She groans, because of course she’s heard of EPO.
“Chasing better endurance, delayed fatigue, and faster recovery. You probably already know that the side effects include heart attacks, strokes, clots, and death.”
She shakes her head when my voice wobbles. I don’t ever talk about him, so dusting off his story is taking every last shred of energy I have left inside my body. But it’s time I told someone what I lived through, whathelived through, and why I was so hell-bent on uncovering the doping scandal in the world of rugby. Maybe it’ll help us both somehow.
“Then he started taking steroids for muscle growth, strength, and faster recovery.” I swallow, taking a beat. It’s not easy to talk about watching what I now recognize as the slow demise of my university best friend. At the time, though, it seemed like it came out of nowhere like a freight train.
“He collapsed during training, massive heart attack. Dead by the time he was twenty-five. Autopsy didn’t reveal any undiagnosed heart issues, so he simply filled his body full of chemicals andpushed too hard.”
She puts down her fork and picks up my trembling hand to hold between both of hers. “You don’t have to share if you’re not ready, Robert. I’ll be here when you are.”
Her eyes are filled with sympathy, compassion, and a knowing understanding of where the story ultimately ends. “I do need to share. I’ve kept this inside for so long; I think it’s rotting me from the inside, Rhi. I need to tell someone.” My voice cracks, along with another fissure in my heart. Sometimes, I don’t think about him at all because it hurts too much. And others, he’s on my mind every damn day: what he’d be doing if he was still here, what he’d say about the state of the rugby union, but I never give him a voice. I never talk about him out loud, never tell his story.
“There were whispers of doping at the time, but it was never made official. I think the family covered it up; you know how shame can make someone react.” It’s something I have in common, so I can understand it on some level.
She nods.
“The performance coach walked away clean, Rhiannon. He got away with pushing my impressionable roommate so far that he collapsed and died on the fucking pitch. I didn’t really want to be a journalist before then. But I changed my degree to media and broadcast production, studied relentlessly, and got a first.” I had been on track to get a 2:1 in my philosophy degree, which is how I know I busted my fucking arse like a dog chasing a ball to pursue the truth.
“The signs were all there. I suspected.” I suck in a deep and unsteady breath. “I knew, Rhiannon. Looking back, deep down, I fucking knew what he was doing. I tried to convince myself I didn’t. But the suspicion was there, sprouting weeds I couldn’t pull out by the root.
“It was so subtle at first; he was more irritable. After, aggression. He dug me in the gut with his elbow once over something completely banal. Then came the paranoia, alwaysconvinced someone was bitching about him behind his back. Super defensive over criticism, even if it was constructive, especially when it came to his game.”
I swallow, but nothing pushes down the lump of guilt and grief entangled in my throat. “He stopped having sex. Rhi, he was a player in every sense of the word. Different woman every night kind of game, and he just… stopped. Looking back, it was all there. Every fucking symptom, every sign, and I just let him do it because it wasn’t worth the fight. The delusions of grandeur were probably the tipping point; he kept taking risks on the field thinking nothing would happen to him. He got so big, so fast. And I remember seeing these weird bruises on his body, and putting it down to the sport but now, looking back…”
“They were from the injections.”
I nod, tears now trickling down my face.
“So now, every time I get even a whiff of doping in sport, my blood runs cold. It’s personal. It’s justice. It’s how many parents are burying kids like him because of a coach like that. No one is being held accountable for their actions.”
She reaches for my hand as the gates open and the tears come harder. “I should have done more to help him, to save him. And… I don’t know. Your dad has four rugby-playing kids, Rhiannon. And he was friends with the bastard that essentially killedmyfriend. There’s no way Darren would have known where to get that shit from if someone hadn’t helped him. I just… I don’t know. It was worth overturning every rock I could to make sure your dad wasn’t going to kill you and your siblings like his friend killed my friend.”
The boulder sitting on my chest finally cracks. It doesn’t disappear, but it moves, making it a little easier to breathe despite the tears.
“He died chasing a dream. I watched him die. And I didnothing. Nothing. Every headline, every article I write, I hear his voice screaming that I failed.”
She pulls our food to the side and moves to sit next to me. She puts her arms around me and pulls me to her shoulder where she lets me cry out seven years of grief and shame and guilt. As she strokes my back, holding me through my waves of agony, she whispers, “Thank you.”
“What for?” I look at her through blurry eyes as she presses a kiss on my cheek.
“For trying to protect me and my siblings, our teammates… even though you didn’t know us.” Her phone rings before I can say anything. She scrunches her face up at the unknown number across the screen and she ignores it.
“There’s something else.” Now I’ve started to tell her the truth, it’s bubbling like a raging river of acid at the back of my throat, ready to burst its dams.
She tips her head to the side before picking up my hand with both of hers. “I’m here for whatever you need to talk about.”
Something about how she’s staring at me makes me feel comfortable enough to tell her about the darkest time of my whole life. “The accident when I lost my leg?” I swallow, the bitterness on my tongue making it hard to speak. “I took my dad’s car.” I can’t meet her gaze. “I didn’t want to be here anymore, so I pointed it toward the cliffs and didn’t stop.”
I fix my eyes somewhere beyond her shoulder, then up at the ceiling, the floor, anywhere so I don’t have to see the pity and judgment that might be brewing in her beautiful eyes. “Woke up in the wreckage three days later, missing a leg and realizing I’d failed at the one thing I was trying to do.” I give a humorless laugh. “Turns out, I’m a terrible quitter. Even at dying.”
She throws her arms around me. “I’m so sorry you felt that there was no way out other than death.” She’s crying into myshoulder. “If you ever get anywhere close to feeling like that…” Her body heaves with heavy breaths as she squeezes me. “You need to tell me, okay? We can work through anything, as long as you keep breathing.”
I nod. “My therapist says that suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary situation.”
“Your therapist is right. But I hope you know you’re not alone, Robert.” She kisses my cheek as her phone rings again. And again.
The caller is persistent, so I encourage her to pick it up, feeling lighter for having shared my story with her, and noting not a single trace of pity or judgment in her concerned and tearful stare.
