HEY GUYS!! tamelaine and I are so excited to give you guys the second chapter of Going for the Gold. We've decided, after Chapter 1, to start a new format. You'll notice a slight change in heading of the first chapter, but it's still EXACTLY the same story. Each chapter will start with a date--actually following the Olympic schedule this year in Beijing and coinciding with the swimming events.
Also, instead of collaborating on a single chapter, the way we did with the first chapter, we are going to be each writing a single chapter, switching off. There will sometimes be several chapters per day, depending on how much is going on. The POVs will be almost exclusively Bella and Edward, though there will be a few surprises thrown in. We sat down this week and planned out the WHOLE STORY so it will get done, I promise, though we do appreciate your guys' patience becuase we also have stories we are writing seperately.
Since Tami is going to be gone this week, I tackled this chapter, but she has totally been awesome--being supportive and coming up with a few GREAT ideas.
Also, a song that goes both with this chapter and really with the whole story in general is "Straight Lines" by Silverchair. There's a link on my profile page.
As always, thanks for your AMAZING reviews and support!
Thursday, August 7th 2008
EPOV
"Dad, we've been over this again and again. I missed the Opening Ceremony in Athens. I don't want to miss it in Beijing too. I plan on going to London, but it's hard to say if I'll actually make it there. I want to get as much of the Olympic experience as I can now," I grumbled to my father.
Esme looked worriedly at Carlisle as I shifted uncomfortably in the cab seat. Both my mother and I were anxious to hear his answer. It had been her suggestion to try asking him one last time as we waited for Carlisle to find a cab. Esme's greatest wish was for me to not only win gold medals but to have an unforgettable experience while doing it. Often her ideas clashed with Carlisle's training methods, and I was forced to walk a thin line between the two of them.
The Opening Ceremony and marching in the Parade of Nations was something Esme had greatly wanted for me in Athens and in Beijing her desire just as great, and so was mine. I felt as if I were depriving myself and the fans who were dying to see me, but in previous discussions, Carlisle had been inexorable and Esme had failed to make any headway.
And so it came down to one last plea. I was always telling my dad that I wanted a more normal life—and his response was generally that I should have picked a more normal way of life. I couldn't deny that maybe he was right, but then I would remember, the memories so vivid, the Olympics where I'd watched him swim. He'd had Esme, and they'd had me. I saw that as pretty normal.
Carlisle sighed. I knew he hated being hard-nosed on things like this, but almost nobody else could fully understand the sacrifices Olympic glory demanded quite like Carlisle—though I was learning, since I was determined to follow in his footsteps.
"Edward, I really think it would be unwise for you to march in the Parade. You need to rest, to focus, to concentrate."
I was so sick of those three words.
"Fine," I replied shortly, refusing to meet Esme's sympathetic gaze. I didn't want anyone to feel sorry for me. I'd chosen this path—this was always what I'd wanted.
We pulled up to the entrance of my Village building, and I could feel rather than see Carlisle's frown.
Carlisle, remembering his own experience, had wanted me to stay with him and Esme in the hotel. Less distractions that way, he'd said firmly to me right after the Olympic Trials, when it had become apparent to everyone that I really was going to attempt this, and he'd been full of ideas of what I should and shouldn't do to prepare.
I'd stayed at the hotel in Athens, four years before, and I'd done well, winning two golds, a silver and a bronze, but that hadn't been enough to really satisfy my thirst for glory. I wanted more.
Which was why I found myself today in Beijing, in the Olympic Village against Carlisle's wishes, attempting an insane program of six events over the next nine days. There would be very little time for myself and no room for distractions of any kind.
Especially ones with soulful brown eyes, long silky hair, and lips that were the incredible deep pink of my mother's roses.
You've done it now, I told myself, you let your mind go there and now it's not going to stop again.
I remembered a point, before I got on the plane to fly to Beijing, when I'd had some form of mental control. That point had long passed, somewhere over the Pacific Ocean, when I'd woken up to find those brown eyes looking at me with most intriguing curiosity.
When she'd run over my toe, I almost asked her if she could run over the other one while she was at it. Maybe the pain would have snapped me out of mooning after her like an idiot.
"Edward?" Esme asked hesitantly as I climbed out of the cab, "would you like us to come with you to your building? We can ask the cab to wait."
Her face was so hopeful that I hated saying no. I looked my dad in the eye and he understood immediately and nodding briefly, he turned to my mother and grasped her hand in his.
"Esme, darling. Edward needs to unpack, get settled in, and focus. Most of all get some rest. He didn't sleep at all on the plane." Carlisle looked at me pointedly and I knew I was going to get interrogated about that later.
I was a sleeping legend on the US Swim Team. Nothing ever affected my ability to sleep anywhere, at any time, whenever there was a few minutes to spare. I just hoped that this hiccup I had experienced on the flight was a minor one. The last thing I needed during this grueling upcoming week and a half was a sudden inability to sleep.
"Okay," Esme relented, giving me a bright smile to reassure my conscience that her feelings weren't hurt. I flashed her my all-too famous grin back and I saw her smile deepen into a genuine one. Carlisle might be my coach, but my mother was the greatest cheering section a man could have ever hoped to have. I never would have made it this far without her by my side.
Carlisle nodded reassuringly, and I went back to the trunk to grab my bags, waving away the driver's assistance. I had more muscle on my pinky finger, it seemed, than he did in his whole body.
Hefting the bags, I walked towards the front door and it slid open silently and quickly. So far, though I'd seen very little of the country, I was impressed by how high tech everything was. Every country tried to put their best foot forward for the Olympics, but China had particularly impressed me so far.
Heading into the main lobby, I was greeted by the staggering cacophony of different languages being spoken. I stopped by the concierge kiosk to get my room number assignment.
I decided to take the stairs instead of the elevator. My legs still felt crampy and I was dying to stretch them out. Maybe I'd head over to the pool early after settling in and taking a nap.
I already knew I was rooming with Tyler Crowley, one of my rivals and friends from the US Swim Team. I swiped my key card, and as I balanced my luggage, swung open the door.
Loud music pumped through the air from a portable iPod dock sitting on a side table.
Britney Spears? What?
I wondered if I'd walked into the wrong room and I craned my neck around, trying to find Tyler. As far as I knew, he liked pretty generic rap music—which was something I teased him to no end about. I was kind of a music snob, but even rap was better than this and it wasn't even classic hot Britney, but new, messed up Britney. Fantastic.
I took a few steps farther into the room, really beginning to think I'd somehow been given the wrong room number and card key by the concierge, and the music crashed over me. I was definitely a music snob but, as I continued to listen, I decided that the beat wasn't half bad, though the breathy half-lyrics were awful. In fact, as much as I hated to admit it, my hips were twitching back and forth a little to the catchy thumps that punctuated the chorus.
I heard a rustling in the entryway to what must have been the second bedroom, and I turned, and felt the oxygen whoosh out of my lungs.
There was a naked man dancing around, with his back to me, and he was shaking his ass to the music. And it was Tyler. God.
I felt a sudden and horrible pain in my foot, and I almost couldn't force my eyes to look down to see what had caused it. The image searing my retinas was like a train wreck—I couldn't look away, yet it seemed wrong to keep staring.
Finally, the fear that I'd managed to hurt myself worse than Bella could made me glance down from the rump-shaking extravaganza. It was then I realized that the luggage I'd been holding in my hand had apparently dropped instantaneously out of my hand at the sight I'd witnessed and had landed on my uninjured toe. Great. Yet another reason for Carlisle to be upset—two broken toes.
Tyler twirled the towel that had probably at one point been around his waist in time to the music, and I grabbed my luggage off my foot and backed towards the doorway.
I couldn't find my voice so I could yell his name. It was still stuck in the back of my throat, paralyzed with shock. Not that he could probably hear me over Britney anyway.
The dancing continued, followed by a successive series of pelvic thrusts that made me grimace and feel more than a little gay for continuing to watch. Of course, eventually he was going to turn around and realize that I'd been watching him shake his ass. That wouldn't make things between us uncomfortable or anything.
I'd been so glad to finally have a friend that wasn't ridiculously older than I was, and here I was, ready to ruin it because his naked ass shaking had me mesmerized.
Actually, I corrected myself, it wasn't the nakedness or the ass that had me mesmerized. I was petrified of what was going to happen when he turned around and that fear kept me unfortunately rooted in place, unable to really do anything to prevent the inevitable.
The song drew to a close, and I was still standing there, struck dumb, mentally cursing Esme and Carlisle for not socially acclimating myself better. Maybe someone with a more normal social life, and well, just life in general, would know how to handle this better.
Tyler began to turn around, probably to go change the song on iPod, and my mouth opened and closed a few times in desperation.
Finally I managed to gasp out "Tyler!" before he could turn around and be completely surprised that I was staring at his naked butt.
He whipped around and instantly the hand holding the towel went to his waist to shield himself from my view. If only I hadn't already seen too much.
"GAH!!" he screamed in shock, "what the hell are you doing here?"
"This is my room too," I pointed out, hoping that he wouldn't ask how long I'd been standing there, watching him shake his bon-bon like Ricky Martin.
Tyler rubbed his head with his free hand and had the intelligence to look more than a little embarrassed. Carefully rearranging and wrapping his towel around his waist, he turned the iPod off, and turned to face me again.
"Man, I'm sorry, Eddie. . ." he trailed off, looking for what I assumed was my reassurance that it was okay and that I wasn't going to make public his weakness for getting jiggy with Miss Britney Spears.
"No problem," I hastily replied, "nobody has to know about. . .that." I had no idea what to call the display I'd just seen without somehow insulting Tyler. Of course, maybe that was what he deserved. Still, it wasn't my job to pass judgment on what the man liked to do after a good shower.
"Great," he nodded, clearly relieved. "I'm going to go walk around the Village a little bit, scope out some foreign beauties. You want to come with?"
Only, I thought, if the beauty is not foreign and is a brown-eyed journalist.
"No, I actually think I'm going to try to rest for awhile before practice. I couldn't sleep on the plane."
Tyler had already turned to go towards his room, hopefully to put some damn clothes on, and he stopped in his tracks. Uh oh.
"You couldn't sleep?"
Tyler and I had been friends for a few years now. He'd joined the team around the same I did, though he was a year older, and he knew me well enough to know my ability to sleep anywhere, at any time.
"Are you okay?" he asked, worry lines creasing his face at my lack of an answer.
Absolutely not. I've been struck dead by a pair of brown eyes and a whole lot of dark hair. Unfortunately this vision wears a press pass and is already making me so distracted I can't sleep, right before the possibly biggest week of my life.
"I'm fine," I said shortly. "Just going to get some rest now." I was still praying that sleep would be forthcoming, because even though I felt tired, my mind was going a thousand thoughts per minute and 99 of them were Bella-related.
"Sounds good, man. Catch you later," Tyler called over his shoulder as he retreated into his room and the door shut. Thank god.
If Tyler found out that I was so distracted I couldn't sleep, he'd mention it to Carlisle, who would in turn dismantle me.
Dragging my luggage into the other empty bedroom, I took in my surroundings. The room resembled a nicer dormitory, with its austere white walls and clean simple lines.
The living room area that the front door opened to was mostly white, with a few touches of green to break up the monotony. The furniture was nearly austere: just one couch, an uncomfortable looking chair and an empty coffee table. There were two bedrooms, each with a bed, dresser and a small desk with a matching chair.
Actually I was glad everything was so simple. I needed to be distracted as little as possible when I came to my room—sleep was my main goal when I was here. I quickly unpacked my suitcases, and stripping down to my boxers, laid down in the bed. I was gratified to see that even though I was nearly 6'5", my feet didn't hang off the edge of the bed. I hated it when that happened. At home I slept in a huge California king, and I was used to being able to spread out so getting used to sleeping on this tiny twin size bed was certainly going to be interesting.
Good thing there wouldn't be anyone joining me in this bed, I thought as I rolled over.
I stopped midroll. Shit.
I needed to stop thinking about her. This was getting more than a little ridiculous. She was just a girl. A woman, I reminded myself, a beautiful, intelligent, fascinating woman.
I clamped my eyes shut and wrapped a pillow around my head as if I could possibly externally block out my internal thoughts.
Two hours later, I had counted thousands of sheep, played a game of Sudoku in my head, and had internally recited the alphabet backwards more times than I cared to remember.
This was no longer ridiculous. It wasn't even ludicrous. It was just bad.
I'd watched the clock tick by second by second, and I was so frustrated I wanted to throw it against the wall and watch it satisfyingly shatter.
Despite every guard against it, my mind was still full of Bella, and it wasn't even like I had a large number of memories to pull from. I had two. Well three, if I wanted to count the time I'd caught her staring at me.
I wondered, again, for about the fiftieth time this hour, if that meant that she thought I was handsome. If she wanted to get to know me better. Of course, now that I knew she was press, it was hard to say whether she liked me or if she liked the number of papers she could sell with my help.
Frustrated beyond anything I'd experienced in years, I tried to tell myself that I was renowned through my sport for my legendary drive and my ability to control both my mind and my body as I pleased. Ha, I thought wryly, what would they say if they could see me now.
Finally, in utter despair at my inability to shut my mind off, and knowing that was nothing like a good workout to clear my head and exhaust my body to the point where it wouldn't matter if there was a naked Bella prancing through my thoughts.
I slid out of bed, changed into my practice suit, threw a pair of sweats over it, grabbed my iPod and headed out the door to catch the shuttle to the Water Cube.
The Water Cube was dazzling in the sunshine, but I had an idea it would be even more dazzling at night. I'd seen pictures of it being built, but seeing it in person was so much better.
I was excited, despite frustratingly lack of sleep, to finally see the arena where I'd put in my bid to be remembered as one of the greatest Olympic swimmers of all time.
Inside, the facilities were even more impressive. There were several large pools, aside from the main competition pool. I picked the smallest of the four and began stretching on the deck by the water. My muscles protested fiercely as they'd been cramped for so long in the plane and clenched during my two hour struggle to fall asleep. But I knew as soon as I dove into the water, the disuse and the irritation skimming along my nerves would simply fade away and it would be just me and the water yet again.
I finished up my stretches and was leaning over to grab my goggles from the deck floor when I heard the lewd whistle.
I straightened up and suppressed a groan. With everything that had happened today, I was bound to run into him. It had been one of those days, after all.
"Well look who we have here, ladies," Jacob Black sneered, his loud voice echoing through the huge concrete room.
"Hello Jacob," I said politely, trying to keep my voice and my temper calm.
The Spanish swimmer simply grinned evilly at me and I regretted coming here. I was in no mood to have a confrontation with this man who considered me his biggest rival.
"Manage to lose your crowd of female admirers?"
I felt the frisson of temper along my spine and I tried desperately to reign it in.
I would not let him get the best of me.
"My 'crowd' of female admirers, as you call them, don't exist," I said shortly, hoping that disagreeing with him firmly but not rudely would dissuade him from egging me on.
"Sure seems like they do. . ." Jacob lecherously replied, "if I were you, I'd nail a few pieces of tail while I was at it. Cause you won't be able to after I wipe the floor with you this week."
Of course, I thought, this was Jacob Black. He'd never stop egging me on.
"It seems incredibly to me, Jacob, that the centuries-long reputation of fine, upstanding Spanish gentleman seems to have entirely passed you by." I knew that sounded priggish, even for me, but I couldn't seem to help myself. I hated the way he referred to women, I hated his attitude and I even hated the way he swam. Not because, like everyone thought, he was almost as fast as I was, but because he only did it for the cache that surrounded a celebrity sports star. He didn't swim because he couldn't do anything else, like me. It wasn't in his blood and in his heart and to me, that seemed wrong.
All that, plus the way he got under my skin no matter what I did, all contrived to make me sound even more ridiculously formal than I typically did.
"God," he nearly moaned in annoyance, "you are way too serious for your own good. I bet some of those women who throw themselves at you wouldn't mind if you loosened up a little."
"I'm plenty loose," I said crossly, definitely feeling my temper was fraying, "and now I'd really appreciate it if you'd leave me alone and let me swim."
"How about a friendly match?" Jacob's sneering grin let me know that the match would be anything but friendly, though I'd never thought that he could actually personify in any way the word "friend."
I shook my head firmly. "No. I'd prefer to practice on my own." I barely forced myself to leave off the Esme-ingrained "thank you." I refused to thank Jacob Black for anything.
"Come on," Jacob wheedled, ambling over toward me and suddenly standing way too close.
"No," I repeated. "Absolutely not."
"What? You afraid to lose to me? You'd better get used to it, golden boy."
I hated that epithet. I didn't consider myself "golden" in any way whatsoever, and when the media outlets had coined that nickname, I'd nearly died of embarrassment and had again wished that I hadn't inherited Carlisle's handsome face.
Jacob must have seen my grimace because he added, "you should own it, Eddie. Use it."
I shook my head, feeling my self-control slowly slipping away. I hadn't been alone with Jacob, without the protection of a throng of media, other swimmers and observers, for a long time. He was obviously using the opportunity to try to provoke me into doing something stupid. I would simply have to not give in.
"Jacob, please. I'm going to swim now." I turned to head towards the blocks at the end of the pool, and I felt his hand grab my shoulder.
I whipped around, my eyes shooting daggers at him. I picked his hand off my shoulder and flung it back at him.
"Do. Not. Ever. Touch. Me. Again," I stated clearly, shaking with fury.
Jacob laughed again, the sound grating on my last nerve.
"Whatcha gonna do about it, golden boy?" he jeered, coming even closer and attempting to get in my face.
I put my hands up, hoping that I could somehow stave off the inferno of temper that was threatening to envelop me. "Just leave, please."
"What? Too pussy to fight?"
That did it.
I took the hands that were already outstretched and shoved hard, sending Jacob flying over the side into the water.
I didn't wait to see how fast he could get out of the water. I took off at a half-run, half-jog, to see if I could find any coaches at the complex early for practice.
As I neared the doorway to the hall, I heard Jacob yell menacingly, spluttering, "I'll get you for that, golden boy."
I tried to shrug it off as I rounded the corner. What could Jacob possibly do to me? He couldn't beat me. We'd already established that at the World Championships and I was even faster now.
Still, as I approached the lobby of the Water Cube, I couldn't help but embrace how good it had felt to finally lash out against the jerk that had bothered me for so long. Of course, I was worried that I hadn't been able to control myself like all the other times he'd baited me, but I chalked it up to stress and a lack of sleep. I was just fine. Nothing was going to destroy my focus this week.
Not Jacob Black.
And not Bella either.
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