Page 13 of Let the Games Begin
“I can pay for myowndry cleaning.” Her words were venom.
“You should also try beingnicerto strangers; it will get youa lotfurther,” he said, looking up at her with a raised eyebrow.
Olivia hated the word “nice.” Being “nice” only served to make other people comfortable while they chipped away at her. “Nice” was no longer a priority. And, while it probably wasn’t wise to offend an Olympian when her future was already up in the air, for once, she just didn’t care.
She took a deep breath, held his gaze, and then opened her mouth.
“Okay, I’ll be nice.Politely, go to hell.” She immediately regretted it, but the words were already out of her mouth. So she winced and walked away.
12Zeke
ONE DAY BEFORE THE OPENING CEREMONY
Zeke was standing in the middle of the Village, covered in green juice, reeling from the fact that a girl he’d never met before had told him to go to hell. If he was honest with himself, it probably stung more because he’d spent most of their interaction thinking about how stunningly beautiful she was. Marveling at how the sun lined her silhouette with gold, transfixed by the way her eyes sparkled as she glared at him, and noticing how her soft, full lips were framed with the faint lines of someone who smiled a lot.
But that was beside the point. Because, honestly, he was offended.
She didn’t know him, but she’d leveled a whole range of criticisms about his character based on a three-minute interaction. Yes, he probably should’ve just said sorry because, the truth was, hehadn’tbeen looking where he was going. And maybe telling her to be nice and taking a few of her wet wipes without asking hadn’t been the best call. But, still, had he really come across badly enough for her to react like that?
He played the conversation back in his head to figure out if he’d said something inexcusable or accidentally hurt her on the way down. But his mind just kept drifting back toher.To her long brown braids and the urge he’d felt to brush a few loose curls behind her ears. To the way her skin glistened a little in the sunshine and the brief moment their bodies had been pressed up against each other. She’d smelled like a heady mixture of vanilla and summertime. And she’d sounded so hot as she told him off.
As he wiped some of the juice off his shirt, Zeke noticed an iridescent notebook lying on the floor beside him. It was hardbound, and the wordsI AM FEELING VERY OLYMPIC TODAYwere inscribed on the front. On the spine was a name:Olivia Nkomo. Her surname was Zimbabwean, just like his. He shook his head. If he ever told his mum that he’d met a Zimbabwean girl within hours of arriving in the Village, he would never hear the end of it.
He opened the notebook. It was empty, except for the first page.
Olivia’s Post-Olympic Plan (according to Aditi, your best friend who knows you more than anyone else in the world)
Ace the OOC internship until they beg you to stay forever (which they obviously will)
Figure out how to become an ethical billionaire & make the Forbes list
Achieve (benevolent) WORLD DOMINATION
PS: HAVE FUN!!!
Aditi xxx
Zeke smiled to himself as he read the last step in the three-point plan. Aditi painted a pretty interesting picture of the girl Zeke had just met. The Olivia he’d encountered was fiery, disproportionately annoyed, and maybe a little bit right. But the version of Olivia that Aditi knew seemed determined, strategic, and deeply loved by her best friend. If his instincts were correct, she was probably the kind of girl who couldn’t live without her notebook. So, Zeke had no choice but to find her and give it back. He just had to figure out where to find Olivia.
13Zeke
THE DAY OF THE OPENING CEREMONY
The Olympic opening ceremony was always a spectacle, and Athens 2024 was no exception. In fact, because Greece was the birthplace of the Olympics, the Greek committee had stepped up their game more than any other host country before them. The Olympic Stadium had cost just south of a billion pounds to build, and when people around the world, across all twenty-four time zones, turned on their TV screens to watch that very first night, they could instantly tell why.
It was eight a.m. in Honolulu, and a woman had just come home from her morning swim. She turned her laptop on as she cut up a bowl of fruit and ran to her sofa as the first beats of the introduction music start to play.
It had just hit one a.m. in Jakarta, and three generations of a family were gathered together in their living room. The youngest son, a five-year-old who’d started learning how to play football just the week before, watched in awe as the first flash of color appeared on the TV screen.
At nine p.m. in Nairobi, a group of university students gathered around an outdoor screen. At three p.m. in São Paulo, a man who’d once dreamed of becoming a gymnast turned the orientation lock on his phone. And at six p.m. in Reykjavík, two newlyweds looked for the remote to turn on their hotel room TV. They were all there, waiting with bated breath, ready to watch the opening ceremony.
The stadium dissolved into complete darkness, and their TV screens went quiet. The commentators stopped speaking, and everyone looked up in anticipation. Then it began.
