Page 4 of Beyond the Hedge Maze

“Look at this handsome fucker standing here and letting the people take you in. Are you ready? It’s nearly go time!”

Sean Murray was the only man Jesse knew who could shift between serious and steady, to carefree and playful at any given second. A former Olympian and three-time Boat Race winner, Sean was the natural choice to be the crew’s President. They were minutes from the start of the race, and Sean had already performed the motivational locker room speeches and rally cries.

Jesse slowly and reluctantly turned away from the crowd to answer his best friend. He was freaking out, his thoughts in overdrive. “Sean.”

Sean frowned. “Hey, what happened? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“You remember that guy I told you about?”

“Mate, you’re going to have to be more specific.”

Jesse huffed. “Oliver. The guy I was in love with, during you know…the summer. He’s here. He’s in the crowd.”

Sean swiveled at lightning speed to face the crowds, but they had lost sight of him.

Jesse hunched over, putting his hands on his knees to support his weight. He needed to go. If he left right now, he might be able to catch up to him—he could find Oliver.

Sean crouched down to meet him at eye-level, his large palm tightly gripping Jesse’s bicep to bring him back to Earth. “Okay. Okay. Listen, J, I know the timing is shite. Let’s go win this thing, and then we’ll make a plan. I need you to focus, okay?”

Jesse could only nod in agreement as his head swam. Sean was right: he needed to focus, there was no room for mistakes today. Oxford was out for blood, and he wasn’t going to be the one to let the team down.

Jesse collapsed onto the grass of the Putney embankment as Sean walked away to speak to each man on their crew. He went through the motions of his pre-race routine, doing one last round of stretches to loosen his muscles while ignoring the concerned looks Sean kept shooting him in his direction. When Sean became distracted by their coxswain, Alex Walton, to finalize their strategy for the day, Jesse took advantage and used the opportunity to scan the crowd, looking for Oliver again.

Why was he there? If memory served, Oliver had never been particularly athletic or into sports. Did he know that Jesse was going to be in the race? Had he shown up just to see him? Or was this all one big coincidence? He was desperate for more information.

Jesse had spent a considerable amount of time trying to convince himself that Oliver hadn’t been one of the reasons he had chosen to attend Cambridge. That he hadn’t decided to move nearly four thousand miles away from home on the off chance that he’d run into the only person he’d ever been in love with. But seeing Oliver confirmed that deep down he had always been a reason.

Sean’s Scottish brogue boomed over the sounds of the crowds and the motorboats already stationed at the start of the race. “Ten minutes, lads!!”

It was warm today, cloudless, and for that he was grateful. The lack of rain would help to minimize any accidents and give their team one less thing to worry about on the Tideway. Jesse tilted his head towards the sun, using the last few minutes before the race began to try and silently meditate, but the noise from the spectators and his consuming thoughts of Oliver made it difficult to relax. He focused on the sun beating down on his shoulders. He let it seep into his skin, muscle, and bone, and he ignored the buildings lining the river.

One day those buildings would become his backyard, but that day was not today.

A man with a megaphone came around, signaling that it was time to get into their boats and row the short distance to the starting line. Jesse begrudgingly turned his face away from the sun and his thoughts of Oliver, as everyone took their corresponding spots next to their downturned boat. It was time to go.

As he shook out his arms and legs, getting ready to lift the boat and carry it into the water, he felt Roger McDavis’s slimy presence at his side. “Try not to fuck anything up, will you, Alvarez?”

He was looking forward to never interacting with McDavis again after today. The prick had disliked Jesse since they had met, and Jesse couldn’t say he had any pleasant feelings towards him, either. Jesse had never figured out if McDavis’s disdain stemmed from the fact that Jesse was queer, or because he wasn’t white, or both.

The team, on Alex’s signal, hoisted their boat into the air and made their way toward the river, taking care not to stumble as they entered the murky waters of the Thames. Oxford’s crew followed close behind. Their rivals had several new members this year, while the Cambridge team had remained mostly the same. The odds were 50/50 as to who would get the win, but Jesse liked to think their team had something special, sans McDavis.

Once they were about a meter off the shoreline, the team flipped over the boat in unison, placing it in the water. Afterwards, Sean and Jesse broke away from the group to collect the oars for their teammates.

He wrapped his arm around Sean’s shoulder. “I’m going to miss this.”

Sean gave him a sad smile in return, but quickly tried to lighten the mood. “I have at least one more Olympics to train for, so your beautiful arse is going to be spending every free minute you’re not working back here with me. The ergometer is only fun when you have a buddy next to you.”

Jesse laughed and picked up half of the oars. “Ergos are never fun, you psychopath.”

Sean and Jesse distributed the oars to the team, and everyone silently screwed them into position. Final checks were made to the boat, clothing was readjusted, wellies were thrown back towards the shore, and silent prayers were sent up to unknown gods as the eight rowers plus one coxswain got into their positions.

Slowly, they rowed to their starting point in the center of the river. He studied the men in front of him, craning his neck slightly to see the back of Sean’s fiery-red hair in the eight seat.

Each coxswain worked meticulously with their seven and eight seats to get them into position against the current along with the anchor boats behind them. In the distance, he saw the umpire raise a megaphone in one hand and a red flag in the other. Jesse took one last steadying breath and tuned out all of the sounds around him: the boats behind, the roar of the crowd, the BBC helicopters swirling above. It was just him and the other eight men in the boat.

The red flag lifted into the air, and with a simple, “Attention! Go!” it was dropped. And they were off.

His muscles burned; biceps, triceps, quads, every tendon in his body on fire as they worked in perfect unison. The oar felt good in his hands, solid, supported by years of callouses that held it with confidence. With the sun beating down on his shoulders, providing a heat of an entirely different nature, Jesse came alive, fueled by endorphins.