He’d clearly already been briefed on what was going to need to happen – we’d be accompanied by two members of the tournament security team as we walked through the grounds to exit number 4 where a black Lexus with the registration number ending DHN would be waiting to whisk us the (no word of a lie) third of a mile back to Marcus’s hotel. I got it – I didn’t suppose you’d want to walk after that, what with the fans and the haters (more of those) swarming around, plus I had no idea if he’d be in any kind of physical pain after a match like that.
‘Ready,’ I said, more confidently than I felt.
We left the building together, with me scuttling along beside him. It might have been my own paranoia, but I sensed that all eyes were on us as I tested my own shockingly bad fitness to the absolute max by attempting to match him step for step as he motored through the grounds. He clearly had one goal: to get the hell out of here as quickly as possible.
‘How are you doing?’ I asked him, gasping for breath.
‘How do you think?’ he answered coldly.
Heads swivelled from all directions as we entered the main hub of the tournament and made our way down what felt like endless flights of steps, past pop-up shops selling tennis merchandise and some of the posher-looking bars linked to the hospitality suites.
‘Dean said we had to—’
‘I know,’ said Marcus, taking my hand.
It was actually easier to keep my speed up now that he was half propelling me along. His hand was hotter than when I’d held it at the restaurant, and his grip was harder, as though he was scared he’dlose me in the crowd if he loosened it. I kept my head down because I couldn’t bear watching everyone watching us, and also I was acutely aware that there were some steep slopes and I could very easy stack it, which although embarrassing for me might actually work very well for Marcus in terms of highly distracting media coverage. I wasn’t aware of any paparazzi taking photos, although they were probably dotted about inconspicuously with their mega-long lenses, lurking behind bushes and up high hanging out of windows. When I saw our car, I squeezed Marcus’s hand.
‘That’s us,’ I said.
On the short journey back to the hotel, we barely spoke. I understood that he didn’t want to and at least he managed a goodbye as he got out at the Monte-Carlo Bay, leaving me to travel on to my own hotel.
Since I had a few hours to myself, I set up a workspace on my desk in my hotel room and began trying to piece together a timeline of Marcus’s game. He first appeared in the national newspapers in June 2012 when he was a finalist in the Boys’ Junior Wimbledon competition. One of the papers had reported on it in their sports round-up:So Near and yet so Far– 17-Year-Old Brit Boy Close to Snagging Junior Wimbledon Title. Wow, he was practically a child at the time and even then journalists were giving him a hard time – what was wrong with celebrating him having made the final instead of criticising him for not actually winning it? I peered at a photo of Marcus with the eventual winner, a Bulgarian player I didn’t recognise – I wondered if he was still on the circuit? There was another photo of Marcus’s mum, looking much younger than she had in the other photo I’d seen of her – she was beautiful, and she was clapping proudly with tears in her eyes.Marcus Makes Mum Blubwas the classy headline.
The next newspaper report I found was from 2017, which I thought was the year before he won the Australian Open. A specialist tennis magazine had run a profile on him in their Rising Talent section – Marcus was twenty-two at the time and there was a photo of him smiling to camera, then another one of him with his arm around his mum. Their eyes were exactly the same, brown and bright with long doe-like lashes. The article talked mostly about his game stats – apparently, he was known for his fast first serves, his impressive physicality and his ability to switch his game so that it was impossible for his opponents to predict what he might do next. I flicked back at my notes – that was what Patrick had said about him, so clearly this was one thing that hadn’t changed over the years. I got as far as researching tournaments in 2018 before I had to start getting ready for dinner, and it had got off to a phenomenal start with Marcus winning the Australian Open in January of that year.G’day to Britain’s Newest Tennis Star! ran one headline.Brit Marcus Taylor Pulls it out of The Bag inOZ proclaimed another. I zoomed in on all the photos I could find. There were lots of Marcus smiling, of him running to the players’ box to hug his then-coach, Marcus waving happily to his fans in a way he never did now. But there was not a single shot of his mum. Had something happened, then, between 2017 and 2018? Had they fallen out, and if so, had it got anything to do with his tennis? From what I could tell, she’d been cheering him on from the sidelines since he was a junior, so why on earth wouldn’t she have been there in Australia to see him win his one and only major title? I made a note on my pad and circled it.Find Out Why Marcus and His Mum Fell Out.
Dean had insisted on taking Marcus and me out that evening as part ofOperation Distract the Press, and as I busied myself choosing a cocktailfrom the extensive – and expensive – drinks menu, Dean appeared to have cheered up considerably. Our hand-holding exit from the tournament had seemingly had the desired effect; a few pictures of the two of us had popped up online already and had even made it to some of the American gossip sites. He showed me a couple of photos of the two of us walking through the grounds, and of course they’d caught the one time I’d looked up at Marcus so that my face was on full display. According to Zoe, I was still the talk of theLuxeoffice, but nobody else I knew seemed to be aware. Unless I’d jinxed it, because when my phone pinged with a message from my mum sayingCall me!!I had an inkling that it was all about to come out. Dad was probably following the tournament results, and if he’d googled those, a story about Marcus having been knocked out might organically have led to these rather incriminating shots of Marcus and I clutching each other’s hands as though our lives depended on it. I tapped back a message, delaying the inevitable:At a work dinner. Call you tomorrow.This wouldn’t please her, but I hadn’t had time to work out exactly how to play it with my family given their delicate dispositions, and I couldn’t think about it now because I wanted to at least try to enjoy the stunning views over the famous marina, which I’d seen only on TV.
‘The footage of you and Ava is great, but level with me, Marcus. What the fuck happened out there today? I thought we were on the same page here? I’ve already had Lacoste on the line,’ said Dean.
Marcus didn’t reply and when I dared to peep over my menu, I saw that he was sitting in a sort of deadly, simmering silence.
‘I don’t need to explain myself to Lacoste. If I had my way, I wouldn’t be wearing them at all. They do not own me and unless they want to get out there and play at the level I do, they can keep their comments to themselves as far as I’m concerned.’
Dean tried a change of tack. ‘We’re just trying to help you out, here. Right, Ava?’
Huh? What was he dragging me into this for, I was just sitting there quietly choosing something to drink and had no intention of getting in the middle of whatever was going on there. Surely Dean had seen him behave like that myriad times before, so why was he getting so irate about it this time? Presumably, it was the losing of sponsorship deals that had done it, of which his agency WCG no doubt took a rather hefty percentage.
‘What’s Ava got to do with any of this?’ asked Marcus.
‘Yeah, I have to say, I don’t think it’s my place to—’
‘This is precisely why you’re here,’ Dean said to me. ‘To show your readers what goes on inside Marcus’s head. And unfortunately, that doesn’t include only the moments in which he’s level-headed and winning, it means reporting on the more difficult times, too. Doesn’t it?’
‘Of course,’ I said, getting fed up with Dean myself now. ‘But if Marcus isn’t ready to talk about it ...’
I caught his eye. In my experience, you couldn’t force things out of people. You had to gain their trust, let them know you were on their side (or at least let them think you were). Dean going in like a bulldozer wasn’t helping anyone.
‘You know what, guys? I think I’ll leave you to it. Marcus, when you’re ready to talk, you know where I am,’ said Dean, throwing his napkin down.
‘What an enticing prospect,’ said Marcus.
‘Oh, and next time I set up what is supposed to be a romantic tennis game for you, try not to totally thrash your date? Spoiler alert: you don’t look like the good guy in this scenario,’ said Dean, jabbing his finger on his phone.
Mine and Marcus’s phones pinged simultaneously.
With a sigh, I opened the message Dean had sent, an article from an American gossip site with the unfortunate title:Cruel Taylor Fails to Let Girlfriend Win a Single Point!
Aaargh. That wasn’t good on any level, not least because I hardly looked my best with sweat sprouting out of every pore and a pissed-off expression on my face. On the other hand, the photos of us by the fence looked hot.
