The 2012 London Olympic committee had, like in years past, provided a dorm room for each individual athlete in a 'house' for each and every country participating. Since the vast majority of all athletes had already arrived, by rights the houses should have been bustling. But for the moment, the US house was thankfully utterly devoid of life. The hallways were so quiet that one could almost hear a pin drop, if it weren't for the Television noise coming from Alfred's dorm room.

The reason for the self-imposed solitude was that Alfred had been the only person from Team USA that had bothered to leave the party so early on. He'd since spent his free time locked up in his room alone and flipping through the various BBC channels in search of something to take his mind off the earlier disaster of his evening.

To be honest, he could barely believe how quickly things had turned so sour. One moment he was on a natural high from life and locked in a battle of wits with a very good looking and sharp Brit… and the next he felt like a rug had been pulled out from under his feet.

He'd never meant to humiliate the British Athlete, just shake him up enough so that he gave Alfred the time of day. Something that Alfred knew would be a challenge with Arthur's 'tough-to-crack' exterior. Had he known that Arthur's parents had been so close by, he never would have been bold or cheeky enough to kiss him like that. Alfred had only been trying to throw him off balance a bit.

Alfred honestly couldn't have predicated a worse outcome to the evening if he tried. It wasn't like he'd never been rejected before, but to see the look of hurt on Arthur's face after all was said and done, and to know that he had some small part in causing that pain…. Uhhh it was just too much.

Alfred threw his remote against the wall and watched with no pleasure as it left a small dent in its wake, the remote breaking to reveal the now unsecured batteries. He groaned into his hands and desperately thought of how he was going to fix this mess.

Considering he really should be thinking of other more pressing things, like his performance in a few days, Alfred just couldn't get the image of Arthur Kirkland out of his mind.

Alfred kept replaying the images of how Arthur had looked sitting all alone on the couch, so proud and defiant. Like he was ready to take on the world, and Alfred believed he could do it if he tried. Or how his green eyes grew bright and glinted dangerously in the badly lit dance hall when he began to challenge Alfred head on.

It had been fun and exciting and Alfred was more than a little sorry when it had ended.

Everything from Arthur's indifference to fitting in socially to his vulnerability when confronted with his parents intrigued Alfred to no end. He wanted to challenge and comfort the man all at the same time.

Arthur was attractive, smart, hard working, and more impressively, Alfred had heard him selflessly lie to stand up for his coach.

Simply put, Arthur was perfect. Or at least in Alfred's eyes he was.

But by now, Arthur probably had a very negative impression of him, no thanks to Tony.

Alfred had only asked his friend to hold his camera so that that he could meet the other Diver, he'd never intended for Tony to use it to embarrass him further.

After all was said and done, Alfred had gotten pretty upset with Tony and stormed off back to the dorms not long after their confrontation. He knew that Tony wasn't really a bad guy, but for whatever reason he really had it in for Arthur. Tony had always been very competitive, and Alfred was beginning to believe they were probably only good friends because they competed in completely different venues.

Alfred just didn't think like Tony did when it came to competitors. If there was a big fish to beat, Alfred just worked harder. He never blamed someone else for being able to last longer than he did on the rings or do a more complicated swing on the high bar. It just forced Alfred to push himself further, work harder, and then beat them when the time came.

Brooding internally, Alfred's long train of thought soon came to an abrupt halt when he heard a familiar name being mentioned on the television in the background.

In the excitement of the upcoming Olympics, the BBC was airing a TV Special dedicated to looking at this year's Olympic hopefuls for Britain. The program had already run through quite a few names before they had finally gotten to Arthur's.

A slideshow of photos showing Arthur throughout the years flashed on the screen and Alfred was awe struck at just how young Arthur had actually been during his first Olympics. He'd just turned 15 the week of his first games in '92 and looked surprisingly young for his age due to the intense workout regime and his slim physique as a diver.

The TV Special took a look back through Arthur's impressive career and Alfred watched in disbelief as the young immature boy smiled shyly at the camera with no signs of the hard weary look that graced his features today. His stern looking parents ushered him past the many reporters and on into the pool. To an outsider it appeared as if they were protecting him, but Alfred now very much doubted that that was the case.

As was usually the situation with young progenies, at this point in Arthur's career he was hailed as the next coming and was Britain's darling of the year. Even though Alfred was nowhere near as young, he was currently experiencing a lot of that same fame and attention that Arthur must have known, although in a much less sheltered capacity.

The television then skipped ahead to a shot of Arthur high on the platform during the preliminaries and Alfred could easily see how nervous he was despite his brave front.

He recognized that look; he'd seen it a hundred of times when Athletes buckled under the pressure of a big event. Routines were forgotten and athletes just tried to make the best of a bad situation.

To be fair to Arthur, despite the look of terror on his face, the nervous glances towards where his coach and parents sat, he bit his lip in agony and managed to pull off a fairly decent performance. He looked proud of himself when he finally emerged from the water. But it hadn't been a high enough score to place for the finals and the young teen had looked crushed when the scores were announced. In contrast, his parents had looked livid.

Game after game was shown on TV and each year Arthur's performance worsened dramatically until he finally hit rock bottom in Beijing back in 2008.

In China, Arthur hadn't just fudged his routine, he'd completely chocked on the platform in what could only have been a full out panic attack. A much more severe version of what Alfred was sure he'd witnessed not an hour before outside the meeting hall.

Being able to quickly look back through the years, Alfred began to suspect that these attacks had been present all along, but never more obvious than in Beijing. By now the cameras only watched Arthur to see how he would once again embarrass himself, no longer were they hopeful or supportive of their star Diver.

Alfred was on the edge of his seat as he watched the proceeding routine; he'd never seen or heard of this performance himself as the antics of a foreign diver wouldn't have made big news in the US.

Alfred watched in morbid fascination as despite all indicators to the contrary, Arthur managed to pull himself together long enough to step forward with one shaky leg after another. This was even after the announcers had stated to predict that he'd probably have to walk back down the ladder.

The recap was night and day from the comments of Arthur's first Olympics. Whereas back then they had been so full of awe of this young new progeny; their voices were now only filled with mocking and scorn to see how Arthur Kirkland would embarrass his home country once again.

It was almost painful to watch as Arthur approached the edge of the platform, he looked unbelievably pale and kept looking over to where Alfred was sure his parents must have been seated; they were no longer next to his coach, but out amongst the crowd.

And this time around, Arthur didn't just give a poor performance, his muscles literally seized up on the jump; no doubt a side effect from the hyperventilation that Arthur was so desperately trying to hide. The results were a spectacularly amateurish descent that even Alfred with his gymnastic background could have beaten.

The resulting splashdown looked painful and yet Arthur swam out with his head held as high as he could, even with his now gaunt complexion that had not improved during his routine. His coach had silently led him away from the reporters without even bothering to go over to the after area where they would have received their scores and been further interviewed.

As Alfred continued to watch, the current day BBC commentators joked that fellow Brits really shouldn't get their hopes up too high for this notorious train wreck, but that they should tune in anyways for what would promise to be a good show.

If Alfred hadn't felt bad before, he felt absolutely mortified now. It was no wonder Arthur had accused him of being insincere. If his own countrymen were so quick to laugh at him, what must the international community think of this 'joke' of a Diver… people like Tony!

And… speaking of the devil…

"I told you he was no good Al, look how he's already managed to ruin your perpetual good mood."

Standing in the doorway was none other than Tony Smith.

Alfred tried his best to ignore his friend and set his face into a stern frown as he purposely kept his eyes glued to the TV, even as the program continued to crack various jokes about Arthur.

"Come on Al… you're not still mad at me are you? You know I would never have posted those photos. I'd never risk your sponsors dropping you!"

Despite his resolve to ignore Tony, his last comment managed to get to him and he cried out petulantly like a child. "I don't care if my sponsors know I'm gay, I'm upset that you made me look like a jerk."

Tony rolled his eyes but still managed to look at least somewhat diplomatic. "Ok first off, you should care if your sponsors find out about that small little 'detail' that you're doing a pretty bad job of keeping under wraps; and secondly, I'm sorry, ok! I know that you're into that British bastard; I even get why. But you really don't know him or what you'd even be getting into if he ever returned your interest, which he wouldn't by the way. I'm helping you out here, Al. Arthur's a really miserable human being. I mean just look at this." Tony pointed angrily towards the TV. "This is a perfect example of how selfish Arthur is. Year after year he wastes a perfectly good Olympic spot for England, when we all know he's just going to choke again anyways!"

Closing his eyes in frustration, Alfred outright snapped.

"I don't want to hear it Tony! Whatever Arthur is or isn't, it's up to me to make that decision. I spent my whole childhood being told by others what I was worth and how I would never amount to anything. I don't need to hear the same thing about anyone else."

"This is completely differ…"

"Tony I'm serious. If you want to stay friends you're just going to have to back off on this issue."

Tony seemed to visibly deflate and it appeared as if he were biting his tongue.

Whatever Tony's feelings were about Arthur, Alfred hoped that they weren't strong enough to throw away a good friendship.

"Alright, I'll let it go. It's not like it's going to matter anyways."

Alfred immediately abandoned the TV and turned to give Tony his full attention. "What do you mean it 'won't matter'?"

In light of Alfred's previous dressing down, Tony seemed fairly reluctant to bring up his news, but his inner satisfaction over the issue must have won through.

"Arthur is practically on house arrest. His parents won't let him participate in any non-mandatory events, and Coach James Gordon won't let him near the Pool House until his practice run. My coach was telling us how Gordon pulled every favour he had in town to make sure Arthur was banned from entering any Pools until he gives the go ahead. "

Alfred let out a huge breath of air out of the corner of his mouth, causing his unmanageable bangs to blow up and off to the side.

"God… that must be killing him?" He whispered out loud.

Tony had been chuckling to himself over the image of Arthur's supposed imprisonment, but stopped to give Alfred an odd look.

"What do you mean?"

Alfred shook his head as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Arthur's a perfectionist; no matter how much he practices it's never going to be enough. You take away the only outlet he has and Arthur's going to crack."

Tony let out an unnecessarily cruel snort with a shake of his head.

"Al, he's going to crack anyways. You better just sit back like the rest of us and enjoy the show."

xxxxxx

Author's Notes: I'm actually leaving for England tomorrow. Will be fun to check out the Olympic village while I'm there and gather some notes.

Thanks everyone for your comments. I know some people are having a tough time with Arthur's age (I'm 30, so I guess it's just no biggie for me). Still thanks for bearing with me.

But to help you overcome this: Brad Pitt and Johnny Depp are both 48… bet you wouldn't turn down a date from them :P

(Not to mention Colin Firth.. yummy! )