Who Do You Love (26 page)

When he'd gotten back to Oregon, all he found was the note that Rachel had left him.
I wish you all the best,
it said. By then he did feel guilty—a one-night stand was one thing, a breakup was something else. For two weeks he called her every day, morning, noon, and night. She never answered. He would have flown to see her, but he was in the most rigorous phase of his pretrial training—as Rachel knew. Then one afternoon his phone had rung, and it was Maisie, saying she was out in Vancouver, shooting editorial for a fashion magazine, and could she visit when she was done? Andy had said, “Sounds great.”

At his apartment, which he'd carefully purged of all signs of Rachel, Maisie told him about the shoot. “It's a big spread on some dead lady writer, so they've got, like, a bunch of important male writers being, like, Henry James and diplomats and architects and whatever.”

“Who are you supposed to be?”

“Edith Wharton,” Maisie said proudly. “Remember that movie Winona Ryder was in? With all the great costumes? Edith Wharton wrote the book that was based on.”

“Why didn't they get an important female writer to be Edith Wharton?”

Maisie shrugged. “Dunno. Maybe they're all cows. I think the guy who played Henry James was hitting on me,” she giggled, reaching for Andy. “Is that your jealous bone?” she'd whispered, sliding her hand down his pants. She'd stayed for three nights, during which Andy had enjoyed his teammates' approval and envy. At least most of them were approving. “Nice upgrade, man,” said James Leonard, a sprinter, and Gary D'Allesandro, who ran the 1500, said, “If she's got a sister, I've got dibs.”

Only Mitch had been dubious, Andy could tell. He missed Rachel. He never had much to say to Maisie when she came to watch them practice, and he'd find ways to be elsewhere when Maisie was at
Andy's
place. “She's beautiful! She's great!” he said when Andy finally asked if he had a problem with her. “Maisie's fantastic. I just . . . you know,” he'd said, staring at the ground, “Rachel was great, too.”

Andy agreed. He missed her . . . but by then it was too late. She was in New York City, back to what he bet she thought of as her real life, and that knowledge felt like a stone on his chest, something heavy that had fallen and that he'd have to carry for the rest of his life.

•••

Summer came, and he flew to Sacramento for the Olympic tryouts. Even with his life in turmoil, his times kept getting better, as if pain was pushing him around the track, narrowing his focus until he couldn't see anything but the finish line. He wanted to call Rachel when he was named one of the two runners who'd represent the United States in the 5000-meter race in Athens, but Maisie had been there, hugging him, holding his hand, smiling for the photographers, almost like she was trying to make sure that she'd be in every shot. If Rachel saw the news, she probably saw Maisie, too.

He bought plane tickets for his mom and Mr. Sills, sending them to Greece three days early so they could get settled in, see the ruins, treat it like a vacation. Maisie paid her own way. “See you at the finish line,” she'd said. He knew the drill—how the athletes would be bused from the airport straight to the Olympic Village, where they'd sleep, eat, and, in the case of the single men and women, hook up. Andy wasn't interested in any of that. When he wasn't eating or sleeping, he was running the race in his head, imagining his competitors, picturing himself powering past them in the first lap and leaving them farther and farther behind.

Thirty-five men ran the two heats for the 5000. Only fifteen of them qualified for the finals.
Andy's
time, thirteen minutes and twenty seconds, put him right in the middle of the pack, which was perfect—he hadn't burned himself out and run his best race in the qualifiers; he still had something left for the main event.

“Good luck, brother,” said Tim Fine, the other American runner who had just missed qualifying for the finals. The rest of the field were Kenyans, Algerians, Moroccans, Ethiopians, guys who were twenty-one or twenty-two, tiny and light and looking like they'd been created specifically for speed. At five-ten and 160 pounds, Andy felt like a giant at the starting line, and was one of only three men in the field who hadn't been born in Africa. Then he'd shut down his mind and focused entirely on his breath. The sunny, slightly breezy day didn't matter, nor did the people in the stands, or his coaches, or his teammates, or all the memories of what had driven him to this place. When the gun went off Andy came charging onto the tracks, and the only thought in his head was
I will not be denied.
Hicham El Guerrouj, the presumptive favorite, hung back in the middle of the pack, biding his time until the last half mile, when his kick took him right to Andy's heels. He stayed with him up until the last two hundred meters, when, with his legs on fire and his body screaming at him to stop, Andy pushed even harder and crossed the line first, a mere fifth of a second before El Guerrouj. The whole race had taken just under ten minutes.

The rest of the day was a blur. His coaches shouted praise in his ear and someone handed him an American flag, which Andy wrapped around his shoulders as he trotted his victory lap. He hugged El Guerrouj, who was crying, and someone led Maisie and Lori and Mr. Sills down to the edge of the track to watch as the winners mounted the rostrum and were crowned with wreaths, and the medals were placed around their necks. Andy touched the medal, running his fingers over the engraving. He still couldn't believe that he'd done it, that he'd gotten what he dreamed of, that he'd won. He felt like he was made of light and air, untethered from all his old shames and sorrows, like he'd been elevated to some plane above other people, with their everyday jobs, their little joys and frustrations, and he'd never have to come down and live in the world again . . . and then, in that moment, a malevolent voice spoke up in his head, in a whisper that sounded like the rattle of old pennies in a beggar's cup.
What if it isn't enough?

He shuddered as he felt the day suddenly turn cool, and the applause from the crowd turn into a dim, muffled sound, like waves slapping senselessly onto the sand. His body became flesh again, leaden and heavy and pebbled with goose bumps, and the familiar sorrow rose up to engulf him. He had taken every ribbon, won every prize, even this one, the ultimate, the gold medal. He had sacrificed so much—love, friendship, leisure, ownership of his own body and time. And now? What if not even all that was enough to quiet that voice, which sometimes sounded like his mother's and sometimes like the father he'd never known, the voice that said,
You're not worthy, you don't deserve it, nothing you do will ever be enough.

Then his mother was shrieking in his ear, and he could hear the crowd chanting his name.

Mr. Sills, resplendent in a USA sweatshirt that stretched tight over her belly, kept lifting up his glasses to wipe underneath his eyes. Maisie wouldn't let go of his hand. “You'll need an agent,” she said that night, and when Andy had looked at her, still dazed from the win, Maisie had kissed him and said, “You just leave everything to me.”

•••

Back at home, the medal went into a velvet-lined box, and Andy began his new life. First came the print ads for the sneakers he'd worn in Athens. Then came the
Vanity Fair
profile (the sneaker ad ran right next to it, which made Andy wonder about the way those things worked). He and Maisie posed in
People
magazine's Most Beautiful edition. (“I'm not beautiful,” Andy had said, to which Maisie had answered, “Sure you are . . . and I am, sugar, and this is publicity that all the money in the world can't buy.”) More ads; more endorsement deals; his first pro-am golf tournament, where he played in a foursome with the world's top golfer, a network news anchor, and a basketball star he'd grown up watching. Maisie told him he needed a stylist, and he reluctantly agreed—it was easier than spending hours in stores trying to figure out what looked right. His publicist got him into the
New York Times,
just on the basis of his new look. Maisie had pouted when the photographer told her politely that she just wanted a shot of Andy, but cheered up when the piece on athletes as fashion trendsetters mentioned her by name and called her a supermodel.

Finally came the one thing he'd been hoping for, the call from
Sports Illustrated.
Their track reporter was a guy named Bob Rieper, known to the runners as the Grim Rieper. Bob was lean and tall and stooped, with a narrow rectangle of a face, dark hair that hung past his eyebrows, and a low, sonorous voice that seemed made to deliver bad news.

Bob had been in Athens to watch Andy win his medal. He'd seen him work out in Oregon, where he still stayed and trained at the camp, and in New York, where he'd gotten a place with Maisie. Bob had talked to him about the 2008 games and had accompanied him on a trip back to Philadelphia, where Andy spoke at an elementary school, introducing Bob to Mr. Sills and to Lori. In all that time, Andy had never heard him laugh, never seen him smile.

It was Bob's voice on the phone that morning, waking him up from a dream, where he'd been back in Philadelphia, chasing a woman wearing Rachel's blue cowgirl boots down Frankford Avenue.

“Hey, man, what's up?”

Bob did not believe in small talk. “I need to run something by you.”

“What's that?”

“It's about your father.”

Andy felt nothing but mild curiosity as he got out of bed and walked to the window, asking, “What about him?”

“You told me that he died in Germany when you were a baby.”

“That's right.”

“And that you don't remember him at all, and you never tried to find out any of the details.”

“Uh-huh.” Across the room, Maisie was looking at him, eyebrows lifted. Andy held up a finger—one minute. Maisie nodded and rolled over as Andy said, “What's up?”

“This is hard,” Bob said. “I've never had to tell anyone anything like this before.”

“Tell me what?” When he paused, Andy realized that he was bouncing up and down on his toes and drumming his fingers on his thigh.

Across the line, Andy heard him sigh. “The fact-checkers found out that there was a guy named Andrew Landis who went to Roman Catholic, who graduated when your father would have graduated and whose enlistment dates line up with what you've told me.”

“Okay . . .”

“But that guy's not dead.”

Andy had been pacing, the way he always did when he talked on the phone. When he heard the words
not dead
he stopped, frozen.

“You're kidding,” he said, in a voice that didn't sound like his own.

“Not dead,” Bob repeated. “He went to prison in 1979. His friend shot someone—a rival drug dealer, it sounds like. That guy gave your dad the gun to get rid of, but the cops caught him with it, which made him an accessory to murder. And because he'd been in trouble before, the judge threw the book at him.”

Andy thought later that he must have said something or made some noise, because he felt Maisie's hand on his shoulder, and her face looked frightened. He shook his head, mouthed,
It's okay,
held up a finger again, and said, “What kind of
trouble
?”

“Drug dealing, larceny, burglary, grand theft auto . . .”

“Wow,” he said, and tried to laugh. “Maybe tell me what he didn't do. Maybe that would take less time.”

“I have to put some of this in my story,” Bob said. “You understand. If I don't write about this, somebody else is going to, and now that I know about it, I can't not use it. I just wanted to give you a chance to say something, if you want to.”

“I get it,” Andy said. He walked down the hall of their spacious and still barely furnished apartment, then into the bathroom, where a face he didn't recognize stared from the mirror.
Alive. In prison.
He'd never tried to get in touch. His mom had never said a word. Had she known? How could she not have? “But it wasn't . . . I mean, he wasn't—he was an accessory, but he didn't kill anyone, right?”

“It looks that way. He just got caught holding the gun. Bad luck.” Andy couldn't stand the sympathy in the Grim Rieper's voice, thick as frosting on a birthday cake. “Why don't you take some time? Talk to your people. I'll ask you to comment at some point, but don't worry about that now.”

A horrifying thought struck him. “Are you going to talk t
o
him?” Andy asked.

“I'll probably reach out. He was paroled eighteen months ago. He's living in Philadelphia now,” said Bob. “It's a part of your story.”

My story
, thought Andy. Is that what he'd become? And if he had to be a story, why couldn't he just be the one he'd crafted, the one he'd been working on since high school, the one
Vanity Fair
and the
Philadelphia Examiner
and all those other places had been content to repeat?
Andy Landis, winner. Andy, who'll push himself to the front of the pack and hang on. He'll pay the price, no matter how high. Andy Landis, who came up from the slums of Philadelphia to win gold in Greece.
Wasn't that a story anyone would want to read? It was simple. Inspiring. American.

He must have said goodbye somehow, because Andy found himself with a phone in his hand buzzing the dial tone, and Maisie looking at him.

“You're not going to believe this,” he began . . . and then he found himself wishing, with an intensity that felt like a fever, that he wasn't talking to her; that he was telling Rachel instead.

But Rachel wouldn't take his calls, and Maisie was looking at him, a question on her lovely face.

“It's my dad,” he said.

“What do you mean, your dad? Your dad's dead.”