Chapter 20
Chloe
Snow Angel—Reneé Rapp
“Come on, is that really as fast as you can go?” I shouted, looking back over my shoulder, finding Inés red-faced and lagging
behind.
“Fuck you,” she puffed out, running to match my stride.
“I knew you could keep up.” I wiped the beads of sweat from my brow. Under the summer sun, even a morning run was brutal,
but I didn’t dare show weakness to Inés.
“I hate running,” she grumbled. “I hate sand.”
“That’s why Calvin sent us out here. Running on sand is hellish compared to a flat surface.”
We’d started training together at my place on the Rhode Island coast, and I was almost certain that Calvin had upped our usual
intensity. The rest of the day would bring on-court practice and drills, as well as some core-strengthening work in the late
afternoon. Inés had seemingly taken most of it in her stride, her years of this lifestyle showing over mine. But our morning
run across the beach, I still had that on her.
“Come on, I’ll race you back to the house,” I challenged, spotting a glimpse of my home down the shore.
It wasn’t even two weeks ago that Calvin and I had walked here with Wilson.
“That far?” she said, her voice starting to betray some exhaustion. In every other practice, she had me.
“Come on, you’ll be no use to me slow,” I said quickly. “If you beat me, you can serve first in practice.”
That got her attention. It was as if the prize had Inés summoning the last of her strength, and within a split second, she was
ahead of me.
“Last one there is a loser!” she cried, pushing me forward.
I raced after her, my sneakers pounding against the sand, pushing forward as I sank. The sand was exhausting, and now at full
pelt, my calves and thighs were truly burning.
But I managed to keep my focus on the race, and not on Inés. I’d been convinced that half the reason I kept losing our practice
matches was because I was distracted by her, by how she looked in that tiny sports bra she kept wearing, the way her shorts
hugged her thighs, accentuating her ass.
The finish line came into sight, Inés a little ahead of me. I dug down deep, going to that place I reserved for the final
round of tennis. When it’s live or die, and victory is hanging on the line.
Push. Chloe. Win.
My dad’s voice rang in my head.
Do not fail. Do not lose.
In the last few seconds, I reached her side, but I couldn’t even bear to look at her, keeping my eye on the target of the
garden fence. Seconds broke into milliseconds, meters into centimeters, breaking down into millimeters until finally—
“I won!” Inés cried, both our hands pressing against the fence, so close together I could feel the heat radiating from her
body.
“No way, I won,” I insisted. “I serve first.”
“Over my dead body.” Her voice was razor-sharp as our bodies almost brushed together. “We both know I was faster. You don’t
want to admit it.”
“If you think I’m going to let you take the first serve because you say you won, you’ve got another think coming.”
“Oh, you’ll let me take it.”
My fingers tightened on the fence rail, my jaw clenched. I hated this feeling. Losing. Even over a stupid beach run that wasn’t
supposed to mean anything.
Dad’s voice sounded in my head again. Another moan about how I was supposed to be better than this. That I had to be the best.
I pushed it down again. Smoothed it out. Remembered everything Calvin had taught me instead. Like rewriting glitchy programming.
I offered my hand. “Call it a tie.”
When she took it, I was thrown right back to when we agreed on this very partnership, the slight spark I’d chosen to ignore
igniting again underneath my palm.
“I still want to serve first,” she pressed.
“Fine. But I’m still going to kick your ass.”
I sat down on the weathered bench that looked out over the shore, its back pressed against the fence. My favorite spot in
the entire world.
She didn’t look at me, aiming her gaze at the rolling waves as she sat down next to me. “Do your parents live far?” I asked.
“Across the street.”
That caught her attention, her mouth open, brows furrowed. “Whoa, that’s . . .”
“Close?” I finished for her. “Yeah. I know.”
She didn’t miss a beat. “Do they have a leash on you or something?”
It had felt like that. A leash so tight it had started to strangle. But now, this was my house that I had earned from my career,
that I had poured blood and sweat into. I had built this, and it wasn’t a cage anymore, it was a home. A home in my most favorite
place in the world: despite how controlling they had been, I couldn’t imagine setting up a base anywhere else.
“What’s your family like?” I asked, trying to change the conversation.
A gentle smile grew across her lips. “We are a very big bunch. I’ve got three younger brothers, and lots of aunts and uncles and cousins.
I left early, because of tennis, but I miss home a lot.
My parents especially—we don’t talk every day, but I can tell they worry, but in a good way.
The way that they just love me, would prefer for me to be closer. ”
“Do you get home a lot?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Not as much as I’d like. I go back during the offseason, but most of the time I’m just living place to
place. Following the tour or going to a training camp. I’m flexible, I’ll go where my coach is.”
“Is your family still in Spain?”
“My parents are, but my brothers are like me, they like to travel. Ivan is in Brazil, Luis in China, and the youngest, Benny,
is in Canada, but he’s always on the move. It’s tough, you know? I miss them all the time. We don’t talk a lot, but when we
do, it’s at least an hour of my parents making sure I’ve been eating enough.” It was so easy to see the love she had for them
on her face; despite the flush of red from our run, she looked the calmest I’d seen her.
“That feels so strange to me,” I admitted, kicking at the sand beneath my trainers. “We’re close in distance, but with my
parents, the pressure can be a lot. I wish they were easier to get along with.”
She glanced at me, her expression unreadable. “How does it work? Having your brother as a coach?”
“That’s . . . different. He’s better than them. He understands me. Before him, I really struggled with the pressure.” I took
a deep breath, admitting more than I thought I would to her. “I was diagnosed with depression. I’ve lived with it for years
so it’s under control, but the pressure can be really stressful. Mom and Dad used to be so overbearing. But Calvin helps.
He’s like a firewall between us now,” I admitted, my voice quieter now. “Since I was a teenager. That kind of pressure . . .
You must know it too.”
Inés didn’t say anything at first; instead her hand found mine, squeezing once as if to acknowledge what I’d told her.
At first, my parents had dismissed me as a typical sixteen-year-old having hormonal tantrums. If a tantrum meant crying constantly in the changing rooms, paralyzed by the fear of failure, unable to cope with the pressure of walking out onto the court, then maybe they were right.
If it meant feeling shattered by the slightest judgement from an umpire, unraveling at even the faintest sense of injustice, all in front of a stadium full of people.
Lashing out at anyone, even my own team, because the self-doubt was too overwhelming to face.
Then yes, maybe it was a tantrum. But it felt like something much deeper.
“You want this,” they’d tell me. “Behave. Make it happen. Suck it up.”
They thought they were helping. That I was a normal girl with a normal brain and not an imbalance of chemicals dressed up
like a professional athlete. But when I really did need help with my depression, they were there, and then they were overprotective, trying desperately to undo the harm they had caused.
“I do.” Her gaze softened. “My family, we all share that drive to win in different ways. My brothers are very smart. My mum
was an English teacher, made sure we could all speak it perfectly. But her thing was the chess team. It was her passion.”
“I can relate. My mum has the same thing—she was a tennis player,” I said, not thinking twice about it.
Inés’s head tilted. “I didn’t know that.”
“She didn’t have a huge career. She doesn’t like to speak about it, but Dad told me some of the stories.”
“What kind?” she asked.
“Like, she used to have a lot of trouble with the other women. Like bullying in the locker room, having rumors spread about
her. When she married my dad she quit, and I think she was happier for it.” I’d never had friends in tennis circles, not with
my mom’s history with the sport—Dad wouldn’t allow it. And by the time I could make my own decisions, it was too late. I was
an outsider.
She hummed, saying, “My dad was a runner. Long-distance, mostly. He wasn’t professional, but he was serious.
Even after he stopped competing, he’d wake up at five every morning to run.
Rain, wind, snow, didn’t matter. He kept going.
I think, to him, winning wasn’t always about medals.
It was about pushing yourself past the breaking point and seeing what’s on the other side. ”
“That’s where you get it from, then? That ‘keep going no matter what’ thing?”
I could only think of her wrist after our doubles match, in that wrap. It had rested since then, but how long and often did
she play through pain to try to claim a victory?
She smirked, but there was no humor in it. “Maybe. But sometimes you’re better off knowing when to stop. My dad, eventually,
his knees gave out. He ran until he couldn’t stand the pain anymore.”
“That sounds . . .” I hesitated, not sure if I should push further.
“Messy? It was,” she admitted, brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “But I guess that’s life when everyone’s chasing
something, right? Sometimes, you lose track of what you’re running towards.”
“That sounds like my parents,” I said, the words slipping out before I could stop them. “They wanted it all for me. The trophies,
the glory, the sponsorships. And when I couldn’t keep up, they made me believe I had to push harder. Until I broke.”
Inés turned to me, her eyes searching mine. “And now?”
“I know I’m doing it for me, because it’s what I want. But the pressure is so hard.”
For once, she didn’t offer a smirk or a sharp retort. She nodded, her expression thoughtful. “I think we all feel it. Whether
it’s from a coach, our parents. Sometimes my worst enemy is myself.”
Inés leaned back against the bench, her posture relaxed, but her eyes were sharp, like she was taking in everything I’d said
and fitting it into some puzzle.
“It’s funny,” she said after a pause. “People think because you’re good at something, because you choose it, that it can’t
mess you up.”
I nodded, my throat tightening. “They don’t see the sacrifices, the breakdowns. They see the trophies and assume it was worth it.”
“Do you think it is?” she asked, her tone more curious than challenging. “Worth it, I mean?”
“Most days,” I said. “You?”
“I wonder what it would have been like to quit when I was first injured. What it would be like to not care so much.” She paused,
neither of us filling the space. I knew exactly what she was talking about. What would it have meant if I’d picked a different life, if Calvin had decided he wanted to go pro. Would I have followed?
“I guess that’s why we’re still here, though. The wondering. If we didn’t care, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. We’d be . . . I don’t know, normal.”
I laughed lightly at the idea. “What is normal anyway?”
“I think it’s not having a breakdown over losing?” she suggested, a glimmer returning to her eye.
“Unimaginable.”
Inés laughed, the sound ringing around me. “Well, if I have my way, you’re going to have to start getting used to it.”
“Not a chance.”