Once Upon a Poolside

Christophe doesn’t expect to find anyone else down by the pool.

It’s night, for one thing, a time when all of the good little cyclists should be getting sleep. They had a rest day today, no cycling. Christophe traveled from Tenerife to Mallorca, so he could meet up with the rest of the classics squad, and he hasn’t had time to explore the hotel yet.

He feels restless from seeing Wout again. Every time they do team things together — training camps, presentations — he feels aware of his jersey, an odd white and blue duckling among the the yellow and black. He remembers the night after he’d won it. The roiling nausea, Wout’s gentle hands. He’d reached what might be the pinnacle of his career, and yet, he’d lost something fundamental.

Somehow, Wout doesn’t treat Christophe any differently. He’s too generous, too kind for that sort of bitterness. Christophe tries to match him, but it’s harder for him to walk around with a barely-scabbed-over wound and not show it. He’s never been much of an actor.

The pool is ethereal and glowing, lit from under the water. The island air is damp with humidity. Wout sits at one of the poolside tables. He stares out over the face of the water with a far away expression on his face. Christophe used to love these moments of stillness, these times he could watch Wout’s face without interruptions, when the distance between them felt the smallest.

He considers turning around, going back to his room, but he can’t bring himself to. Maybe it’s just an echo, a lingering afterimage of a dead thing, but he still feels greedy for every bit of Wout he can get.

“Hello.” Christophe says. He sits down in the chair next to Wout’s.

Wout blinks and turns to him. A warm grin crosses his face. “Hi,” he says. He’s dressed down in a t-shirt, shorts, and sandals. They do nothing to hide the leanness of his frame. He gestures toward the basket on the table. “Bread? It was good, but I think it might be a little stale now that it’s been out all day.” Back when they were — when they were still a them — Wout would speak to Christophe in heavily accented and slightly awkward French. Christophe had found it to be charming, another one of Wout’s few imperfections, like his scars. Now he only speaks to Christophe in English. It feels cold, impersonal. Christophe didn’t realize how much he would hate it.

“No, thank you,” Christophe replies. It might be some sort of cultural snobbery, but the bread outside of France always tastes wrong. The texture is never quite right.

They lapse into silence. The air is filled with the sounds of buzzing insects and the low hum of the pool’s water pumps. It smells like chlorine, sharp and chemical. One of Wout’s arms rests on the table, hand flat, palm down. Christophe thinks about laying his own hand on top of Wout’s. He could twine their fingers and feel Wout’s warmth again. On impulse, he does it. Wout’s hands are bigger than Christophe’s. The knuckles are hairier.

Wout turns to look at him with those deep brown eyes. He doesn’t pull his hand away. He says, “I know you maybe didn’t believe me, but I am proud of you. You were incredible.” He doesn’t try to smile. His voice is soft and deep as it curls around the English syllables.

“I believed you,” Christophe says. His voice is barely louder than a whisper. His chest aches from the memories, though the pain has dulled a bit over the passing months. Even though they’re in the depths of winter, it feels like spring is just around the corner. Classics season. A season for new things to grow.

Another silence. This one is more comfortable. Christophe thinks about the elasticity of time. He wonders if he could draw this moment out forever, just the two of them and this pool and the quiet understanding between them. For a while, he was always so worried about when the end would come. He had been so sure it would be Wout who called things off. He had never expected anything like this.

After another few minutes, Wout makes to stand up. The metal of his chair’s legs scrapes over the concrete. Christophe tightens his fingers around Wout’s hand. He doesn’t know why. He doesn’t have that sort of claim to Wout’s time and attention anymore.

Wout pauses long enough to look down at him. When Christophe had first met him, he had been startled by the sculpted perfection of Wout’s face. Now he notices the dark bags under Wout’s eyes and a reddened divot that might be a shaving nick on Wout’s right cheek. Christophe feels a swell of fondness at the sight of them. He grasps for the right words to say. “I’ll see you tomorrow?” he asks. It comes out in French. He winces at the mistake.

Wout disentangles his hand from Christophe’s. His eyes are dark and unreadable. He says, “I’ll see you tomorrow,” before pulling away and heading back inside.

Christophe watches him. It could be a dismissal. It could be a more permanent goodbye. It could be Wout’s gentle way of telling him that this broken thing between them can never be fixed, but also– but also, Wout spoke in French, too.