Love Game - Season 2012 (13 page)

Sasha was standing inches away from her,
stiff and silent. It would be so easy. So easy. Yes or no? Heads or tails?
Flipping an imaginary coin Gabriella looked into Sasha’s eyes – and didn’t wait
for the metal to fall. This was meant to be. An easy reward for a hard day. She
closed her eyes and softly kissed the Czech on the lips.

***

“Hot,” Elise declared.

“You are tickling me,” Amanda mumbled, but
the German wasn’t listening. Elise let the sensation spread over her tongue,
then she lowered her head again.

“Very hot,” Elise exclaimed.

“Stop it!” The Australian wriggled under
Elise. “What are you doing anyway?”

“Hold still!” Elise ordered. “You will
spill all the spices.”

After a hard hit in the Dubai sun, Amanda
and Elise had taken the afternoon off and paid a visit to the Old Souk. In the
long narrow alleys, they had raided the small stores, haggled with the shop
owners and in the end brought home an impressive array of herbs and spices. Now
Amanda occupied the bed, lying on her belly and reading her e-mails on her
laptop, while Elise had the glorious idea of pushing up Amanda’s shirt and
spreading the various spices over Amanda’s lower back. Leaning over the
Australian, she dipped her tongue into the powders to test their hotness.

“Too hot,” Elise yelled, jumping up like a
scalded cat. She rushed to the bathroom and stuck her tongue under the tap.
“Don moo,” she uttered with her tongue hanging out.

“Have you had enough now? Can I turn
around?” Amanda shouted gleefully from the room.

“No,” Elise yelled back. “You ha go wai. I
sill need do gasde he frui powers.”

After ten minutes, when her tongue had
stopped feeling like it had been roasted, Elise emerged from the bathroom and
sank onto the bed again where Amanda was still waiting with colorful lines of
mango, banana and coconut powders running over her spine.

Amanda turned her head to Elise and
chuckled.

“Sweating?” she grinned. “By the way,
Natsumi’s rehab is going well,” she reported, pointing to the e-mail she was
reading.

“Great,” Elise smiled. “When will she be
back on the tour?”

“Clay season,” Amanda answered without
enthusiasm. “Not earlier.”

They both knew what that meant. They had to
transport the wooden
mara
from the Emirates to the United States, from
the American west coast to the east coast and from there to Stuttgart. The clay
tournament in the German city was their first stop of the European tournament
season.

Elise sighed. “Why can’t we send her the
stupid thing?”

Amanda shrugged. “She prohibited it
explicitly. We have to carry it around with us.”

“I wonder if it’s very valuable,” Elise
mumbled while she tasted the banana powder. “I searched on the internet last
night. It’s possibly from the Edo period which spans over 250 years. So it
could be really, really old or not so old.”

Amanda had to smile at her girlfriend’s
amateurish approach to historical research. But she continued to listen on
while Elise sucked up the remaining spices from her back.

“Have you seen the little hole in the
bottom? It's probably for a screw,” Elise explained. She turned away from
Amanda’s back and pulled out the wooden box from one of her bags and opened it.
Little hole? Screw? Amanda finally turned around.

“What's going on with you tonight? Is it
all the hot spices you ate? Are you randy?”

“Who's Randy?” Elise asked, absentmindedly.
An idea had taken hold of her and she reached out and grabbed the bags with the
spicy treasures.

“It means - ,” Amanda started explaining to
her German girlfriend the depth of the English language, but then stopped.
“Nevermind.”

Elise had turned back to the Japanese box
and begun arranging the little plastic bags of spices around the phallus. After
stuffing the last bag into the box she proudly presented the spicy hiding place
to Amanda.

“Now, isn't that smart?” she exclaimed.
“The box now looks as if it was made for the spices.”

***

Her mind was wandering back and forth. She
wasn’t concentrating at all. And yet all of her balls seemed to find the lines
in miraculous fashion. Even the few visitors who were strolling between the
practice courts in the morning sun seemed to stay and watch longer than usual.
The effortlessness and ease of her stroke-making surprised Sasha herself.

“As long as you can reproduce this in
tomorrow’s match everything is fine,” Sasha’s coach said, giving her a pat on
the back. Sasha just nodded. Tennis was not on her mind today.

Back in her hotel room, she opted for a
short afternoon nap before she had to get ready for the players’ party. She
snuggled into bed, and for a short moment Sasha was disappointed not to smell
the scent of last night’s sensations on the pillows. While she had been at the
tournament site, the maids had changed the linen. But then again, she didn’t
need a reminder.

As soon as she relaxed under the blanket
all the memories came flooding back. The kiss in the elevator that seemed to
never end until finally the hotel technicians were able to unlock the breaks
and the elevator doors opened on the next floor. The silent walk through the
hotel corridor. Her own alertness of the woman walking next to her and the
amazement that she was still there. Lulu helping her to unload the luggage
trolley. Lulu’s body under the sheets. The warmth of her skin on hers. Lulu’s
confident moves.

The scenes were floating through Sasha’s
body, layer upon layer, slowly weaving a cover of comfort. So Sasha had been
right about the Galloway twin. Lulu wanted her just like Sasha wanted Luella.
The moment in the locker room at Roland Garros, the kiss in Cincinnati and the
painful encounter in Istanbul revealed Lulu’s feelings and her struggle to come
to terms with them. To this, Sasha could relate. When she was younger she
herself had tried to resist her emotions. What happened last night was
promising, to say the least, even though Lulu didn’t seem completely
comfortable with the situation yet.

“Don’t approach me and don’t call me,” Lulu
had said standing in the doorway, looking back at Sasha in bed. “I’ll call
you.”

Sasha had smiled at her. She was fine with
a tentative start. Also – she sighed, thinking about it – she needed to be
extra cautious now that everybody believed she was a soon-to-be wife.

The phone rang and Sasha sat up
immediately. Perhaps Lulu was already missing her. Perhaps she wanted to see
her again before they had to kill time at the players’ party pretending they
didn’t like each other.

“Hello?” she said. But the joy of
anticipation vanished immediately as the receptionist told her that the local
fashion designer was waiting with dresses for the players to wear at the party.

Walking into the lobby, she spotted Luella
right away. For a second the Galloway twin was looking at her, but she didn’t
smile or wink at her. No sign that there was anything between them but a fierce
rivalry. Sasha sat down on a lounge chair and observed Lulu from the corner of
her eye. The Galloway was joking around with Marieke and Ivana then walked over
to someone standing at the reception desk making arrangements. Rafael. Sasha
frowned. She had completely forgotten about the fitness trainer who traveled
with Luella and was well-known to be her boyfriend. Was he really? Or was he
just a friend who covered for Luella like Jaro did for Sasha?

Sasha was inclined to go with the latter
explanation. Also, why worry after only one night? She really was getting ahead
of herself. Who cared what Lulu did with Rafael as long as she kept on spending
nights with Sasha? And why should Sasha rack her brains about the Galloway at
all? Breaking Sasha’s nose was pretty excessive to say the least, whether Lulu
was confused or not.

Technically, it was only fair that she
receive some compensation for her mutilated nose.

HEARTS BEATING

JUST AS ONE
                        

Indian Wells, United States

After looking over the names, Amanda slowly
pointed her finger at one name. She was sitting with Ted and Tom on a terrace,
happy to have found a quiet place outside the busy players lounge of the Indian
Wells tournament.

Ted and Tom looked at each other.

“Anastasia?”

“It was a while ago. Three or four years,”
Amanda said.

Ted cleared his throat. “Okay, let’s get
this straight. You have a history with Anastasia Stea?”

The Australian hesitated. “Well, I wouldn’t
call it a history,” she finally said. “We met occasionally.”

Ted and Tom nodded. They had heard this
before. Everything began to make sense.

“Anyone else on the list you have a history
with?”

Amanda shook her head.

“What about Carina?” Tom asked.

“Carina?” Amanda laughed. “Are you crazy?
Wild horses couldn’t drag me there.”

Tom chuckled. “I didn’t mean to suggest you
had an affair with her. I wanted to know if you had a bad experience with her.”

“No,” Amanda said. “But I admit she’s an
obnoxious pain in the ass – on the court and off the court.”

She got up and grabbed her jacket. “I’ve
got to go. Elise will be back from her helicopter flight and we want to watch a
movie tonight.”

She went to the door but then turned
around. “You won’t tell Elise about Anastasia, will you? I don’t want her to
get the impression I was sleeping around.”

Ted and Tom shook their heads and put their
index fingers on their mouths. The secret of Amanda’s adventurous past would be
safe with them. After the Australian had left, they sat down on their bed and
looked over the list.

“It must be her,” Ted said. “She’s had
affairs with
everyone
who received a picture. Martina, Antonia, Sasha
and even Amanda.”

Tom wasn’t convinced by Ted’s theory. “But
Amanda wasn’t the recipient. It was Elise.”

“She knew if she gave it to Elise it would
land in Amanda’s hands eventually.”

Tom tilted his head. “I still don’t
understand her motive.”

“Jealousy?” Ted suggested. “Perhaps
Anastasia is jealous of other people being happy. She used the pictures to cause
mischief and to worry her former lovers.”

“Could be,” Tom said.

He had spoken to the outgoing and friendly
chair umpire at different occasions and had always enjoyed the chats with
Anastasia. The Romanian gave the impression of someone who savored the life on
the tour and was easy-going with the girls. A clandestine campaign to trouble
her ex-lovers seemed completely out of character.

But who knew what went on inside a person
who only ever said “30 –15” or “Love – 40” or “Advantage Curry” for hours and hours?
Perhaps she was actually a very dangerous psychopath.

“Let’s keep an eye on her,” Tom said.

***

Sasha was nervously tapping her foot
against the floor. Outside the window a high palm tree was swaying in the wind,
gently disrupting the view of the Indian Wells mountain ridge.

“Sasha?” Kurt sounded irritated.

Sasha turned to her manager. “But it’s not
necessary anymore. I’m winning matches again. I’m playing more consistently
again. Besides, it’s not like I was doing horribly bad all the time. I made it
to the semifinal in Melbourne.”

Kurt spread his hands defensively.

“Sasha, I beg your pardon,” he chuckled
ironically. “You were crying and moaning after that semifinal that you couldn’t
play tennis anymore, that people thought badly of you and Jaro. You said you
felt like a
dwarf
.”

He shook his head in incomprehension, and
Sasha grimaced with pain. She should have never let Kurt in on those
bewildering feelings she had had after that match. Of course, this had only
given Kurt an excuse to proceed further with the wedding plans.

“I don’t feel like that any longer,” she
snapped. “I’m feeling great.”

“Well, I can see that,” Kurt replied.
“You’re being your old self again. I certainly appreciate that fact. But we
still have those rumors about you and Jaro.”

“They will die on their own when I play
better again,” she retorted.

Kurt shook his head. “Jaro hasn’t been that
careful either. There are massive rumors that your relationship is only a
farce. We
have
to do something about it, and you know it.”

Yes, Sasha knew it.

“Sponsors are already asking what’s going
on,” Kurt informed her. “There are two contracts that need to be renewed in the
summer.”

Sasha closed her eyes.

“How do you make your money?” Kurt asked
quietly.

Sasha smiled a little bit. They had been
playing this quiz game since she was sixteen.

“I win a lot of matches?” she replied,
already knowing his answer.

“Nope, guess again!”

“I get good sponsors.”

“That’s correct,” he winked at her. “And
how do you get good sponsors?”

“By winning a lot of matches?”

“Nope, guess again.”

“With my tits and my ass?”

“That’s correct,” he rejoiced. “And how do
you make a lot of money with your tits and your ass?”

Sasha grinned.

“By being smart,” Kurt answered for her.

“And trusting you,” Sasha finished the
sentence.

“That’s correct.”

***

“Enrique Martinez?”

Polly pulled a face and handed the
headphones back to Elise.

“I know, I know. Amanda hates him,” Elise
chuckled. “I’m not allowed to listen to the new album when she is around.”

“Understandably so.”

They were walking through the hotel lobby
after the Supersport Channel crew had dropped them off at the front entrance.
The flight over the mountains and through the valleys had been fun and they had
shot a nice sequence along with Chili and Robyn.

“I liked the song you let me listen to on
the way back.”

“The Jetlips,” Polly explained. “Famous
Canadian chick band. I’ve got their whole catalogue.” She patted her MP3 player
which she carried in the front pocket of her sweater.

“Perhaps you could give me some of their
songs?” Elise asked when they stepped into the elevator.

“Sure, we can copy it onto your PC now if
you like. So you have something to play aloud when Amanda is around.”

They got out on Elise’s floor and walked to
the room she shared with Amanda. When they entered, Amanda was slouched on the
bed and was watching videos on her laptop.

“How was the helicopter flight? Did you
girls have fun?”

Elise and Polly nodded.

“It was pretty amazing actually,” Polly
said. “I’m glad they chose us for the task.”

“It wasn’t really a task. Not like the
trampoline thing,” Elise said while getting her laptop out of her bag. “More a
nice fun activity.”

“No match between Gabriella and Lulu then?”
Amanda asked with a grin.

“They weren’t with us this time,” Polly
explained.

“Thank god,” Elise exclaimed, switching on
her laptop. “Enduring them together is terribly exhausting now that they are
not talking anymore. Gabriella is all grumpy around Lulu.”

“They are very different,” Amanda said
pensively.

“Well, one is a lesbian and the other a
slut, basically,” Polly chuckled while handing Elise her MP3 player.

“You know that Gabriella is gay?” Elise
looked up.

Polly shrugged and handed Elise her MP3
player. “I figured she was since she was hanging with you guys a lot.”

“Not really that often anymore,” Amanda
threw in.

“We should ask her to come over and watch
the movie with us tonight,” Elise said to Amanda.

The Australian nodded, then looked at
Polly. “You want to come, too?”

“Yes, I’d love to,” Polly said. She stepped
towards the window and looked outside at the hotel garden, which was drenched
in the warm light of the setting afternoon sun. Then she turned back and sat
down at the table to wait for Elise to copy the new songs into her music
library, when something caught her eye.

“What’s this?” Polly asked.

Elise looked up and gulped. She and Amanda
quickly exchanged looks.

“Spices!” they squealed in unison.

“May I?” Polly asked, picking up the wooden
mara
box.

“Sure,” Amanda said with a strained voice.
Elise and Amanda both watched Polly open the old box and take a look at the
accurately stashed spices.

“Colorful.”

“Yes,” Elise laughed awkwardly. She jumped
up, waving the MP3 player. “Done.”

Before Polly had time to take out one of
the little plastic bags and discover the hard fact behind the hot and sweet
spices, Elise grabbed the box away and quickly slipped the MP3 player into
Polly’s hand instead.

“Thank you for the music. I’m sure Amanda
will like it as well,” she said with a grin. “Shall we call you after dinner
and you come over to watch the movie?”

Polly agreed. She gave them her phone
number, said good-bye and Elise closed the door behind her with a big sigh.

“We really need to be more careful with the
dildo.”

“
Mara
,” Amanda insisted. But she was
already stuffing the wood box deep inside one of her bags. “No need for
Gabriella to ask the same questions.”

***

“I think it’s a good time to aim for the
bigger tournaments,” Gabriella told Freddie. The coach nodded slowly.

“Well, the beginning of the year has been a
bit of a bumpy ride, but your current ranking will set you up well to tackle
the Top 15,” he said. “Now that your game is coming together again I see no
reason that it shouldn’t work.”

Gabriella put her feet up on Freddie’s
hotel room couch and smiled. Her revival had begun in the smaller tournaments
in Monterrey and Acapulco. She had arrived from Dubai with new enthusiasm, a
much bigger punch to her strokes and a big grin on her face. Her coach had
wondered how one skiing day in Dubai could cause a 180 degree turn in his
player, but eventually attributed her good mood to the fun they had in Mexico –
which included a night out on the town in Monterrey, a big Mardi Gras party and
finally, a tournament win in Acapulco. She had played magnificently in the last
three matches, implementing Freddie’s advice and executing her game plan from
the first ball played until the last.

“I’m glad we are working together,”
Gabriella said, even though she knew it wasn’t Freddie’s coaching alone that
had lifted her game in the last two weeks. Neither had it been the fun she had
with the other players, running around in Mexican costumes. She knew that the
reason she had turned things around and that confidence was flowing through her
veins again, was accredited to a certain Czech player.

In hindsight, nothing could have been more
daring than kiss Sasha in the elevator. Who knew what the Czech would do after
Luella had broken her nose in Istanbul? It could have been entirely possible
that Sasha might have started screaming, as she clearly believed it was Lulu
with her in the elevator. Gabriella still grinned at the thought. It was such a
ludicrous idea that she had spent the night with the most-desired girl in the
WTA because said girl believed her to have been Luella Galloway, the
straightest girl in the WTA.

Sasha thought she knew Lulu’s little
secret, as she had called it when they had faced each other in the Wimbledon
locker room. As Sasha had a little secret of her own, she understood the need
for collusion. When Gabriella had forbidden her to call her or talk to her,
Gabriella had of course thought of the possibility that Sasha might contact
Lulu by accident. But the Czech had nodded immediately. She wouldn’t put
everything she had worked for at risk.

This was the best situation Gabriella could
have hoped for – a lover on the side who ignited her energy and revitalized her
game. After her good runs in Mexico and Columbia, Gabriella felt more confident
about making an even bigger step forward in the rankings, the Top 15 only being
a stopover. Thinking about the little note she had written down before the
season started, she felt certain again that she could crack the Top 10.