‘Cool,’ says Alex. ‘Are you going to be there, Cat?’

‘Most certainly,’ says Cat.

‘Cool,’ says Alex.

Cat links arms with her colleagues and they prepare to disembark back on to English soil.

OCTOBER
Paris. The launch of next year’s Tour de France

Cat took the Eurostar from Waterloo to Paris the day before the launch and was booked to come back the day after it. Josh and Alex were travelling the next morning, making it a day trip. Though a train journey with them would have been fun and would have passed swiftly, Cat was thankful that she was alone even if the minutes seemed insufferably long. Ben was to meet her at Gard du Nord. She hadn’t seen him since the Vuelta finished twenty-two days ago, a period of time the same length as a Tour de France and the trial of it just as arduous. And now she was on a train rumbling under the Channel towards three days and two nights with her beau. Paris couldn’t come quick enough.

Though Cat and Ben, to each other, their friends and family, constantly rue the fact that they live thousands of miles apart, their relationship has blossomed and, with it, the fortunes of their respective telecommunications companies and postal services. Ben managed a stopover at Heathrow airport a week after the Tour de France ended and then they had twenty-five days together in Spain. With the salle de pressé of the Vuelta being a quarter of the size of the Tour de France, the pressures were much less too and Cat and Ben were able to indulge in each other’s company. Luca had loved his profile written by Cat for Pedal Power. More to the point, so had Jeremy Whittle who had praised her, paid her handsomely and commissioned a daily website from her during the Vuelta. She still doesn’t know if she will be Features Editor at Maillot but she should find out at the launch tomorrow.

During the Vuelta, Luca won two consecutive Stages and ensured he rubbed his collar bone theatrically, accidentally on purpose, when giving interviews at the finishes and for the benefit of his fans watching coverage on TV. He had become a hugely popular and well-known figure in the peloton. Press and fans and riders alike were interested that, next season, he was to be a Viper Boy. Fabian Ducasse won the Vuelta and, the week before last, the World Championship Time Trial too. Vasily Jawlensky came second. Last week, Lance Armstrong won the World Championship Road Race. Vasily Jawlensky came second. But the season will end with the great Russian’s name still foremost on everybody’s lips and it is his image which remains imprinted on everyone’s memory of the season: the reigning maillot jaune of the Tour de France.

So how are you, Cat?

I’m fine. I’m happy. I’m broke. My train ticket is an early birthday present from Fen and Pip. Django has just paid off my phone bill. I’m twenty minutes from the Gard du Nord and the arms of Ben York. I feel like an excited, lovestruck teenager. It’s a wonderful sensation and it doesn’t dissipate in the slightest the deeper I get to know him.