Game. Set. Match.

by Jennifer Iacopelli

  ***

  Awkward. That was the only way Penny could describe the heavy silence that hung over Dom’s office the next morning as they waited for their coach to arrive. There were only inches separating the two chairs in front of her coach’s desk and that meant she was sitting only inches away from Alex, after a text message from their coach had summoned them both there instead of where they should be, out on the training court.

  What the hell was taking Dom so long? It was seven o’clock in the morning. Nothing else was going on at OBX except breakfast, and so help her, if she was sitting in the most painfully awkward situation of her life while he was enjoying his morning coffee, coach or not, she was going to let him have it. Her fingers started tapping against the wooden arm of the chair.

  Granted, she’d still have to be near Alex, but at least they’d have something else to do, a distraction from how good it had felt to give in, to finally close the space between them. Penny had never been kissed like that, like she was the only thing holding him together, like he needed her.

  She glanced to her right and had to suppress a sigh. He looked like hell—dark, purple circles under his eyes, drawn expression, shoulders slumped. He was probably hungover.

  Suddenly, a warm hand landed on top of hers, ceasing the tapping. “Please stop,” Alex rasped. Her hand stiffened under his and she nodded. Their eyes met for the first time since she’d walked into the room to find him sitting there, slumped down in the chair, head hanging back, legs extended out in front of him, crossed at the ankles.

  “Ah, good, you’re both here,” Dom said, jogging up the last few steps into his office. They turned toward him together and Alex’s hand shot away from hers, but not before Dom saw it and raised his eyebrows. He pushed on, however. “Sorry about the wait,” he said, but didn’t offer an explanation. He stepped behind his desk and sat down, picking up a thick envelope and fiddling with the flap.

  “So,” he said, looking back and forth between them, “do you want the good news or the bad news?”

  “Bad,” Alex muttered.

  “Good,” Penny said right over him.

  Dom snorted and shook his head. “The draw is out for Paris.”

  Penny sat up straight, but Alex didn’t move.

  “Funnily enough, you’re ranked the same, twenty-five.”

  “Lovely,” Alex said through a grunt.

  “Damn it,” Penny said. She knew her ranking might drop after not playing in Rome, but she’d hoped to stay in the top twenty. “When would I get Lutrova?”

  “Third round,” Dom said, winking at her. “So the end of week one, just about.”

  “Gotta win two matches first, love,” Alex quipped, his posture unchanged.

  Penny rolled her eyes and then turned to Dom. “Wait, was that the good news or the bad news?”

  Dom grimaced, opening the envelope. “That was the good news.” He stood, pulling out two packets of paper and handing one to each of them. It was a print out of the Athlete Weekly website and there, front and center, was a collage of pictures from the past week and every single one was of her and Alex. The photo in the center was from their photo shoot, but it was surrounded by candid shots. The first was from the Classic Reception, Alex towering over her, a tumbler in his hand while she glared up at him. The next was of them arguing over a point on the practice court; another of them on that same court, lying down, hands entwined and the last from that same night, him leaning in, his mouth hovering just over hers, her fingers curled around the cotton of his T-shirt.

  “Now look,” Dom said, “what either of you does off the court is none of my business, but…”

  “You’re right,” Alex cut him off. “This is none of your damn business.”

  Dom raised his hands up in surrender. “Easy there, Al. I’m not the enemy here. I was on the phone with Hodges already this morning, but he claims he didn’t take these pictures. He says they were sent in anonymously and when his editor saw them, he was forced to run them.”

  “Dom, this isn’t what it looks like,” Penny said, scanning through the article quickly. From what she could tell, they were creating their own narrative, starting with Australia—she and Alex leaving the Nike party together, then the motorcycle accident with another woman, filling in the blanks with whatever garbage they thought would sell the most magazines and whatever Hodges observed while he was at OBX. Apparently, she and Alex Russell had a rocky on-again, off-again, relationship, which she didn’t want to commit to because he was bad for her public image, and with that, Penny stopped reading and crumpled up the papers. “None of this is true.”

  “I don’t know,” Alex said, finally sitting up, as he read through the article. “Some of it they nailed right on the head.”

  Penny turned, ready to blast him, but Dom said. “Look, like I said, this is none of my business, but what do you want me to say once the phone calls start pouring in?”

  “No comment,” they said together.

  Penny laughed, though there was absolutely no humor in it. At least that was one thing they could agree on.

  Chapter 12

  May 21st

  Jasmine rolled over and buried her face into her pillow. She wasn’t ready to face the day. Groaning, she pulled the covers over her head. It didn’t help; she could still hear it in her mind, like a song on infinite repeat for two days. The chair umpire’s voice amplified by the microphone as the crowd roared, “Game, set and match, Gaffney.”

  Sleep was impossible. She tossed and turned late into the night, body exhausted, but replaying the match over and over again. Then the expression on her father’s face when he saw her after the match would swim behind her eyes, part disappointment and part disbelief. She’d let him down and that hurt even more than the loss itself.

  “Jasmine!” Her mother’s voice carried up the stairs, followed by the pounding of footsteps. “Jasmine, wake up!” Her mom, bracelets jangling, burst through her door and grabbed her duvet cover, yanking it away.

  “Mom,” she grumbled. “Go away.”

  “You have to get up, mija. You gave yourself a day to wallow. You lost. It happens from time to time, but today you must go back to training. The OBX Classic is over and the French Open begins. Simple as cake.”

  “Pie. Simple as pie.” Even after nearly twenty years in the States, her mom tended to mix up her idioms.

  “Cake, pie, I love both. Now, get up.” She felt a soft tap against her backside and then her curtains and windows were thrown wide open, the morning air blowing in and sunlight blinding her.

  Jasmine rolled over, sitting up and her stomach lurched. She couldn’t go in to OBX and face everyone, not after that loss and not after what the Athlete Weekly article wrote about her.

  Dom probably went nuts on Hodges for focusing his article on Penny and Alex’s off-the-court relationship in what was supposed to be a serious sports publication, but it wasn’t the tabloid crap that worried Jasmine. It was a separate section entirely, one that focused on the results of the Classic.

  Mental toughness is a necessary quality in any champion. Both John and Lisa Randazzo had it in spades, along with far superior athleticism and instinct, but the same can’t be said for their daughter, who folded under the pressure in the tournament’s final after coasting through a relatively weak field…

  There, in black and white was an analysis of what happened during the final match that hit far too close to home. Athleticism, instinct, mental toughness, things necessary to succeed as a top athlete in any sport, qualities Harold Hodges, a tennis expert, didn’t think she possessed.

  That’s why the loss was eating away at her. She’d lost big matches before and they were always disappointing, but this one was different. It was a match she should’ve been able to win but didn’t. The competition at the OBX Classic was good, but at the end of the day, it was still a junior tournament and a great junior player didn’t necessarily become a great tour player. Indiana was very good, but she had a week of elite-level coaching u
nder her belt and managed to beat her. It shouldn’t have happened and yet, it did.

  “What if he’s right? What if I’m not good enough?”

  “Mija, he is one man.” Her mom sat down beside her on the bed and wrapped her arm around her shoulders. “He is one man who watched you play for one week. He is not God. He is not the final word.”

  “He’s one of the best tennis reporters in the world.” She slipped out from under the embrace and stood, crossing her arms over her chest.

  “It’s his opinion. He doesn’t know you and the article is such trash.”

  It didn’t make her feel any better, but she knew her mom wouldn’t stop, so she plastered a grin on her face and nodded.

  “Fine, you’re right. He’s one man and he doesn’t know me.”

  “Good, get dressed. I’ll make you breakfast before training.” Sometimes her mom saw what she wanted to see and not what was right in front of her.

  Jasmine eyed the crumpled printout of the article sitting on her nightstand next to her phone, which had finally stopped beeping at her after she ignored Teddy’s tenth message. Harold Hodges was one man, a man who didn’t know her game beyond what he saw last week. Her parents were great, but they couldn’t be objective. And Teddy, he was the last person she wanted to talk to about anything. There was only one person she knew who would be brutally honest.

  ***

  The atrium was empty when she arrived at OBX, aside from Roy, his nose buried in his paper as usual. Jasmine made a beeline for the stairs to Dom’s office, knowing he usually set aside mornings for paperwork. As she climbed the stairs, she had to move aside for Penny, who nodded at her quickly, and Alex Russell trailing just behind, his eyes boring into the back of Penny’s head.

  “Jasmine,” Dom said from behind his desk as she emerged from the stairs into his office, motioning to the chair before it, inviting her to take a seat, “what can I do for you?”

  She ignored him. “You know why I’m here.”

  Dom pinched at the bridge of his nose. “That damn article. I wish I never agreed to it.”

  She nodded, but Dom’s regrets were the least of her worries.

  “Was he right?” she asked.

  He leaned forward rubbing his face with both hands before looking at her again. “Jasmine, you’ve got to understand, Hodges wasn’t writing about how you performed in the tournament, at least not entirely. You did a great job against your competition, and that final match, well no one saw that coming.”

  “Then what was he writing about?”

  Dom opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again, pulling his lips into a thin line.

  Jasmine felt her knees shake and she let herself sink into a chair across from him. “You agree with him.”

  “No.” There was no hesitation and Jasmine felt a little better, but he still hadn’t given her a straight answer. “I think his analysis was shortsighted at best.”

  “Then what? Either I have what it takes or I don’t.”

  “It’s not that simple. The tennis world isn’t black and white. You’ve worked so hard all these years to try and measure up to your parents.” She opened her mouth to protest, but Dom kept talking. “Don’t deny it. I’ve known you since you were seven years old. I know you want to prove to the world that you’re every bit the tennis player the daughter of Lisa Vega and John Randazzo should be.”

  “But I’m not,” she finished for him. “Is that what you’re saying? That I’m not as good as my parents?”

  “I’m saying that not everyone is Top Ten material, Jasmine. Not everyone is going to win Grand Slams and Olympic medals.”

  “Not me, you mean.”

  “Not you, at least, not yet. You’re only eighteen years old. You have to give yourself some time. You can still have a very good career. You’ve got a great head for the game and you’re a hard worker.”

  His words didn’t have much meaning in that moment. The whole world expected greatness from her. Good, in the face of those expectations, just wasn’t good enough.

  “Thanks,” she said, leaping up from her seat and striding to the stairs.

  “Jasmine,” Dom called, but she didn’t turn back. She didn’t need Dom to see her cry. It would just be another thing to add to the list of her faults as a player: emotional basket case.

  She raced down the stairs and flew through the atrium toward the women’s locker room. There was a maintenance man standing at the end of the hallway, a small power drill pressed into the wall. The shrill whirring of the drill-bit securing Indy’s victory plaque into the Title Wall was worse than nails on a chalkboard, setting her teeth on edge. She swiped under her eyes, forcing the tears back. Stalking past him into the locker room, she changed into her training clothes and marched out to the practice courts. OBX was in full swing, practice courts packed with players and coaches.

  “Bene, Indiana, keep your feet moving. No hesitation. Bene,” Coach D’Amato said as Jasmine stepped onto the training court where Indiana Gaffney and the rest of the Junior Elite Girls were training on an agility course meant to increase stamina and improve footwork. Jasmine felt her stomach clench. The OBX champion was getting better, doing what she needed to do to win again.

  “Nice job, Indy,” Lara called from the line of girls at the baseline.

  Indy skidded to a halt as she finished her agility run, then turned and nodded, but didn’t say anything as she went to the back of the line.

  “Ah, Jasmine. Eccellente.” Coach D’Amato greeted her with a sharp nod. “I will be right back and then you girls will play a set.”

  Jasmine blinked in total confusion as her coach left. She was late, but D’Amato hadn’t said anything about Einsteins. Did they really think she was that much of a lost cause? No sense in making her run because it wouldn’t make her any better? She turned to Indy whose mouth twisted into a pout, but obviously, Indy couldn’t come up with anything to say, so she just shrugged. Later, Jasmine wouldn’t be able to explain what happened, but with that shrug of Indy’s shoulders, something inside of her just snapped.

  “You,” she barked, stomping out onto the court, getting right up in Indy’s face, looking her dead in the eye. “This is all your fucking fault. Everything was just fine before you showed up.”

  “What are you talking about?” Indy asked, taking a step back.

  “This was supposed to be my year. And then you came out of nowhere and stole it.”

  “That’s not…” Indy started.

  “Come on, Jasmine,” Lara said, standing just a few feet away.

  “Stay the hell out of this, you little hypocrite,” she snapped and then whirled to Indiana again, “And don’t pretend like you don’t know what I’m talking about. You waltzed in here like you owned the damn place. You’ve been here two seconds. I’ve been training my whole life, and in one week, you took it all from me.”

  People were wandering over to the court, the Junior Elite Boys group from the adjacent court, Jack Harrison who’d been working with them and dozens of others drawn by Jasmine’s raised voice, but the rage boiling through her veins couldn’t be cooled, not even by embarrassment. She had to get away before she did something really stupid, like burst into tears in front of everyone. She turned and started to run off the court, but her retreat was interrupted.

  “No,” Indy yelled at her back.

  “No?” Jasmine repeated, wheeling around so fast her ponytail whipped her in the face. “What the hell do you mean, no?”

  Indy stalked forward, coming straight at her, her hands clenched into fists. “No, you’re not going to dump all your shit on me. I beat you fair and square. It’s just that simple. I beat you. You want to blame someone? Take a look in the mirror. Maybe next time you won’t fold under the pressure.”

  Those were the exact words Hodges had used in the article and hearing them spill from the lips of her biggest rival was just too much for her.

  “You don’t know shit about me,” Jasmine screeched and launched herself for
ward. Her hand got there first, her open palm striking skin with all the force she could manage. Indy reeled, clutching her face, thrown off balance from the blow, but Jasmine wasn’t done. She was inches from tackling the bitch, ready to scratch her blue eyes out of her head, but her forward momentum stopped as an arm snaked around her waist and held her back.

  “Easy there, Jasmine,” Jack Harrison’s voice rumbled through his chest and into her back. She struggled against him for a moment, but his grip was like iron. He lifted her off the ground easily enough and carried her off the court. She thought about kicking him in the shins, but figured maiming him probably wasn’t a great idea. Finally, just outside the gate, he let her down. She pushed her way out of his arms and whirled around to run away, but was suddenly face to face with Coach D’Amato.

  Jasmine felt herself deflate, the reality of what just happened, what she’d just done sinking in. “Shit.”

  Chapter 13

  May 21st

  Indy slumped in the chair across from Dom’s desk and propped her elbow on the armrest. Her cheek was still stinging and she winced as she leaned against the ice pack in her hand. Just inches away, Jasmine sat rigid in her seat, staring out of the floor-to-ceiling windows in Dom’s office, looking over the OBX grounds and the beach in the distance. Her day had started off great—a really tough training session with Coach D’Amato, pushing herself through agility workouts that just a couple of weeks ago would’ve been impossible for her. Then Jasmine showed up.

  If Indy’s face didn’t hurt so damn much, she would chuck the ice pack at the other girl and finish off the fight Jack interrupted. She was bent over, clutching her face when she saw eldest Harrison emerge from the crowd that gathered around the court, spring over the fence and pull Jasmine away from her. She almost wished he hadn’t gotten there in time. Then her face would still hurt, but she would at least have gotten in a shot or two.

  Heavy footsteps on the stairs drew her attention and she lifted her head gingerly as Dom stomped into his office, glaring at them. Indy glared right back. Jasmine could spin the story however she wanted. Indy knew it wasn’t her fault.