Chapter 10
Back in my hotel room, I make a mistake. I could have let a good night be a good night, but I had to take it one step further. I had to do what I do best. I had to make it weird.
Diego and I are being shipped.
Now, I could have just smiled to myself about this. I could have just sent the video to Char and asked, how does this fan account have access to confidential footage in my brain. But no, for a reason that should be studied in a lab, I also send this video right to Diego.
And then I make it worse.
my hero is the message I make the very conscious choice to send as well, just before rolling over and going to sleep and not giving it a second thought.
But the next morning I wake up with a sinking feeling that was a bad idea. That it might have been a little intense. That sharing that creepy video with a straight guy who seems to be pretty careful about his public image could freak him out, could drive him away in a go-kart with no brakes.
I open up our messages and find the video of my hero sitting there, too late to unsend, preserved in permanent pixels. And underneath it, nothing, no reply, only—
A read receipt.
Fuck. I wipe the sleep out of my eyes as I stare at what I’m almost certain is a snub.
But…maybe it’s not?
Maybe he saw it, read it, and was too busy to write back.
Or maybe he didn’t think it was funny and went on with his morning, but it’s all gonna be fine.
These are the best-case scenarios I construct as I go about my Sunday, the day before my first match at the US Open, when I should be focused on, you know, winning it and giving it all the attention I have.
But during my morning stretch session, and breakfast with Robbie, and when I arrive to site with my head on a swivel, looking for Diego down every hallway, I cannot shake the thought that I just supremely fucked this friendship up.
I’m growing this teeny-tiny read receipt into a mountain, and it’s casting a shadow across my entire day. My brain is a magical place.
Robbie and I have to walk a bit to get to today’s practice.
There are a few courts tucked away in a neighboring park, just outside the main grounds.
I’m not positive, but Robbie could have made a special request to practice here.
The crowds don’t really make it this far, which means there are fewer distractions.
And lucky for me, it also means there’s zero chance of running into Diego, so I can give my scavenger hunt a rest. He’s always scheduled somewhere where people can see him.
My hitting partner is waiting at the court and greets us with a “happy to be here” smile and wave. He’s the same one from yesterday, the number one junior in New York, or so he keeps telling me. And his name is also Austin, or so he keeps telling me.
Maybe he was too nervous to ask me for a photo yesterday, but he finds the confidence to do it today.
“No, no, let’s do a selfie,” I tell him before he hands Robbie his phone.
Robbie’s talents abruptly end at anything camera related, and he insists on taking all pictures horizontally, like a “normal picture.”
“What should my caption be, do ya think?” Other Austin asks, swiping through the photos we’ve just taken.
Dude, you don’t want my advice on social media right now. How about my hero?
He rattles off some options. “Two Austins. No—serving two Austins. How many Austins does it take to hit a forehand? Or maybe just twins, and we’ll see if people get it. Wait. What’s the kind of twins that don’t look like each other?”
“Fraternal,” Robbie mutters, cracking open a can of balls. “Let’s get started. We only have ninety minutes.”
“Austin, will you repost when I post? You don’t have to, but will you?”
“Sure, Austin,” I reply.
“You have, like, fifty thousand followers now. When I checked the other day, it was five. How can I grow my account like you?”
“Just…be gay, I guess.”
Austin thinks about that. “Crap,” he says to himself.
Robbie points to a clock mounted on the fence. It’s already six minutes past the hour. “Yes, okay, got it,” I say, and pull my phone out of my pocket one last time to check for any sign of life from Diego.
Wasteland. Tumbleweeds. Nothing.
“Austin!” Robbie shouts. I quickly type out a message. I can’t help it. Desperation courses through my dumb thumbs.
hey head sock hows ur day going
There. The video was easy to ignore, but if he ignores an actual question—yes, a boring one—I’ll know that something is up.
I grab a racket from my bag and decide that I will not check for a reply until practice is over. Ninety minutes of pure uninterruption. Well, eighty-four minutes. I’m strong enough for that. I think. I hope. Please.
After a few rallies, it’s clear that Other Austin is really upping his game.
He’s competing in the US Open boys’ singles tournament next week, and he needs this new energy to stand a chance there.
He forces a tiebreak during our practice set, and Robbie barks something from the side of the court about me being impatient.
“Good aggression, but wait for those winners,” he adds. “You’re too eager. You’re too eager.”
Well, now I’m eager and annoyed, because this advice is accurate on too many levels.
But he’s probably right, and I give his advice a shot, pulling back a bit, just keeping the ball in the court and waiting for Other Austin to make errors—which he does.
He’s just a baby trying to kick it with the pros, after all.
“Who put that net there?” he shouts with a grin when his serve doesn’t make it over, and “Biscuits!” when I win the tiebreak 7–2.
Not the language I was expecting from a kid who grew up on the mean streets of New York. He must be protected at all costs.
—
Back in Manhattan, I attempt to squeeze myself and my giant racket bag through the dining room of a tiny Italian restaurant.
It’s Robbie’s favorite, and he finally got his wish tonight.
He’s ahead of me, catching up with the owner, when I take a sharp turn around a table and the edge of my bag snags a wineglass.
I wince as it shatters across the stone floor.
The half of the room that wasn’t already watching us shimmy across the chessboard of chairs looks up from their pizza.
“Sorry, folks. Dinner’s on me,” I say without skipping a beat.
“Austin!” Robbie hisses.
“Sorry. Just kidding,” I add, and hurry up to Robbie.
“Why do you say shit like that?”
“I am sorry,” I say to the owner, and to the wineglass table.
Robbie shakes his head as we descend a set of stairs into an enclosed garden and take our seats. Squinting, he reaches for his phone to turn his flashlight on.
“Oh, and you think I’m the embarrassing one?”
“Shh,” he says. “You will not ruin my lasagna Bolognese.”
A whole Margherita pizza later, I grab my phone from the table. It’s already eight p.m., and there’s still nothing from Diego—not even a read receipt on my last message.
We’d made plans to hang out tonight. I didn’t fucking imagine that, right? Why has he been silent the whole day?
“Do you know how many times you’ve looked at your phone?” Robbie asks.
“Oh my god, did you talk to Helen about this?”
“What? No.”
“You can’t talk to her about what we talk about. She said it’s illegal. I could arrest you.”
“You could arrest me?”
“I have handcuffs. I’m very kinky.”
He shakes his head, completely at a loss for words. It was just a joke. I don’t have handcuffs. And I’m not kinky. And I think I may be losing it from exhaustion and waiting for a guy to message me.
“I would very much like to know how your session went, but no, I did not talk to Helen about it. We will not talk about it. That’s how this goes.” He pauses. “And the answer is twenty-two times. You’ve checked it twenty-two times since we sat down.”
“That’s a lotta counting, Rob.”
“And each time you pick it up, you do your blinking thing.”
Okay, that part I wasn’t clocking. “I felt fine this weekend. I’m not just saying that.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I’d like to keep you feeling that way,” he says, and wipes his mouth with his napkin. “So, Helen brought up your phone usage?”
After a moment, I answer honestly for some reason. “She thinks it might be a trigger.”
“What do you think?”
“I think I’m handling it fine.”
He considers this as we sit in silence. I check my phone again even though it hasn’t lit up, perfectly fine with Robbie’s counter ticking up to twenty-three.
Fuck it. I just need an answer so this can be over. I start typing.
yo still on for the rematch tonight?
My thumb hovers over the Send button. And I fire off the message.
Setting my phone on the table—face down—I shoot Robbie a smirk. Look at me, taking a screen time break. He shakes his head.
I creak back in my chair as my stomach starts to turn. Could be the tiramisu. Could be the fact that this third and final message might also go unanswered. I’m really digging a ditch.
Robbie raises his hand, waiting for the check. And I wait for a response that never arrives.
—
He left me on read. I’m standing alone in my hotel room, staring at a read receipt—again—which means he opened my message and thought, Oh yeah, Austin. I had plans with him. Oh well, and he went about his night.
I did not pursue this friendship. This dude hopped the net for me, he Romeo-d up to my room, and he dragged me all the way to Jersey.
God, the fire raging in my eyes could burn a hole through the plastic of his Nintendo Switch.
It’s still sitting where he left it, like my hotel room is some kind of lost and fucking found.
I need to erase him from my brain, because this is getting embarrassing. I have the biggest match of my life tomorrow, and I’m spiraling about a guy.
But is it that hard to just fucking reply?
I scream at the wall and the stupid painting of a pigeon hanging on it. It’s very dramatic, but I need to get it out of me. Throwing in one more shout, I grab the bucket I’ve been using to fill the tub with ice, and then I stomp down the hallway.
The ice machine makes a deranged churning sound, spitting out ice as slowly as it possibly can, and I’m on my phone again to kill the time. As promised, I reposted Other Austin’s selfie of us, and I go to his account to check how it’s doing.
Mistake. Mistake, mistake.
He finally settled on a caption. T-winning, it says. Short, sweet, vaguely endearing. But the comment section is really running with this one. Looks like my repost of the photo has led my homophobic haters to a brand-new target.
Gay twins
Another one??
Are they dating
Cool so everyone is gay and named Austin now?
“Oh my god.” I lean against the coldness of the ice dispenser as my head starts to pound. This is too much. It’s too fucking much.
Back in my room, I dump the bucket’s contents into the tub and stare down at the freezing water that I force myself into almost every day.
I hate ice baths, but I have to be one hundred percent tomorrow, and they’re the fastest way to recover.
I chuck my sweats into a pile in the corner of the bathroom and strip off my socks and boxer briefs.
And yes, I check my thread with Diego one last time, because I cannot be stopped, cannot be saved.
And I find—nothing. It’s ten p.m. No reply. Pack it up everyone. It’s over.
When I step into the bath, the water is a thousand needles on my feet and calves. I power through the pain, and in one quick movement I slide my body in, all the way up to my chin.
Sharp inhales and exhales through chattering teeth give way to longer ones, and soon I’m thinking about nothing but my breath. The ice forces this. It forces everything out of my mind except one thing: survival.
Breathe.
Just an endless road of cold—
Breeeathe.
For ten minutes straight—the longest stretch of my day—
Breeeeeeathe.
I do not think about tennis. I do not think about me. I do not think about him.