I wait for him at the top of the ski lift and jump into his arms as soon as he gets off. His board falls to the soft snowy ground, and he kisses me full on the lips, with tongue. There’s no way the cameras missed that.
“You won!”
His breath is ragged with leftover adrenaline. “I know. Now I need to do it three more times.”
My shoulders hunch. Three more times. My nerves can’t take it. I’ll have an anxiety attack.
The four final rounds are held in a bracket style. Each person competes against the next to knock one another out until the final three medals will be confirmed in the last meets. It’s like an entire basketballMarch madness semifinals in the course of six hours.
But it doesn’t matter how messed up his sport is because Cyrus made it! He’s on to the quarterfinals, which will start at exactly two o’clock. Until then we have to sit around, load up on protein, and hope I don’t die from my inability to handle stress.
“How much time do we have until the quarterfinals?” he asks, taking off his goggles andswitching coats. Cyrus only wears the equipment he races in when he’s racing so the special mojo isn’t lost.
Yes, it makes absolutely no sense, but you can’t tell him that.
“Let’s go wait inside.” Cyrus normally likes to watch the other competitors, but he’s already made it into the next finals. Watching the rest of them won’t do any good. As the only American competing in this event, there’sno one for him to cheer on. With races happening, everyone’s attention is on the action on the slopes and we’re allowed to make our way into the building not being called out by a reporter.
It’s a miracle.
There are two chairs set off to the side of the large room used for athletes to do interviews or prep before meets. I lead Cyrus away from the major action and sit down waiting for him todo the same. He hesitates but finally sits.
“So when we get back to Vermont, when do you plan to move in with me?” he asks.
“What do you mean?” We live side by side. Why the heck would I move into his house?
“Well we’re dating now. It only makes logical sense.”
“Cyrus, we’ve been dating for like twenty-four hours. You don’t move in with somebody after a day.”
“You do when they’re your bestfriend.”
“We live next door to one another. It doesn’t even make sense.”
“Exactly.” He leans back in his chair smiling what might be his first real smile all day. “It won’t take you long to move your boxes at all.”
“Wait, now you aren’t even helping me move?”
His smile turns into a devilish smirk, and I know I’ve fallen into whatever trap he set. If he wasn’t so good on a board, Cyrus couldhave been a lawyer. “No, I’m not going to help you move. I wouldn’t want to take away your feminist rights.”
“It makes absolutely no sense, Cyrus. Plus, your condo is always dirty. That’s why you’re at my house all the time.” And the fact he never buys groceries and is always eating my food.
“But I have a videogame system.”
“Yeah, because you couldn’t move your videogame system to my house.”
“Fine, we’ll move to your place.”
“Wait a minute. I didn’t agree to us moving in together in the first place.” How did he end up living with me now?
“You’re going to be difficult about this, aren’t you?” he asks.
He’s kidding me, right?
Cyrus sighs when I don’t reply. “Fine, if you want to be a pain about it, we’ll tear down the wall that separates our living rooms and kitchens.”
My eyesare squinted together trying to process how this lines up between our two places. I’ve never been great with 3-D imagery. “Then we have two kitchens?”
“Yes, it will be great. We’ll turn them into one of those big chef kitchens.”
