Open (46 page)

J.P. says he’ll fix me a drink.

T
HE TOURNAMENT PROVIDES
a small measure of distraction. Sadly, the distraction lasts only a few hours. In the first round, against Dominik Hrbaty, from Slovakia, I can think only of Steffi and her boyfriend enjoying or awkwardly ignoring my roses. Hrbaty whoops me in three sets.

I’m out of the tournament. I should leave Fisher Island. But I stick around, sitting on the beach, plotting with J.P. and Brad.

Steffi’s boyfriend probably showed up unexpectedly, Brad says. Plus, she still doesn’t know you’re divorced. She still thinks you’re married to Brooke. Give it time. Let the news come out. Then make your move.

You’re right, you’re right.

Brad mentions Hong Kong. In light of my performance against Hrbaty, clearly I need another tournament before we head into clay season. Let’s go to Hong Kong, he says. Let’s not sit around anymore thinking and talking about Steffi.

Next thing I know I’m settling into a seat on an airplane bound for China. I look at the screen at the head of the cabin.
Estimated flight time: 15 hrs, 37 mins
.

I look at Brad. Fifteen hours and thirty-seven minutes? To obsess about Steffi? I don’t think so.

I unbuckle my seat belt and stand.

Where are you going?

I’m getting off this plane.

Don’t be ridiculous. Sit down. Relax. We’re here. We’re all packed. Let’s go play.

I ease back into my seat, order two Belvederes, swallow a sleeping pill, and after what feels like a month I’m on the other side of the earth. I’m in a car being whisked along a Hong Kong highway, looking up at the soaring International Finance Centre.

I phone Perry. When is the news of my divorce going to break?

The lawyers are hashing out the details, he says. Meantime, you and Brooke need to work on the statement.

We fax drafts back and forth. Her team, my team. Lawyers and publicists have a go at it. Brooke adds a word, I delete a word. Faxes and more faxes. What began with faxes ends with faxes.

The statement is about to be released, Perry says. It should be in the papers any day now.

Brad and I run down to the lobby every morning, buy up all the newspapers, then sit over breakfast and scan every page, looking for the headline. For the first time in my memory I can’t wait for newspapers to report about my private life. Each day I say a prayer: Let this be the day that Steffi learns I’m free.

Day after day, it’s not there. It’s like waiting for Steffi’s call. If only I had hair, so I could pull it out. Finally, the cover of
People
carries a photo of Brooke and me. The headline reads:
Suddenly Split
. It’s April 26, 1999, three days before my twenty-ninth birthday, almost exactly two years after our wedding.

Reborn, renewed, I win Hong Kong—but on the flight home I can’t lift my arm. I rush from the airport to Gil’s house. He examines the shoulder, grimaces. He doesn’t like the look of it.

We might need to shut everything down and skip the entire clay season.

No, no, no, Brad says. We have to be in Rome for the Italian Open.

Please. I never win that thing. Let’s forget it.

No, Brad says. Let’s go to Rome, see how the shoulder does. You didn’t want to go to Hong Kong, right? But you won, right? I see a trend developing.

I let him drag me onto a plane, and in Rome I lose in the third round to Rafter, whom I just beat at Indian Wells. Now I really want to shut it down. But Brad talks me into going to play the World Team Cup in Germany. I don’t have the strength to argue with him.

The weather in Germany is cold, dreary, meaning the ball plays heavy. I look at Brad with murder in my eye. I can’t believe he’s dragged me to Düsseldorf with a sore shoulder. In the middle of the first set, down 3–4, I can’t take another swing. I quit. That’s it. We’re going home, I tell Brad. I have to get my shoulder right. And I have to figure out this thing with Steffi.

As we board the flight from Frankfurt to San Francisco, I’m not speaking to Brad. I’m mad as hell. We have twelve hours ahead of us, side by side, and I tell him: Here’s how it’s going to be, Brad. I haven’t slept all night, because of this shoulder. I’m going to swallow two sleeping pills right now and I’m not going to listen to you for the next twelve hours and it’s going to be heaven. You hear me? And when we land, the
first thing
I want you to do is pull me out of the French Open.

He leans into me and badgers me for two hours. You’re
not
going back to Vegas. You’re
not
pulling out. You’re coming with me to my house in
San Francisco. I’ve got the guest cottage set up with plenty of firewood, the way you like it, and then you and I are flying back to Paris and you’re going to play. It’s the only slam you don’t have, and you’ve always wanted it, and you can’t win it if you don’t play.

French Open? Please. You must be kidding. That ship has sailed.

How do you know? Who’s to say this isn’t your year?

Trust me. In no sense is 1999 my year.

Look, you were just starting to show glimpses of the player you used to be. I saw something in you I hadn’t seen in years. We have to stay after that.

I see right through him. It’s not that he thinks the French Open is remotely winnable. But if I pull out of the French Open, it will be easier to pull out of Wimbledon, and there goes the whole year. Goodbye comeback. Hello retirement.

Landing in San Francisco, I’m once again too tired to argue. I slide into Brad’s car, and he drives me to his place and puts me in the cottage. I sleep for twelve hours. When I wake a chiropractor is there, ready to treat me.

It’s not going to work, I say.

It’s going to work, Brad says.

I get treatments twice a day. The rest of the time I watch the fog and stoke the fire. By Friday I do feel better. Brad smiles. We hit balls on his backyard court, twenty minutes, then I hit a few serves.

Call Gilly, I say. Let’s go to Paris.

I
N OUR
P
ARIS HOTEL
Brad is looking over the draw.

I ask, How is it?

He says nothing.

Brad?

Couldn’t be worse.

Seriously?

Nightmare. Your first-rounder is Franco Squillari, lefty, from Argentina, probably the roughest guy in the draw who’s not seeded. An absolute beast on clay.

I can’t believe you talked me into this.

We practice Saturday and Sunday. Monday we start. I’m in the locker room, getting my feet taped, and I realize I forgot to pack underwear in my tennis bag. The match is in five minutes. Can I play without underwear? I don’t even know if it’s physically possible.

Brad jokes that I can borrow his.

I will never want to win that badly.

Then I think: This is perfect. I didn’t want to be here anyway, I shouldn’t be here, I’m playing the quintessential dirt rat in the first round on center court. Why shouldn’t I go commando?

There are sixteen thousand people in the stands, screaming like peasants overrunning Versailles. Before I’ve broken a sweat I’m down a set and a break. I look to my box, stare at Gil and Brad.
Help me
. Brad stares back, stone-faced: Help yourself.

I hitch up my shorts, take the deepest breath possible and let it out slowly. I tell myself that it can’t get any worse. I tell myself: Just win one set. Winning one set off this guy would be an accomplishment. One set—try for that. Scaling down the task makes it seem manageable and makes me looser. I start ripping my backhand, hitting my spots. The crowd stirs. They haven’t seen me play well here in a long time. Something inside me stirs too.

The second set turns into a street fight and a wrestling match and pistols at fifty paces. Squillari doesn’t give an inch and I have to bludgeon the set from him, 7–5. Then a shocking thing happens. I win the third set. Now I start to feel hope, actual hope, rising from my toes. My body is tingling. I glance at Squillari—he’s hopeless. His face is expressionless. One of the fittest guys on the tour, he’s unable to take a step. He’s done. In the fourth set I roll him, and all at once I’m walking off the court with one of the most improbable wins of my career.

Back at the hotel, covered with clay, I tell Gil: Did you see him? Did you see that dirt rat cramp? We made him cramp, Gil!

I saw.

The elevator is tiny. There’s room for five normal-sized humans, or else me and Gil. Brad tells us to go ahead, he’ll catch the next one. I hit the button, and on the way up Gil leans against one corner of the elevator, I lean against the other. I feel him staring.

What?

Nothing.

He keeps staring.

What is it, Gil?

Nothing. He smiles and says again: Nothing.

In the second round, I stick with no underwear. (I will never don underwear again. Something works, you don’t change.) I play Arnaud Clément, from France. I win the first set 6–2. I’m up in the second, playing the best I’ve ever played on clay. I’m rocking him to sleep. Then Clément wakes up. He wins the second set—and the third. How did that just
happen? I’m serving at 4–5, love–30, in the fourth set. I’m two points from being bounced out of this tournament.

I think: Two points.
Two points
.

He hits a forehand inside-out winner. I walk over and check the mark. It’s out. I circle the mark with the racket. The linesman runs out to confirm. He examines it, like Hercule Poirot. He puts up his hand. Out!

If that thing had caught the line I’d be down triple match point. Instead I’m at 15–30. What a difference. What if—?

But I plead with myself to stop thinking about what if. Don’t think, Andre. Turn off your mind. I play two minutes of the best tennis I’m capable of playing. I hold. We’re at 5–all.

Clément is serving. If I were a different player, he would have the edge. But I’m my father’s son. I’m a returner. I let nothing past me. Then I run him from side to side. Back and forth. His tongue starts to hang from his mouth. Just when he and the crowd think I can’t run him any more, I run him a little more. He’s a metronome. Then he’s a goner. He pitches forward as if shot in the head. His cramps have cramps. He calls for medical treatment.

I break him. Then I hold easily to win the fourth set.

I win the fifth set 6–0.

In the locker room, Brad is talking to himself, to me, to anyone who will listen.

His back tire blew out! Did you see? Holy shit! His back tire—
boom
.

Reporters ask if I feel lucky that Clément cramped.

Lucky? I worked hard for those cramps.

At the hotel, riding the tiny elevator with Gil, my face is covered with clay. My eyes and ears and mouth are filled with clay. My clothes are spotted with clay. I look down. I never noticed before how Roland Garros clay, when it dries, looks like blood. I’m trying to brush it off when I feel Gil staring again.

What is it?

Nothing, he says, smiling.

I
N THE THIRD ROUND
I’m playing Chris Woodruff. I’ve played him once before, here, in 1996 and lost. A disastrous loss. I secretly liked my chances that year. This time I know from the start that I’m going to win. I have no doubt that I’ll have my revenge, served ice cold. I beat him 6–3, 6–4, 6–4, on the same court where he beat me. Brad requested it, because he wanted me to remember, to make it personal.

I’m in the round of sixteen at the French Open for the first time since 1995. My reward is Carlos Moyá, the defending champion.

Not to worry, Brad says. Even though Moyá’s the champ, and real good on the dirt, you can take away his time. You can bull-rush him, stand inside the baseline, hit the ball early and apply pressure. Go after his backhand, but if you have to bring it to his forehand, do it with purpose, with heat. Don’t just go there—drive it hard up Main Street. Make him feel you.

In the first set, it’s me feeling Moyá. I lose the set fast. In the second set I fall down two breaks. I’m not playing my game. I’m not doing anything Brad said to do. I look up at my box and Brad screams:
Come on! Let’s go!

Back to basics. I make Moyá run. And run. I establish a sadistic rhythm, chanting to myself: Run, Moyá, run. I make him run laps. I make him run the Boston Marathon. I win the second set, and the crowd is cheering. In the third set I run Moyá more than I’ve run the last three opponents combined, and suddenly, all at once, he’s cooked. He wants no part of this. He didn’t sign on for anything like this.

As the fourth set opens, I’m oozing confidence. I hop up and down. I want Moyá to see how much energy I’ve got left. He sees, and he sighs. I put him away and sprint to the locker room. Brad gives me a fist bump that almost breaks my fist.

In the hotel elevator, I feel Gil staring again.

Gil, what is it?

I have a feeling.

What
feeling?

I feel like you’re on a collision course.

With what?

Destiny.

I’m not sure I believe in destiny.

We’ll see. We can’t build a fire in the rain …

W
E HAVE TWO DAYS OFF
. Two days to relax and think about something besides tennis. Brad discovers that Springsteen is in our hotel. He’s playing a concert in Paris. Brad suggests we attend. He scores us three seats, down front.

At first I’m not sure. I don’t know if it’s such a good idea to go out and paint Paris red. But the TV has mostly news about the tournament, which isn’t good for my mood either. I remember the tennis official who
mocked my playing a challenger, comparing it to Springsteen playing a corner bar. Yes, I say. Let’s take the night off. Let’s go see the Boss.

Brad, Gil, and I enter the arena a few seconds before Springsteen comes onstage. As we run down the aisle, several people spot me and point. A man yells my name. Andre!
Allez, Andre!
A few more men take up the cry. We slip into our seats. A spotlight scans the crowd—and suddenly lands on us. Our faces appear on the giant video screen above the stage. The crowd roars. They begin to chant:
Allez, Agassi! Allez, Agassi!
Some sixteen thousand people—about the same number as the crowd at Roland Garros—are chanting, cheering, stomping their feet.
Allez, Agassi!
It has a lilt the way they chant it, a bouncing rhythm like a children’s nursery rhyme.
Deet-deet, da da da
. It’s contagious. Brad chants too. I stand, wave. I’m honored. Inspired. I wish I could play the next match right now. Here.
Allez, Agassi!