One
Sydney King,formerly the nineteenth best women’s tennis player in the world, sat with her body curled up on the sofa at The Stone’s Throw Inn. A plush blanket covered her bare legs, and she snuggled in deeper until it enveloped her completely.
Nothing but her head poked out, which was a shame since her blonde hair, tied up in a messy bun, had seen much better days.
She liked the feeling of being hidden right now, not even the writing across her shirt visible. She loved this shirt—soft after hundreds of washes, a reminder of how far she’d come. It was from her first professional tennis tournament, the letters spelling “Puerto Vallarta Open” all but faded into obscurity.
Just like her career.
Her muscles twitched from disuse in a way that she tried not to let gnaw at her. The television across from her played a talk show, but it couldn’t drown out the noise in her head. She could still smell the faint scent of the lobster roll that had been delivered from the kitchen thirty minutes ago. She took in a shallow breath as her stomach roiled, nauseous from all the fried food she’d consumed in the last few days.
How the mighty had fallen.
She rolled her neck and stretched her arms to alleviate theenergy pent up inside of her, fingers snagging on something sharp, stuck on the blanket, as she did. Without looking down, she flicked a leftover piece of last night’s tortilla chips away from her.
Guess she hadn’t eaten the whole bag after all.
Since returning to her hometown of Stoneport, Massachusetts, three days ago, she'd rarely ventured out of The Stone's Throw, a charmingly outdated inn right next to downtown. This was her trip to do with as she wished. And right now, she wanted to pretend like the outside world didn’t exist.
Which was why, as her phone vibrated somewhere underneath the blanket, she let the call go to voicemail.
Her lips twitched as she considered standing up, but she found the option overwhelming enough that she ended up sinking deeper into the sofa.
She let out a frustrated groan into the empty room.
Where had it all gone so wrong?
It was a question Sydney had spent the last few months thinking about tirelessly.
On paper, everything should have worked out. It felt like she was staring at a perfectly executed rally, yet she’d still lost the point. The match, really.
Stretching out her knee along the couch, she felt a phantom twinge. After months of rehab, she knew it wasn’t real. It still hurt, though. All of the rehab had hurt, too, and, ultimately, it had been a lot of pain for nothing.
Professional tennis had been her dream for the last fifteen years—the pursuit of it all she’d ever known, really—and now she was staring down the barrel of what came next.
She’d attended her dream college on a full ride to play tennis after dedicating her adolescence to thousands of hours training at a local academy. It had meant forsaking her junior and senior years of high school in person in favor of two years of homeschool classes, but at the time, it hadn’t felt like she was giving anything up.
For years, she’d slogged through the lower circuits beforefinally getting a wildcard entry into the pro tour four years ago. She’d been twenty-four. Young, in the scheme of life, but she was up against women who’d started playing professionally at fourteen, with already a decade of experience in major tournaments under their belts by her age.
Still, she’d finally been making her mark.
Last year, she’d made it to the quarterfinals of the Australian Open and then the semifinals at the US Open in the fall. She’d lost both matches, but she’d never forget the high that came with entering the stadium, under bright lights and a sold-out crowd.
She flexed her bare, extended foot, missing how the different surfaces she’d played on felt beneath her sneakers.
Until a few weeks ago, shewastennis. Her lifestyle, diet, training regimen, and the place she’d called home were all oriented around a simple, singular goal: to see how far her career could take her.
And now, with a stupid series of decisions made because she couldn’t keep her emotions in check, she’d lost everything.
What’s it that they say? Love means nothing in tennis? She’d sure proved that right.
“Idiot.” Frustration was laced through her voice as she searched for the bag of M&M’s she’d placed somewhere within reach earlier.
Whether she was talking about herself or Grant, she didn’t know.
“Hey! Are you about done with your pity party this morning?”
Hallie Thatcher, her childhood best friend, stared at her from the door to the hallway. Wisps of Hallie’s dark hair haloed her temples, her face flushed. She’d already accomplished more in the morning than Sydney had in the last few days since she’d arrived back in Stoneport. Sydney was at least five inches taller than Hallie, not that anyone in the inn would know, given that she had spent most of her time glued to this spot on the couch. She andthe furniture had become one. Where she ended and it started was really no one’s business these days.
