Chapter 46 Amy
In terrible news it turns out Patty is some kind of tennis demon. Jay has informed me that they have a court at home, of course they do, so we scrape through to the next round of this tournament. Hours have passed; it feels like these matches might never end as the bright afternoon slips into a softer evening. Fortunately, I think others are convinced I am being a gentleman by holding back – only Patty is annoyed by my good manners.
I’ve started to remember the rules, the tramlines, the boxes you need to serve into, and have spent a large part of each game stepping backwards and watching Patty zip all over the place with the energy of a twenty-something. She’s a phenomenon: hair held back with a towelling headband, a plentiful supply of energy drinks and bananas and an off-putting grunt as she strikes each ball.
Lumbering around after her, I have done my best to swipe and swing at the ball but have not covered myself in glory. Patty has stopped telling people I played for Hampshire. Through the fence I can see Flynn watching me in his green maxi dress, his fists curled around the wire and a wistful expression on his face. He’d so desperately want to be doing this, it makes me a little sadder for him.
‘Tanya and Jay, you’re up.’
Patty is beckoning and I realize, with a gulp, that our next match is about to start.
Tanya is jogging on the spot, pausing every now and again to stretch, and Jay is leaning against the netting grinning and chatting to Laura. For a second I watch them, the easy way they are leaning into each other, the way Laura throws back her head and laughs at him. They’d fallen for each other so hard and so quickly I had always held back. I’d been worried it was fleeting and wouldn’t last. I had good reasons to mistrust Jay.
From afar they look perfectly suited and I feel a yearning for Flynn and I to be returned. He makes me feel relaxed, he quietens the noise in my head. How has it taken this swap for me to see that? Why am I willing to chuck it all away?
‘Flynn.’
Patty digs me in the arm, ‘Come on. It’s your serve.’
The service has probably been the biggest humiliation of the day so far and I make the mistake of looking at Flynn through the fence as I manage to get my fourth double fault in a row. It is incredibly difficult to work out how to get the ball over the net into that reasonably small square. We are a game down and Patty is barely hiding her displeasure.
It’s Tanya’s turn to serve and I can’t help admiring how she looks in her perfectly cut tennis dress, her long, tanned legs looking longer as she curves her body and slams the ball down into the square. I draw back my racket only to feel the ball whizz past my ear.
‘Fifteen love.’
The game continues in much the same way and we are looking at utter annihilation. It’s five games to nil and I can almost smell the scones and cake and feel the bubbles of the prosecco I’m craving. Distracted, I take my place at the net as Patty serves behind me.
I’m not sure how it happened. Tanya receives the serve and dashes to the net the other side of me. The ball is arcing over my head and I believe I can hit it, I want to hit one, I want to try to salvage something. I pull my arm back and I swipe at the ball in the air, squeezing my eyes shut as I do so.
Almost at the same moment I hear a satisfying noise from my racket and watch in delight as the ball is no longer flying over me but is very much flying away from me. This delight morphs rapidly into horror as I realize where the ball is heading and it explodes onto Tanya’s face.
Her racket clatters to the ground, she grabs at her head, Jay comes rushing over and I am frozen in fright, staring at the weapon in my hand, dread pooling in my stomach.
‘Is she dead?’ I whisper as Patty stands at my side.
She huffs, ‘We’ll give them the game.’
Tanya steps to the side, a perfect red circle blooming on her cheek, and I bite my lip.
They call time on the game and, horrified, I walk like a zombie off the court, still amazed at the strength, the speed and feeling terrible.
From somewhere behind me I hear two women talking but I want to get away from here, escape.
‘Is he … crying?’