Our first host house, where we would stay until Sunday’s prologue, was a mansion owned by a couple named Grant. The Grants had offered the third floor of their house to us because it was empty except for when their sixteen grandchildren visited throughout the year. After hauling my suitcase and cycling gear to the third floor, I walked into a room that looked like an army barracks at Neverland Ranch. A row of sixteen twin-sized beds lined the room, eight on each side. A miniature railroad track weaved between and under each of the beds and a train circled the track continually. In between the train track and tiny beds, the room was littered with stuffed animals, rocking horses, toy cars, Barbies, costume jewelry, Legos, a fake kitchen set, toy guns and a bunch of other toys that I didn’t recognize but wished I had seen on my trip to Toys “R” Us.
Alyssa was unpacking her bag in the furthest corner of the room when I walked in. I walked towards her, dropped my suitcase next to hers and said, “Do you even fit on one of those beds?”
Alyssa had obviously not yet realized that at five-ten, she would be sleeping in the fetal position until we moved into the next house. “Shit,” she said. “This is the nicest house I’ve ever been in and now I’m dreading the next four days.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, “it’s not like we can complain either.”
“Do you have any water?” Alyssa asked. “There’s no bathroom up here and I don’t feel like going downstairs and back up again.”
“No,” I said, “but let me check the fridge.” I stopped unpacking and walked over towards the fake kiddy refrigerator a few feet from my bag and opened it, pretending to look for water. A bunch of maggots and fruit flies greeted me. “Shit!” I said, “One of the grandkids put real food in there. Who knows how long that’s been rotting.”
We laughed, then quickly chose the two furthest beds from the vermin in the refrigerator. “So when did you start cycling?” I asked to strike up a conversation while we were unpacking.
“When I was a kid. My dad actually raced professionally throughout Europe, so I got into it at a young age.”
“Let me guess,” I said. “You’re a former Junior National Champion, lost interest in the sport when you went to college and recently got back into it.”
“Close,” she answered. She was lying on the bed talking to me, her feet dangling off the end. “I was a National Junior Champion three times and World Junior Champion once. I got burned out in high school and took it up again five years ago.”
Cycling is not a sport kids pick up in the neighborhood or at a local little league. Unless your parents buy you a three thousand dollar bike and drive you to races all over the state, you can’t be a kid cyclist. There are very few child cyclists, and even fewer female child cyclists. Of the fourteen cyclists I know that race in the Junior category, five have been National Junior Champions and two have been World Champions. Generally, these kids develop monster egos at age nine, then have an identity crisis in their late teens when they start racing with adults and get their asses handed to them. Alyssa didn’t seem to be an exception.
“Why did you get back into it?” I asked.
“To get in shape. Because it’s something I’m good at. I like it now that there isn’t a ton of pressure. I teach middle school and race in the summer when I’m off.”
“Maybe I’ll do that,” I said. “I hate my job and could use summers off.”
“I heard you’re a lawyer. You’d be crazy to give that up to be a teacher. The pay is shit and the students and parents are pretty shitty too.”
“So I’ve heard,” I said, as I sat down on my bed which was inches from Alyssa’s. “But you’re only around once and you can’t buy a minute. I want my summers off to race.”
“You seem to have a pretty good vacation policy,” Alyssa observed.
“I’m on a leave of absence.” I changed the topic and asked, “Did you ride yet today?”
“No, want to go for a spin?”
“Sure,” I said. “Let’s check out the prologue course.”
We rode two easy hours, including three reviews of the course, then returned to the mansion. I was practically giddy to have Alyssa as a friend. We really hit it off in the short time we spent together and I was so thankful to have a friend. I was really worried it was going to be Brenda and the team against me. Now I wouldn’t be isolated and Alyssa seemed pretty awesome.
Danny and Sonny were at the Grants when we returned. Sonny went ape shit when he saw me. I tried to pet him, but he kept barking with excitement and running around in circles. Danny grabbed a ball out of the car and threw it to him. Sonny disappeared and I used that minute of quiet and calm to say hi to Danny and thank him again. He looked exhausted after the ride but said he was psyched to be here.
I introduced Danny to Alyssa and then directed Danny to our quarters. He looked like he really needed to crash. At the foot of the stairs I pointed up and said, “Third floor.” I should have taken him up myself, but there was no way I was climbing those stairs until I had to. It sounds insane considering I was about to race almost two thousand miles, but climbing stairs was a huge waste of energy I planned to avoid as much as possible over the next four days. Besides, I wanted to hang out with Sonny since I hadn’t seen him in almost two months. I told Danny to come back down and hang out when he was unpacked and rested.
Sonny was happy to be out of the car. I continued to play fetch with him for about ten more minutes in the Grants’ backyard. Then he got tired and decided to sniff every blade of grass and pee on every other blade of grass. While he was occupied, I climbed into the Grants’ hammock. My phone rang. It was my office. I let it go to voice mail, then checked the message. It was David. He called to ask me about a case and left his number for me two times. Each time spelling each number out slowly.
I couldn’t believe it. First, it was so nice of him to check on me two months after my fetus and I were hit by a car. Second, I had been out of the office so long that I didn’t even remember the name of the case he was talking about let alone the facts. There was no way I could discuss it intelligently. Finally, what a dumbass. The number he gave me was the number for the entire office, including mine, and he’d given it to me twice. I decided to call him back later, after I was sure he’d left the office, and leave him a message telling him I didn’t recall the file but would look into it next month when I returned from maternity leave.
* * *
The days before the Tour de West passed very slowly. We were in top shape and eager to start racing, but none of us wanted to waste any energy. Those of us who arrived in San Diego early just sat around all day other than the occasional training ride or to get food.
On Friday, Erica arrived. Prior to her arrival, I had been taking Sonny up to the third floor each evening, where he would hog three-fourths of my twin bed. I was scared shitless that Erica would put the kibosh on Sonny. I didn’t want to board him in a kennel for the next three weeks, then drive back from Seattle to San Diego after the race to get him. Fortunately, Erica turned out to be a dog lover and really liked Sonny. We didn’t even discuss the matter.
The prologue of the Tour de West began at high noon on Sunday. It was the biggest women’s cycling event that had ever taken place. The entire 1.8 mile course was lined with fans, mostly locals, who wanted to see what cycling was all about. I’m sure they walked away disappointed, as watching one woman after another pass you at thirty second intervals 117 times in a row is not very entertaining.
The course was rolling and there was a tailwind, so the times were very fast. I placed fourteenth with a time of just under four minutes; putting me twenty seconds out of first place and thirty seconds out of last place. Such time gaps were negligible with 1,853 miles left to go.
The next day, Stage 1, was the first serious stage. Just before the start I was in the staging area twenty feet from the start line trying to stay as calm as possible so as to not burn up nervous energy. I looked around and noted that I was in a sea of women who were virtually indistinguishable as they were all young and tan, with skinny arms, bulging quads and hamstrings, and glasses and helmets disguising a good portion of their features. It was hard not to be intimidated.
Once we were permitted to move forward to the start line, there was a mad dash to get as close to the front as possible. We were packed in so tight that I could barely see anything aside from the girl directly in front of me and the ones on either side of me. I had lost my teammates in the shuffle forward and did not have enough room to even twist my body to find them. The noise from the racers and the crowd only added to the confusion. I decided to just relax and concentrate on hearing the start gun. Minutes later, it went off and I heard the sound of over one hundred women clipping into their pedals at the same time. I got chills.
I got over that sentimentality quickly. The pace was fast from the gun, particularly for the first hour as riders tried to escape from the pack. Every time someone darted out, the pace increased to catch them. Once the catch was made, someone else sprinted ahead. Finally, four women got away that the big teams did not seem inclined to chase. The pace slowed and steadied until thirty miles before the finish, when the big teams organized and chased the break. All four women in the break were exhausted from working in the wind all day. The catch was made a mile before the finish in Long Beach, one hundred and twelve miles from San Diego, and ended in a field sprint.
The final sprint was slightly downhill and since it involved one hundred and seventeen women full of caffeine and adrenaline there was, not surprisingly, a crash. It was on the left side of the pack and I easily avoided it because I was far out of the mix as usual. There’s a rule in stage races that if there’s a crash within three kilometers of the finish, anyone who gets caught out by the crash is given the same time as the
peloton
. So, I didn’t worry about losing time even though I was at a full stop behind the crash as the winner, a woman from Germany, crossed the line with her arms in the air.
After the race, Alyssa and I grabbed burritos from Chipotle. I ate half and drank two Nalgene bottles of water. I couldn’t stuff anything else in my mouth. I wrapped the other half of the burrito to eat after the massage. I had to eat at least five thousand calories a day to compensate for the calories burned during the race, a difficult task because I needed to eat food high in energy and nutrients, not just ice cream and brownies. It was also difficult because I was riding my bike through midday, so lunch generally consisted of a Clif Bar every hour for four to seven hours. Even though the bars are okay, it’s not the most enjoyable way to consume 1,000 to 1,500 calories.
When we got back, Alyssa went to meet Danny for her massage, while I sat outside on the porch sipping water and rubbing Sonny’s belly. Brenda came out and with her usual tact said, “You and that dyke are really getting along, huh?”
“Who?” I said.
“Alyssa.”
“She’s gay?” I said in disbelief.
“You’re kidding right?” asked Brenda incredulously. “How could you not know?”
“Because she looks completely feminine.”
“Ever heard the term ‘lipstick lesbian’?”
I had, but I thought they just looked feminine compared to the muscle-bound lesbians with spiked hair. I didn’t know they were actually feminine looking, let alone pretty. Besides, I had always assumed that any lesbian involved in sports was leaning towards the butch persuasion.
In addition to being shocked by Alyssa’s sexuality, I was embarrassed that Brenda, who was clearly homophobic, had better gaydar than me. “Yes I’ve heard of lipstick lesbians,” I replied. “I just didn’t know Alyssa was one.”
“You would have found out soon enough. She’ll probably hit on you,” Brenda said. “Fucking carpet muncher.”
“I doubt she’ll hit on me,” I said. “I’ve told her enough dating horror stories for her to pick up on the fact that I’m straight.”
Brenda left and few minutes later, Alyssa was standing across from me on the porch. She said, “Your turn.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Hey, great race today,” I added, realizing I’d never said that at Chipotle.
“I came in twenty-somethingth place,” Alyssa said, puzzled.
“Well, it was nearly one hundred places better than me,” I said smiling and trying to think of something else to say, completely forgetting that it was my turn for a massage. It dawned on me while I was smiling at Alyssa and trying to think of something clever to say that I was flirting. I stared at Alyssa. Objectively, she was hot, even with her hair all greasy after her massage. But she was hot yesterday and I wasn’t flirting with her then. Hell, I’d been around hot women all my life and hadn’t flirted with them.
Was I a lesbian? I had considered the possibility before, such as when I obsessed over various actresses, but I’d always dismissed the idea as crazy. I’d heard that everyone had that “what if” scenario in their head when looking at a gorgeous actress. Plus, I’d never been attracted to any of the lesbians I’ve met. Never mind that all of my friends are straight and, to my knowledge, I’d never actually met any lesbians other than some professors in college and the fat woman with the crew cut that worked at Blockbuster. I always assumed that as long as I was never attracted to a lesbian and didn’t have a desire to chop all of my hair off, bind my boobs and wear men’s clothing, that I was heterosexual. Now I was confused. Alyssa wasn’t an unattainable actress or a butch woman I wasn’t attracted to. She was, however, the first lesbian I’d ever met that I didn’t evaluate and say, phew, I’m not attracted to her so I’m not gay. Instead, she was a hot and interesting woman whom I didn’t realize I was attracted to until the second Brenda mentioned she was gay and therefore an option. If Alyssa looked feminine and was gay, I could be, too.
I turned the thought over in my head. I was twenty-eight and had never had a relationship longer than a month, and most hadn’t lasted more than one date. Plus, I was a total tomboy, hated shopping and had an appreciation for sensible footwear. In fact, I avoided sensible footwear because I didn’t want to look like a lesbian. Oh my God, I was one of those self-hating lesbians! What was wrong with me? I looked at Alyssa, who was now next to me on the porch swing relaxing, and pondered whether to say something. As I was trying to decide what to say, Danny came out and said, “You’re up Jenna.”