Twenty-Eight
Scrunchie
they’ve given us the afternoon tomorrow, so if you’re up early, i’m not sure when we can talk
these team matches go for fucking ever
We can skip tomorrow if it won’t work out
nope, i refuse to go even a day without hearing your voice. i’ll call after your match even if i have to hide in a bathroom somewhere
So romantic!
right? cassanova himself couldn’t do better
Scrunchie
did you send me flowers?
Maybe
i love them! thank you
You’re welcome, love. Thought your hotel room might be a little sad
how did you know my room number? i don’t think i mentioned it
You didn’t because you’re rude, but thankfully I can just message Tina
It’s very handy for being able to find out where you are at all times
damn, i’m going to have to get macca’s number
but seriously, thank you. i can’t stop smiling
Scrunchie
that was a great match
why do you keep getting into finals when i’m not there
It’s only happened twice!
And if you had been here, I’m not sure I would have made the final. Not sure how I did it at all, honestly. A lot of luck, I guess
what do you mean?
and don’t make me remind you about what happened last time we played
I haven’t forgotten, you’re just playing phenomenally right now while I feel like I’ve hit a wall. Or a ceiling. Like I’m just waiting to fail
says the man who just made a tournament final
Small tournament
all tournaments count #sizedoesntmatter. you got this
I don’t feel like I do this time. I think I’m done
call me. i’m free until 8
I CALLED HIM from my Brisbane hotel room.
He answered almost immediately, saying, “Give me a sec,” as movement rustled and he left the sound of chatter behind.
“Sorry, was sitting in the gym listening to Jameson tell stories about the LA Olympics for the fiftieth time. Every year I don’t play on the American team I forget how mind-numbing he is. Anyway, all yours now.”
“If you have things you need to be doing—”
“What I need to be doing is this. Talk to me. What do you mean you’re done? Why can’t you do it?”
I flumped down onto my bed with a sigh, staring up at the strip of artificial light slicing across my ceiling.
I’d drawn the heavy curtains like maybe shutting out the world would shut off my thoughts.
“It’s just . . . this tournament has been like a dream, because I know I’ll wake up any moment. Or be forced to.”
A moment of silence, then Miles said, “What do you mean be forced to?”
We’d talked about so many things in the last couple of weeks, and I’d tried to carry my renewed confidence in us into the first tournament of the season, but with every match I’d won, doubt had grown like a swelling cancer.
This was going to end like it had last time. Foolish to think I could get past it.
“I mean . . .” I closed my eyes like that would help. “It’s just not going to last, right? It didn’t before so why would it now?”
“Do you mean when you had your accident?”
“Yeah. It was the same then – flying up the rankings, beating top players, expectations growing that I would be the next big thing. Then it ended.”
It was hard, alone in my dark hotel room, not to close my eyes and hear the screeching tires. The crack of impact. The deep silence that followed.
“Mat, that didn’t happen because you were playing well,” Miles said, his voice cutting across that sucking silence.
“You didn’t do anything to make it happen and it won’t happen again now.
And yes, I am sure because the statistical likelihood of it happening in the first place was miniscule, so the chance of it happening a second time to the same person in the same situation is equivalent to those monkeys banging on typewriters being able to recreate Shakespeare. ”
“Mm, it’s hot when you math at me.”
“That’s not even math!” he laughed. “Just some basic logic or something.”
I tried to laugh along, to brush off the dread, but even as I failed, I realised I didn’t really want to. This was Miles. I couldn’t keep being afraid of what he might think of me.
“That shoulder injury felt like a warning,” I said. “That I was getting close to the limit of what I was allowed.”
“Limit?”
“My ranking. It’ll be forty-one if I lose tomorrow. Thirty-eight if I win.”
By his heavy sigh, I knew he understood. “Shit. You were forty-one when you had the accident.”
I nodded though he couldn’t see it. “I honestly don’t know if I’m more terrified of winning or losing.”
“My statistical observation about monkeys writing Shakespeare still stands,” he said gently. “Just because you reach the same ranking, doesn’t mean the same thing will happen.”
“Maybe not, but what if I’m just not meant to ever do any better than this? Perhaps this time I’ll just get a worse injury and—”
“We all get bad injuries, that’s tennis. And then you get better and you keep going.”
“Then maybe it’ll be something else!”
Silence but for the hum of the hotel, and the faint echoes of distant noise nine hundred kilometres away. I knew it was stupid. Knew it made no sense. But knowing it wasn’t helping.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I—”
“No, don’t apologise,” Miles interrupted, ferocity in the words. “We say what we’re thinking, that’s the deal, yeah?”
“Yeah, but this train of thought is ridiculous.”
“Who cares? It’s the one you’re stuck on so I’m riding it with you until we can both get off.”
I hummed a suggestive sound. “I think there are better ways for us to both get off. It’s too bad you’re not alone. I am. All alone in my hotel room.”
“Hey! No deflecting from the conversation by making me horny.”
“Worth a try. Since I learned it from the best.”
The way his laugh lightened my heart would never get old. “Ouch!” he said. “Matteo has claws!”
“Tell me I’m wrong!” I laughed back.
“You know I can’t, I had just kinda hoped you hadn’t noticed.” The words had a shy edge, rueful and self-conscious, and the reminder that he was his own mess helped steady me.
“I did warn you I was getting wise to you,” I said.
“You did, yeah, but I refuse to be distracted here. Have you talked to Tomas about this?”
I smiled up at the shadowy ceiling, grateful for his tenacity. “No. I think I’ll be all right. I just needed to let it out.”
“You should still tell him. This is part of his job, right?”
“He doesn’t need to hear every single little—”
“This isn’t little! If you don’t tell him, I’ll call and tell him myself.”
That I knew he meant it was the worst part. Or perhaps the best. A reminder that there was no limit to the ways he would show up for me. “Thankfully, you don’t have his number!”
“Ah, but it turns out that Tina has Macca’s number.”
“What? Why?”
“I refused to ask, but I will absolutely make use of it if I have to. You need to talk to him about it, and no, not because I’m sick of talking about it and want to palm you off onto your coach, so don’t think it!
But he’s the one who’s there with you, while I’m stuck in Sydney reliving Drew Jameson’s glory days. ”
“All right! I’ll talk to him.”
The way I could all but hear his eyes narrowing down the phone line was impressive. “Promise?”
“Promise.”
“Good. There’s no magic way to be sure bad shit won’t happen, but remember what we do with that fear? We tell it to fuck off. Which you do by playing the next match. And the next. And choosing to believe you’ve always got one more in you.”
In the artificial dark of my room, I found my fingers tracing the bracelet he’d given me, stopping at the scrunchie charm to spin it slowly. “Are you ever afraid of anything?”
Miles laughed, the sound soft. “All the time. I used to fear I would never be as good as you. Or as brave as you. I spent a long time afraid people would find out about me. And afraid of my parents. The first two pushed me to work hard, but the rest fucked me up. Still fuck me up. And I’m still afraid I’ll never be as good or as brave as you, and that I’ll never really deserve you.
But I’m just going to keep choosing to not let it be important.
Keep finding ways to say fuck you to the fear.
Even if it’s just standing here, not knowing who might be able to hear me, and telling you that I love you, Matteo. ”
His voice echoed off the concrete of the stadium corridor, loud enough that I could imagine how hard his heart would be racing.
My heart would pound out the same fearful tattoo when I walked onto the court tomorrow, but that suddenly seemed far from exceptional – fears something we all carried with us one way or another.
“I love you too,” I said. “And thanks. I think maybe we can get off the train now.”
I WON. MILES wasn’t there, but Mum and Dad flew up with the twins, and by the time I stepped off court after the award ceremony, I already had six missed calls.
“I’m so mad I wasn’t there!” he cried when I called him back.
“It’s fine! You had your own final to play. Did you win?”
“No! Well, I did, but Nora didn’t, and Den and Gisella are still playing but it’s not looking good. Italy are going to take it, I’d say. But I did not call to talk about that, Mat. Congratufuckinglations!”
I had to laugh, that a word we’d so often typed but never actually said aloud. “Thanks. I’m still processing it, honestly.”
“I bet you are. Enjoy it. I wish I was there to make a huge fuss over you.”
“Mum and Dad came with the twins,” I said. “So don’t worry, I think they’ll make quite a lot of fuss.”
“Good.”
“And besides,” I added. “You can be there next time. Because I’m going to win another.”
“Yeah.” I could hear the grin in his voice. “Yeah, you are.”
I FLEW HOME the following morning to begin what was already shaping up to be a whirlwind week leading into the Australian Open. Media requests had been rolling in, but ignoring them all, I went straight out to meet Katie at the practice courts.
For almost three years we had shared crummy apartments and cheered each other on before grand slams, and though everything was changing, there were some things I wouldn’t let go.
“You didn’t bring it!” she cried when I arrived.
“Bring what?”
“The trophy! I expected it to be glued to you.”