There wasn't anything to say. We both knew there was nothing that could make this better. Instead, he just held me in his arms, his chin resting on top of my head. He held me as I sobbed ugly tears. He held me until I had left a huge wet spot on his shirt from my tears. He held me until I couldn't cry anymore. And then he just kept holding me as the stadium slowly emptied out around us.

  Chapter 29

  Saturday

  Alina

  Bryce and I had talked about what we were going to do after the game. It was all I had been able to think about for days. But I didn't want our first time to be like this. We were supposed to be celebrating. I didn't want pity sex. Luckily he wasn't making any moves. He was just sitting on the couch holding me, letting me rest my head on his shoulder. He seemed to understand my dismal state of mind. Probably because he had been trying to cheer me up for a few hours already.

  I wanted him to know why I was so upset. I didn't want to hold anything back from him. "It's my fault," I whispered into his shirt. I bit my lip.

  "Alina." He shifted so that he could look directly at me. "It wasn't your fault. The refs were clearly..."

  "No." I sat up. I tucked my bangs behind my ear. "Gabriela knows how to crawl under my skin."

  He stared at me for a second. "Did she do something?"

  "When I opened up my locker this morning, these pictures fell out. Of her and Chris... having sex." Oh God. "From the night he swore they only kissed. I knew he was lying. And I know that Gabriela put those pictures in my locker to throw me off my game. I hate that she knows how to manipulate me. She knew how much that would mess with my head."

  Bryce lowered his eyebrows.

  "Not because I still have feelings for Chris." I grabbed Bryce's hand. "I don't care about that, I just..." my voice trailed off. "She always wins. She always beats me." It felt like I was going to start crying again, but I didn't think I had any more tears in me. "I thought I could win this time. I thought this time would be different."

  "It was. They cheated."

  I shook my head. "It doesn't matter. I still missed the last shot."

  "It kind of looked like the girl in front of you could have easily stepped back and gotten it."

  "But she didn't. And I reacted too slowly. And I missed a serve. I played badly the whole time because Gabriela is better than me."

  "I don't think she's better than you."

  I lifted the silver medal off my neck. I didn't even know why I was still wearing the stupid thing. "This says otherwise."

  "An ITA silver medal is a huge accomplishment."

  "Ugh." I tossed it on the bed.

  Bryce laughed.

  "We were supposed to be celebrating tonight. Not...this." I was still in my sweaty jersey. I probably smelled. But Bryce hadn't complained at all. He was the sweetest guy I had ever met. "You have no idea how much I was looking forward to...that. To being with you." I felt my cheeks flushing.

  He smiled and ran his thumb across my palm. "I don't mind waiting."

  "But you're flying back to Pasadena on Monday. And I'm going to Wilmington." I wanted to freeze time. I'd live in this moment of pain as long as it meant I'd have more time with him.

  He smiled. "I wouldn't mind having a super long layover in Philly."

  "Super long?"

  "Let's just say everything I'm planning on doing to you is going to take awhile."

  I gulped.

  "Are you hungry?"

  I searched his face. He didn't look disappointed about not having sex. He looked a little relieved that I was finally talking. I wanted him to come home with me. Maybe I'd kidnap him like I had thought that Uber driver had. "I'm starving."

  "How about I go get some pizza?"

  "Pizza sounds perfect."

  He stood up. "And I'll get some fancy new dessert to try." He leaned down and kissed me before heading out the door.

  My stomach twisted into knots. Dessert. I wasn't going to be able to afford to fix up the bakery with the money from a silver medal. I'd barely even be able to cover rent for a few months. I needed to call home. I needed to tell them I'd get the money another way. They couldn't sell it yet.

  I pulled out my phone and called my mom. After a few rings she answered.

  "Hi, sweetie." I could tell that she knew. Of course she knew. She had been watching all of my games.

  "Mom." My voice caught in my throat. I didn't think I had it in me, but I started crying again. The realization that I wouldn't be able to take over the bakery seemed to hit me in a rush. Gabriela had taken everything from me.

  "It's okay," my mom said in her naturally soothing voice. "It's going to be okay, sweetie."

  "No. Mom, it's not enough. Dad's going to sell it. I need more time."

  "Shhh. It's okay. I'll talk to him. He's not going to sell it before you come home."

  I put my face in my hands.

  "Alina, they showed the crowd on the TV. We saw Chris."

  Oh God.

  "He was wearing a Team Brazil T-shirt. Is everything okay with..."

  "We broke up. He cheated on me with Gabriela Santos." I lifted up my head. I had talked to my mom a few times this week, but I hadn't mentioned Chris at all. I just didn't want to think about him.

  My mom didn't say anything for a long time. "What an asshole."

  "Mom!" My mother never cursed. I had never heard her say something like that in my life.

  She laughed. "Well, that's the only way to describe him."

  I couldn't help but laugh. It sounded weird in my throat. Like I had forgotten what feeling happy was like. I ende
d up coughing instead of laughing.

  The door of my room opened. I thought it would be Bryce, but Kristen walked in. She looked a little happier. "Where's Bryce?" she asked.

  I put my hand over my phone. "He went to get pizza."

  "Is that your mom?"

  I nodded.

  "Tell her I say hi."

  I lifted the phone back to my ear. "Kristen says hello."

  My mom was super polite. I thought she'd immediately say, "say hello to Kristen for me." Instead, she said, "He went to get pizza? If you're not with Chris, who is the he that Kristen if referring to?"

  The smile that came to my face didn't feel weird like my laugh did. "His name is Bryce. He's on the track team. We've been hanging out a lot."

  "Talking about him has seemed to cheer you right up."

  I didn't say anything. She was right. Maybe tonight could turn around. I couldn't change what had happened earlier. A silver was still damn good. I shouldn't be moping around my last few days in Brazil. Screw Gabriela. I just wanted to focus on Bryce.

  "Isn't it a little fast though? You've only been there for two weeks. I don't know when you broke up with Chris, but..."

  "Bryce is a really good guy, Mom. It's not like it was with Chris." I looked over at Kristen. She was staring at me, but she quickly looked away and pretended to fold some clothes when we made eye contact. "He actually hears me, you know? We have so much in common. He's so easy to talk to. He's supportive and sweet and really handsome. And even though he lives in Pasadena, his sister lives in Philly. So he'll be around a lot." I hope. I pulled my knees to my chest. Oh my God, I'm falling in love with him. "I really, really like him," I said instead.

  "Just be careful, sweetie. When I saw you fall to your knees after the game, I..." her voice trailed off. "It's so hard to see you upset. You'll understand when you're a mother. It kills me to see you hurting."

  "I know, Mom."

  "But if he makes you happy, hold on to him."

  The door opened again and Bryce walked in.

  "He does. He actually just came back with food, so I have to go."