Naked Hero - The Journey Away

Clothing?”
    “Oh, there are some things I can work with them on. They still need to be ironed out, though. I’ll tell you later when the plans are a little more solid. It’s good gear they have - you’d look fabulous in it. Of course they would kill for you to model for them.”
    Lewis laughed. “No, that’s more your line. I don’t have what it takes to model stuff like that: the tennis gear, maybe, but not the swimwear.”
    “You’d be surprised - I think you’re exactly what they would want for that, even without the fame. But it would be wrong for you. Not the sort of image you want to put across. I assume you have people who do that for you... marketing.”
    “Yeah, I’ve got a management company, the one most sports people use, but it’s not a big thing for me. I earn enough anyway.”
    “I understand that now. I didn’t before. You know - what you did after Wimbledon. I thought you made the wrong move, but I was looking at it from my perspective. Who I was, not you. Now I’ve got to know you a little, I can see it was right for you.”
    “For me at the time - things change.”
    “So I’ve noticed. I’ll speak to you tomorrow, Lewis. Goodbye. And good luck.”
    “Goodbye, Lee.”

Chapter 29
    Lewis delivered the news two hours later, doing his famous trick of throwing in a spoiler at the end of proceedings. Scott had arrived shortly after Lee’s call, with a bottle of fine wine for the meal, and a bouquet of flowers for the cook – nothing for Lewis apart from good advice as he stuck to water throughout the evening.
    Strategy came first, Jim ruling the roost . Then general chit-chat with the food where everybody chipped in and compliments abounded. Back onto strategy once the meal was over, with a focus on tomorrow’s match – the four men round the table, Fiona eavesdropping from the couch whilst flicking through a magazine. Lewis took it all in like a good student should – waiting for his moment, wondering if he was about to make a hideous mistake, cursing the fact that Scott Taylor was straight – because if he’d suspected anything else, just the merest chance, then Lewis certainly wouldn’t have done what he did. Life can be such a bugger at times!
    “Erm well... I think I’ve got the general idea of how to go about tomorrow,” Lewis told the new coaching team, bringing their strategising to a close. “Earlier on, Scott suggested I have a think about what happened yesterday – painful stuff, but definitely needed. Well I’ve had a think. So maybe we can spend a few minutes looking back rather than forwards then hopefully draw a line under it and consign it to history.”
    “Fair enough,” said Jim shifting awkwardly in his seat. “So, Lewis... What’s the conclusion?”
    Lewis leaned back in his chair and delivered as best he could. “Well, if I’m honest, Jim - I think we made too much of it yesterday. We expected trouble, and prepared for it by trying to pretend that it wasn’t there, by trying to shut it out. I got away with it for a while, but then let a silly call get to me. That could happen again, though I’ll try not to allow it. But when it did happen, I let everything else in, and couldn’t ignore what was going on around me - couldn’t ignore what was going on in my head...” Feeling the passion, he leaned forward before continuing, elbows on table, eyes darting around monitoring expressions. “...I allowed it to become important - allowed a bunch of bigoted arseholes to become important to me, just like I did at Wimbledon. They’re not!” he snapped, a fist coming down to emphasise the point. “They’re nothing!” he yelled repeating the action. “So why should I bother about what they think, or what they say? I just need to accept that some people are like that, and they’re entitled to their opinions...” Another glance around the table then he settled on his coach, staring intently as he delivered the finale. “But I don’t value their opinions, so I’m not going to let them bother me when they’re expressed. I am what I am, and I’m not going to pretend to be something else. I just need to accept it. We both do, Jim - or else this is going to haunt us forever.”
    Lewis continued to look at his coach who was nodding in agreement, though Jim knew that it was coming too late for him. This should have been tackled years ago, on the day that Lewis had told him he was gay. It wasn’t, but he would deal with it now as best he