other new friends, cheered and urged each and every rider who passed her on their passage.
On L’Alpe D’Huez, four riders abandoned the Tour de France, bringing the number of riders retiring on Stage 14 to twelve. Luca Jones was not one of them. It took Massimo Lipari a phenomenal 36 minutes 51 seconds to climb the mountain, win the Stage and claim the polka dot jersey, a true King of the Mountains. It took Luca just under an hour to limp to the line. Ben was waiting in the team bus. When Luca crawled up the steps, Ben thought how his face was like that of a wizened old man, but how his fragility, his comportment, was that of a child. Luca looked to Ben and, just then, all the doctor felt he could do for the rider was to open his arms, into which the young rider collapsed. He sobbed, his body shaking in spasms of cold and fatigue.
On L’Alpe D’Huez, in the salle de pressé, wearing Josh’s fleece and with Alex’s sweatshirt over her knees. Cat wondered how on earth to finish her article. She was thrilled for Massimo to be wearing the polka dot jersey after an epic Stage won in 5 hours 43 minutes and 45 seconds, she was ecstatic that Vasily was now the maillot jaune of the Tour de France, having come home with a hissing, livid Carlos Jesu Velasquez two minutes later. However, her heart bled for Carlos and of course for Fabian, now lying second and nearly four minutes behind Vasily; she felt for the whole of Système Vipère who had relinquished their two prized jerseys on this horrible day. But it was Luca Jones, though, who captured her sympathy and haunted her. With no defining jersey on his back apart from his sodden Megapac strip, he was, in general, just another rider from the peloton who had suffered beyond comprehension today. To Cat, though, he was a champion. Luca had given every ounce of his physical and emotional capacity to finish the Stage for his team, for his directeur, for cycle sport, for the fans and lastly, for himself. For Cat, even those ten riders who abandoned, even the two riders coming home well over the time limit only to be sent home, were victors commanding her respect, her compassion and commensurate columns in her report.
Today, I am not writing sport reportage, my piece is not a commentary on the day’s Stage. It is my deeply personal response, as honest and emotional as a private diary entry.
‘Hey, Cat,’ Rachel’s voice crackled through bad reception on the mobile phone.
‘Rachel,’ Cat said, ‘what a godforsaken day.’
‘I know,’ Rachel agreed.
‘I mean, well done Zucca – but the conditions, Jesus! How are the boys?’
‘Too exhausted,’ Rachel said, ‘absolutely shattered and shot through to the marrow.’
‘You sound low, Rachel,’ Cat detected, ‘it must really take it out of you, too.’
‘It does,’ the soigneur confided. ‘Today Zucca have the yellow and polka dot jerseys – but the team are supremely exhausted, their bodies brutally battered. I have to pick up the pieces and it’s knackering.’
‘Would you like some company?’ Cat asked, seeing it was eight o’clock and wondering when Taverner was going to lambast her for exceeding her word limit by 100 per cent.
‘Please,’ said Rachel, ‘come by the hotel.’
‘Shit,’ said Cat, once she’d hung up, ‘my sisters.’
Cat’s sisters had trudged up L’Alpe D’Huez, very wet and a little drunk. They’d walked the finishing straight, thinking how, amidst the debris and lingering vibe, it was as if a circus had come to town and then gone again. The rain had settled into an eye-squinting mist and it justified more schnapps and a good sit-down somewhere warm.
‘I can’t believe Cat’s pissing off to see some physio friend,’ Pip said petulantly, a hearty glug of liqueur dissolving a mouthful of cake. She was also piqued that Marc had not invited them to thaw out in his campervan, that Fritz had not enquired where they were staying, that Jette had merely said ciao, see you on the Col de la Madeleine tomorrow.
‘Soigneur,’ Fen corrected, ‘Rachel. Zucca MV. Cat’s at work, remember.’
Pip nodded reluctantly, concentrated on her cake and then brightened up. ‘When are we meeting Josh and Alex?’
‘In half an hour,’ Fen said, ‘at the apartment. Another drink?’
‘Let’s raise a glass to Vasily and Massimo – le maillot jaune and le maillot à pois,’ Pip declared, knocking her drink back in one.
‘And here’s to Fabian and Carlos,’ said Fen, doing the same.
‘We’d better have another,’ said Pip sincerely, ‘we must toast those who bowed out.’
‘And Luca,’ said Fen.
‘I wonder if he’s had a shower,’ said Pip, the sorry sight of the rider urinating over his hands indelibly printed on her memory.
‘Can we talk about anything but cycling?’ Rachel asks Cat, welcoming her in to her room.
‘Of course,’ says Cat. ‘You look ghastly.’ The soigneur has dark circles around her eyes, her hair hangs lank and there is a visible slump to her characteristic energy and poise.
‘I should toast the team,’ Rachel remarks, as if it were a requirement of her job, ‘taking two jerseys from Système Vipère in such fine style.’ She stifles a yawn and lies back on her bed. ‘Well done, Vasily and Massimo. Well done team for just making it today.’
‘I’ll nip down to the bar and bring a couple of drinks up,’ Cat offers sweetly. ‘Beer?’
‘Make it whisky,’ says Rachel, ‘and if it isn’t Scotch, bugger it, I’ll have vodka instead.’
To Rachel’s delight. Cat brings her a large tot of Glenfiddich.
‘When were you last home?’ Cat enquires.
Rachel scrunches her eyes. ‘Far too long ago – I miss it and yet when I return it doesn’t really feel like home. I soon miss the camaraderie, the familiarity of life with the peloton. Anyway,’ she says, taking a hearty glug, her eyes watering at the severity of the liquor, ‘enough about work. Let’s talk about boys.’ Though her eyes are slightly bloodshot, a sly twinkle courses its way through. ‘Let’s get He Who No Longer Exists out of the way first.’
Am I ready for this? Cat wonders.
Yes, you are.
Rachel was so proud of Cat’s level-headed analysis of her failed love that she delved into a bedside cabinet and retrieved an immense block of Cadbury’s chocolate as a reward.
‘Bliss,’ said Cat, filling her mouth and closing her eyes.
‘The One Who Is No More,’ Rachel toasted, ‘well done.’
‘Any developments with Vasily?’ Cat asked.
‘The maillot jaune is the development,’ Rachel defined quietly. ‘Until the race is over, I would think the only thing he’ll desire next to his skin is yellow lycra.’
‘Are you frustrated?’ Cat asked. ‘Hurt?’
Rachel considered this. ‘Frustrated?’ she mused.
