Chapter 8
eight
Aleksandr’s smirk when we get onto the clay courts in Charleston two days later worries me. I have no idea whether it’s a this is going to hurt smirk, or, more distressingly, an I know something you don’t smirk, but either way, I don’t like it.
While clay courts tend to be made with the bright red dust most are accustomed to seeing, Charleston’s clay is a dark grayish green, a product of crushing rock from nearby mountains.
Though the surface is harder and faster than regular clay, a perfect transition between seasons, dynamic players find clay in general easier to navigate than power hitters like me.
That’s why Valentina Ortega, who uses heavy topspin and lots of variety in her play, has won the last two French Opens.
Even so, they were the courts I grew up playing on most in Athens.
Nothing can beat the feeling of my shoes sliding on the red dirt, of being able to make it to a ball that would be too far away on another surface, the way it covers me in a layer of grime so it takes a few showers to feel clean.
It allows me to be one with the court. One with the game.
There’s nothing I love more than the red streaking my socks. Than taking part of the court home with me.
Though I’ve been away from Greece for the better part of thirteen years, over half my life now, stepping onto a clay court, no matter where I am in the world, is like stepping back into the place I grew up.
The courts I lived on, because they were the one place I felt loved, and if not loved, respected.
“You look like you think I plan on torturing you,” Aleksandr says as he sets up orange cones and highlighter-yellow agility hurdles, pulling three different long resistance bands from his bag.
Karolína sits on the bench, watching us, and Pen has her phone out, prepared to film. I’m wearing a new striped tank from Stratosphere, my biggest sponsor, and she’s been adamant that we need to get footage of me training in it so that it takes off when they launch it in their new collection.
“More like I’m not sure you’re going to work me hard enough.” It’s our first official session together, and I’d hoped he’d throw everything he can at me. But based on our conversation after my loss in Miami, it might be more likely we take things easy. Find balance and all that nonsense.
Another byproduct of our conversation Thursday is I find myself analyzing him and our interactions more.
It’s clear that there’s more than meets the eye.
I watch him now, placing four hurdles in a line on one side of the court, then four orange cones in a square.
He’s grinning at me, his eyes lighter than I’ve ever seen them.
Not that I’ve paid much attention.
“I will ‘work’ you plenty hard.” His grin turns lascivious, a wink in my direction before he’s serious again. Or his version of serious. “But I certainly won’t punish you the way you do yourself.”
There’s a flash of something on his face, there for only a moment.
It reminds me of what he said about being like me, punishing himself no matter his successes.
I picture him in a locker room, barely holding it together after getting everything he wanted and it still not being enough.
I don’t remember his arc. When did he start winning?
How long did he feel this way? Why wasn’t winning enough? What made him quit?
And why do I care so much?
I assure myself that it’s healthy scientific curiosity, wanting to know what my life might be like if things ever get better.
“You’d think the person who wants this job so badly would try to do things my way,” I mutter.
“I want this job so badly because you’re a phenomenal tennis player and I want to see you playing for as many years as your body allows instead of burning out at twenty-five.”
Ignoring the fact that he either knows or guessed my age perfectly, I cross my arms. “I’ll still be the judge of whether this lasts past June.”
Instead of dimming, his smile brightens, which irks me. “Oh, solnyshko.” He has yet to tell me the meaning of the word, and I’m too…something to search it up. Proud? Maybe. Scared? Probably. “You’re not going to want to get rid of me now that you have me.”
“Cocky.”
“Confident.”
“Annoying.”
He chuckles. “Persistent.”
“Annoying,” I emphasize.
“I believe that means you lose.” At my questioning look, he continues, “You used the same word twice. If it was word play you wanted, you lose.”
I resist the urge to stomp my foot. “Do you have a plan, or is needling me the only thing on the agenda for training today?”
“If you’ll uncross your pretty arms for a moment, I can tell you what to do first.” My eyes narrow at the compliment, but I comply.
“Very good. Now come stand here.” He points to the alley, away from where he set out all his equipment.
I stand at the baseline of the alley, facing the net.
Pen moves so she can get a good shot, whispering to my coach, whose eyes are fixed on the two of us.
“Are you warmed up?” he asks as he takes a step in front of me, then to the side so he’s no longer in the alley. He already had me jog, roll out my lower back, do dynamic stretches and core activation—more than I’m used to.
At my nod, he gestures toward the net. “Lateral jumps with one-legged stutter steps.” He demonstrates, pulling up the hem of his short shorts before jumping to his right and hopping on that leg twice. Then, he jumps to the left onto his left leg, hopping twice. “To the net and back twice.”
I listen, trying not to glance at him for approval every few jumps the way I might have with Nora. When I reach the net, I turn around and begin again back to the baseline, then back to the net and to the baseline again. By the end, my breathing comes quicker, my heart pumping louder in my ears.
“Good. How’s your back?”
I balk for a moment, forgetting his knowledge of my injury. Then remember the way his hands landed on my torso to straighten my spine in Miami. I’m warm, and it’s not because we’ve started training.
“Fine.”
He scans my face. Nods. “Now do two sprints to the net and back.”
Again, I listen. “Put them together. Four sets. Lateral jumps into sprints.”
By the second set, my chest constricts, my breathing heavy. My legs are jelly, and the “faster” Aleksandr calls after each set isn’t helping.
As I finish my final sprint, Anya marches onto the court beside us, her hitting partner trailing her. Anya calls to Aleksandr in Russian, which he ignores. She tries again.
“I’m working,” he answers without turning to her, his attention on me. “Two more sets,” he says to me. I don’t immediately begin, still processing the way he brushed her off.
Apparently, she is too. She steps onto our court, and speaks again, hands on her hips. Aleksandr sighs, turning around. “Anya, I told you I’m working.” She looks ready to stomp her foot, but instead glares at me. I rub the mati pendant on my necklace between my thumb and pointer finger.
“Can’t find any other performance coaches willing to work with you? That tracks.” She scoffs.
“Anya,” Aleksandr barks. “Enough. Get on your court.”
She mutters something, turning on her heel. Seconds later, she’s smacking a ball at her hitting partner, far harder than necessary for a half-court warmup.
“Ignore her,” Aleksandr says, focusing on me once more. “She’s upset she lost in Miami.”
“And probably that she lost you,” I point out.
He doesn’t agree or disagree, instead gesturing at my feet. I do another set, more confident in my decision to work with him. After my final set, I bend over, clasping my hands behind my head and breathing deeply, in through my nose, out through my mouth. It hurts, and I love it.
“Good. Let’s get water.”
Pen and Karolína are sitting on the bench, so I grab my bottle and sit with my back in the net. Aleksandr settles beside me as I gulp down water. Anya slaps ball after ball at her poor hitting partner, a woman ranked in the upper thirties.
“You like the clay.” It’s said like a statement, not a question, pulling my attention to Aleks.
“It’s what I grew up on. In Greece.” Speaking it aloud instantly makes the nostalgia stronger.
An ache for my yiayia’s moussaka: delicious eggplant, beef, tomatoes, potatoes layered beneath a rich white béchamel sauce.
For the tyropita my aunt used to leave at my grandmother’s house when she dropped off her five rowdy children.
For the way my yiayia would turn a blind eye to how much baklava I consumed because, by virtue of my not consistently trying to break a bone or a piece of her furniture, I was the easiest to deal with.
But thinking of home also reminds me of coaches terrified by my parents, who gushed about how amazing my mother was.
“Why doesn’t she coach you?” they’d ask, and I never had an answer.
I think of quiet corners in my yiayia’s house, tired of being left out and finding something of my own to occupy myself.
I adjust the gold hoops in my ear before doing the same to my necklaces, tucking the mati pendant under my tank.
Aleksandr observes me raptly. “You miss it.” Another statement.
Swallowing over the memories, I nod once.
“So maybe your homework shouldn’t be doing one new thing a day. Maybe it should be doing something for you each day. Like getting food that reminds you of home.”
There’s a humming in my chest. Nothing will ever come close to my yiayia’s food, but it might ease the pain of the nostalgia.
I glance at him, take in the far-off look in his eyes and the way that, when he’s not paying attention to it, his smile slips. Wonder what he wishes he’d done more of while on tour. “Do you miss home?”
Aleksandr shrugs. “Everyone but Dima travels the world with me, and even him I see often at joint tournaments.”
“So family equates to home for you, then?” I ask quietly. I forgot he had a brother who played on tour too.