Love Game - Season 2012 (34 page)

“Kurt was happy, too,” Candice remarked.

“I can imagine,” Agnes smacked her lips.
She was tasting one of the small lobster tapas. “Has Sasha told you why she ran
away?”

Candice shook her head. “But it’s none of
my business anyway. I don’t care about her reasons, I just care that people
believe the reason I gave of her bailing out.”

After a long night of discussing and
disputing with Sasha and Jaro how to proceed and what to say.

Nowhere would Sasha claim that Jaro had
cheated on her. But in the official statement Sasha said that someone closest
to her had deceived her. The Czech herself had come up with the wording and
Candice had to admit that it was quite clever.

The known facts, runaway bride Sasha
calling off a long-planned, highly-anticipated celebrity wedding, in the course
of which she crashed an oldtimer car and disappeared for several days, together
with her cryptic statement and the timeout after the Olympics, left the public
with only one conclusion – Sasha had found out about Jaro cheating on her. She
had to have found out only shortly before the wedding ceremony, felt it was
impossible to go through with it and, confused and hurt by the deception, sped
off in the sports car.

With gratitude Candice noticed that
spectators held up signs of encouragement and support for Sasha during her
first matches at the U.S. Open. Another poster said ‘Goodbye cheaters. Have no
mercy, Sash!’ and marriage proposals were shouted down to the court throughout
the match.

It was perfect. On the one hand, Sasha
Mrachova seemed available again, stirring the fantasies of millions of men and
making her interesting for potential sponsors. On the other hand, everybody
knew that she was badly hurt. And wasn’t that a great reason to stay single –
at least for the rest of her career?

Candice smiled to herself. Yes, Sasha never
again had to explain why she didn’t have a boyfriend.

Jaro on the other hand was the bad boy in
this story. It had to be his fault. Candice had boosted the ‘cheater’ theory by
a few phone calls to the UK. The next morning a former football colleague of
Jaro was quoted in
The Sun
, saying that Jaro had a reputation. He
wouldn’t be surprised if the Czech football star had two-timed Sasha more than
once.

Neither Jaro nor Sasha were available for a
further statement. Sasha would cultivate the image of the hurt girlfriend who
would stay away from relationships in the future to focus on tennis again. Jaro
suddenly had a reputation as a ladykiller, which wasn’t the worst thing if you
were trying to hide the fact that you were gay. He would concentrate on
football again and once in a while be seen with various girls.

Candice grabbed another piece of caviar
toast and raised her champagne glass.

“To true love and marriage,” she grinned
and clinked glasses with Agnes.

Agnes giggled and leaned forward to kiss
her girlfriend. They were just about to get it on, when a call saved the
champagne bottle from falling out of bed and the caviar and the lobster bits
from spilling over the sheets.

Agnes sighed. She answered the phone,
nodded and gave the receiver to Candice.

“It’s Alice,” she informed the
communications manager. “She says it’s urgent.”

***

Ted pulled out a pen and slowly crossed out
a name on the paper.

1                 2 Supervisors + 4 staff
members (players’ service)

2                 Candice Crantz + 2 staff
members (communications)

3                 2 Chair umpires (
Stea
,
Sanchez)

4                 2 Physios (McManus,
Reichelt)

5                 Marieke + 2 team members

6                 Morgana + 2 team members

7                 Carina + 3 team members

8                 Angela + 2 team members

9                 Ivana + 1 team member

10                Monica/Agnes + 1 team
member

11                Bernadette

12                (Martina/Antonia)

13                (Elise)

“We are so dumb,” he said turning to Tom.
“We concentrated on one poor person.”

“We couldn’t be sure she was innocent,” Tom
remarked meekly, but Ted was right. They had wasted many months observing the
Romanian – for nothing.

“Well, we found out that she is actually
the least innocent person traveling on the tour,” Ted chuckled a bit. “But she
doesn’t have the pictures.”

The photos were not on Anastasia’s computer
and neither Sasha nor the other girls could believe that the umpire was behind
this. Given Anastasia’s busy bed schedule it was entirely implausible that she
was the jealous kind. Instead, all the players must be jealous of her.

“So, we have to keep looking.”

Ted moaned. “But where?”

They leaned over the list again.

“When I asked Martina and Antonia they
mentioned Carina,” Tom said pensively.

Ted nodded. “I never thought she was the
type for these clandestine operations. She’s more like a bull in a china shop
with her blunt homophobia.”

“Yes, she would have probably made a scene
and hung the pictures out in the players’ cafeteria for everyone to see.”

Ted nodded again. Then he slowly crossed
out Carina’s name on the paper.

“Let’s cross out the WTA staff, too,” he
suggested and let his pen do the talking.

“Marieke?” Tom asked.

“Too senior and too decent for this kind of
childishness,” Ted said resolutely, crossing out the Dutch woman’s name.

“Morgana is weird but she is only
interested in her PhD. I doubt she’s the one,” Tom added. Morgana’s name was
buried under a dash.

“Carina is out,” Ted said, going down the
list. “Angela? No way. She’s absolutely honest and straightforward. Elise told
me that she was one of the first people she came out to. She was very
supportive.” He crossed out Angela Porovski’s name.

“Ivana?” Tom wondered. He had conducted a
few interviews with the aspiring Russian player. She seemed like a normal kid,
mostly hanging around with either Gemma and Robyn or the other Russian players.

But Ted shook his head. “Can’t be Ivana.
She lost in the first round of the Australian Open. And Sasha said that Luella
had received her picture during the middle weekend of the Australian Open.
Ivana would have never stayed that long in Melbourne after a loss.”

Tom agreed. He also remembered that Ivana
played a smaller tournament in Pattaya the following week. No, the Russian
would have left Melbourne right after her loss and flown to Thailand.

Ted crossed her out and Monica and Agnes,
too. It was just impossible that the two respected elder women would have
tricked these players – some of them close friends. They also crossed out
Martina, Antonia and Elise.

1                
2 Supervisors + 4
staff members (players’ service)

2                
Candice Crantz + 2
staff members (communications)

3                
2 Chair umpires (Stea,
Sanchez)

4                
2 Physios (McManus,
Reichelt)

5                
Marieke + 2 team
members

6                
Morgana + 2 team
members

7                
Carina + 3 team
members

8                
Angela + 2 team
members

9                
Ivana + 1 team member

10               
Monica/Agnes + 1 team
member

11                Bernadette

12               
(Martina/Antonia)

13               
(Elise)

“This looks a lot better now,” Ted stated
proudly. They really should have done that a long time ago instead of following
Anastasia.

“Bernadette?” Tom scratched his head. “I
don’t really know anything about her. She is so inconspicuous.”

“Exactly,” Ted mumbled. “Exactly.”

***

“I have to apologize,” Polly said and
frowned. She nervously picked on the overgrip tape of her racquet handle. It
had already come loose a bit and soon she would have to regrip the racquet.

“Why would you have to apologize?” Mint replied
vehemently. “You did nothing wrong. Everybody would have flown home.”

They were sitting on the chairs on the last
practice court. There was Marieke and her hitting partner on court P2 preparing
for the Dutch player’s match later, but the other practice courts were empty.

“I know I did the right thing,” Polly
explained. “But for Bernadette it was still shattering. It’s probably the last
Olympics she’s played. Even if she plays in Rio in four years, she will be
forty. This was her last chance.”

She remembered the words the older player
had told her when they were sitting in the restaurant in Sydney.
You are my
last chance.
She also remembered her promise to do everything possible to
win a medal. Even though she had a very good reason to fly home she had let
Bernadette down.

“Is she mad at you?” Mint asked.

Polly shrugged. “I’m not sure. She didn’t
ask me to play doubles here, you know? I had to ask her. She hasn’t been
unfriendly since the Olympics, but a bit cool.”

“She does understand that this was a matter
of life and death, right?” Mint grunted.

“Bernadette never really seemed to care
about my mother, to be honest,” Polly answered. “She once told me very directly
that she believes donating a heart is the dumbest thing to do. That you
shouldn’t give your heart away. That it belongs to you and no one else.”

“She did that?” Mint had turned around and
looked Polly in the eyes.

Polly nodded. “She actually made me cry
that evening.”

Mint still looked her in the eyes until
Polly turned away. Then she felt how her new American friend put one arm around
her and squeezed her shoulder. Mint didn’t say anything and Polly was glad she
didn’t. A gesture was so much better than a thousand words. How often had she
told people about her mother’s heart condition only to witness how they
stammered and choked, unable to find honest words of consolation and hope? Most
people got scared and nervous when they were confronted with sickness and
death. Not Mint.

“Did she ever apologize for that?”

Polly laughed. “No. She only ever had a
medal in her mind.”

“And you want to apologize for not winning
one with her?” Mint shook her head in disbelief.

“I know it’s hard to understand but I am
grateful,” Polly explained. “She pushed me so hard and I learned so much. I see
the results in my singles and I know it has to do with playing doubles with
her. And she is a fitness fanatic. I never worked out so much in my life.”

“I can feel that,” Mint purred. “Nice
deltoid.” She still had her arm around Polly and was now feeling up the
shoulder muscle.

“See, you too can be grateful to
Bernadette,” Polly chuckled. “But the downside is she made me work out so hard
that now I am used to going to bed very early. I fall asleep right away.”

Polly’s comment was intended to further
their flirtation, but Mint didn’t catch it. She had raised her eyebrows.

“Oh, that’s why you never showed up,” she
mumbled.

Polly frowned. “Showed up where?”

“When I invited you to come over and watch
a movie,” Mint clarified.

“You invited me over?” Polly frowned.
“When?”

But then she saw Bernadette coming out of
the building and jumped up. Her doubles partner began to unpack her racquets
and prepare court P4 for a practice.

“Will you wait for me?” Polly asked Mint.
The American had pursed her lips and looked over the practice courts at
Bernadette, obviously thinking hard about something. She finally nodded.

“I’ll be here.”

Then Polly walked over to her doubles
partner. She apologized for the withdrawal from the Olympics, offered to give
her best in the U.S. Open and promised to get the team to the Year End
Championships in Istanbul.

It was little consolation for Bernadette
and Polly knew it. She could promise to win twenty doubles Grand Slams with
Bernadette and it would mean nothing. They would be all forgotten as doubles
was only the ugly cousin of singles. An Olympic medal, however, would have been
in a different category altogether.

“Let’s not talk about it anymore,”
Bernadette eventually said.