Page 47 of Game Point
And in my desperation, I took my final shot.
‘If you go out now …’ There was no taking back my words once I said them. Knowing how much more they would hurt her.How much I was hurting her.‘If you go out now, like this, you will lose.’
There was a flash of hurt in her eyes, a physical wince at my words as if I’d injured her all over again.
I immediately regretted my words. I’d always believed in her. I backed her one hundred per cent. But I couldn’t support her if it meant letting her hurt herself like this.
‘Please, Oliver,’ she whispered my goddamn name, throwing me into a tailspin, making me feel like I’d been the one in the car crash. She murmured again, like she couldn’t bear to say the words any louder. ‘Just leave.’
I summoned the rest of my strength for one final ultimatum. ‘If I leave now, this friendship is over.’ I hated this. Wanted to scream. Wanted to punch my fist into a wall if only to feel something other than this weight of dread or the thought of never talking to her again. ‘I can’t watch you do this to yourself.’
Her words were a bitter pill I forced myself to swallow. ‘Then don’t watch.’
I took a good look at her, noting how she looked half the size of the Dylan Bailey I had known.
With one last look, it dawned on me Dylan meant entirely too much to me, that this friendship had grown too big for the thing it was supposed to be. I could notwatch somebody who meant this much to me keep hurting themselves. Not when it hurt me right back.
I left. Needing this pain in my chest to stop aching, to stop the heart she had healed from feeling like it was breaking all over again.
16
Dylan
Smile – Wolf Alice
Bailey vs Murphy
Final – Diamond Court
It was the final set. Chloe’s serve.
Only a few months ago, she was defeated in the first round of Wimbledon by Scottie Sinclair. At the US Open, she made it to the semis. Now, here she was in the final. I rewatched her match against Scottie last night. She’d played with a good arm, but lazy footwork. That performance that was leagues apart from how she had been in this competition.
Today, she was fighting back, unafraid to move forward from the baseline, constantly challenging me with a strong backhand. Today, she was a formidable opponent that left me thinking,what the fuck had happened to this girl in less than two months?
She served, the ball landing perfectly in the box, and I pulled my body into position, returning into open court. We rallied, her matching my intensity with no problem.
She’d taken me by surprise in the first set. I’d been dumb and had underestimated her. Chloe had been average at the start of the tournament, catching lucky breaks to make it to the quarter finals. It was there she showed a bit of resolve, a bite on the court.
And now she was in full swing, matching me blow for blow.
I’d fought back in the second set, fighting back for control of the match. And while I’d been successful, my body had punished me for it.
The crash had left me bruised, blotchy brown and purple marks already forming on my chest where the seat belt had cut in. No doubt it had saved me from further serious injury, but when I breathed too deeply, there was a sharp pain against my ribcage I knew meant business.
As I ran at full speed across the court, spiking the ball over the net to win the first point, the sharp jab in my chest begged the question.Maybe Oliver had been right.
0–15
I’d convinced myself that fifty per cent of the pain I was feeling was because of his words. The ultimatum he’d issued before I’d kicked him out. I didn’t need him. Didn’t need anyone around me who was going to try and stop me from winning. This pain was manageable.
So manageable, I’d walked away from a car crash.
So manageable, it only hurt when I breathed.
Chloe served again, but this time the ball was fast, somehow catching me unaware. I hit back, but she was the one to score the point. She didn’t crack a smile when she won. Not even when she did the same thing, over and over, using her speed to her advantage and my pain to my disadvantage. Before I knew it, the score was in her favour.
40–15
