Naked Hero - The Journey Away

would inevitably be on offer. So often he had done that. It was a habit, but like so many habits after years of habituation it no longer delivered quite the same hit. He would still persist, however. He looked around at the men, most of whom would be available, and caught the eye of one in particular – a youth in his early twenties, which was how Lee liked them.
    ‘Typically Australian,’ he thought as he checked the lad out. Golden tanned with sun bleached hair. Melanomas in ten years time no doubt, but that was his problem, not Lee’s. Lee was only interested in the present, and this guy would most certainly do for the present. A raised eyebrow as Lee walked past was all that was needed. The typical Australian followed him into the changing rooms, and shortly thereafter into one of the cubicles.
    Thirty minutes later, Lee emerged from the leisure centre and made his way onto Oxford Street. His first stop was at a newsagent. It was part of his routine now to spend a few minutes each day flicking through the sports pages, before deciding which newspaper to buy. The criterion was simple: who was reporting on Lewis Macleod? And the decision today was easy - the Daily Herald, who had dedicated almost a full page to Lewis and his first round encounter in Melbourne two days hence. Having made his purchase, Lee then proceeded to The Darlinghurst. Not his favourite bar on Oxford Street, but the one that he frequented the most when he was on his own. It was the bar that Lewis Macleod had sat in over a week before, and met a guy who then sold his story to the press. To the very newspaper that Lee now held in his hand.
    Lee was on good terms with the bar staff, very good terms in fact with one of them having shagged him the previous week. It had been easy thereafter for Lee to solicit information on the night that Lewis was in the bar, and to build up his own picture of what had actually happened. He was hopeful that the ‘kiss and tell’ guy in question would make an appearance, but he had apparently left town.
    It was late afternoon, and the bar was fairly quiet. Lee ordered some fruit juice then took a seat at one of the many empty tables outside and took in the scene. He loved Oxford Street in the day time - so much less hectic than at night. At night all the weird and wonderful would come out to party, especially at this time of year, but during the day it was real and it was gay. There was no other place on earth quite like it. Soho, Earls Court, Castro, The Village - they all had a stamp, but nothing matched Oxford Street in Lee’s opinion, even if it had straightened out a bit since the last time he was here.
    Smiling contentedly, Lee opened up his copy of the Herald and turned to the page where Lewis was featured. It didn’t take long for the smile to disappear and he cringed over what he read. It beggared belief – Lee was lost for words, but not for thoughts. His mind was racing by the time he reached the end. Could it be that opportunity number two had just reared its ugly little head?
    In its infinite wisdom, The Herald was predicting that Lewis would make a repeat of his first round exit in Sydney. A reporter had spotted Macleod leaving the house he was renting in Melbourne, and implied that he had gone out for another night on the pull. It was the newspaper’s opinion that Macleod was no longer interested in tennis, and may well retire after Melbourne. His behaviour, in their eyes, was doing a serious disservice to the game, and they felt that it was best that he leave. There was no place for someone like him in tennis - and accordingly, the Australian people who would attend the Open on Monday were being encouraged to go along and support their man, and make it clear what they felt about the insulting way Macleod had treated Australia with his behaviour in Sydney. The British tennis fans had made their own statement at Wimbledon last year, and the Australians should now do the same.
    Lee thought back to his conversation with Lewis three days earlier. “It was only a few,” that’s what he had said. That was all that it took though to kill his chances of defending his title, and now Lee could see that there would be more than just a few gunning for him on Monday. He wondered if the same would happen to Lewis - be defeated by the crowd. It sounded like some people wanted to hound him out of the game and were using this as a means to that end. Lee was appalled by the tone of the article, and stunned