Page 4 of Double Apex

4

BAHRAIN

LATE MARCH

COSMIN

My sister, Viorica, looks tired, but I know better than to say so. Last time we had a video call, I made some comment to that effect—purely because I’m worried about how hard she works for Vlasia House, the Ardelean Foundation children’s home—and it was lucky for me there were nine thousand miles between us. Rica is quite sensitive about being thirty-seven.

I’ve learned so much from her over the years. At times this has been painful—she can have a hot temper when provoked, which little brothers tend to do. She was fourteen when our parents died in a car crash and we were taken in by Andrei Ardelean. He was not a good man—cruel, in fact—though he was willing to throw much of his considerable fortune into my education and childhood karting career, starting at age five.

To Viorica he was a monster. I didn’t understand the extent of it at the time; I was so young. Now I know. And though he is dead, I still fight him. I fight his sharp edges, which are part of me. His arrogance, his manipulativeness.

Some days I can’t look in the mirror, and I repress a bitter laugh when people comment on my beauty. I only see the ugliness of my uncle’s face staring back at me.

I start our conversation—speaking in our native tongue—with a compliment.

You have done amazing work, Rica. The garden expansion is beautiful.

She rubs the bridge of her long, straight nose.

Thank you. But what Vlasia House needs most is a modern heating system—the third floor is so cold in winter—and that will be expensive. We already took such a big financial hit with the new roof.

She sips her tea. The video connection is good today—I see the steam rising from her cup. Behind her, she’s framed by the tall antique bookshelves in her office.

“Let us switch to English—I should practice,” she says.

“Of course.”

“The grant we secured last year, though large, didn’t go as far as I’d hoped.” Her tone is oddly clipped when she adds, “Next week I am approaching a potentially generous new donor.”

“Would you like for me to be there?”

“I prefer to manage it myself.” Before I can request further detail, she asks, “When do you visit next?”

“Before Baku. But you seem to be changing the subject.”

Her scoff tells me my intuition is correct.

“It’s something about this donor, isn’t it?”

Her nostrils flare in annoyance. “I have it under control, Cosminel,” she replies flatly, using the diminutive to put me in my place.

I can’t resist goading her a little by pretending to hide an indulgent smile at her sternness. “As you wish.”

Her phone rings, and she looks down at it.

I must take this , she says, gliding back into Romanian. Good luck this weekend.

I will do my best. Good night, Rica.

I drop my phone on the bed and walk to the window, admiring the bay, the lights of the city on the other side reflected along the edge like neon teeth. My own reflection is faint, as if underwater. Viorica isn’t the only one who looks tired.

I change into workout clothes, then grab water, a towel, my phone and wireless headphones, and a pouch of sponsor-supplied energy gel before going down to the fitness center.

I already had a workout earlier with Guillaume, my physio. But when my mind is restless, troubled, I need something less structured. If no one’s waiting for a machine, I’ll run on the treadmill for an hour, escaping into music.

I incline-run through a Cage the Elephant album—a band my best friend Owen’s American girlfriend told me about—thinking of home and Vlasia House, and whether I should take a few days to fly to Bucharest before the Chinese Grand Prix. I’d like to be with Rica for the meeting, to see what is troubling her that she thinks she must hide.

I’m walking back to the elevators when I spot Phaedra coming down the hallway from the women’s fitness center. Her hair—a reddish brown that reminds me of the cover of an antique book—is pinned up with damp wisps flying free. Her cheeks are pink from exertion, and the disheveled hair and flush of her face makes me wonder if she looks like this after sex.

She’s wearing a long, baggy unzipped hoodie that hangs past her hips like a dressing gown. I wonder if it belongs to a boyfriend. Is she dating? The woman is such an enigma—I know nothing about her, other than the small clues I’ve hoarded like magpie treasures.

She’s staring at her phone, rubbing her neck with a towel. I wait in front of the elevator door. Her shoes bark against the floor as she startles to a stop inches from me.

Standing this close, I notice how short she is—maybe 160 centimeters, five foot three. Her personality makes her seem taller. At this proximity, I see how easy it would be to lift her. Her clean-sweat smell reminds me of hot metal. I want to feel how perfectly my face would fit against her neck. I imagine her salt on my lips, her arms clasping me, slender hands moving up my shirt, fingers aligning in the valley of my spine.

“Good evening, drag?. Nice to see you. What are you listening to?”

She darkens the screen, expressionless. “A podcast.”

I could see she’s listening to David Bowie’s Diamond Dogs . My question was merely an opening, a courtesy. Is her overt lie a dare? It’s a shame, because I want to ask which is her favorite song on the album.

The nostrils of her freckled nose twitch. “Why do you stink like cough syrup?”

“The energy gel. Not a good flavor—it’s meant to be cherry. You want to taste?” I tip my head as if angling for a kiss.

Her look is icy. “You can keep your lips—and your opinions about the flavor of our sponsor’s product—to yourself, thanks. You’ll pretend it’s ambrosia even if it tastes like Satan’s asshole. God help us if someone posts a pic of you sucking on anything else.”

The elevator arrives, and I open a hand for her to precede me. I push the button for Emerald’s floor. The doors shut. I plant my feet, clasping my hands behind myself as if standing for a publicity photo.

A thought rises in my mind: already I’m so used to posing, I’ve almost forgotten how to be at ease in my body. This might be what every day is like for a woman.

I glance at Phaedra, and her eyes shift away.

“You must be relieved,” I say, “that there’s a separate gym for women downstairs.”

“No. I think it’s stupid and backwards.”

“Oh?”

“Like, ‘ Don’t worry, li’l lady! ’” she drawls in an American cowboy accent, “‘ I’ll save you from the dreaded male gaze! ’ It’s fucking absurd.”

I shake my head, perplexed. “Do women want this ‘male gaze,’ or don’t they? It seems you are always complaining about the problem.”

“Thanks for your vote of confidence on me being the spokesperson for all womankind,” she says with sarcasm. “No, I don’t want men staring. What I resent is men deciding I need to be hidden for my own protection in a separate gym. I can defend myself, thanks. If some douche-canoe is gawking, I’ll tell him, ‘Quit it or I’ll stick a fork in your eye.’”

“I’ll ask Javier in catering to hide the forks. And I know the slang use of ‘douche’—”

“You must hear it enough,” she mutters.

“—but why the addition of ‘canoe’? This is a small boat.”

“It’s a more colorful version of the same thing.”

“As for not needing the protection of men, I understand your resentment of condescension—”

She snorts. “Really?”

“—but I disagree. It should not be the responsibility of a woman to defend herself from men. The men need to do better.”

“It’s like you’re trying to miss my point. Is this a language thing?”

“I went to UK schools, and my English is excellent. How’s your Romanian?”

“Also, it’s pretty goddamned rich, having a narcissistic playboy attempt to teach me feminism. You’re a complete fucking sexist, and you know it.”

“I’m old-fashioned in some respects and quite progressive in others.”

“A week and a half ago, you introduced me to that bar bimbo as your boss’s daughter, ‘ Miss Morgan,’ not a goddamned engineer.”

“Did you say ‘bimbo’?” I scoff. “Which of us is sexist?”

She has the grace to look a little embarrassed.

“And that woman ,” I continue, feeling a rush from the advantage of her error, much like on the track, “had just told me how intimidated she felt about her friends with degrees, herself having none. I introduced you that way to put her at ease, not diminish your accomplishments.”

The doors open at our floor. I hold them as we stare each other down.

With an indeterminate noise, she finally steps out. “Super cool,” she deadpans. “But you’re still missing my point. I don’t need rescuing. I prefer to confront things head-on.”

“You are confrontational. I wonder if you don’t look for reasons to be angry.”

She plants her hands over her face before giving me a brutal glare through the fingers.

“Stop that shit. Women don’t have to search for reasons to be angry. It’s everywhere—a twenty-four-seven clown fuck. Why the hell would I want to be angry?”

“Because it sets your blood racing. But let me tell you this: if I drive angry, I don’t drive as well. I wonder if anger is the only type of passion you allow yourself.”

The pupils of her green eyes are pinpricks.

“You know what, Ardelean? Go fuck yourself.”

Her movements are stiff as she goes to the door of her suite and taps her phone to unlock it. The pneumatic hinge prevents her from slamming it, though she tries.

Back in my own room I feel remorse for my taunting. In a way, I was giving her what she wanted—she is invested in a certain image of me. But her face comes to mind again, and I’m concerned there was not only pleasurable indignation there but hurt .

After a shower, I open my laptop and begin an email.

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: I am an ass

The heading says it all. Please accept my apology. The comment was uncalled for.

My hands are poised above the keyboard as I consider whether to include more. I type the words to see how they look, to enjoy the relief of freeing them from my fingertips.

But I think I may be correct. If so, that’s a shame. You are fierce and brilliant and lovely, and you deserve every passion.

I immediately delete that and try a different kind of candor.

I am poor at apologies. I was sensitive and reflective as a child, and my uncle was quite strict. It was my impulse to apologize over every dropped teaspoon, thinking it would spare me his wrath, but I soon learned the abuse was worse if he saw me as weak.

I stop and delete again. Adding my name to the bottom of the initial three sentences, I hit send. In the morning, I find a reply, sent minutes after I fell asleep last night reading Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood .

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: You absolutely ARE an ass

All is forgiven if you hit double-digit points again on Sunday.

I wonder if there were secret sentences she typed out and deleted as well.