Chapter 3
by A.J. Kohlhepp

“Come on, Henry,” she said calmly, holding open the door of the court.

“I’m not sure about this,” stammered Henry as the sweat on his forehead threatened the absorptive properties of his throwback terry-cloth headband. (Had Jonathan Power or John McEnroe ever logged time as southern California paddle tennis players, they would have looked a lot like this.) “I think Reid just put us together to fuck with us.”

“All you have to do is get your serve in and stay out of the way,” she reassured him. “Do that and we’ll win.”

This racquet sport, like most racquet sports, came easily to Stacy. Too easily, you might say. In fact, it was boredom with the junior squash and tennis circuits that had propelled her toward the cross country team in high school. Even if she won the races, which she usually did, she was still chasing her own PRs, then the age group records, then the international standards, and so on.

You never really ran out of competition in the running world, she realized early on. And when things started to seem easy, you could always tackle a different distance. She was comfortable with marathons by now, and considering the jump to ultra- as her work and family obligations lessened a bit.

Back to the task at hand…. Henry was probably right about Reid’s intentions with his partnering and seeding strategies. Henry wasn’t bad with a racquet, actually, but the swagger that served him well in his real estate ventures had seemingly deserted him on this cloudless Angeleno afternoon.

“Who needs a paddle court in LA anyway,” blurted Henry.

“The same guy that peddles socially conscious growth portfolios to real estate tycoons and techies, I guess,” laughed Stacy, glancing in Reid’s direction. Intent on his clipboard, he missed her telling look and called out once more for Mr. and Mrs. Silverman to come down to the court.

“We’re already here, Reid,” she called out, striding purposefully to the backhand side and taking a few fluid swings along the way, with Henry fiddling with his matching wristbands in her wake.

Across the net, in deep conspiratorial enclave, stood a real power couple: a Hollywood producer and his fashionista wife. Apparently, Reid had played squash with him in college and their clubby camaraderie still translated to the West coast social milieu. Reid’s probably moving their money around too, she mused. Assuming they had any to move. People were so leveraged (and so phony) in this town that it was impossible to really know who was up and who was down.

The same ambiguity held true for her and Henry, as far as the outside world knew. Going solo would create some challenges in that regard, she calculated, as she pounded the pink orb off of the sandpaper-like board of the paddle court. Henry’s laissez faire attitude toward their marital finances – for somebody who chased money relentlessly he was curiously casual when in possession of it – had given her plenty of freedom with the checkbook. She drew a good salary from the start-up but the bonuses of the early, heady days in tech were a thing of the past. And Finn’s school was expensive. Tuition alone stood at $16,000, to say nothing of school uniforms, sports apparatus, electronic gewgaws, private music lessons, and all the other opportunities that parents in their milieu were expected to provide their offspring.

The producer and the fashionista were approaching the net, their inside arms linked at the elbow and outside hands waving their customized Wilson Surge racquets as they approached. (Orange and black – Princeton colors?) Henry, already there, waited petulantly for Stacy to join them. And so she did, jogging forward in her dusty Title 9 tights and North Face trail running shoes. (Her texted request for Henry to grab her bag out of the foyer on the way over had apparently arrived too late or been ignored completely. Since she had run up and over the ridge line – an easy but interesting ten miles -- to get to Reid’s in advance of the party’s official start time, she had had to put her trail running garb back on for paddle and post-game cocktails. She was thankful for the arid climate that had allowed her outfit to dry as she killed time with Reid in the tub.)

After the customary over-the-net greetings, and a fast and furious round of “You must know,” it was time to play.

The fashionista served first. Henry, playing on the forehand side to minimize his exposure, managed a reasonable return cross court, which the fashionista then blocked back in a soft, spinless arc. Stacy sprung toward the net, intercepting the ball with a vicious volley and imparting enough side spin to ensure that neither opponent would be able to manage an extraction off of the chicken wire. First point to the Silvermans.

On her turn to receive serve, Stacy ripped a wickedly sinking backhand toward the producer at net. He barely managed to get a paddle on it, thus avoiding extensive damage to his genitalia (and ego), but his attempt at a volley fell meekly into the net.

“So sorry,” said Stacy, feigning a surprised look to compound the uncertainty.

“No worries,” said the Hollywood man, who subsequently took a pronounced step away from the net, thus opening up all manner of angles for Stacy to exploit. The first game was easy after that.

Henry barely managed to hold serve, thanks to Stacy’s aggressive volleys, but the producer proved a worthier adversary than his partner. His booming, high-kicking serve had Henry and Stacy consistently retrieving off the back fencing, and the glamour couple was just strong enough at net to consolidate their advantage and claim the third game.

Which left Stacy serving at 2-1. Win this game and they would walk away with the mini-set; lose it and they would have to play a tie-breaker, with rotating serve, to anoint a victor. No way she was letting this thing go the distance, as much as she had going on off court….

She made quick work of the fourth (and final) game, varying pace, trajectory and spin enough to pick up a couple of service winners and set up simple volleys on the other points – Henry even managed to put away the final rally, which satisfaction Stacy didn’t begrudge him at all.

“Well played,” noted the producer as they shook hands over the net.

“Yes,” added the fashionista. “You must have played before!”

“I picked it up when I was a kid,” Stacy responded matter of factly.

“Fairfield County,” murmured Henry, as if merely naming that faraway region could convey all that anyone needed to know about his soon-to-be ex-wife. The power couple nodded knowingly, though what precisely they knew was anybody’s guess.

“Nice job,” offered Reid as they exited the court, extending a tanned fist for bumps from the victors.

“Nothing to it,” smiled Henry, uncertain about how to extend his own paw to consummate the gesture Reid had extended his way.

Stacy connected knuckle to knuckle in a deft punch as her left hand extended backward, in counterpoise, toward the cell phone zippered into the back pocket of her running top. It had vibrated repeatedly during their match, and she had a pretty good notion who had been trying to reach her.