We’re not just here to participate. We’re here to win.
Chapter Seven
Violet
“Okay, but which one was she?” Cassie’s face fills the screen of our video call. “Not sure if you noticed, Vi, but that whole team was women.”
I stare at my best friend. Her facial expressions are cracking me up as she sits there in her scrubs with her hair pulled back too tight, and dark circles under her eyes that only a surgical intern could be sporting.
“She was the one carrying the flag.”
The gears are turning in her mind as her gaze rises above her like she can re-watch the opening ceremonies on the ceiling of her car.
It’s midnight back home, and she’s on break during her night shift. I told her I’d set an alarm to get up and call before I got myself ready to head to the studio. She was all over the chance to talk about my chaotic life here in Milan.
“Yeah, I don’t remember.” She shakes her head and sighs heavily. “You just need to get a picture and send it to me.”
“Like that won’t be weird.”
“People take pictures of Olympians all the time. It’ll be fine.” She takes a long pull and groans from the taste of the liquid in her Styrofoam cup. It’s from the coffee cart out front of the hospital. I was a frequent flier there when I’d go visit Cassie, and she’d show me around the different floors. Of course, there were places I couldn’t visit, but I became pretty close with a lot of the other interns and doctors in the building.
Two of them thought I was hot, which always made Theo mad. Knowing what I know now, I should have fucked them both.
That makes me laugh. As though I’d have it in me to actually do that.
“Are you getting any sleep over there in your ritzy hotel?” Cassie brings me back to reality.
I shrug. “I slept well the first night.”
“Because you were shit-faced.” She’s lifting a brow at me as if to say,and you were swept away by the hot hockey player woman who put you to bed and made sure you were safe.
“Last night I slept decently. Couldn’t shut my brain off about the new song I’m working on.” I put my coffee to my lips and let the taste of caffeine flood through me.
“So, are you a lesbian now?”
I almost spit out my coffee all over the white carpet in the seating area. I’m sure that cost a pretty penny to have cleaned.
“WHAT?” I shriek, unsure if I heard her correctly.
Cassie doesn’t say anything further; she simply stares at me. She knows damn well that I heard her, and I just don’t know how to answer that question.
“I’m not a lesbian,” I finally answer, because it’s true. I don’t date women. I’ve never even considered touching another woman.
“What if she asks you out on a date?” Cassie’s face is practically pressed against her phone now, and I feel like I’m being interrogated.
She startles when someone taps on her window. Then I see her shake her head and tap her wrist.
“Who is telling you to get back to work?” I watch the situation like a silent film.
She groans. “It’s Logan. He’s useless without me there, and they need help to find a vein on the new guy that just came in.”
“Shouldn’t be too bad.”
“He put both hands into a meat grinder…”
My eyes go wide, and I can’t seem to form sentences. “He did what?”
“Drugs were involved,” she groans as she grabs her coffee from the holder beside her and turns off the ignition that she had running for heat. February in New York is brutally cold. “Anyway, I gotta run. Probably end up having to put the IV in his neck. We’ve done it before.”
