Twenty-Nine #3
You don’t have to say anything, I just wanted you to know that while there are always arseholes, most people think it’s pretty cool actually
Ah! Quick, TV if you’re near one!
I’d just made it back to the room, and leaving the door to swing closed, I snatched up the TV remote. The women’s match that had followed Miles’s was at five all in the first set, though play had been paused for a medical timeout. Not that the commentators were talking about injuries.
“—caused about a ten-minute delay to the start of the match,” one was saying. “Not that I think anyone was complaining.”
“Not in the least,” the other laughed. “If you’ve only just tuned in and missed what happened earlier, here’s a replay from the end of the Callahan-Benitez match.”
The coverage cut to Miles standing with the on-court interviewer, and an anticipatory shiver rippled through me.
Like I was there all over again, I caught my breath as he asked the man to enquire about his players box, and at the first sight of my own confused expression as the camera cut to me surrounded by his team – all of them hiding smiles.
To watch it unfold as a spectator was even more surreal than being there.
From here, I could see my own face, see the crowd’s reaction, see it all play out from his admissions to our kiss like it was a fairy tale happening to someone else.
But it was our fairy tale, and while Miles and I smiled at one another over the court wall, the match commentators said, “Well, folks, this is certainly not something we see every day.”
“Definitely making history,” the other replied. “And this crowd will forever be able to say they were here for it.”
“Absolutely, John. And to think, with the time difference, America will be waking up to this.”
They cut to footage of Miles sitting in the press room next, cameras flashing endlessly around him. Despite the buzz, he sat at his ease, faintly smiling as someone asked a barely audible question. My heart thudded sickeningly like I was right there with him.
“Why not?” he said in answer. “When you’ve got a big stage, use it for a big moment.”
“Surely, winning the tournament would have been the bigger stage,” someone said.
“Of course, but that would require being sure I was going to win it, right? And it doesn’t matter how well you feel you’re playing, there’s no sure in tennis.”
A quiet question that sounded like it had the words “first-round” in it followed.
“No, obviously not,” Miles said, and I could tell he’d started bouncing one knee beneath the table, containing nervous energy. “I didn’t want to distract Mat while he was still in the tournament. Look, the choice of timing really wasn’t that interesting.”
Taking the hint to move on, another reporter asked, “How do you think this will affect your tennis?”
“Being gay or having a boyfriend who’s also on tour?
” Miles looked oddly pleased by the question, despite it being one I’d always hated.
“Because me being gay isn’t new. You all finding out about it is new, but I was gay before I stepped onto the pro tour.
As for the other,” he went on with an amused smile.
“I think we can all agree that I’m playing better than ever and so is Mat, so you tell me.
I’d say we’re very good for each other.”
Of course he was good at this. Sitting there dripping his charm and answering their ridiculous questions like it was nothing, like he was damn well enjoying himself.
The coverage cut back to the women’s match then, with one of the commentators saying, “I doubt anything that happens for the rest of the tournament will top this.”
While I waited for Miles, I called my parents, called Katie, fielded dozens of messages and braved a scroll through social media.
While there were would be negative reactions if I looked for them, the outpouring of joy for us was undeniable.
People were sharing videos of their families screaming at the TV, clips of American morning news programs, even hasty sketches of us, and I sat on the couch alternately crying and laughing with disbelief, my heart full.
It overflowed when Miles arrived. He looked tired yet bright-eyed, everything about him soft and gorgeous with his hair dry and the sleeves of his hoodie pushed halfway up his forearms. He set his bags down inside the door and stayed there, smiling at me across the room. “Hey, you.”
“Hey,” I replied, smiling softly back. “You look exhausted.”
“It was a lot, but . . . in a good way. I like being able to talk about you. Really like it.”
I jerked my head at the TV. “I saw some of it.”
“Oh? I hope I did you proud.”
“Proud? More like enraged that you’re already better at being The Gay Player than me.”
His smile twitched. “Idiot.”
I crossed the floor and slid my arms up around his neck. “Yeah, but I’m your idiot,” I said, and kissed him, soft and deep and oh so sure.
THE SECOND WEEK of the slam was a bewildering whirlwind.
Miles still had to play, yet every moment he was off court, we were bombarded with requests for photoshoots and interviews, endlessly written about and tagged on our social profiles, and everywhere we went together people pointed and called out and snapped pictures.
With a few words and a kiss, Miles had changed everything.
When he stepped out to play his fourth-round match, it was clear the Australian crowd had adopted him as an honorary Aussie.
Australian flags waved amid the American and the cheer that met him was huge.
No longer having to hide, I sat in his box with his team, could cheer with my whole heart, and was there waiting the moment he stepped off court.
And the thrill of being able to kiss him where other people could see wasn’t going to wear off any time soon.
Neither, it seemed, was Miles’s winning streak.
The matches got harder, but he was walking out with the belief of a man who’d already won and no one could prove him wrong.
Fourth round. Quarter-final. Semi-final.
By the end of the second week, he’d completed a dream run to the final of the Australian Open and the realisation of what that meant finally caught up with him.
“I’m nervous as all hell,” he admitted as we lay in bed together the night before.
“It’s my first grand slam final, so no one is really expecting me to win, especially not given my head-to-head against Alejandro.
But at the same time, the whole coming out thing made this bigger than just tennis, at least for me.
I want this so bad. I want to complete the fairy tale.
Prove to everyone that you and I are better together and that I’m better off without my old team. All that.”
I could have told him that losing wouldn’t make any of those things less true.
That even making a grand slam final was an achievement most players would never realise.
That there would be other slams and other opportunities, especially if he kept playing like he was.
But he already knew all of that. So, I kissed his forehead and said, “I know. But you’ve got this. ”
He breathed out a laugh and nuzzled into the side of my neck. “Thank you.”
“That’s what we do, right?” I said. “Believe in each other.”
“Yeah, we do. And I’m glad you’ll be there.”
I wrapped my arms around him and breathed deeply of everything that was so entirely Miles Callahan. “Always, no matter what. Even after tomorrow, when you’re a fucking grand slam champion.”
Miles’s lips twitched. “I do like the sound of that very much.”