Tiebreaker

by P. Dangelico

He’s already declined twice. It’s not like I need him for emotional support. We don’t have that kind of relationship and that suits me just fine. Except going home means I have to come face-to-face with my past and my past is something I’d rather not deal with without a buffer, a bottle of vodka, and possibly a HAZMAT suit.

  I try to gather as much of my clothing as I can handle with only one useable hand and end up ripping most of them off the hangers in frustration. Designer clothes for interviews that still have the tags on; I never dress up unless threatened by Katya. Expensive jeans and shirts that I never wear because they’re uncomfortable. And then my actual clothes: threadbare jeans, shorts and more shorts, t-shirts in every color, and polos.

  As soon as I walk back into the bedroom, I stop short at the sight of Oliver’s ass comfortably planted in an armchair, legs sprawled apart, one foot up on an ottoman. For a fleeting moment, I consider setting the chair on fire.

  “I’ll pass,” he drawls, teaming it with a slanted mocking glance. The tennis ball he’s holding bounces from one big hand to the other. “Do you remember last time? Christ, that was awful.”

  Yeah, I remember.

  The food was terrible.

  The hotel was musty.

  The sheets cardboard.

  The mattress soft.

  What a disaster that was, one I’m not too keen on repeating. So maybe he’s right not to want to come. Dumping the clothes next to the suitcase, I return to the closet.

  “How long is this going to take?” he shouts.

  “I’m not getting the oil on my car changed.” I can’t keep the resentment that’s been building out of my voice. “My grandfather died. I don’t know…a week. Maybe more. There’s going to be a lot of family bullshit and the estate to sort out.”

  My voice peters out. I’m at a loss to understand why my grandfather would’ve made me the executor of his will over my father. It just doesn’t make any sense.

  When I glance up, Oliver’s leaning against the doorway with his arms crossed over his designer linen shirt. At thirty-nine, he has a better body than most twenty-five-year-olds. He trains harder than most of them too.

  “No, really, don’t trouble yourself. I only had surgery twelve hours ago.” My injured arm throbs like a bitch as I stand there with a load of clothes.

  “I can’t believe you’re asking for help. Did that hurt? Saying it out loud?”

  I roll my eyes and he smirks. With a lazy push off the doorframe, he comes over and takes them out of my arms, carries them back to my luggage and proceeds to haphazardly stuff them in.

  I swear next time I do laundry I’m going to “accidentally” stick one of his red shirts in with his whites. Unable to watch him mangle my clothes for another minute, I march back into the closet to gather my shoes.

  “Your mother doesn’t even like me,” he points out as if he needs to justify his decision.

  I pause from gathering my sneakers and poke my head out of the closet. “What? That’s crazy. Of course she likes you. Why would you say that?”

  “We both overheard her speaking on the phone, remember?”

  Oooo, I forgot about that. I drop the sneakers into the luggage. “She was going through menopause.” Kind’a…about six years ago. Not really. “She didn’t know what she was saying.” Oliver’s face projects all the skepticism in the world. I’m a terrible liar and he knows it. “Well, I like you. Shouldn’t that be enough?”

  He wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me in. His hands slide down, cup my ass. He grinds his erection against me. “Let’s take a trip when you get back.” I can feel the sly smile on the side of my throat. “As your trainer it’s my job to make certain you get the proper care. And I say you need some serious sexual healing.”

  Six years and that British accent still has the power to kick my legs out from under me. He slides his hand between my legs and I’m dangerously close to taking him up on his offer––God knows it’s been a while.

  Oliver treats sex like it’s an Olympic-level competitive sport and he’s looking to medal every time. The sex is great––when it happens, that is. Because unfortunately it comes around about as often as the actual Olympics.

  There are only so many times I can initiate and be told he has an early morning workout, is tired, or something to that effect without starting to believe that I’m the problem. That maybe he’s no longer attracted to me.

  “Maybe now would be a good time to get married,” he murmurs close to my ear.

  My body goes instantly cold. Every muscle I possess contracts and draws tight while my tongue lays useless inside my mouth as I sort out how to respond.

  History has shown that this has the potential to blow up into a monster argument and I really don’t have it in me right now. Events in the last forty-eight hours have taken a toll on my patience and I’m liable to say things I can’t unsay.

  Oliver releases me and drags a hand through his thick chestnut hair, a few threads of silver along his sideburns the only sign he’s nearing forty. “I guess that answers my question.”

  “We have a good thing here. It works…most of the time.” I flash him my trademark smile, forcing it to stay up by sheer muscle alone when he doesn’t smile back. “Why ruin it with marriage? Didn’t you say that to me once?”

  “I was young and stupid then.” In a frustrated gesture, he crosses his arms and pouts.

  When Oliver and I met, I still had a gaping hole where my heart used to be and he was in the prime of his life, young, handsome, and successful. We had everything in common––tennis, an insatiable drive to succeed, and most importantly no time for anything other than our careers. Neither of us had marriage in mind. Neither of us broached the subject for years. Now it’s all he talks about.

  I leave him to swipe the toiletries from the bathroom counter. Hugging as many as I can against my body, I carry them back to the bag and drop them in. Oliver reaches over and roughly zips it up.

  “How does Spain sound?” I throw out in an effort to steer this conversation away from the danger zone. Being relentlessly stubborn is a great quality in a trainer, not so much in a boyfriend. His pouty frown persists. I drape my good arm around his neck and pull him in for a quick kiss.

  “Bali,” he counters without losing any of his stiffness.

  Sometime later, he helps me into the SUV waiting to take me to Kennedy Airport. “I’ll arrange for a car to pick you up at Will Rogers.”

  “No, don’t. I can get a rental,” I tell him. “Don’t forget any of my gear.”

  “I’ll take care of it.”

  A quick peck on the lips is all I get as a goodbye. No, “I’ll miss you.” No, “I love you.” There are no false promises, or empty endearments between us. We’re both realists and the reality of our relationship is that it works as it is. Not every relationship is meant to inspire tragic love songs, or poetry. I learned the hard way that those burn hot and fast and leave a wake of destruction in the end.

  You want poetry? In tennis, Love means zero. I call that poetic.

  Oliver shuts the door and steps back, stuffing his hands in the front pocket of his jeans. As the SUV pulls into traffic, my composure cracks. Tears well in my eyes as I stare out the window. Oliver and the rest of the bodies tightly packed together on the sidewalks of Manhattan become a smear of color. My chin trembles, and my jaw aches from the fight to hold back the feelings rushing to the surface.

  It’s not a surprise. He’s been sick for a long time. But it doesn’t make it any less devastating. Rowdy’s gone, taking with him a chunk of my heart…the little I had left.

  Chapter Two

  Maren

  As soon as I step out of Will Rogers Airport, the heat slaps me in the face. It’s sharper, a little bit drier than it was in New York. Cruel in its own way. A man in a dark suit calls out, “Miss Murphy?” Oliver has never been good at listening. The driver takes my bags and opens the door to his SUV. A minute later, I’m on my way home.

  I don’t go home. No
t often. And when I say not often I mean I’ve been home only a handful of times since I transferred from the University of Oklahoma to UCLA ten years ago. I don’t go home with good reason. Because home is where the heartbreak is.

  I could come up with a dumpster full of legitimate excuses. I could say that I was busy training. That I lived an ocean away, in the UK. That I was building a career. And all those things are true, but it’s not the entire truth.

  The truth starts at the beginning and the beginning starts with a boy named Noah Callahan, a boy who lived in the house across the street from my grandfather, Rowdy Ronald Murphy.

  My grandfather was something of a legend to everyone who follows the PBR, the professional bull riding circuit. Before retiring in his late thirties, Rowdy won every bull riding championship there was to win, and broke just about every bone twice doing it, only to recover and win again. The old coot used to say it strengthened the bones. Many people would argue that Rowdy was certifiable but no one would dispute that he was a bull riding phenom.

  Being a natural born risk-taker, all rough and tumble, it’s no surprise that he assumed his children would follow in his footsteps. But life has a shit sense of humor––Rowdy’s words, not mine. And despite his best efforts, what he got was one son, my father.

  Jonathan Murphy, quiet scholar, collector of stamps, and Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Oklahoma, can best be described as the polar opposite of rough and tumble. The only time my father breaks a sweat is when he prunes my mother’s rose bushes, or the Dallas Cowboys make the playoffs. That’s about it though.

  Seeing his only son was a lost cause but not one to take matters lying down, Rowdy set his sights on his last great hope, me and my younger sister, Annabelle.

  He tried horses. Bebe was allergic and I was terrified. He tried golf. Neither of us had the temperament for it. We got fined at the local golf course for tearing up the place. That was before the screaming and brawling managed to get us permanently banned. Nobody was surprised. Rowdy was proud.

  All hope seemed lost until, on a whim, Rowdy purchased two tennis rackets and took us to the courts behind the high school. That was all she wrote.

  Bebe was a natural, a tennis playing Mozart, the second coming of Billy Jean, Chris, and Steffi all rolled up into one aggressively competitive blonde package. I had to work a little harder at it, which turned out to be a blessing in the long run.

  The summer after I turned ten my grandfather installed a tennis court in his backyard. As soon as my sister and I had finished our chores, we hopped on our banana seat bicycles and went to get a look at the newly built court. In my defense I had asked for a dirt bike and my mother refused.

  As we rode up, I noticed a boy in the front yard of the red brick house across the street, a boy I had never seen before. He was busy doing yard work and didn’t notice us. I’d learn later that the family had recently moved from a few streets over. Which is why I’d never seen him before. Otherwise I would have––trust me.

  While Annabelle raced to Grandpa’s backyard to check out the tennis court, I stood in the driveway and in a trance watched him, committing every detail to memory. The hair that was as black as tar. The blond freckles that covered the bridge of his nose, which was peeling from sunburn. Sweat dripped down his face and neck. His faded Dallas Cowboys t-shirt was soaked straight through. I don’t think I blinked once.

  He was bent over, down on his knees, trying to pull weeds. Trying being the operative word because the gloves he wore were way too big for him. The weeds kept slipping through his fingers. Until, finally, he yanked them off, threw them across the lawn, and started pulling with his bare hands.

  There was no thunderbolt. No parting of the heavens. Only a quiet knowing. Clearly as day I remember thinking, there you are. As if I’d been searching for him all my ridiculously short life. Noah Callahan became mine the moment I laid eyes on him and nothing would’ve convinced my ten-year-old self otherwise.

  I didn’t question it any more than I would’ve questioned that my parents were Jonathan and Maryanne Murphy, that my name was Maren Murphy, and that I loved tennis. I didn’t question why I loved tennis, I just did. And it was the same of the boy standing before me.

  Sensing me, he stood straight and glared. He was built like a scarecrow, tall and painfully thin. His knees were stained green below his silky blue basketball shorts and his t-shirt stuck to his bony torso, and still he was the best thing I’d ever seen.

  “What are you lookin’ at?” he barked. His anger made me smile, which judging by the expression he returned, only confused him.

  “You,” I answered with pride of ownership in my ten-year-old voice.

  One side of his lips pushed up in a bare minimum of a smile. It was small and reluctant, hardly noticeable. But I noticed. I noticed everything about him. And that right there was the beginning of the end…the moment I fell in love with Noah Callahan. Little did I know that ten years later that so-called love would flame out, crash and burn in spectacular fashion.

  Cue the part of the story where the jilted heroine stages a monster comeback, complete with soundtrack featuring Pink, Fergie, Beyoncé…and a little pre-bad girl Taylor Swift if I’m being completely honest.

  It took time and hard work. A lot of both. But I did it. All that history we shared, every memory I had of him which was sitting like a precious jewel front and center in my mind was shoved onto a back shelf and forgotten.

  I grew up. I moved on. I realized that whatever my ten-year-old self thought was love was nothing but a figment of an overactive imagination, and possibly a touch of heatstroke.

  However true all that is, there’s still too much water under the bridge for me to pretend Noah is a stranger. I know my limits. I know my serve needs work. I know my backhand kicks ass. And I know I’m not capable of pretending Noah wasn’t once the source of all my joy––and later, in the words of The Police, the king of pain.

  Do I wish I could’ve gotten some closure, some understanding of what happened that night so many years ago? Of course, I do. We never spoke again so, yeah, I wish I could’ve gotten some answers.

  However, I’ve accepted that I probably never will and that’s okay too. Sort of. I mean, that’s life. It doesn’t ask for permission to screw you, and it offers no excuses or apologies afterward.

  * * *

  “So I’m not the executor of the will?” I ask my grandfather’s lawyer, one Timothy Walters, a crusty-looking man in his late seventies. Bald on top, tuffs of gray hair on the sides, handlebar mustache. The whole nine yards. If you do a Google search of country lawyer, this dude’s picture would appear next to the definition.

  The car service, the one that picked me up at the airport, the one I asked Oliver not to arrange, drove me straight here. I didn’t even bother changing out of my jeans and latte-stained polo shirt.

  The plan is to get in and get out as quickly as possible. Less risk of running into the asshole who nearly ended me. And the quicker I get this over with, the quicker I can return to my life.

  “No. What makes you ask?” Walters’ face puckers in confusion.

  “Never mind.” Meanwhile, I make a mental note to murder my sister before leaving town. Something about this news makes me uneasy. As if it’s a harbinger of more unpleasant news to come.

  Walters looks down at the open file resting on his desk and leafs through some papers while I absently glance around.

  The office is small. One wall covered by a bookcase crammed with what appear to be dusty, fake leather books. The other by musty tartan drapes covering a bay window. The only item purchased in this century seems to be the ergonomic desk chair Walters is sitting in. I feel an asthma attack coming on and I’m not even asthmatic.

  “Your grandfather did not want a funeral.”

  I nod absently. My father called to make sure I didn’t rush back, seeing that there wouldn’t be one. I was relieved to say the least. There would’ve been less than zero chance of avoiding Noa
h at a funeral and plenty of witnesses to the entire spectacle. And Lord knows there’s nothing this town loves more than a spectacle.

  “He left very specific instructions on how he wanted to be remembered. A bronze statue of his last win on Goliath has been commissioned. It’s to be placed in Memorial Park. The mayor has made arrangements to have an unveiling ceremony later this month.”

  My attention returns to him at the mention of the unveiling. It crosses my mind that I won’t be here and ignore the pang of guilt that follows. My life’s in London. My training doesn’t stop because I’m injured. I’ve got stuff to do. Kind of. I mean, I could find stuff to do.

  Walters meets my thoughtful frown and pushes his round spectacles up his nose with one finger to the bridge. Then he eyeballs the clock on the wall.

  “Mr. Callahan is late. Might as well get on with it.”

  Come again.

  It’s like my brain short-circuits. I blink. I blink some more. I spend an inordinate amount of time imitating a lump of Play Doh.

  “Excuse me?” is the best I can do when it sputters back on. After the blow it just sustained, this could very well qualify as a modern-age miracle. Unfortunately with the brain activity comes the pounding of my heart.

  “I said we may as well get on with it.”

  “He’s coming here? Like…now?”

  “Yes,” is Walters’ simple reply, oblivious to the flaming turd he just threw at me.

  “Why would he come here?”

  Walters’ face adopts a confused frown. “You are aware he was your grandfather’s business partner?”

  And therein lies the problem. Sometime in my extended absence, the one person I’m trying to avoid has become my grandfather’s business partner. How? Why? No freaking clue.

  I didn’t understand it at the time and I still don’t. Of all the people my grandfather could’ve chosen as a business partner why it would have to be Noah is beyond me. Quite frankly, it felt like a betrayal at the time, but I pushed it aside. Out of sight, out of mind I guess.