Chapter 4 #2
Bounce. Bounce. Bounce. Bounce. Bounce. Leo sends another massive serve straight at Gabe’s body and he can barely react in time, merely bunting the ball back.
It flies high and lands short over the net—Leo is all over it, hitting a screaming forehand past Gabe before he can reach it, his first winner of the match.
He clenches a fist again in celebration.
“30–love,” the ump says over all the WOOOOOs coming from every direction.
Leo serves the ball out wide.
Gabe hits a forehand back across the court.
Leo sends a forehand right back.
Another.
Another.
Gabe hits his first drop shot.
Leo’s sneakers squeak as he slides up
to the ball and slices it hard the opposite way,
out of Gabe’s reach.
“40–love.”
“Let’s go,” Leo says, pumping his fist. The fans do the same.
Leo steadies his breath. Game point. Bounce. Bounce. Bounce. Bounce. Bounce. He serves and the ball lands just beyond the service box.
“FAULT,” the line-calling system shouts.
Leo wipes his wristband across his forehead. Okay. It’s time for a second serve. He looks at Gabe, who’s moved a couple steps in, ready to pounce. God, he does look obscenely hot.
Leo exhales and hits a gentler serve with some kick on it and it bounces high, but it’s not enough: Gabe pummels it past him for a winner. The handful of Peruvian flags around the stadium are waving in excitement.
“40–15.”
Leo looks over to his box and gives his dad a brief glare, as if to say, I told you so. He moves on, nodding to the ball boy, who tosses him another ball.
WHACK. It’s another ace—and it’s also the game.
“Game: Chambers,” the ump says over the screaming fans. “First game.”
He holds up a fist to his team and they all pump theirs back, except for Sheryl, who gives him an encouraging smile but also looks like she already wants to puke three minutes into the match. With the first game under his belt, he’s settling in, and he’s ready for Gabe.
“Gabriel Montoya to serve,” the ump says as Leo watches Gabe step up to the line and jog in place for a few moments.
Another wave of whistles and claps engulfs the stadium.
Leo bounces from one foot to the other as he watches Gabe hold up the ball, quieting the crowd.
A lone “Vamos!” echoes from behind Gabe.
Leo studies Gabe’s toss for a split second, trying to guess which way he’s going to serve—out wide or down the middle (the “T”)—and leans a little to the right.
He guesses correctly. The ball comes careening over the net, heading out wide, and Leo cracks the ball back to Gabe.
They get into a crosscourt rhythm, hitting it to each other over and over and over until Gabe mixes up the pace with a backhand slice.
Leo steadies himself and slices it back.
Gabe slices it back again. Leo doesn’t want to get into a slice battle with a guy who, he’s reluctant to admit, is a master of the shot, so he attempts to eject himself from the rally with a strong shot the opposite way. It lands a bit long.
“15–love,” the umps says, and the fans let out a victory cry for Gabe, the Peruvian flags shaking faster yet.
Leo silences Gabe’s supporters, though, when he smacks a return winner down the line off his next serve.
“15–all.”
The next rally is even longer than the first—twenty-eight shots, to be exact, sending both of them gliding along the baseline to meet each forehand and backhand—and this time, Leo is the victor when Gabe hits a forehand into the net.
“15–30.”
Leo feels pumped now as he puts some early pressure on Gabe.
He’s bouncing around with a real pep in his step and muttering, “Come on” to himself, keeping his thoughts positive and away from the fact that Gabe never looks better than when he lifts his shirt a little after a big point, airing out the heat and the tension, Leo’s favorite habit of his.
His least favorite habit of Gabe’s, however, shows up in the next point, when he pushes Leo farther and farther off the court with his forehand, and then unleashes a gentle drop shot that Leo has no hope of reaching in time.
“30–all.”
The next point is over before it even begins, Leo mishitting a rocket of a serve from Gabe and sending it flying.
“40–30.”
Leo’s step? A little less pep in it now. Then it’s completely snuffed out when Gabe curves his next serve down the T and, again, Leo has no hope of getting his racket on it.
“Game: Montoya,” the ump says. “One game all.”
Beads of sweat sliding down the bridge of nose already, Leo glances at Gabe and their eyes meet briefly, Gabe raising one of his thick eyebrows, daring Leo to bring his best. Two games in and Leo can already sense that this is going to be a tense first set.
He looks to his box for encouragement as the stadium rumbles louder than the subway.
“Point by point,” his dad says as he claps emphatically. “Let’s go.”
Quite literally digging his heels in, Leo refuses to blink first, to allow Gabe to break him—not just his spirit, but his serve.
If Leo loses a service game, if he gets broken, Gabe will move that much closer to winning the six games he needs to take the first set.
Leo will not let that happen tonight. It’s happened far too often in meetings past.
The games tick by in smooth succession. Neither player has stolen the momentum just yet—both of them in a tug-of-war to earn the upper hand, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, like the fans’ heads moving side to side as they watch the ball fly from end to end.
Leo holds, then Gabe holds. Leo holds, then Gabe holds. Leo holds, then Gabe holds.
The crowd is enthralled, putting their drinks down and their hands together every time Leo serves an ace or crushes a forehand winner or—their favorite and his—hits a smooth one-handed backhand winner down the line, arms stretched wide, his full wingspan on display.
Much to Leo’s chagrin, a chorus of oohhs and aahhs also fills Armstrong whenever Gabe lands a perfect drop shot that Leo can’t sprint to before its second bounce, or slices the ball so finely over the net that it dips viciously at the baseline, too low for Leo to spin it back over.
An hour passes by like this, Leo’s soaked-through shirt a testament to both the humidity and his effort, and the set reaches what feels like an inevitable conclusion.
“Six games all,” the ump announces. “Tiebreak.”
It’s the first to seven points, win by two.
It’s no surprise to Leo that the tiebreak is just as tight as the rest of the set. In a flash of powerful serves and forehand winners from both players, Leo finds himself down 5-6—a set point for Gabe.
He can feel every pair of eyes in the stadium watching him. Okay. He can do this.
He can do this.
He can do this.
He—his first serve lands long.
Okay, okay, okay. He shakes out his body.
But the nerves don’t go anywhere. He looks across the court at Gabe, who’s moving in and keeping his eyes locked on Leo, prepared to pummel another of his second serves.
Don’t get the yips. Don’t get the yips. Don’t lose to Gabe.
Don’t lose to Gabe. His internal monologue is still going.
The crowd is still roaring. They know this could be it for the first set.
“Please,” the ump says firmly into the mic. “Ladies and gentlemen, players are ready.”
They settle down.
Leo does not.
His toss isn’t as precise as it should be.
His arm comes down. The ball flies over the net and—
“FAULT,” the system shouts.
It misses the service box out wide.
Leo hears Gabe yell “Vamos!” as the crowd erupts and the ump calls it: “Game and first set: Montoya, 7–6.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. A double fault? Seriously? He grips his racket tighter and stares straight ahead as he makes his way back to his bench, more beads of sweat making their way down his face.
The noise from the crowd is too loud for Leo to hear any of the surely optimistic words wafting over from his box, so he grabs his things, tells the ump he’s taking a bathroom break, and heads off the court.
Despite his having lost the first set, some of his fans are hunched dangerously over the tunnel on his way out, dangling T-shirts and tennis balls in hopes he’ll stop and sign some during the break.
He has to stay focused, though, so he keeps his gaze fixed ahead and attempts to block out “Shake It Off” by Taylor Swift blasting in the stadium, mocking him.
In the bathroom, he changes into new, fresh match clothes and leans over the sink, using the five minutes he has to practice the 4-7-8 breathing exercise again and give himself a pep talk: Play without fear.
Pick your targets, Swing through the ball.
It’s not Gabe on the other side of the net.
It’s just some opponent. Don’t think about his face.
Don’t think about his butt. Pick your targets. Swing through the ball.
Leo would very much like to be beamed up into space right now, considering that his pep talk is having approximately zero effect on his level of play after that nail-biter of a first set.
Gabe continues to take hold of the momentum in this match, chipping drop shots like magic tricks, punching volleys at the net like a brick wall, and keeping that fucking smarmy look on his smarmy face that always burrows its way into Leo’s mind.
And after another thirty-five minutes, Gabe takes the second set 6–3, and Leo finds himself down two sets to love.
There is nothing to love about this. He’s now a set away from being knocked out in round one of his favorite Slam by his least favorite person.