When No One Was Looking (12 page)

Kathy walked straight through the unfamiliar Hazard Bay Racket Club grounds and found the beach. While jogging her two miles down the sand she also found a Californian to practice with whose name she instantly forgot.

As many as sixty times in a row Kathy and the girl from California slammed a ball back and forth across the net in the heavy dusk. There was still, for Kathy, an exquisite wonder to this ritual. It drained her of worries and of sadness. In this simple near-dance with a stranger she was consumed with joy in the execution of every perfect stroke. Her happiness, unfettered as a very young child’s, mounted until she was lost in it, grinning at her nameless partner, who grinned back from across the net.

No scores were posted, no tricks contemplated. The girl was an excellent player.
What a thing it is,
Kathy thought,
to be happy about that and not try to beat her.
She was aware that she loved the game best when hitting without hatred and without calculation. She also knew that this was not supposed to be so and that it was a pity she felt that way because that feeling would likely trip her up someday, as Marty had warned. Nonetheless, as the other girl returned a particularly difficult backhand with a yelp of pure ecstasy and Kathy returned that shot low and hard to exactly the same spot, catching the girl out of position and causing her to laugh out loud at herself, Kathy supposed that this exhilaration and unity with another person was found seldom, except by people in lifeboats and catchers on trapezes.

“Come,” said the California girl. “Come meet some of the kids. There’s a welcoming party tonight in the main clubhouse. Food and everything. Are you staying with a family or in the motel?”

Kathy followed the girl uneasily. She did not want to meet the kids. On the one hand she was frightened of so many strangers all of whom seemed to know each other. On the other hand she didn’t want to appear a silly, frightened loner. “Who’s your first round tomorrow?” the girl asked. Kathy answered the unfamiliar name, stumbling over it.

Oh, ho!” said the California girl. “Lucky you. You know she’s only ten? Playing up.”

“No, I’ve never heard of her.”

“Couple of issues back
Tennis World
did a piece on her and a bunch of other babies. She’s on the cover. I know her. She comes from Santa Monica. I think you can take her though. Keep away from her backhand. It’s like a cannon. Most of the kids hate her. She’s spoiled. Cries all the time when she loses. Little brat. Clothes all custom made with her initials on the collar. Copied straight from Tinley designs ... The girl turned and fixed her friendly slanted hazel eyes on Kathy’s dress. “Yours are made by hand too, though, aren’t they?” she asked.

“My mother ... likes to sew,” Kathy answered, feeling herself blush. Kathy owned six wash-and-wear tennis outfits made from store-bought patterns by her mother. The dresses fit her well and were quite pretty; however Kathy longed for a Bogner tennis dress or even a pleated heavy linen Fred Perry skirt. Those things were unaffordable by her family, and there was simply no chance of having them. It was enough that she wore out a pair of twenty-five-dollar sneakers every three weeks. As Kathy and the California girl neared the clubhouse she noticed the clothes of the other players who sauntered around. Each one looked like a model for one or another maker’s outfits. Suddenly she hated her plain white dress with the red and white gingham facing. The party would be twice as unnerving since Kathy felt as conspicuous as if she were dressed in black.

“We’ll shower,” said the girl. “Then we’ll go have a beer. I know some kids who’ve sneaked in a case of Coors.”

“No, thank you,” said Kathy, suddenly stopping short of the clubhouse. “I’m expecting a ride. It’s late. I have to wait out by the gate.”

“Well, see you around,” said the girl and waved.

A pair of high French doors opened into the central clubhouse, revealing to Kathy what lay inside. There was a fountain with revolving colored spotlights and four marble cupids. At the bottom of it coins winked and glittered. Lost wishes for tournaments past? There was a junior boys’ tournament going on somewhere nearby, and so the room was filled with boys and girls. They stood and talked in groups, not in a way, Kathy decided, she had ever stood in a group but in the easy way grown-ups did. Near the fountain stood a girl Kathy recognized immediately from pictures in tennis magazines. Johnson or Jackson was her name, nationally ranked about sixth in fourteen and under. A Black girl from Detroit, or was it Cleveland? She seemed to be looking for someone. Another highly ranked player, or another Black player? Kathy wondered, it never occurring to her that the girl might feel as lonely as she, because she was not only a good player but as beautiful and poised as a full-grown woman.

Kathy, keep your mouth closed when you smile, your braces reflect. Kathy, you walk like a boy,
said her hygiene teacher’s voice in her head, and silently Kathy stepped backward and walked away down the driveway, the crumbling stucco wall at her side under her fingertips. She reached the outer gates and stood by them in the shadow of a thick, squat palm until Jeffrey/Roger should come back for her.

Aunt Liz herself came for Kathy. Because Kathy could think of nothing else to say, she asked Aunt Liz to tell her the bullet story, which Aunt Liz was delighted to do, stretching the details out until the moment she pulled into the driveway and turned off the ignition, the air-conditioner, and the stereo, which had played some unenduring Broadway show tunes the whole of the trip.

Dinner was served by a butler, whose name Kathy did not catch, on the terrace beside the pool. The presence of Jeffrey and Roger, whom she could not yet tell apart, the butler, and Aunt Liz came between Kathy and Julia, and Julia seemed more a part of them than Kathy wished. Aunt Liz sat low in her leather-padded wrought-iron chair. Kathy’s eyes took in the whole of her, although she tried not to stare, and not to gobble all those unidentifiable things on her plate that lay under various sauces.

There was, to begin with, Aunt Liz’s turquoise-blue silk blouse and the deeply suntanned face, nearly as dark as a new penny. The gold choker had been replaced by pearls. In her conversation Aunt Liz made easy reference to past events and people, all unknown to Kathy but all apparently extremely important or amusing. This served to make Kathy feel desperately ignorant, and she looked across to Julia for support, but Julia’s eyes did not catch hers. Aunt Liz’s right hand bore two diamond rings, and it held and set down a wine glass without allowing the glass to make a circle on the tablecloth as Kathy’s glass had done six times so far. Each of Aunt Liz’s fingernails was a perfect oval containing a perfect white moon, and her hair moved in the slight breeze as if it had been orchestrated just so.

Kathy wondered how such a woman could ever have thrown a vase at Julia’s mother, since she was positive Aunt Liz was not the type ever to be angry, dirty, or even to go to the bathroom very often, if at all. A brief argument occurred about whether Kathy’s telephone call home should be made collect, which Kathy lost. As she excused herself to make the call Aunt Liz remarked that she was sorry to have forgotten to have steak that night but that she hoped it would not affect Kathy’s match the next day. It was Aunt Liz’s view that athletes ate only large amounts of steak and raw eggs.

The telephone rang ten times before Kathy remembered that her family was probably somewhere between Dedham and Plymouth, possibly still at the new nursing home with her grandmother. Evidently it had been a long day’s work. She could see Bobby’s head resting in Jody’s lap in a waiting room somewhere. The lounge at the Springfield home had been pleasant enough with comfortable overstuffed chairs and fresh flowers in crystal vases. Would this second home be all that much worse? Would it be dirty and dreary with plastic armless furniture like the bus-station waiting room in Boston? She remembered the salmon-colored plastic lounges there. They had stuck to the backs of her thighs one hot night.

“Marty!” said Kathy aloud before she dialed Marty’s number, as if to assure herself that she was going to call Marty. Her fingernail caught slightly in a beige silk sofa cushion, causing a run in the material. Kathy turned the pillow over and placed it at the far end of the sofa. As she dialed the number she had written on the side of her sneaker in case she lost it she stared straight into the face of an Inca dancer that had been assembled out of copper and brass pieces and stuck to the wall opposite her. He was very large and expressionless with only a suggestion of a face, as the metal bits, like small wings and shelves, were meant to be an abstract design. Kathy told Marty about the ten-year-old whose picture had been on the cover of
Tennis World.

“You know who she is, don’t you?” Marty asked.

“No.”

“Kathy, with one of the most famous last names in California tennis?”

“Oh, gee, I didn’t know there was another sister,” said Kathy.

“Well, there is, and she’s it, and you can take her,” said Marty, “even if she has been coached for nine and a half years and has played against her older sisters and brother, not to mention her old man, who’s the biggest coach in southern California. Keep in mind, she’s only ten. She won’t have much of a serve yet, so don’t hang back too much. She’ll have a fast return herself, since her brother and sisters will have served to her as hard as they can. I know these young superstar types. She’ll have learned to cover the whole court, so this is what you do. Are you listening?”

“Yes, Marty.”

“Don’t give her what she’s used to. Don’t play a base line game. She’ll wait for you to make an error in a long rally. Spin your serves, even your first serves. Dink her and lob her and get her off balance. Act like you’re having a ball doing it, smile, and you’ll drive her crazy and have her where you want her, mad as a hornet. Remember one thing.”

“Yes, Marty.”

“She won’t have much court sense yet, she’s too inexperienced. You have to play really mean to get court sense, and her sisters won’t have played that mean. Watch for signals. Since her father is her coach, he won’t do anything, but her mother may signal from the stands. She can’t stop herself. You’ll recognize her because she looks like Judy Garland after a bad night. If you see the little angel looking up at her mother or see a hand raised or anything, call the referee. Only if you’re sure. She’ll lose her concentration after that. Remember, little Miss Muffet’s old man has put about forty grand into each of his kids, and this one’s a spoiled brat. You play fair but mean and make her feel ten years old. It’ll mess up her game, and she’s got it coming. Who’s your second round?”

“Either the seventh seed or a girl named Foster from New Jersey.”

“It’ll be the seed. Where’s she from?”

“Port Washington.”

“Well, don’t let her ranking bother you. Just be a little hungrier and a little better than Miss Port Washington. She’s probably loaded. Most of those kids are. You know Angie McKenzie, the sixteen-year-old whiz, at Wimbledon this year? She’s a Port Washington special too. Her last tournament she was playing one of the older pros. Someone in her thirties. Anyway, McKenzie started off the match with a rally of a hundred and thirty shots from the base line before one of them netted a ball. She completely exhausted the other player. Nearly gave her a heat stroke. I want you to know what some of the girls do. There’s no way you can lose to this girl if you use your head and play your own game. Don’t get mad and don’t get scared. Remember that dummy who almost beat you at Quincy ...

“Marty, please. The girl drowned ...

“That hardly makes her a saint, my dear, or a good player. Just keep certain things in the forefront of your decent little Christian mind. Tennis is full of smarties like Angie McKenzie who’ll do anything to win. You have a reputation preceding you for blowing your stack, and I want that reputation killed right now in this tournament. If you get a bad call, stare straight ahead. If you double fault three times, follow it up with three aces. I want you to go into every match as cool as ice inside. You do that, and Miss Port Washington is going to think a snake bit her after the first set. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Marty.”

“Tell me what you understand.”

“I’ve got to control my temper.”

“If you do, you’ll be a leg up on every opponent. Believe me they’ll all have a couple of notes about your famous thin skin. They’ll try to get to you. Make it a waste of time. Did you do your two miles?”

“Yup, and it’s about a hundred and ninety degrees here.”

“Don’t eat much breakfast. Go into both matches knowing you’re going to egg both girls. Just remember they’ve both had every advantage that you haven’t. Their parents are rolling. They have private courts at home. Private lessons at the age of four. Girls like that are trained like racehorses. Born with a silver spoon, Kathy, full of caviar. Grandma puts a grand in the savings bank every birthday, and they leave a gut-strung racket out in the rain and Daddy buys them another one. Are you there?”

“Yes, Marty. I’m listening.”

“Good. Call me tomorrow night same time. I know people down there. They’ll be watching you.”

Kathy said good-bye and rubbed her ear as if Marty’s words were still lodged in it. Trying her own number again, she gazed at Aunt Liz’s living room as the distant telephone rang unanswered. She definitely could not recall ever having been in a room as clean as this in all her fourteen years of being in various rooms. She hung up the telephone and, checking to make sure she was unobserved, stepped cautiously around, going first to the copper and brass Indian, or so he seemed to be. She looked closely at the gleaming pieces of metal and decided that if such a thing were to be in her own living room, she would have placed tiny objects on each of the shelflike precipices. Perhaps pebbles or coins. The pure white carpet was as soft as down and as deep as the second knuckle on her finger. This was not a room in which a somersault had ever been turned, a dog had ever lifted a leg, or a piece of pizza had landed cheese side down—
And you’d better get out of it before anything happens,
Kathy advised herself. She opened the sliding glass door and between two whispering palms stepped out into the night.