Page 25 of Summer Skate

We go out to the patio. I shiver and rub my arms, and he takes off his sweatshirt, hands it to me. I struggle to roll the paper properly. He gets frustrated and does it himself. I take one hit and blow the smoke out of my mouth.

“Look at you. You didn’t even cough.”

I shrug. “I’m a game-time player.”

“Well, your pregame is atrocious. You don’t ever smoke?” he asks me.

“Not really. I used to, when I was your age, but now I just drink and microdose Xanax, like an adult.”

“Are you kidding?”

“I wish I were.”

“Why Xanax?”

I laugh, crossing my legs and leaning back into the cushy patio chair. “Because I’m prone to panic attacks, and when I have one, Xanax makes it stop.”

“I’ve never had a panic attack.”

“Eh, it’s not that big of a deal. You just feel like you can’t breathe and like you’re going to die for a few minutes, but then it passes.”

“That sounds like a big deal.”

“I started having them senior year of college, but more often when I was in my twenties. I’m not the most level-headed person you’ve met,” I say, laughing.

“I run on adrenaline and bad decisions. Like I have a list, in my head, of all the people who have said ‘no’ to me. I think about them almost every day.”

“I call it a revenge bin.”

“My list is long.”

“My revenge bin is full.”

I laugh. “You need a lot of mental fortitude to withstand heaps of rejection as a writer! Not to mention play a five-hour tennis match against a Russian girl twice your size whose father is ready to kill her if she loses. I’m sure you’ve needed it too.

Sometimes I use that power for good, and sometimes I use it to destroy myself. ”

“It has to have somewhere to go,” he says.

“A safe landing space.”

We start talking about our childhoods, adolescence, college.

“I was a theater major, you know,” he says.

“Were you? I gotta tell you . . . I can’t picture you doing theater.”

“I can act.”

I stare at him. “Prove it.”

“I will! I’ll do a fucking Shakespeare monologue for you.”

I make a sweeping motion with my hand. “I’m waiting.”

Before I know it, the sky is beginning to brighten, and we’re on our second round of our sixth Phish song and he’s doing Henry IV . When he’s done, I rub my eyes. I can barely keep them open.

“Okay, now I really need to sleep,” I say.

“You’re not moved ?”

“I’m moved, I’m moved, but I’m also very tired.”

And so we go upstairs, and I sleep in his arms, which is not normally something I like but this time doesn’t feel so bad.

I wake up to bright sunlight filtering through my shades.

I shift slightly, which wakes him up enough that we are both half asleep and kissing.

I go from asleep to craving sex in about ten seconds flat.

Soon, he is fingering me and then fucking me and even though I am wide awake, I keep my eyes closed.

“This is all your fault,” he says to me, once it’s over.

“How is this my fault?”

“You sent the text last night. You made the first move. You set off a chain of events the likes of which . . . ”

I start to laugh.

“I’m not going to be able to recover from this,” he says. “I can’t leave here. Where am I going? Seriously, where do I go from here?”

I ask: “Do you feel like playing tennis?” He raises his eyebrows at me.

Soon, he’s on the phone with the manager of the Meadow Club, a fancy country club in Southampton. He met him a few weeks ago. Apparently, he’s a big Rangers fan.

“All right, we’re in,” he says. “Get your whites on, sweetheart.”

In the car, he’s doing nothing but talking trash.

“I am going to smoke you,” he says.

“You’re not, but it’s cute that you think so.”

“I don’t want to just hit though. Let’s play a match. Best two out of three.”

“Fine by me.”

“I’m going to serve underhand the whole time.”

I laugh. “Why? Psychological warfare?”

“You’ll see. You’re dead.”

“I’m more concerned about your self-esteem than anything else.”

“My self-esteem? I’m a world-class athlete.”

“Oh my god, you’re deluded.”

“You don’t understand. My backhand is not a normal backhand.”

“Yeah, yeah. Your backhand is not a normal backhand . . . Your push is not a normal push . . . Spare me the details.”

We drive along Gin Lane, pass by the beachfront mansions hidden by hedges.

We pull into the Meadow Club, an expanse of forty pristine grass courts and a shingled clubhouse with a green-and-white striped awning.

He parks his fancy car in a long row of other fancy cars and it’s almost like we belong here. Almost.

We get out of the car. He trails behind me, reaches for my waist.

“You look so hot in that skirt,” he says.

I look at him. “This is going to be the easiest match of my life.”

The manager greets us at the door to the clubhouse. He shakes our hands and takes us to our court, the court farthest away from the others, the dungeon of the Meadow Club. We’re not members. Also, my sneakers have a thin red stripe on them. It’s against the rules.

“See what you did,” Carter says, shaking his head. “I wanted this match to be on full display.”

“Trust me. It’s for the best.”

During the warmup, we are very cordial. We hit without a lot of pace, straight down the middle of the court.

Nobody ventures a winner. Nobody makes a mistake.

We say “nice shot” and “good try.” We comment on the weather, the quality of the court, the view of the water.

It is all very civilized. He comes to net to hit a few volleys and I’m a little thrown off by how large he is. I’m used to playing women.

We take some practice serves. I admire his body as it bends and twists to hit the ball in the air. It really is quite nice. But it can’t beat me.

We begin the set. I’m a little nervous because I want to win, and I want to win big. He has a few good shots, but most of his balls are sailing long. I head out to a quick 3–0 lead, just by keeping the ball in the court. He gives me compliments on my shots.

“You’re better than I thought you’d be,” he says. “Based on your legs.”

“What’s wrong with my legs?”

“Nothing. Beautiful. But, you know, not super tough.”

I nearly lose the last game but take the set 6–0. He throws his racquet. I pump my fist, and then start to laugh. “Sorry. I’ll give you a game or two in the next set. I just really wanted that bagel. I wanted to send a message.”

He rolls his eyes. “Message received.”

The longer we play, the better I feel, the cleaner and more powerful my shots become.

It is hard for me to contain myself, hard to not run around a short lob to my backhand side and hammer it as a forehand winner across court.

So I do. Over and over again. His backhand may be good, but mine is not even necessary.

Once a game goes to deuce, I don’t exactly let him have it, but my play becomes a bit friendlier. I want him to get on the board. And he almost earns it. It’s 4–1.

He keeps trying to get me to come up to the net with excuses. He wants to tell me something. He wants a water break.

“This time I just wanted to touch you,” he says.

I look around and push him away. “I know. But it’s distracting, and it’s . . . ” He pulls me in, and I shimmy away from his grasp. “ . . . not going to work.”

But it does. I am being friendly again, playing like I did in the warm-up. I make a few errors.

“I thought you were some big tennis player,” he yells from the baseline. “What happened? You lost it?”

I walk up to the service line, and shrug dramatically. “The thing about tennis is . . . sometimes, when you play with somebody much worse than you are, it makes you worse.”

He laughs.

I hit the net a few times. I start to curse. It’s 4–4. I throw my racquet in disgust. I gather myself and the next two games are a bit of a battle, but I win it. He curses so loudly that they turn toward us four courts over.

“Tough break,” I say, shaking my head and smiling as I come to the net. “How’s your ego?”

“Bruised. Very badly bruised.”

“Well, I had a fantastic time,” I say, as we walk toward the clubhouse. We return the balls and thank the manager. He wishes Carter luck in the new season.

As we head to Carter’s car, we see a man who looks familiar to me, but I can’t quite place him.

He eyes Carter, and then I realize it. I feel a pain in my stomach.

It’s the man from Tutto. He is with a woman, presumably his wife, and they are dressed in white, crossing the parking lot, headed to their court. He stops walking when he sees Carter.

He smiles at him. “Carter Hughes. Good to see you again. I’m afraid we haven’t been properly introduced,” he says. He turns to his wife. “Honey, this is Jim’s new rookie on the Rangers.”

Carter shakes their hands, solemnly.

“How was the helicopter ride to Oyster Bay? Always a fun experience. Your first time. Beautiful home, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. It was.”

The man turns to me and introduces himself, then says: “I’m sorry, who’s this?”

I stick out my hand. “Jessica Riley.”

“Jessica Riley . . . That seems easy enough to remember.” He has a funny look on his face, a delight that’s visible in his eyes. He says: “How do you two know each other? Did you meet at the club?”

“This place?” I laugh a little, to diffuse the tension. “No. This is a tennis club. And Carter doesn’t play tennis. He just proved that to me.”

The wife is the only one who laughs. The man doesn’t flinch. I turn to Carter, but he doesn’t break the expression on his face.

“I’m a bit of a novice myself,” the wife says. She is wearing a white dress with a white cable-knit sweater draped around her shoulders. Her hair is held back by a large, white bow and she has diamond studs in her ears.

“Well, you look great,” I reply, holding up my hands. “And that’s half the battle out here.”

She asks: “Why don’t we all play doubles sometime?”

“Yeah. Yeah. We should,” I say, slowing backing away from them. I’d love to beat the brakes off both of you . “Well, we’re starving . . . Worked up quite an appetite chasing all those balls on the neighboring courts . . . Nice to meet you!”

Carter is silent as we get in the car.

“Well, I guess he survived,” I say, buckling my seatbelt. “I didn’t see any bandages.”

“Yeah.”

“I got a little worried when he asked about us.”

He doesn’t reply.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he says. But something is certainly wrong.

I say: “Maybe going out in public wasn’t such a great idea.”

He grunts. “You think?”

“It was your idea to come here! I wanted to break into one of the homes on our street, which was a much more practical idea.”

He is silent.

I say: “And when did you take a helicopter to Oyster Bay?”

“A few days ago. It was nothing.”

He starts the engine and pulls out of the spot fast, then hits the brake a little hard. We jerk forward and back. We drive by the courts and away from the club.

I can feel a sadness slowly creeping in, but I’m not ready for it yet. I look out the window at the blue sky, the manicured hedges, one sprawling mansion after another hiding behind them. I want to stay in fantasy land.

I ask: “So you want to get something to eat?”

“Yeah,” he says, and puts his hand on my knee. “Where do you want to go?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Tutto?” I say, and then I curl up in the seat laughing. I can’t stop.

He tries hard not to smile. “Fuck off.”