Page 26 of Oar Than Friends

All roads lead to Rome, and all that.

I should never have texted her in the first place, because this was exactly what I’d predicted would happen. I’d seen it the second she realized who I was; the way her jaw clenched and her body stiffened as her eyes travelled over my initials and recognition dawned.

I’d seen that look before. I knew that look.

I could definitely blame my father for that.

It was the one which came over people right after they remembered who my father was, and the reputation he’d garnered over years and years of questionable political activity, not to mention the affairs he seemed more adept at. Lately, however, they remembered how he’d spent the summer.

Then they’d remember one or other fabricated story about me, my rowing achievements and how I was just like him – a raging lothario – likely alongside a stolen picture of me next to one of my Greek cousins who’d been wrongly labelled as my latest girlfriend.

Or perhaps like the time when a photo had been cropped to look like I was groping the arse of a passing girl, when in fact I was trying to shield my sister after her dress had caught in her underwear.

Or the week this past August when I’d given myself the first break of the entire rowing season after the World Championships – Olly, Brooks and Charlie had come over to Greece to relax, and we’d been papped the one night we decided to take a boat to the mainland for dinnerwith my family. The ensuing images had been splashed across every European gossip page, making me out to be some kind of endless partier hopping from one girl’s bed to another.

No one ever questioned how I have the time for all the socializing and drinking and women, alongside the gruelling training hours and my coursework. No one ever said, ‘There’s no way he can win Olympic medals and partythatmuch, it can’t be true.’

But I have a problem I can do very little about.

My face.

I look good.

And that’s not me being arrogant, it’s stating a fact. I am aesthetically handsome; it’s something to do with the thick dark wavy hair, dimples, cheekbones, the Osbourne-Cloud blue eyes my siblings and I have, and the Mediterranean skin. My grandfather always jokes my mother is part Amazonian, and I’ve inherited my height from her. Rowing has sculpted my body and thickened my muscles.

I’ve turned down more modelling contracts than I can count. I’m given the attention of anyone I pass whether I want it or not, but stopping short of never leaving the house I can’t hide. And why the fuck should I hide when I’ve done nothing to court the limelight except compete for my country, and win? Bottom line, I’ve been put on a pedestal I was never consulted about, and then ordered to cling on while everyone tried to shove me off. And it’s not all bad, my face does afford me a few free passes when I need them – parking ticket here, late paper turned in there.

I have a tight circle of friends who know the real me, and that’s all I give a shit about.

Then nine days ago I met someone who hadn’t seen my face before, didn’t know my name, or my bank account. She didn’t know my rowing credentials, she didn’t know where I lived, or where I studied. Or how I’d spent my summer. She’d never heard of my family.

For a week it was an incredible feeling. I was starting with the blank slate I’d never been afforded, I had the luxury to reveal myself at my own pace. Show what I wanted to show.

Me. Therealme.

I’d come to the conclusion that was the reason I’d been so angry on Saturday – the reminder that my life would be an endless stream of living under the raincloud of my hideous father and family name, forever tarred with his brush.

I couldn’t escape it. Kate Astley had shown me that. I’d seen it in her eyes. The reason she’d run out of there had nothing to do with me being the president of O.U.B.C. and everything to do with the false perception of how I lived my life, because of how my father lived his.

I ran my hands through my hair and let my head fall back against the headboard, ‘Just my fucking father still ruining my life.’

Brooks drained his cup of tea, placing his mug on the desk, ‘What happened?’

I sighed deeply, trying to flush out all the irritation I knew was building back up in my bloodstream, and looked at them.

‘You remember that girl I told you I met, the American one?’

Charlie nodded through a mouthful of chocolate chip cookies he’d run to fetch when the Jaffa Cakes had finished. ‘The one you were supposed to see on Saturday?’

‘Yeah. Her. Kate. Kate Astley.’ I had no idea why I kept repeating her name, but I kind of liked it. ‘When I snuck into the boathouse for a piss on Saturday I bumped into her. She was in the changing rooms. I was wearing my Oxford kit, and she noticed.’

Brooks’ mouth formed a little O shape, but he said nothing.

‘She wasn’t too happy, but I brought her around to the notion it wasn’t a big deal. Then she let slip the reason she was in the boathouse was because she’s part of the rowing squad.’

Charlie inhaled his cookie so sharply it set him off in a coughing fit until Brooks got up and smacked him on the back. He picked up a glass of water from my desk which had been there since yesterday and gulped it down.

‘She rows for Cambridge?’ he wheezed eventually, wiped his eyes dry and drew his arm across his mouth.

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