Antoni Vert was standing behind the desk, just behind the receptionist. As in the photograph, he was wearing a baseball cap pulled low on his forehead, and a pair of reflective sunglasses hung on a neoprene cord around his neck. His face, though wider when she had seen it so often on a television screen, still looked to Franny like a Spanish movie star’s—the dimple in the chin, the black hair. She smiled and rushed toward the counter.
“Hello, Mr. Vert, Antoni, it is such a pleasure to meet you,” Franny said, holding out her right hand, the borrowed sneakers in her left.
Antoni swiveled at his hips and pointed at the wall clock. “You’re late.”
“Oh, am I?” Franny shook her head. “I’m so sorry. We’re still getting to know the island roads, I’m afraid.” Franny said this knowing full well that Mallorca had the most clearly marked highways she’d ever been on, gigantic signs with arrows and plenty of space. The royal we seemed to help her cause, as if she were blaming her lateness on some invisible chauffeur.
“We start now,” he said. “You need a racquet, yes?”
“Oh, shoot,” Franny said. Gemma had had a closet full of sporting equipment, of course. She was nothing if not healthy and industrious. There were probably cross-country skis hidden somewhere in the house, just in case the earth stopped spinning on its proper axis and the mountains were suddenly covered with powdery white snow. “It’s in the car!” She waved the sneakers at Antoni and then bolted out to the parking lot. “I’ll be right back!”
Franny laced up while Antoni waited, clearly irritated at the delay. What was three hundred euros a lesson? Franny chose not to do the math. It was a priceless experience she was giving herself, a gift that could not be bought at any other time or place. She double-knotted, trying to remember the last time she wore sneakers. Her best guess was sometime in 1995, when she was trying to get back into shape after Sylvia was born, doing Buns of Steel in the living room. “Ready.”
“Come,” Antoni said. He opened the door and waited for Franny to walk through it. She had to get so close to his body in order to pass, and she walked sideways, as slowly as possible, a happy little crab.
The courts seemed more crowded once she was on the other side of the fence. On television, they always looked so enormous, with these lithe young bodies scurrying around, but in reality a tennis court wasn’t very big. In fact, the courts were so close together that Franny worried she might hit balls into someone else’s game or, worse yet, into someone else’s face. Luckily, Antoni kept walking until they’d reached the final court in the row, which had a few courts’ cushion from their closest neighbors, a boy of about twelve and his coach.
“So, you know how to play?” Antoni spoke with a thick accent, his voice low and his tongue heavy.
“I watch everything,” she said, lying. “Even the small tournaments.” Franny tried to think of one to name, but couldn’t. “I have an excellent grasp of the rules.”
“And the last time you played?” Antoni reached into his pocket and pulled out a tennis ball. Franny wished that Charles had come along and was close enough to make a joke. It was strange, having this experience alone, when it would clearly (so clearly) become something that she would write about, a story she would codify into a moment on the page. There would be a witty and slightly naughty joke from her best friend, right there. Only he wasn’t. Franny could tell him all about it after, he would make the joke then, and after that, it was a matter of editing.
“Oh,” Franny said. “Ages ago. A decade?” One of the women in her detestable book club played tennis every week in Central Park, as spry and mean as a goose, and she and Franny had had a game one morning. The woman pelted her with ball after ball, always giggling afterward in faux apology. The bruises had lasted for weeks. “I’m not an athlete. I’m a writer. You know, there haven’t been very many good books about tennis. Do you ever think about writing a memoir? I have a lot of friends who have ghostwritten sports books. We should talk, if you’re interested.”
“Okay, we start easy,” Antoni said, ignoring her. He walked over to the far side of the net. “Ready?”
Before Franny knew it, Antoni had served a ball. She watched it land three feet ahead of her and laughed. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Did you want me to return that? It just seems so funny, actually playing with you.”
“This is not playing. This is practice. Warm-up.” He hit another ball, and Franny was surprised to find her feet moving and her racquet outstretched. She connected—the racquet smacked the ball back over the net, and Franny was so thrilled by her own sporty prowess that she jumped up and down, ignoring the fact that Antoni was, of course, going to hit the ball right back. He did, and the ball skidded by her, its bouncing path to the fence undisturbed. “Sorry, sorry,” Franny said. “I’m ready now. Sorry! I just didn’t know that that was going to happen. Ready.” She dropped into a half-squat like the players on television did, waving her hips back and forth.
Antoni nodded, his eyes hidden behind the reflective panes of his sunglasses. He arched backward, throwing a ball high into the air. Franny had watched him play for so many years, she knew the motion of his body. It wasn’t an OCD tic, like some of the younger players had (Nando Filani was notorious for turning his head to the side and coughing, which McEnroe always likened to a prostate exam). Antoni’s body moved purposefully, his shoulders as wide as a swimmer’s. He threw another ball up and hit it slowly, as gently as a mother to a child. Franny bounced from side to side, waiting to see where the ball would land, and then hurried toward it, getting the edge of her racquet underneath it just in time to send it back over the net. They volleyed lightly for a few more strokes before Franny missed a shot, and she panted happily, exhilarated.
“Not bad,” Antoni said. Franny wiped her forehead with her fingertips. “Let me see a serve.” He walked over to her side of the net, coming deliberately behind Franny. He slid his sunglasses down his nose and then crossed his arms. “Toss, then serve.”
Franny bounced the ball a couple of times and was relieved to find that it felt good in her hand, familiar. There had been a time when this was a normal function for her, and she willed all the atoms in her body to remember those days, standing outside in Brooklyn, the girls from her high school team all cackling and yelling. She threw the ball into the air and swung her racquet overhead. Franny heard a loud crack, and then she wobbled forward a few feet, and the next thing she knew, she was staring into Antoni Vert’s shadowy face, lying on her back in the middle of the tennis court. At last, he looked as delighted to see her as she was to see him.
Bobby and Carmen were out by the pool doing their exercises, and normally that would have made Lawrence do an about-face and sit in the bedroom reading for a couple of hours, but the day was too beautiful to stay indoors. He put on his hat and sunglasses and headed outside, a novel tucked under his arm.
“Hey,” Bobby said from the deep end of the pool. He was treading water in the most athletic way possible, bouncing up and down like a spring, the damp ends of his curls weighty and dark.
“Hey!” Carmen said, mid push-up. She dipped down halfway, stopped, and then went even closer to the ground before straightening her arms and rocketing back up to a plank position. Lawrence was impressed.