Page 39 of Floored By Love

“This is fancy,” I heard Colton say. He held the comp suit up to his chest.

“Yeah, they’re specially made for each of us,” Luke answered.

I made eye contact with him, and he smiled at me. I spun back to my locker. A butterfly or two had definitely fluttered its little wings. I needed to get over this mental hurdle getting dressed in front of me and go with it. It’s just pretend. I could do this.

“We look like superheroes,” Alex observed. We all had our comp suits on as we headed to the arena.

“I’d like to be Captain Abs. How about the rest of yo-” Colton’s snark ended the moment we stepped into the arena. It was packed. I watched Orion, Alex, and Colton soak it all in. Their eyes were practically bugging out.

“How are we supposed to do this?” Orion asked.

“You just have to pretend it’s like any other competition,” I said.

“Ignore everyone and focus on one or two things. Your family, your team, the bar, the vault. Just pick something,” Luke added.

“Y’all didn’t say it was like this,” Colton whispered in my ear.

I shrugged. “It’s not exactly something you can really prepare for.”

And you couldn’t. I’d been here before, and I still felt the nerves creeping up my spine. China, Brazil and Germany were in our division and a group of athletes that didn’t have full teams. Most of the individuals were specialists, meaning they excelled in one or two specific events. Rasmus Ivanov from Estonia was the reigning world champion on the pommel horse. Team-wise, China was the biggest threat, but Brazil had become a team to watch out for the last few years.

Their star was hard to miss. Inácio Silva. He could’ve been Luke’s little brother. Similar build, tan skin, dark hair, though he kept it shorter than Luke. He was all business on the apparatus, but as soon as he was done with any routine, he broke into this ridiculously adorable smile. He was something of a social media darling known for his emotive displays - the opposite of me in both respects - and he got a lot of attention for it.

“Should I be happy with the division we have? Seems like a lot of big guns,” I asked Noah, dropping my bag on the floor.

“Do you want the real answer?”

Not when you put it like that.

“Sure. Why not?”

“Great Britain annihilated their division. Home crowd advantage dwarfed anything Ukraine could muster. Russia and France didn’t come close to Japan this afternoon. You guys are the big team here. You’re going to crush it.”

Perhaps I wanted to hear that after all. “Thanks, Noah.”

“Go warm up, Cam.”

I headed over to the parallel bar. It was one of my weaker events. One of China’s gymnasts was on it. The warmup was a weird set of unwritten rules regarding sharing equipment and time on c each apparatus. Basically, don’t be selfish. Work your routine or skill and let someone else have a turn. I was next.

“You’ll do great.”

I practically jumped out of my skin. I knew that voice.

“Just tighten your core more on the first release and it’ll help keep your elbows in,” Luke continued.

I turned my head slightly. “Why are you talking to me? Isn’t Cassandra going to yell at you?”

“Di-did you…uh,” Luke stuttered, “f-forget we’re supposed to be friendly?”

Fucking hell. Yes, I did. “No.”

“You totally forgot.”

I smiled. “Okay, so yeah. I did.”

“There’s your smile.”

I turned around. Big mistake. I hadn’t bothered to look at him yet. Comp suit Luke was my second favorite Luke. This year’s singlet was bursting with his muscles and I could see his chest hair peeking out.