Gold: A Novel

203 Barrington Street, Clayton, East Manchester

On a tiny TV in the cluttered living room of a two-bedroom terraced house, Kate Meadows watched her best friend emerge from the tunnel into the central arena of the velodrome. The crowd noise doubled, maxing out the TV’s speakers. Her heart surged. The baby’s bottle was balanced on the TV, and the howl of the crowd raised concentric waves in the milk. When Zoe lifted her arms to acknowledge the crowd’s support, the answering roar sent the bottle traveling across the top of the TV. It teetered on the edge, fell to the floor, and lay on its side, surrendering white formula from its translucent teat to the thirsty brown hessian of the carpet. Kate ignored it. She was transfixed by the image of Zoe.

Kate was twenty-four years old, and since the age of six, her dream had been to win gold in an Olympics. Her eighteen years of preparation had been perfect. She had reached the highest level in the sport. She had shared a coach with Zoe and trained with her and beaten her in the Nationals and the Worlds. And then, in the final year of preparation for Athens, baby Sophie had arrived.

This was an old TV and the picture quality was terrible, but it was quite clear to Kate that Zoe was now sitting on a twelve-thousand-dollar American prototype race bike with a matte black monocoque frame made from high-modulus unidirectional carbon fiber, while she herself was sitting on a Klippan sofa from Ikea, with pigmented epoxy/polyester powder-coated steel legs and a removable, machine-washable cover in Almås red. Kate was well aware that there were victories to which such a seat could be ridden, but they were small and domesticated triumphs, measured in infants weaned and potty-training campaigns prosecuted to dryness. She ground her knuckles into her temples, making herself remember how in love she was with Sophie and with Jack, who was in Athens preparing for his own race the next day. She tried to exorcise all jealous thoughts from her head—kneading her temples till they hurt—but God forgive her, her heart still ached to win gold.

Under the coffee table Sophie picked over the fallen mess of breakfast and lunch, cooing happily as she brought cornflakes and nonspecific mush to her mouth. The doctor had said she was too poorly to travel to Athens, but now the child seemed effervescent with health. You had to remind yourself that babies didn’t do these things deliberately. They didn’t use the kitchen calendar to trace out the precise schedule of your dreams with their chubby little fingers and then plan their asthma and their allergies to clash with it.

It was sweltering in the living room. The open window admitted no cooling breeze, only the oppressive August heat reflecting off the pale concrete of their yard. Kate felt sweat running down the small of her back. From next door, through the shared wall, she heard the neighbor vacuuming. The Hoover groaned and thumped its bald plastic head against the skirting board, again and again, a lifer despairing of parole. Crackling bands of electrical interference scrolled down the TV picture, masking Zoe’s face as she lined up to start the race.

The two riders were under starter’s orders now. A neutral voice counted down from ten. Up at the start line, behind the barrier, Kate caught a glimpse of Tom Voss in the group of IOC officials and VIPs. At the sight of her coach, her pulse quickened to prepare her system for the intense activity that his arrival always signaled. Adrenaline flooded her. When the countdown in the velodrome reached five, she watched Zoe’s hands tense on the handlebars. Her own hands tensed too, involuntarily, grabbing phantom bars in the stifling air of the living room. Her leg muscles twitched and her awareness sharpened, dilating every second. Kate hated the way her body still readied itself to race like this, hopelessly, the way a widow’s exhausted heart must still leap at a photo of her dead lover.

There was a commotion by her feet, and an excited squeal. She reached down to lift a small electric fan from the floor to the coffee table, out of the way of Sophie’s exploring fingers. Its breeze was a relief. On the TV, the starter’s countdown reached three. Kate watched Zoe lick her lips nervously. Two, said the starter. One. Sweat was beading on Kate’s forehead. She reached out and turned up the speed on the fan.

The picture contracted to a bright white dot in the center of the TV screen, then sparked out entirely. From next door the whine of the neighbor’s Hoover descended in pitch and faded through a long, diminishing sigh into silence. Through the wall she heard the neighbor say, “Shit.” Kate watched the blades of the fan relinquish their invisibility as they slowed to a stop. She looked at the fan dumbly, feeling the breeze on her face fade into stillness, wondering why a breeze would do such a thing at the exact same second the TV went on the blink. After a moment she understood that something had blown in the fuse box. As usual, it had taken half the street’s electricity down with it.

She felt a rare pulse of self-pity. Only these little things set her off. Missing the Olympics was too big and blunt to wound in anything but a dull and heavy sense. It was like being etherized and then smothered. But Jack’s plane tickets when they arrived had been sharp enough to cut. The packing of his send-ahead bag had left an ache, and a specific emptiness in the wardrobe that they shared. Now the electricity burning out had left her burned out too.

A second later she laughed at herself. After all, everything could be fixed. She looked in the kitchen drawer until she found fuse wire, then took a torch into the understairs toilet, where the fuse box was. Sophie screamed when she left the room, so she picked her up and held her under one arm while she juggled the torch and the fuse wire in her other hand, standing on the toilet seat to reach the fuse box. Sophie wriggled and squawked and kept trying to grab the wires. After a minute of trying, Kate decided she cared about not electrocuting her daughter more than she cared about watching Zoe race.

She put Sophie back down on the living room floor. Immediately the baby brightened up and resumed her endless quest for dangerous objects to put in her mouth. Fifteen hundred miles away the first of the best-of-three sprint rounds was over by now, and Zoe had either won or lost. It felt weird not to know. Kate clicked the TV on and off, as if some restorative element in the wiring of the house—some electronic white blood cell—might have healed the damage. No picture came. Instead she watched herself, ten pounds heavier than her racing weight, still in her nightie at three in the afternoon, leaning out of the reflection in the blank black TV screen.

She sighed. She could fix the problems with her reflection. Some hard miles of training would put the leanness back into her face, and her blond hair wouldn’t always be scraped back into a tight bunch to keep it clear of Sophie’s sticky grip, and her blue eyes were only hidden behind her ugly glasses because she just hadn’t found the strength to get dressed and go to the shops for the cleaning fluid for her contacts. All this could be sorted.

Even so, as she watched herself on TV, she panicked that Jack couldn’t possibly still find her attractive. It didn’t do to dwell on thoughts like that, so she slumped back down on the sofa and phoned him. Behind his voice when he picked up was the roar of five thousand people.

“Did you see that?” he shouted. “She killed it! She won like she wasn’t even trying!”

“Zoe did?”

“Yeah! This place is unbelievable. Don’t tell me you weren’t watching?”

“I couldn’t.”

She heard him hesitate. “Come on, Kate, don’t be bitter. It’ll be you racing next time, in Beijing.”

“No, I mean I actually couldn’t watch. The power’s gone out.”

“Did you check the fuses?”

“Gosh, Ken, my Barbie brain did not entertain that option.”

“Sorry.”

Kate sighed. “No, it’s okay. I tried to fix the fuse but Sophie wouldn’t let me.” Straightaway, she realized how sulky that sounded.

“Our daughter is pretty strong for her age,” said Jack, “but I still reckon you should be able to kick her arse in a straight fight.”

She laughed. “Look, I’m sorry. I’m just having a shitty time here.”

“I know. Thank you for looking after her. I miss you.”

Tears formed in her eyes. “Do you?”

“Oh my God,” he said, “are you kidding? If I had to choose between flying home to you and racing for gold here tomorrow, you know I’d be right back on that plane, don’t you?”

She sniffed, and wiped her eyes. “I’m not asking you to choose, idiot. I’m asking you to win.”

She heard his smile down the phone. “If I win, it’s only because I’m scared of what you’ll do to me if I don’t.”

“Come back home to me when you win gold, okay? Promise me you won’t stay out there with her.”

“Oh Christ,” he said. “You know you don’t even have to ask me that.”

“I know,” she said quietly. “I’m sorry.”

Through the phone connection, the noise of the crowd peaked again.

“The second race is starting,” Jack shouted over the roar. “I’ll call you back, okay?”

“You think she’ll win it?”

“Yeah, absolutely. She made round one look like a Sunday ride.”

“Jack?”

“Yeah?”

“I love you,” she said. “More than ice cream after training.”

“I love you too,” he said. “More than winning.”

She smiled. It was a perfect moment, and then she heard herself ruin it by saying, “Call me when the race is over, okay?”

She cringed at herself for being so needy, for putting this extra demand on him. Love wasn’t supposed to require the constant reassurance. But then again, love wasn’t supposed to sit watching its own reflection in a dead TV while temptation rode a blazing path to glory.

Whatever Jack said back to her, the crowd drowned it out by chanting Zoe’s name.

She clicked the call off and let the phone fall softly to the washable, hard-wearing cushion covers. It wasn’t just that she’d stopped believing she would ever get to the Olympics. Now, if she was really honest with herself, she wasn’t even sure if she could win the kind of races you rode on kitchen chairs and sofas.

She stared with glazed eyes through the window. In the shimmering heat of their little back yard, a squirrel had found something in the bottom of a crisp packet.

She thought, Is this my life now?

She held her hands to her temples, more gently now, and timed the pulse in them against the second hand of the living room clock. It had been months since she’d trained hard but even now—even with this stress—her heart rate was subsixty. The second hand was back where it started, and she’d only counted fifty-two. Sometimes this was the only small victory in her days: this knowledge that she was fitter than time.

She looked up and saw that Sophie was mimicking her, trying to press her own tiny hands against the sides of her head. Kate laughed, and for the very first time Sophie laughed back.

Kate brimmed with euphoria.

“Oh my God, darling, you laughed!”

She dropped to her knees, picked Sophie up, and hugged her. Sophie grinned—a gummy, prototype grin that faltered and twitched lopsidedly and then shone again. She gurgled noisily, delighted with herself.

“Oh, you clever little thing!”

Wait till I tell Jack, she thought, and the thought was so light and so simple that she suddenly knew everything would be okay. What did it matter if Zoe won gold today or if Jack won gold tomorrow? Kneeling here in the untidy living room, holding her baby close and breathing the warm curdled scent of her, it was impossible to believe that anything mattered more than this. Who even cared that she had until recently been able to bring a bicycle up to forty miles per hour in the velodrome? It seemed absurd, now that real life had begun for her—with its real progression through these lovely milestones of motherhood—that anyone even bothered to ride bicycles around endless oval tracks, or that anyone had had the odd idea of giving out gold to the one who could do it quickest. What good did it ever do anyone to ride themselves back to their point of origin?

God, she thought. I mean, where does that even get you?

After a minute, during which her heart beat forty-nine times, she smiled wearily.

“Oh, who am I kidding?” she said out loud, and Sophie looked up at the sound of her voice and produced an experimental expression, unique to her and perfectly equidistant between a laugh and a lament.

Eight years later, Monday, April 2, 2012
Detention deck 9 of the Imperial battle station colloquially known as the Death Star

The Rebel—the kid—resisted, so they locked her in a dark metal holding cell that smelled of machine oil. It was too much for her and she grinned and wriggled with excitement. She clung to her father. He held the kid’s skinny neck in the crook of one arm and squeezed with just enough pressure to restrain her or to convey silent affection, the way fathers will apply forces. The child squirmed to escape, giving the hug an aspect of violence: parenting didn’t seem to change much, wherever you went in the universe.

Two Imperial Stormtroopers stood guard over the pair. They exchanged a look, decided that the detainees were secure for now, and nodded. Leaving the detention block of the Death Star, they slipped discreetly out of a side door and emerged into the bright April light of the car park. They took off their helmets, shook out their hair, and bought two takeaway teas from a catering van. They were both thirty-two. They were athletes in real life. They had sponsorship deals and privacy issues with the press and body fat below four percent. In the world rankings for sprint cycling on the track, they were numbers one and two.

“The things I do for you,” Zoe said. “It’s far too hot in these.”

Strands of black hair were stuck to her forehead with sweat.

“I could do with a wee,” said Kate. “How are you meant to go in these costumes?”

“They weren’t designed by a woman.”

“The Death Star wasn’t designed by a woman. There’d be curtains. There’d be a crèche.”

Zoe shook her fists at imaginary higher-ups. “Yeah! Can’t you brass hats figure out some way of balancing motherhood with suppressing this damned Rebel Alliance?”

Kate shook her head sadly. “With insubordination like that, you’ll always be a Stormtrooper.”

“You’re wrong,” Zoe said. “They’ll recognize my zeal and my passion. They’ll promote me to the command of their battle station.”

“Don’t flatter yourself. They’ll take one look at your personality profile and make you a droid. Highly specialized but basically single.”

“Oh, get fucked,” said Zoe, smiling. “I wouldn’t swap for your life.”

A cold squall rippled the yellow-brown puddles of the film-studio car park. On the far side, in a blue SUV splashed with mud, the next group of ticket holders for the Star Wars Experience was already looking for a parking space. Kate checked her watch. The Death Star was theirs for another twenty minutes.

“We’d better get back in to Sophie,” she said.

The two women rushed their teas. Zoe looked at Kate over the rim of her cup.

“Be honest with me,” she said. “Is Sophie dying?”

“No,” Kate said, without hesitation. “The chemo’s going to work. I’m one hundred percent sure she’s going to get better.”

“Honestly?”

“We’ve proved it before. When she first got sick, the chemo worked and she went into remission. This is just a little relapse, and now the chemo ...

'Sport is so packed with tension and surprise that when authors or scriptwriters use it as the basis for fictional drama I always end up thinking the real thing is preferable by far. Gold is the exception. Set in the world of elite track cycling Chris Cleave's novel follows the ambitions of three very different cyclists with Olympic dreams. He captures the intensity of the sport with aplomb and if you have doubts about whether romance could flourish with the ferocity it does here then, well, look at Laura Trott and Jason Kenny, Team GB gold medalists, who made the front pages with that kiss' (Times Book Club)

A thrilling and quite literally heart-pounding story... You'll never look at an Olympic champion in quite the same way again. (Richard Madeley, Richard And Judy Book Club Spring 2013)

Cleave is an acutely intelligent wordsmith. Some of the sentences cut so deep you want to scream out in pain and recognition . . . This is an inspirational and moving novel in so many ways, and everyone should read it. (The Times)

The wait has been worth it . . . As with all Cleave's work, GOLD probes the limit of what its protagonists will do to identify and protect what they really cherish. And that, in Cleave's confident hands, truly is exhilarating. (Independent)

GOLD is a very good novel . . . strikingly well written . . . it has that rare gift of getting past the urban sneer to move and gratify, to stir us because it does, indeed, matter. It is bold and brave and, when you're on your way to the games this summer, and the person opposite you on the train is sobbing hot tears on to their Kindle, you'll have a pretty good idea what they're reading. (Observer)

Novels about sport are notoriously hard to pull off . . . GOLD , Chris Cleave's third novel, is a skilful demonstration of the form . . . This is no niche book for aficionados looking for a brief summer distraction. Instead, cycling is the backdrop for a deeper exploration of the struggle between the physical and the psychological... GOLD works as a novel because Mr Cleave manages to make the reader care about what it takes to win - or even to take part . . . The small details speak loudly . . . . Cleave knows what makes a good story. Here, his concern is not with macho physicality or crossing a line, but with the endless and enduring human endeavours: love, death and what is left when hopes and dreams are crushed or fulfilled. A book to savour long after the Olympic games are over. (The Economist)

'Cleave does a magnificent job of exploring the emotional terrain that top athletes must travel in order to become champions [...] Cleave has undoubtedly put in the hours where research is concerned, as the technicalities and the (actual) rule change that provides one of the novel's bigger twists gleam with authenticity'. (Independent on Sunday)

Cleave is excellent on the technical details of the athletic life which, along with its physical and mental demands, requires further personal sacrifices, both of privacy and happy relationships . . . This book overflows with astute perceptions. One of the most moving is the parallel drawn between the athletes' need to live in the present . . . and the more devastating necessity for the parents of a sick child to not consider the horrors the future may bring. (TLS)

The race scenes have true visceral intensity, leaving the reader feeling as breathless as a cyclist. From start to finish, this is a truly Olympic-level literary achievement. (Publishers Weekly)

If there's one Olympic-themed novel you ought to read this summer it's Chris Cleave's well-imagined and researched look at just what it takes to compete at the highest level. (Daily Mirror)

Extremely moving . . . It really has that same thing as The Other Hand and Incendiary, where you feel a bit lonely and annoyed until someone else you know has read it and you can discuss it with them . . . I really loved it and I do think it's one of those books that you want to talk to people about . . . no one will be able to read it then put it down with a gentle sigh. They will be pressing it on people. (Alex Heminsley, BBC 6 Music)

With its tightly plotted twists and turns this is a novel of extremes - of the heights a body can reach in pursuit of Olympic cycling gold, and of what the heart can endure in the face of love, parenthood and an ill child. Cleave's writing is nothing short of poetic and this has to be our (very early) tip for the best book of 2012. (Glamour)

The Olympics are almost upon us and if like me you are given to wondering whether it's possible to be a superhuman athlete and a simple human being, GOLD is here to help . . . What counts about this thrilling novel are the characters: the flaws and fears that fuel their need to compete, the drives and dreads that bring them together and threaten to bring them to blows . . . Cleave artfully interleaves moments of high-tensile emotion with no less taut descriptions of action on the track . . . I don't know about Kate and Zoe but Chris Cleave deserves a medal. (Daily Express)

Cleave's brilliantly plotted, nail-biting, and emotional tale dramatizes the anguish and triumphs of ambition and sacrifice, fame and heartbreak to celebrate the true gold of love. (Booklist)

If you are looking for a book to read to avoid the brouhaha of the Olympics this year but still want to get a taste of what all the fuss is about, this would be a superb choice . . . Cleave's style is highly readable, with plenty of humour and some wry similes and metaphors . . . It would take a cold heart not to be moved at some point in this book. (thebookbag.co.uk)

Compelling, dramatic and . . . pure gold. (Scotsman)

Compelling and heart-wrenching. (Good Housekeeping)

GOLD is immensely enjoyable . . . The writing is energetic and urgent, and, far from being geeky, the descriptions of bike racing are among the most poetic passages. Best of all are the powerful, dark moments where we glimpse the cost of obsession with something as painful as cycling. (Financial Times)

A riveting read because at the heart of it is the unseen, private world of our greatest athletes. (Press Association)

Underpinning their stories is poignant tragedy, fierce ambition, hope, failure and a glorious twist in the tale that will take your breath away. I tore through the pages with such rabid abandon that, by the time I looked up again, it was dark outside. (Herald)

If you've read Chris Cleave's earlier novels you'll know how well he wraps searing social commentary in a gripping and engaging narrative. In GOLD he focuses his insightful gaze on the world of Olympic-level speed cycling . . . It's the perfect counterpoint to all the Olympic mania - but it's one for sports fans too. (Irish Times)

A gloriously fast-paced romp of a sporting novel that's a must-read in this Olympic year. Thrilling and deeply touching, it'll have you sobbing. (FHM)

Gold is an emotional rollercoaster ride as it explores what drives people to succeed and what they choose to sacrifice for success. (Choice)

This bestseller-bound, tightly told story is unusually compelling . . . Cleave is that rare creature -- an Oxford graduate with an emotional IQ of Mensa proportions. Add some hard research to give his characters credibility and you have a dream team of story-telling ingredients. (Evening Standard)

'It is a timely work of fiction, but Cleave is meticulous in his research' (Claire Byrne, Irish Times Books of the Year)