Page 28 of Head Over Wheels

Yeah, well, life’s not all chocolate and waffles.

Dad approached and I hurriedly stuffed my phone away, the conversation with Mum still too fresh in my mind. I probably shouldn’t have told her I’d slept with someone on the team. If it got back to Dad… Oops. I’d have to make sure he didn’t guess it was Seb.

He clapped his arm around me, giving me a gentler version of the shakedown he’d given Colin. ‘How’s my Molly? Ready for the next one, ay? Good on ya.’

Actually, no. I didn’t feel ready for the next race. I felt adrift – on the brink of failure. I was already the sister, thedaughter, with half the prize money potential of my brother simply because of the lack of a warped Y chromosome. If I stopped bringing home the trophies…

It didn’t bear thinking about. I had to get back my form – and my luck. And Ireallyhad to stop wasting time thinking about Seb.

15 October 06:17

zpeed.com/voicechannels/@LoonieDunes/7493376900111

Folklore99: Have you ever been… really bad at something?

LoonieDunes: Lots of things.

Folklore99: How do you sound so chilled about that? I hate the feeling. I have a family of overachievers and I suck at everything except riding a bike. I hate it sometimes.

LoonieDunes: My family is the opposite. They don’t expect me to be good at anything, which is maybe why you train more than me despite your injury.

Folklore99: At least you know they’ll love you no matter how much you screw up.

LoonieDunes: Lore…

Folklore99: I’m just feeling sorry for myself. Forget I said anything.

LoonieDunes: Did something happen?

Folklore99: Nothing out of the ordinary. I was supposed tomeet my mum yesterday and I forgot and she hates anything that reminds her I’m not perfect. She doesn’t blame me openly, she just… I dunno. She can’t deal with the fact that I’m not like her – or like my brother, whose flaws she cannot see. But seriously, can we talk about something else?

LoonieDunes: You want to watch a film? Take your mind off it? I’ll let you tell me everything that’s wrong with the film.

Folklore99: You can’t stop me anyway.

LoonieDunes: You’re lucky I’m stuck on the stationary bike – and I kind of like your whingeing.

Folklore99: I don’t whinge!

LoonieDunes: You get this buzz in your voice and it goes all high-pitched—

Folklore99: Shut up and pick a movie!

Chapter 12

Seb

If the Tour of Flanders was my lucky race, then the one that reliably deflated my ego every year, right at the beginning of the season in Europe, was the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad. Even worse than the late winter weather was the team introduction beforehand in the Ghent velodrome, where we were paraded before a crowd of fans in strobe lighting and manufactured smoke to make the whole thing artificially dramatic. One year I’d even slipped on the blue-carpeted circuit and fallen off my bike and that clip had been played more often than any other footage of me.

In the packed backstage area where the team buses were parked, milling with riders and officials and team staff, there were a lot of familiar faces – too many. The Belgians turned out in force for the opening of the Classics season, the one-day races that dotted the calendar between the longer Grand Tours, and every team I’d ever raced with was in attendance, including the second-tier Walloon outfit where I’d got mystart. But I was the only Belgian signed to Harper-Stacked, making me feel even more out-of-place than usual.

Our lead riders Colin and Lars Fiske got to stay home instead of competing in the bitter February cold and Lori was similarly absent from the women’s race that started two hours later, although that hadn’t stopped me daydreaming about what it would have been like to meet her gaze across the breakfast room of our hotel once more.

I was still low in the pecking order, rolling onto the stage behind my teammates to wave awkwardly to the crowd, wondering how my new kit would look in photos. There had been some unfortunate design flaws over the years that had drawn too much attention to the crotch.

At least I was deep inside the bunch staying warm at the starting line. By the end of the race I was always certain I would lose two fingers and my little toe to frostbite. But the local crowd was enthusiastic despite the weather – or perhaps there was something stronger than coffee in their insulated flasks – and my teammate Derek Sabel, an Australian youngster on his first year in Europe, glanced around him in awe as he shivered. We’d practised parts of the route and the climbs yesterday and I’d kind of enjoyed feeling useful, introducing the kid to the tortures of the Cobbled Classics.

My job that day was to lead the young hot-shot out, ride in front of him to save his strength and help him get into position to attack at the right moment – and hope he didn’t lose any skin on his hands as the bike shook him to his bones on the brutal surface.

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