Seven
THE LIGHT IN the fridge case flickered like it was getting sick of me staring. It had been warm at the court, but two minutes standing in the meat section of the supermarket had turned my sweat to ice. And my brain to sludge.
We’d stopped for groceries on the way back since we couldn’t live off chocolate mousse cake however tempting it was, but while Miles searched up recipes on his phone, I was trying to do math and failing.
“This sucks,” Miles said, glancing up as someone brushed past behind us. “We could avoid this if you gave me permission to order in again.”
“Three thousand eight hundred and fifty. You’re taking this way too seriously.”
Ignoring that last part, I said, “Is it? That’s a lot.”
“Of meat or money?”
“Both.” I gnawed my lip, staring at the neat little packages of meat with their neat little price tags. And because the decision was impossible, I put it off by throwing him a look. “Did you do that sum in your head?”
He’d gone back to scowling at a recipe for what looked like some kind of fried rice. “It wasn’t hard,” he said. “Just seventy-seven times five and add an extra zero.”
“That doesn’t make it easier. Damn it.”
“Just buy the meat, Mat.” Miles sighed and shoved his phone into his pocket. “Screw living on beans or whatever if you don’t want to.”
“Yeah, well, you can say that because you don’t have to worry about running out of money,” I said, picking up one of the plastic trays as though staring at the price closer up would change the numbers.
“Neither do you right now.”
I dropped the tray back and shot him a glare. “If you mean because I can rely on you to help me if I get—”
“No! I mean, yes, you can, but that’s not what I meant. I’ve seen your budget. You sent it to me, remember?”
“Vividly.”
“Right, so I know what numbers you’re working from and unless I’m missing something, your total is based on losing in the third qualifying round at Roland Garros, not the second round of the main draw. That’s a huge difference in cash.”
“Yes, but the last time I got main-draw-of-a-grand-slam money—the year you knocked me out of Wimbledon, thank you for that—”
He nodded graciously. “You’re welcome.”
“—I got too far ahead of myself and ended up in massive debt when I couldn’t back it up, and I refuse to do that again. If I do okay here then maybe I can use that money when I hit the US, otherwise it’s my security in case I lose in the first round of qualifying next week.”
A beat of silence met this, filled only by the hum of the meat fridge and the tinny strains of terrible store music. Then Miles set a heavy hand on my shoulder, his dark gaze catching me like a hook. “Mat.”
“What?” I said, hating the way my stomach lurched the moment he got serious.
“I think you—” He broke off as a middle-aged woman strolled by with a squeaky cart, throwing us a curious glance.
Removing his hand, Miles shoved it deep into his pocket.
“Look, Mat, this is your decision and I respect that,” he said once she’d gone.
“And I’m genuinely grateful for the opportunity to see firsthand what this is like for you, but I need you to listen for a moment, all right? ”
“All right,” I said, a squirm of discomfort wriggling in my gut. He had such an intense stare when he chose to use it.
“I get that you’ve got your plans and your budget and your rules for a reason,” he said, shoulders hunching like a six-foot-five man trying not to be.
“They protect you, right? They make sure you’ll never have to feel that fear again.
But the fear doesn’t actually go away, because there’s always a chance the protections you put in place will fail. ”
He spoke like he understood how it had felt, like he’d been there while I kept tightening the budget and still trying to find a way to play. I’d been so close to giving up, but I hadn’t after the accident, so to quit over money would have made a mockery of all that hard work.
“And because the fear doesn’t go away,” he went on, “sometimes you have to take risks. Even just small ones.” Pulling a hand from his pocket, he lifted it to my temple to brush aside a loose strand of hair, fingers ghosting over my skin.
“Just to say ‘fuck you’ to the fear, right? So it knows you can see it. Knows you refuse to be ruled by it.”
He traced my cheek with one fingertip before letting his hand fall. And in the aftermath of such words, the hum of the refrigerator units was like a roar.
I swallowed the lump in my throat, though it stretched my chest uncomfortably all the way down. “That was, uh . . . a very eloquent argument in favour of meat.”
“It was an argument in favour of committing to yourself,” Miles said, rolling his eyes. “To believing in yourself. But yes, adding a few hundred dollars to your food bill over the next couple of weeks isn’t going to ruin you. You don’t need meat to be an amazing player, but you do need belief.”
I looked from him to the meat fridge and back. He was right, yet I couldn’t bring myself to put any packets into the shopping basket at my feet.
Seeing my indecision, Miles threw up his hands. “Buy the meat, Mat. Or don’t. But make up your mind so we can get out of here before someone asks for my autograph in a fucking Tescos.”
“Uh, excuse me?”
We spun to find a young man grimacing at us apologetically. “Ah, shit,” Miles said. “Sorry, I . . . don’t have a pen with me.”
The young man’s eyes widened and he looked from Miles to me then along the aisle as though for help, before gesturing to the fridge. “I, uh, just want some sausages.”
I pressed my lips tight to keep from laughing as Miles moved out of the way, cheeks turning pink. The young man stepped up to the fridge between us and leaned down, taking his time to pick through the trays while Miles glared at me over his head.
“That,” he said, lifting an admonishing finger once the young man had hurried off, “didn’t happen, okay?”
“Pretty sure it did.” I grinned. “Miles Callahan, sausage blocker.”
“If that’s another terrible Australian phrase, I’m going to bite you.”
He stalked away on the words, leaving me laughing, though in the face of my indecision, it didn’t last long.
It wasn’t really about the meat, I knew.
Meat had just become an easy shorthand for a far larger collection of worries that ate at me daily.
Worries about money and injuries and the unsustainability of the sport I loved, about how I’d failed to live up to my potential, and was losing strength for the fight.
Wise to stick to my plan and see how things went at Wimbledon, to be safe and sure, yet Miles’s words lodged in my mind like shards of glass.
Sometimes, you have to take risks. Say fuck you to the fear and choose to believe in yourself.
I wasn’t sure I could after years of failure, but for some reason he seemed to believe in me. Perhaps, for now, that would be enough.
I bought the meat.
IT WAS DARK when we got back. Miles took his groceries to his own apartment, but within a few minutes had brought a large tray of frozen fish and vegetables to stick in my oven before settling on the couch.
We hadn’t discussed evening plans, yet the conversation at the courts hovered, sticky in the air, leaving the promise of a really hot fuck catching at my attention even as I put my groceries away.
“Can you get match replays?” Miles asked, gesturing at the TV.
“Yeah, I cast from the laptop. Which do you want?”
“The Van der Stoep-Kozel match from today. It’s been a while since I played Piotr, so I want to see how he’s doing.”
I closed the oven on my own tray of inelegantly laid out food. “You’re playing him on Wednesday?”
“Seems so. Would have bet on Pieter getting through myself. Ha! Pieter and Piotr. I didn’t notice.”
So, with our dinner cooking, we settled in to watch the battle of the Peters, its winner Miles’s next opponent.
“Damn, I forgot how little seating there is outside centre court,” Miles said. “Have you ever played Queen’s?”
“No.”
“Next year.”
The words contained such confidence that the damn lump was back in my throat, and I was glad his attention was wholly on the screen.
“Do you always watch your next opponent’s previous match?” I asked to change the subject.
“If I can. Leo likes to give me game plans, but I play best when I can get into their headspace.”
“So, you watched my first-round match in Paris?”
He looked at me, the sound of tennis a background rhythm. “Yeah. Resentfully though. I always preferred to watch you lose.”
“Wow,” I said, though I’d always done the same.
Miles grinned. “Come on, you must have been hoping I would lose. Or did you not watch mine?”
“I saw part of it, though I was distracted by the cute French guy chatting me up.”
“Ah, well that’s far more important.”
He went back to the match, slipping into that watchful silence he had when he was giving something his full attention. I’d found myself its focus too often since he’d dropped his laundry bag at my door. Safer to let him stay absorbed in the TV for now.
When the oven timer went off, I plated up both our dinners, the thanks I received a grateful smile and the observation, “Piotr’s not just a big server.”
“No,” I agreed. “Long gone are the days you could get by on just that.”
“Sure. Although, I think last time I played him that serve was still the biggest challenge. Last year. Monte Carlo, perhaps. He’s definitely improved.”
We sat and ate and talked about the tennis, yet despite such domesticity, the space between us had a charged quality.
After taking away the dinner plates, I expanded it by shifting to the corner of the couch, but the move seemed only to increase my awareness of him.
Of his choice to sit here and watch the match rather than in his own apartment.
I kept forcing myself not to think about it, until nearing the end of the second set, Miles gave in to the tug of awareness that had been growing steadily stronger.