Chapter Two Juliette
TWO JULIETTE
Luca Kacic starts the Australian Open final with a double fault. Juliette bounces on her toes as Kacic’s first serve sails out. Her second serve snaps into the net. First point to Juliette.
Juliette knows this won’t be that easy, but as she walks to the opposite side of the court, she hopes maybe it will be.
The crowd murmurs, perhaps about the perceived nerves, perhaps about the press conference comments.
Juliette tries to ignore the hushed chattering, but it echoes in her head anyway.
She crouches, watching Kacic twist the racket in her hand and breathe out. Despite how even-keeled Kacic seems, it’s clear she’s not immune to nerves. Still, Kacic settles easily and wins her first service game.
Juliette tightens her ponytail as they switch sides, annoyed at herself for not getting more returns in the court. She pauses at her bench to sip her electrolyte mix, and her eyes fall onto Kacic. It’s a mistake.
So far, Juliette’s been ignoring her opponent.
She can’t let her focus slip for a moment.
Kacic is all elegant lines and hard edges, her long limbs gleaming with sweat already.
The muscles beneath her skin shift, power in her shoulders and lean forearms. Her hair is tied into a high ponytail, braided down so it isn’t flying all over her shoulders.
A black visor obscures her face as she looks at the ground, but Juliette’s mouth goes dry anyway.
Then Kacic looks up. Juliette jolts as Kacic’s eyes skate over her. Juliette clenches her jaw and refuses to look away. Kacic is impassive, but her chin tilts up, as if challenging her. Heat coils in Juliette’s stomach, a corrosive tincture of anger and defensiveness as she stares back.
It lasts only a fraction of a second. Kacic blinks first and stalks away from her bench.
Juliette strides to the other side, and they pass each other with a wide breadth.
Kacic wants this as much as she does, and that desperate energy crackles on Juliette’s skin, in tune with the frantic want swirling in her chest. Tennis may be a sport without physical contact, but a match is about a connection between players.
A conversation where every serve is a statement and every backhand a question.
But this match already feels like an argument, one that Juliette intends to win.
She holds out her racket to the ball kid, who diligently puts four balls onto the strings. She plucks at them, twisting them in her fingers as she selects the two she wants.
She looks up at her box and sees her family all clustered together. Her three sisters. The elder two, Octavia and Claudia, flank the youngest, Livia. But her focus lands on Antony. He’s nodding slowly at her, but something about it is less encouraging and more threatening.
Don’t fuck this up.
Juliette turns back to the baseline and knocks two of the balls back, stuffing one up into the compression shorts beneath her skirt. The fuzz is soft against her skin, comforting and familiar.
As she goes to serve, her fingers lock too tightly around the handle of her racket. She glances up at Kacic before she rocks back. Kacic is crouched, swaying at the ready, a panther in her pure black dress and Adidas shoes.
With two more bounces for luck, Juliette spins her first serve in, her arm stiff through the motion. As soon as it bounces, Kacic pounces, crushing the ball down the line.
The crowd roars but Kacic doesn’t even pump her fist. She simply moves to the other side as if this is just another day at the office. Juliette grits her teeth, annoyed.
Quiet falls as Juliette bounces the ball.
She hits a sharper, faster ball and Kacic responds with a deep, spinning shot into Juliette’s backhand.
Juliette stays her ground on the baseline and crouches, angling the shot back.
Kacic lunges and slices it back, but it drifts wide.
Juliette pumps her fist at her box, and her sisters clap encouragingly.
With a few good serves, Juliette settles the vibrating nerves that threaten to overwhelm her and manages to win her service game. It’s now Kacic’s turn for a rebuttal.
In the next game, Juliette puts more balls in the court, but Kacic is ruthless with her shots.
She clips lines, maneuvering Juliette out of position and striking winners from the middle of the court.
It’s a master class in how to hold serve, and Juliette would be impressed if it wasn’t being carried out against her.
Back and forth they spar until Juliette holds for the final time to reach an even six games. Tiebreaker.
Kacic will serve first, and then they’ll take turns serving until one of them earns seven points and is ahead by two, winning the set. All Juliette has to do is win two sets, and the match will be hers.
She can hear her sisters yelling her name and clapping. Antony shouts something in Italian, but Juliette is locked in. She doesn’t need his help.
“Quiet, please,” the umpire says as the crowd continues to roil with noise, excited that the final has been so close. “Players are ready.”
Juliette closes her eyes and breathes, dancing on her toes. These are the kind of matches that make or break a player. This is the final of a Grand Slam, and while Juliette has been shaky on keeping her nerve, this is what she has trained for.
As the crowd finally quiets and Juliette crouches into her ready position, she watches Kacic step up to the baseline.
She flicks her braid over her shoulder, almost impatient with the movement.
The humidity presses down on them, damp and heavy, and Juliette wipes the sweat from her upper lip with her wristband.
Desire burns against her skin. She needs this.
Is Luca feeling the nerves too? The excitement? Does the need to win also course through her veins, hot as white flame? Does that override any aches and pains from an hour’s worth of brutal tennis in the Australian heat?
Juliette’s heart thunders against her chest. A familiar ache throbs in her forearm, the back of her bicep, because damn, Kacic hits hard.
But this is the culmination of all they’ve worked for in this set, their closing arguments.
She won’t give in, she won’t give up. Kacic has been fighting her just as hard, so she doesn’t have an advantage over Juliette.
This is Kacic’s first Grand Slam final too, and she won’t let Kacic have any mental edge over her.
Juliette stares across the net and a jolt races through her as Kacic meets her gaze, a fraction of a second before she eases into her elegant service motion.
Time shivers to a stop and the tightness in her chest snaps, a reverberating vibration like a string breaking after an off-kilter shot.
Juliette’s knuckles blanch around her racket.
Kacic launches into her service motion, but the tension doesn’t break.
It prickles along the back of Juliette’s neck.
The ball flies, lifting out of Kacic’s open fingers as her racket arcs through the air, cutting across the fuzz of the ball.
Juliette blocks the ball back, muscle memory saving her the point.
Juliette’s legs move anyway, dragging her to the center of the baseline.
The shot is weak and Juliette watches Kacic hesitate.
She eases off her forehand, and Juliette’s body makes the decision to move before her mind does.
She sidesteps to her backhand and the ball connects beautifully, lancing down the line with precise power.
Kacic lunges for it, but it tips off the end of her racket.
Juliette clenches her fist and lets herself smile, all thoughts of her aches and pains dissipating.
Whatever this energy is that courses between them, Juliette will take advantage.
She only needs to hold her serve for six more points, and the set will be hers.
Another set after that, and she’ll be lifting the Australian Open trophy.
Juliette wins the next two points fairly easily, one with a forehand winner and the other with Kacic missing a backhand by a larger margin than she probably should have.
Maybe she’s getting tired and her muscles are tightening up.
She won the first point, and Kacic is faltering under this contest of wills.
Confidence floods her until Kacic takes her next two points with twin aces, but she’s able to scrape a win in the next rally, putting the score at 4–2 in Juliette’s favor.
The points are flying by and then they switch sides.
Juliette gulps down a few mouthfuls of water.
She watches Kacic walk around the net, her fingers tapping the post as she does.
Then she jogs, hitting imaginary forehands, trying to find her rhythm.
Juliette shakes her head, but the fluid movement of Kacic’s body is stuck in her brain.
Antony would say Kacic was doing it as an intimidation tactic, but it’s distracting in a different way.
Juliette tosses her bottle down onto the ground harder than she means to and tries to focus instead on imagining herself winning this set, feeling the triumph that would surge through her veins, sharp and sweet. Just three more points, and it’s hers.
She doesn’t make the mistake of looking up at Kacic before she serves.
Juliette hits a low slicing serve, and Kacic nails it into the net.
A free point. Kacic twists sharply on her heel, braid smacking against her sweaty shoulder.
When Kacic returns to the baseline to serve, she’s icy calm; no nerves flicker across her face.
Kacic takes the next two points with ease, putting the score at 5–4, and Juliette knows she has to take a chance now.
No risk, no reward. She can hear Antony urging her behind her but doesn’t spare him a glance in the audience. She must focus.
She hits a hard serve in the middle of the box and Kacic cringes out of the way, catching the ball awkwardly on the frame.