“Hi. Did you get your rackets? The front desk said they’d put them in your room.”
Marco peered at her through squinted, questioning eyes. “The movie star, Charlie? He is really old, no?”
Charlie tried not to smile. So he did care. And he had brought it up first.
“The nanny, Marco? She’s a child.”
“She didn’t mean anything to me. She was there, you weren’t. But you are now. And I missed you.”
They looked at one another. Almost hating herself, Charlie agreed to meet him later that night . . .
The sound of Dan’s voice snapped her back to the present. “So let me get this straight. You’re both just going about your merry business?”
“Tell me what you really think, Dan. No, please, don’t hold back.”
“You want to know what I think?” He finally brought his gaze up to meet hers. “I think you’re settling for some asshole because it’s easy. And that kind of sucks.”
Charlie could feel her color rising despite herself. “I was kidding. I don’t want you to tell me what you really think.”
He gave a half smile. “You’re the one who said we’re each other’s business.”
“Then at least get your analysis right. I’m settling for some asshole because it’s easy, yes. But also because he’s really, really hot.”
“Lovely.”
“Well, clearly neither of us thought we were so committed that we couldn’t date someone else.”
“Date? Is that what you people are calling it these days?”
“And it’s kind of a weird, fortunate coincidence that we both got publicly busted being naughty at the exact same instant. Because neither of us can really give the other one any grief, can we?”
“So you both just pretend the whole thing never happened?”
“Yes.”
Dan looked up at the sky. “It’s like I’m talking to someone who hears voices.”
“Look, I’m working hard, and I’m winning, and I would hardly be the first one who tried to fit in just the smallest bit of fun along the way. Wasn’t Agassi doing meth a few years before his French Open win? I mean, let’s put this in perspective.”
“Hey, no judgments here,” he said, holding his palms up.
Charlie laughed. “Yeah, not at all.”
A blond-haired child of four or five streaked past their table. Charlie watched the little girl’s pigtails bounce as she made her way around the room. Then, just as she was about to turn back to Dan, a taller but equally as energetic blonde raced past them in pursuit of the child.
“Oh my god, it’s Elin,” Charlie said, her eyes taking in every detail of the girl down to her adorably funky high-top sneakers.
“Who?”
“Marco’s au pair!”
“Wasn’t Elin the name of Tiger Woods’s ex-wife?”
“I can’t believe she’s here.”
“What are the chances that they would both be drop-dead gorgeous blond au pairs named Elin?”
“Her name is not Elin!” Charlie hissed. She watched as the nanny grabbed the squealing little girl and hugged her close. The child wriggled with joy.
“Didn’t you just say it was Elin?”
“I can’t believe she’s here. Of course I can. She nannies for Raj’s coach, where else would she be?” Charlie sneaked another peek, and Sofie must have sensed someone looking at her, because she lifted her head and looked directly at Charlie. And smiled.
Instantly, Charlie turned to Dan, who had just stood up. “She looked right at me. She smiled! Do you believe the nerve? This barely legal babysitter screws my boyfriend and then has the nerve to smile at me? And of course I have to be wearing sweaty tennis clothes while she looks like a supermodel . . .”
“Charlie, you’re delusional. I can’t even begin to—”
“Here she comes. Oh my god, she’s walking over here. Dan, where are you going? Sit down! Don’t leave me here!” she hissed without moving her lips.
“As fun as this promises to be, I have to go now. I’ll see you tomorrow at eight, court ten. Bye, Charlie.”
But she hadn’t heard a word he said. Sofie was barreling toward her with her pigtailed charge by the hand, and it was clear she planned to say hello. Despite being certain this would happen, Charlie still nearly collapsed from the surprise of it.
It made sense Sofie would recognize Charlie—she was ranked fourth in the world, for heaven’s sake—but Charlie wasn’t about to admit that she’d spent hours googling this girl and knew not only her name but also that of her favorite fifth-grade teacher.
“You’re Charlotte Silver, right?” the girl asked. She looked even younger in person. Fresher, somehow.
“Yes.” Charlie, suddenly convinced she had food stuck in her teeth, was also acutely aware of exactly how her hair was plastered to her head after a long training day. There wasn’t a stylist-chosen article of clothing or a crystal in sight . . . nothing but wide expanses of spandex and Drymax and caked-on clay. It was so unfair.
“You must hear this all the time, but I just wanted to tell you that I’m a huge fan!” The girl’s smile seemed genuine and her accent was adorable.
Charlie cleared her throat. “Thank you. That’s so nice to hear.”
“I just think it’s so cool for a woman to be tough and confident.” Sofie dropped to her knees, and of course Charlie instantly thought a thousand uncharitable things about how expertly she did so until Sofie turned to the little girl and said, “This lady is a famous tennis player. She’s not just a princess, she’s a warrior princess! And she might win this whole tournament!”
The little girl’s eyes widened. Sofie sounded so genuine that Charlie was willing to overlook the “lady” bit. “She’s a pwincess?”
Sofie nodded. “A real-life one. This is Anabelle, and Anabelle is in love with princesses.”
Charlie stuck out her hand, which Anabelle stared at, and then, feeling like an idiot for not even knowing what to say to a four-year-old, she said, “It’s very nice to meet you, Anabelle. I actually have to go now. I’m meeting, uh, someone.” Charlie had thrown in that last part merely to offer a logical excuse for her speedy departure, but she realized immediately how it sounded.
Sofie must have as well, because she blushed in the most charming way. No wonder Marco couldn’t resist her.
“Oh, of course. We don’t want to hold you up, do we, Anabelle? Besides, we must go rescue your brother from the day care. Come, darling. Say good-bye to Ms. Silver.”
Ms. Silver? She looked at Sofie, but the girl gave no hint at being anything but polite.
They all waved good-bye, and Charlie had to admit that she seemed to be the only one feeling strange about the whole thing. All Charlie had to do was recall the photo of Sofie wearing one of Marco’s T-shirts and straddling his lap to be able to envision exactly what the rest of their night looked like.
She made her way back to the locker room and texted Jake on the way.
Dinner at the hotel tonight? Need to be asleep early.
His reply came back instantly.
Sorry, I can’t tonight. Just order to your room and relax a little. You’ve been training so hard.
Why can’t you? Hot date?
Something like that.
?????????
No one you know.
Don’t care, tell me anyway!
Charlie tossed her phone in her locker while she showered and picked it up again the second she returned. Jake had replied three times in a row:
He’s cute.
He’s not appropriate.
I will tell you on a need to know basis and right now there’s nothing to know
Charlie rolled her eyes. She looked at her phone again.
If Jake had a date tonight, it meant her father was eating alone. She dialed his numb
er and he answered on the third ring.
“Hey, Dad.”
“Oh, Charlie. Hello.”
“I just got back to the hotel. Are you here?”
“That was some interview today, huh?” Charlie could hear that he was trying to mask the disappointment in his voice but wasn’t succeeding.
“Yeah, she was pretty out of line. Asking all those questions about my, uh, personal life wasn’t really fair.”
“I know I’m no altar boy, but when you’re in the public eye and you give people a lot to talk about, you can hardly blame them for asking.”
Charlie was silent.
“Was all of that Todd’s idea? From his No Publicity Is Bad Publicity playbook?”
“No, Dad. I got into trouble all by myself on that one. You can’t blame anyone but me.” If he was trying to shame her, it was working. Brilliantly. On second thought, she figured she should eat alone.
“Do you want to join me for dinner with some of my old tour friends?” her dad asked, as if reading her mind.
“No, thanks. I’m going to order something to my room and watch tape. Todd left me a whole bunch of film from last year and I want to review it. We can do dinner tomorrow.”
Her old dad would have said something like, “After your big win tomorrow,” or “We’ll have a victory celebration,” but her father simply assured her he’d be sitting front and center in her player box the following morning and wished her goodnight.
Charlie took the elevator to her room and found a padded envelope of DVDs waiting for her on the desk. The note attached was scribbled rapidly on hotel stationery.
Watch Acapulco first, Singapore second, and Stuttgart third. Make note of her increased willingness to take risks on game points and her stunning second serve. Car will pick you up at seven tomorrow. —Todd
Sighing, Charlie inserted the first DVD and waited for it to load. She called room service to order the grilled salmon with a side of steamed vegetables. When the woman on the phone asked her if service was for one or two people, it occurred to her how often lately she ate alone in her hotel room. Marcy had always joined Charlie for room service dinners. The two of them would ask to have the table arranged in front of the TV, and they’d alternate between Love It or List It and Property Brothers, with the occasional House Hunters International thrown in. Clad in sweats and fuzzy travel socks, Marcy would drink wine and Charlie would sneak bites of whatever dessert she’d ordered, and they’d make fun of everyone who had the nerve to appear on the screen in front of them. Jake used to say he could hear the evil cackling from down the hall. The thought of doing any of that with Todd was equal parts laughable and repulsive, and she could feel herself missing Marcy even more than usual.
The three sets of match highlights lasted nearly an hour; when they were over, Charlie looked at her empty plate and could barely remember eating. She picked up her phone to check the time and a text message popped right up.
Hey, grabbing dinner with a few of the guys now. Come?
Marco.
She reread the message three times before realizing she was holding her breath.
It wasn’t exactly an invitation to a romantic dinner for two, but it was also the night before play began in a Grand Slam tournament and no one would be doing much more than eating early and retiring to their rooms. He certainly didn’t need to invite her. She already knew the hot nanny was in Paris and probably perfectly willing to meet him. And if not her, there were dozens, if not hundreds, of others. The fact that he’d even thought of Charlie counted for something.
Hey! Would love to but can’t right now . . .
Charlie replied no reflexively. She’d already eaten, and she had a surprisingly tough first-round match early the next day, and the last thing she needed was any Marco-related distraction.
A text came right back: so come whenever you can. Eating at patisserie around the corner from hotel. Heading back to Rinaldo’s room afterwards to play the new Madden. Everyone to sleep early, just come say hi. Missing you.
She set her phone down without replying and did a little dance. He missed her, he missed her, he missed her. Without even thinking about it, she scrolled through Beats to find “Blank Space,” mounted her phone on the bedside speaker, and blasted the volume. Taylor Swift’s cotton candy voice filled the room and Charlie started to dance. I can make the bad guys good for a weekend. She grabbed a bottle of water for a microphone and hopped up on the bed, shamelessly gyrating her hips to the rhythm, until there was a knock on the door and she jumped down, breathless and not nearly as embarrassed as she should have been. The front desk guy standing in the hallway looked sheepish, as though he’d known Charlie was having a solo dance party to a tween hit, and he couldn’t meet her eyes when he conveyed another player’s request to turn down her music. It wasn’t even seven, but quiet time was enforced on player floors twenty-four hours a day. Charlie nodded solemnly, apologized as sincerely as she could manage, and then cracked up the moment she shut the door. Was this what going crazy felt like? She grabbed her phone and headed to the bathroom.
There in 30, she wrote, her fingers flying across the keyboard. She’d stop by for an hour just to say hello. No harm in that whatsoever.
17
how do you say “flameout” in french?
THE FRENCH OPEN
MAY 2016
Her heart was beating so fast that she couldn’t catch her breath. As slowly as she could, Charlie walked toward the baseline. The perspiration was streaming down her neck into her black tank, and the clay stuck to her sweaty calves in the most uncomfortable way. Todd’s instructions reverberated in her mind over and over again, a mantra that brought her no calm, no mindfulness: Attack and draw. Attack and draw. Attack and draw. Attack her backhand, which was weaker than it should be, and draw her into the net, which was out of her comfort zone. Eleanor McKinley also preferred to play quickly, opting to put the ball back in play as fast as possible and not waste a lot of time between points. Charlie had read the interviews Todd’s office had collated for her. Eleanor didn’t like having the time to dwell on past points—either winners or losers—because it allowed her to get too much in her own head. She preferred to hit hard and take risks and end points rather than endlessly rally back and forth, merely waiting for either her or her opponent to hit an unforced error. Already she would be uneasy playing the French Open’s slower courts. Todd was always elated when a player went on the record with such crucial preferences since he kept a dossier on every woman on the tour.
When she reached the back of the court, Charlie lifted her gaze to the ball boy and offered him the slightest nod. He trotted over holding two balls, one in each hand, and held them aloft as though they were precious jewels. Charlie shook her head and immediately he tucked them in his pocket and pulled out a towel. She accepted it and methodically patted down her forehead, cheeks, and neck, and then for good measure, her forearms and palms as well. As soon as he had put away the towel, the boy again proffered the balls. Charlie nodded, almost imperceptibly, to his right hand, and he placed the ball on her outstretched racket head. After securing it under the spandex of her black, crystal-encrusted skirt, she held her racket out for the second. This one she bounced as she made her way back to the baseline, preparing to serve. It occurred to her that she was doing precisely what Karina had done to Charlie in the final of Charleston—essentially, stalling for time in order to challenge her opponent’s toughness—but she brushed the thought away. It was different now. Instead of being one point away from winning the entire tournament, she was one point from a devastating loss in the very first round.
A glance across the court revealed Eleanor bouncing patiently on the balls of her feet. Her lithe body was almost as tight as her severe bun. She wore a fitted gray tennis dress with an attached pleated skirt that barely moved, and she was as flat-chested as a boy. Altogether it gave the odd impression that she was a w
ooden figure, a statue carved from lifeless materials that could bounce up and down and right to left without moving anything in between.
Charlie tried to calm her breathing. A snapshot from the night before appeared in her mind like an IMAX film: her legs draped over Marco’s proprietarily as they lounged on a couch. Her exhales now, on the court, were similar to those of the night before, only now there was no long, seductive smoke trail streaming from her lips and hanging in the humid air of the hotel suite, just the quick and shallow breaths of someone who knew she was seconds away from big trouble.
Charlie realized there were no possible ways left to procrastinate. This was it. Match point for what could be the single most disappointing match she had ever played. But no! That was no way to think. Entertain that horrid thought and you were as good as done. Attack and draw. Get a first solid serve in, attack her backhand, and if she is still able to return the ball, take advantage of what will surely be its relative weakness and hit a drop shot to draw her into the net. Then watch as she crumbles, because she has no net game.
Charlie took her position behind the baseline, bounced the ball three times, and tossed it in the air. It was a perfect toss, she could tell right away, and she was grateful to the muscle memory she’d developed from tens of thousands—hundreds of thousands? millions?—of practice serves when her hips and arms worked in perfect synchronization to connect her racket with the ball. It was a hard, fast, nearly perfect serve, and Charlie was so thankful for it that she wasn’t as quick as she should have been returning to position. Eleanor seemed to read exactly where the serve was going to land. She was there, ready and waiting, as though she had received a map showing the exact intended path, and she pounced on it while the ball was still rising, smashing it back to Charlie with a shocking swiftness. Caught unprepared, Charlie ran four steps into no-man’s-land and propelled her body into an immediate lunge, taking instinctive advantage of the clay to slide the remaining few feet. She got there in time but was too disoriented to do much with the ball other than get her strings on it and pop it up into the air, and it didn’t matter that she got back to position quickly because Eleanor moved in on the weak lob, turned her body sideways, planted her feet, and smashed the overhead so cleanly and with such power that Charlie didn’t see it coming until she felt it strike her neck.