Page 100 of Best Year Ever
I sink down onto my bed, hurting for her. She definitely didn’t want one of her key warm-up tournaments for the U.S. Open to end so soon, frustrating her goal to play Tessa next too.
Not to mention, all of the surrounding circumstances must have contributed to her losing early. She’s probably pissed.
I notice in the score lines that Tessa won. They would have played each other in the next round. That’s gonna irritate Rori more. She missed her chance to take one back from Tessa.
After another three minutes, my phone comes back on. Several notifications come up at once, but there is only one set of texts that matters.
They are from an hour ago, after Rori’s match.
RORI: Landon, I don’t think this is going to work with us anymore. I’m so tired of the public drama. I think the heat from the press that we’ve both been dealing with has broken me.
RORI: On top of which, our schedules are crazy. We’ll hardly be able to see each other, and everything would have to miraculously stay a secret.
RORI: I just want to lock in on the U.S. Open. I’m sorry.
I sit there for at least twenty minutes, trying to figure out what to say.
All I can come up with is a one-word answer.
LANDON: Ok.
What the fuck just happened.
CHAPTER 37
Rori
Icollapse on my couch as soon as I get home from Canada.
Everything feels sowrong.
I lost a match yesterday that I should have won, ending my time in the tournament well before it could help me tune up for the U.S. Open and get one up on Tessa.
The press coverage is awful coming off the article and my loss.
Over the course of several conversations into this morning, Nina and Dad have persuaded Julie to un-resign or whatever. But not before she made it back to Florida—too late to help me in the match. Plus, she and I haven’t spoken directly since they brought her back from the brink, since I’ve been on my flight. So I’m not feeling settled about that yet.
And Landon. I freaked out and ended things with Landon yesterday.
I’d lied when I suggested to him that Dad thought we shouldn’t make the relationship public. The truth is that I’d told Dad how Landon and I had evolved into a relationship—the PG version—but it’d been all me who’d chosen to pull the plug on any announcement.
“Whatever you decide will be the right call,” is all my Dad had said, neutrally, in his typical supportive fashion.
Even after that decision, I couldn’t find a way out of my anxiety as the press scrutiny came to bear on all of us.
To be able to be there for each other fully, attend games and matches, Landon and I would need to go public. The thought of inviting more attention by sharing that we’re dating completely sent me over the edge.
And if we couldn’t be with each other in public, how could we be together at all?
All of this stewing in my mind, with Julie MIA and my head pounding with stress and fear about what would happen next, I lost my second round match.
And then after my loss, angry and overwhelmed, I burned down our situation entirely. Ended things completely with Landon.
Now, regret at my hasty texts to him is sinking in.
I just don’t know what to do about it. Nothing is going to change. Landon and I are going to be professional athletes in the public eye for years upon years.
My phone rings, breaking me out of my train of thought. It’s Taylor, who hadn’t come with us to Canada, instead triaging all the crises from her office in New York.
