Chapter 22 - Logan
Logan’s team, on the other hand would play a minimum of three matches and likely advance even with a loss in group plays, since eight of the twelve teams reached the quarterfinals.
The USWNT checked into the Village earlier than most teams or athletes, since their sport was among the first to kick off, and the buzz Solomon would experience hadn’t yet begun.
Logan found herself rooming with Savannah, Alyssa, and Tara, the four youngest players on the team. The Olympics were a first for all of them, although Tara’s National Team experience made her the de facto leader of the quartet.
“Listen up, no guys in here the day of or day before a match, okay?” Tara addressed the group, who didn’t, at first, seem to take her seriously. “Hey, I mean it! I was talking to Lori and some of the others, and they have a million stories about past Olympics where, hell, half the team was up partying all night with the Australian rugby team or some bullshit like that. I want to win a gold medal, and if any of you are dragging ass because of some dude, or chick, or too much caipirinha or whatever, I’m going to be pissed.”
“Cai-pi-who?” Logan asked
“Caipirinha,” Tara explained. “It’s an alcohol made form sugar cane. It’s served kind of slushy and it will get you wrecked. After we win gold, drink all you want. Until then, if I catch anybody drinking, I’ll sic the Twins on you!”
“But T, Australian rugby players sound really, really hot,” Savannah joked.
“What, did you break up with Troy?” Alyssa asked, referring to Savannah’s college boyfriend.
“We’re on again, off again, he’s got another year at FSU and who knows where I’m going to be,” Savannah responded. “Besides, I thought the Olympic Village was like Las Vegas, you know, what happens in the Village stays in the Village?”
“Yeah, until you come home pregnant with an Australian rugby baby!” Logan laughed, throwing a pillow at her best friend.
Tara faked an awful Aussie accent. “Oi! Mommy! Why aren’t there any kangaroos here in Tallahassee?”
Lori and Kat appeared at the door.
“Lots of laughter in here, what’s so funny?” Team captain Lori queried the group.
“Well, Savannah is pregnant with an Australian rugby player’s baby, Alyssa is drunk on caipirinha. Tara was just leaving to hook up with a Greek weightlifter, and me? I’m the good one of the group, I just want to take a nap,” Logan explained.
“Yeah, right, Lowery, if you’re the ‘good one’ we’re all in trouble,” Kat replied.
“Guaranteed Logan comes home from the Opening Ceremony with like fifty names and room numbers of guys from the parade. They’ll spot that hair a mile away,” Lori predicted.
Logan’s heart fell thinking about how the only man she’d ever want to hear from was Solomon. She wondered what he was doing at this very moment. She knew judo was one of the first events of the Olympics. She would have done anything to hear his voice, to tell him how much she wanted him to win. That to her he was already a champion.
But instead, as always, she pushed the emotion aside. She couldn’t lose focus.
“The only hair anybody will notice on our team is Leah’s,” Logan insisted, referring to her teammate’s new red, white, and blue, stars-and-stripes coif. “And if anybody is looking at our team in the parade, do you really think I’ll get a second glance once they see Jada?”
“Jada’s a model, everybody knows her already. You’re like the fresh-faced, all-American girl next door, Lowery,” Tara interjected. “Guys love that shit. And running around with Beyoncé and J Lo over here,” Tara pointed to Savannah and Alyssa. “I’ll probably have to barricade the door to keep the guys out.
“Oh yeah, poor you, is your Austrian boyfriend not going to make it?” Kat inquired, and Tara rolled her eyes.
“Austrian?” Savannah let the word hang in the air until Lori picked it up.
“We were in France for a tournament two summers ago and this creepy dude who was like fifty kept hanging around whenever we’d get off the bus or even at the hotel, slipping notes to the coaches, he was wherever we were. It turned out he was stalking T. He was obsessed with her or something. He was from Austria and had just seen her picture in the background of a story in the paper about the German team and he somehow figured out who she was and somehow convinced himself they were meant to be together or some shit. I mean we always have fans hanging around, I guess you could even say groupies, but this was so weird.”
“And gross,” Tara piped up.
“I’m sure he’s on some sort of banned persons list or security watch or something,” Kat assured the group. “Anyway, after dinner tonight get some rest. Coach Pressley is serious about bed check and we have a game tomorrow. See you downstairs in a bit.”
“Were you totally freaked out?” Alyssa pointed the question in Tara’s direction.
“I think he was harmless. I hope so anyway. We’re always in such a large group, so many people around, I wasn’t ever really worried. A lot of us have had creepers, stalkers, whatever. You can imagine the people following Jada around. None of you have ever gone out with her to like a club or anything, right?”
The group shook their heads in unison.
“It’s like being with a Kardashian. Photographers, paparazzi everywhere, guys and even girls hitting on her like crazy. Leah has her fans too. And Lori, you know, she’s always been Miss Downhome Southern Belle, but ever since she did that photo shoot with Travis Zane and then she was in that Most Beautiful People issue of People, she’s been on another level. You guys should be prepared; life is going to change for you. College soccer is a very niche sport, hardly anybody notices. But when you play in a World Cup or an Olympics, and really play, you’re on worldwide television. If we win gold, it will get crazy. Commercials, you’ll be asked to be on television shows, all that kind of stuff. It all starts tomorrow, so get good rest tonight.”
The women finished dressing in their matching Team USA tracksuits and went downstairs for dinner and a meeting with the coaches.
Coach Riffle addressed the team first, going over New Zealand’s personnel and playing style. She’d broken down all the game tape they could get on the Kiwis, and she warned the team that they’d be facing a big, physical opponent that liked to attack through the air, to expect long punts and lots of running after long balls. The starting lineup was given out, and both Logan and Savannah were part of the eleven who would be on the field for kickoff. Tara, with a slight hamstring pull, would come off the bench, as would Alyssa, Coach Pressley preferring to ease such a young player into her first major international tournament slowly.
After dinner and their meeting, the coaches loaded the players onto a bus and left the Village, to the puzzlement of even Lori Gallagher.
“No idea. This is all Coach. I had nothing to do with it.” Lori responded when several players asked what was happening.
The bus pulled into a hotel a few miles away from the Village, and the players were led through a side entrance and ushered toward a ballroom. From down the hall, they could hear voices inside, reciting a familiar chant.
“I.” A single voice.
“I!” A large group, in response.
“I believe.”
“I believe!”
“I believe that we.”
“I believe that we!”
At this point, the USWNT, led by co-captains Lori Gallagher and Kat Malloy, rounded the corner and walked into a room willed with red, white, and blue streamers, balloons, and Uncle Sam’s Army, in full voice.
“I believe that we will win.”
“I believe that we will win!”
The chanting continued, and the players broke into grins as they looked around the room and recognized friends and family members sprinkled throughout the crowd.
Logan rushed to her mother, wrapping her arms around her and burying her head into her shoulder. Tracy was more subdued than the others around them, wearing jeans and a Logan Lowery jersey.
Logan turned to welcome Savannah into their duo, but she noticed her friend standing, slack-jawed, in the center of the floor with tears streaming down her face.
She followed Savannah’s eyes across the room to a couple in wheelchairs, the man with oxygen tubes running below his nose. Logan hadn’t met Savannah’s parents, but she knew.
She watched Savannah cross the room and drop to her knees, weeping as she embraced them both. Savannah’s mother had battled diabetes for years and her right foot had been lost to amputation. Her eyesight was also failing. Savannah’s father had lung and prostate cancer, and neither had been expected to travel to Rio.
Uncle Sam’s Army made it happen, taking up collections and arranging for transport.
Logan and her mother strolled over, among pats on the back and high fives, to meet Joe and Aundrea Reeves.
The night was spectacular, a proper “Welcome to the Olympics” moment for the team and a chance for the fans to rub elbows with their idols. Several players made remarks, the coaches each thanked the organizers and the fans and promised to do their best to make America proud.
Coming down off the high of celebrating with their fans didn’t let sleep come easily, but eventually Logan and her friend drifted off, the feeling of how much she missed Solomon one of the last of her waking thoughts.