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By the time Tashi told Art she was leaving Stanford to rehab her injury and start training for the pro tour, he’d already heard it twice, from other people.
First, it was his coach. Late on a Sunday afternoon, the last hours of Art's precious weekend were leaking away, but Coach Petrovic believed in one-on-one meetings, even when there wasn't much to meet about. Art was playing well -- he hadn’t dropped a set since Tashi got hurt a month ago -- but Petro always managed to find some area of concern.
He hoped Art was aware smoking anything, yes even tobacco, was against team rules and if the coaching staff heard anything about any players doing it, no matter where they were on the depth chart, team rules were team rules (who was the snitch? Art wondered and anyway he hadn’t touched a cigarette since the last time Patrick was on campus so he could honestly, earnestly promise there was nothing to worry about.) Tutoring schedules needed to be approved by the athletic department and verified on a weekly basis (yes, he’d switched math tutors in the middle of last semester because there seemed to be a potential dating situation, but the new tutor was working fine, meaning she agreed Art didn’t really need help with math, so she mostly played video games while Art did his homework. He'd better check that she'd been submitting the timesheets.)
“And of course,” Petro said, “I understand right now girl trouble feels like the most important thing in the world --”
“Girl trouble?” Art laughed uneasily. The situation with the first tutor had fizzled over winter break and he’d been too busy to pursue anything outside the most casual drunk makeout, especially when there was the Tashi situation to worry about. He’d been there every day to talk Tashi through her rehab and as soon as she needed someone to practice with, he’d be there too, but there wasn’t, there couldn’t be, they hadn’t by any means worked their way up to anything. . . "Seriously, sir, I should be so lucky to have girl trouble.” He hoped his smile hit the right self-deprecating note. Patrick had an endless collection of smiles for dealing with authority figures, and Art had spent a lifetime studying them. Not that Patrick had much use for “self-deprecating.” Not that Art was talking to Patrick anymore.
Coach frowned. “I thought you and the Duncan girl. . .?”
Art had a sinking feeling this was what the meeting had been about. “Tashi’s a friend. I know I’ve been spending some time with her since the injury but -- ” But he could do that for a friend. And he was winning. He couldn't think what he'd done wrong.. “It’s obviously not hurting my game.”
“Still. It might be just as well she's leaving." What? "Don’t let Coach Laura know I said this, but that girl's got to do what’s best for her own career. That injury gave her a reality check about what she could have lost. There’s no point in wasting good resources on someone who isn’t committed to playing for the school.”
“Tashi’s not going anywhere." He'd had this conversation with Tashi -- yesterday? Two days ago? "She's making great progress with rehab. She'll be at one hundred percent for the fall season."
“Guess I misunderstood.” Petro did not look like he thought he'd misunderstood.
Art managed to get out of the meeting quickly after that, and he was looking at his Blackberry before he left the room. He saw the name "Duncan," two missed calls and a text that said, “Do you have a minute?” Okay, good. She'd been reaching out to him. Just bad timing. But the number wasn’t right, and he was starting to figure it out when the phone rang again.
“Artie, hey. It's Bobby Duncan. What is this nonsense about my daughter dropping out of school?”
***
Art had always been the kind of guy parents liked, which was a blessing and a curse. Twenty percent blessing to eighty percent curse, maybe. He’d met the whole Duncan family twice, and been blessed with career advice and the promise of connection to the right agent and marketing reps when he was ready. The Duncans absolutely knew what they were doing about their daughter’s career. They were good connections to have. The conversation would have been less stressful if he hadn’t been thinking oh God oh God if they knew the night I met her I gave their daughter beer and invited her to a shitty hotel room -- technically Patrick invited her but there was no way that part made the story better . . .
That was the curse part. Also, as Patrick would put it -- “Your dad thinks he can trust me to check on you” was not really the thing that got girls' panties wet.
As soon as he got off the phone with Mr. Duncan, Art called Tashi. She didn’t pick up. He sent a text, “You around?” He wasn't going to sit there waiting for an answer, so he headed to her dorm. On the way, he stopped at Jamba Juice and got two of the green smoothies she always ordered. He'd tell her they’d made an extra by accident, and they'd sit in her room and talk. She'd bring up the subject naturally. He could listen and give her the best arguments for staying.
But why? It wasn't Art's job to do what Tashi's parents wanted. The idea of being here without her tugged at his heart, but what was the plan? If Tashi hated being at Stanford, would it do any good for Art to sit there absorbing the hate until the day she magically saw the light and realized she wanted him? That was what Patrick had accused him of doing, in tennis and life: playing the percentages; waiting passively to vulture everyone else’s screwups.
Fuck that. If Tashi really was leaving, this was the time to put it out there. He wanted to kiss her. Could he just say he wanted to kiss her? He wanted to do more than kiss her. This wouldn't be news to Tashi. He’d been afraid of screwing things up with their uneasy friendship but if she was leaving anyway. . .
***
Someone had used a rock to prop open the lobby door to Tashi’s dorm, probably so they could get back in without a key card. Art waffled between “Shut it for security” and “Don’t be such a fucking narc.” The phone call from Mr. Duncan had left him feeling narky enough; he left the rock in place.
Art's hands were full of Jamba Juice, so, when he got to her room, he had to knock on the door with his elbow.
Tashi's voice carried from inside: “Let yourself in, you fucking loser!” Art started, then realized she couldn't mean him. He thought,Maybe if you didn’t always talk to your teammates like that, I wouldn’t be the only one who ever checked on you..
“I hope that doesn’t mean me?” He shifted the cups to free his hands and opened the door.
“Uggh, I thought you were --.” Tashi crashed back onto her bed and covered her eyes. Then she peeked out. “Aww, you brought me Jamba Juice.”
“Thought you might be –”
“Too crippled to walk across the quad?”
“I was gonna say thirsty.” Art couldn’t remember why he’d thought he ought to make up a story about why he’d come to see her. He held out the cup. She sat up and, when Art went for her desk chair, pointed to a space beside her on the bed. Not too close to her; not like the night in Flushing, but the same motion.
He sat. “Was there something you were going to tell me?”
“Oh.” Tashi took a sip of her smoothie. Art tried not to get distracted by her mouth around the straw. Maybe that’s why it took him an extra second to process her answer. “I didn’t invite him, he just showed up.”
Then his eyes settled on a familiar Wilson racket bag in the corner of her room. Fuck. He should have known. “You’re quitting school because of Patrick?”
“Who’s quitting?” And there was Patrick; the fucking loser had let himself in.
***
Art hadn’t talked to Patrick Zweig in a month.
It was simple at first. Tashi was mad, and so Art was mad. He knew she and Patrick had fought, but he never asked about what or who started it. He just knew Patrick skipped her match and so it was Art who sat with her in the ambulance and then the emergency clinic. She clutched both hands around her knees and rocked in pain, and when Patrick stepped into the doorway, she yelled, “Get out!” and when he didn’t listen, Art yelled the same thing, yelled it louder, and then Patrick got out. The only thing Art knew, then, was that Tashi, who he loved, was hurt, and Tashi, who he loved, was sad. Tashi already knew Art loved her, and he needed her to know he wouldn’t make her sad.
Patrick called three times that night. Art didn’t pick up. Patrick texted, “I need to talk to you” and “At least tell me how she is” and “Seriously?” The next morning, Patrick texted a link to an article about Nadal's training methods ("Hardcore!"), and another to a South Park clip (“My sister didn’t get this joke!”) The same shit he would have texted last week. Art replied, “Don’t act like nothing’s changed,” then put his phone on mute. He lasted the length of a morning practice and half a psych lecture before he checked his texts. He expected to have a dozen increasingly desperate messages. He just saw one. "Fine. Fuck you too."
A few days later, Art worked up the nerve to mention Patrick’s name. “Piece of shit,” Tashi said, and that was all Art needed to know.
Except now, Patrick was walking into Tashi’s dorm room, with a pizza box in one hand and a two-liter of Coke tucked under his arm. “Look sharp, Donaldson.” Patrick tossed a white paper bag in Art’s direction.
Art stood up to catch it, then swore because it burned his hand. “Aren’t you supposed to be in Indian Wells, losing to a 38-year-old?”
“Did that yesterday.” Patrick spoke like getting a spot in the biggest American tournament outside the US Open, and blowing his chance, were equally unexciting to him. But then he smiled in the way that made it clear he was pissed off, and that was the Patrick that Art knew.
“You sure did.” Tashi said. “We need to talk about what the hell happened there.”
She took the pizza, opened it on her bed where Art had been sitting a moment ago, and folded a piece in her hand. Patrick straddled Tashi's desk chair and rolled away from the bed. He reached back to Art without looking at him and demanded, “Cheesy bread.” Art opened the steaming bag and took a piece for himself, then handed the bag over.
"There's not much to talk about." Patrick stretched his arms over Tashi to take a slice of pizza. "I lost. I don’t have anything to do this week so I came here.”
"Shouldn't you have taken the chance to stay around and practice?" Art asked. "At least wait to see if someone drops out and a spot opens up in the draw."
"I wanted to check on Tashi," Patrick said, wounded.
"I didn't invite him," Tashi said for the second time. "He just showed up."
“You could visit me some time too," Art mumbled.
Patrick spun the chair around and jabbed his finger at Art. "You told me to get the fuck out!”
“So did she!”
Tashi sighed. “It’s not that complicated. Patrick didn’t call you because he’s not trying to fuck you.”
“It’s true,” Patrick said, and if his hurt had been genuine before, now he was plastering it on. “I never try to fuck Art anymore. He always says no.”’
“Funny,” said Art, to make clear he knew it was a joke. Art remembered the taste of Patrick's mouth as well as he remembered Tashi's. He could close his eyes and summon the urgency of their bodies in that stuffy hotel room, the reek of cigarettes and the frantic staticky music from a distant radio, but it had all been a joke.
“Don’t worry,” said Tashi. “He would have gone over to your dorm and tried to sleep on the floor after I kicked you out.”
“Were you gonna kick me out?” Patrick's real sense of grievance peeked out from behind the playacting again.
Tashi shrugged. "You haven't exactly made a case for keeping you around."
“That's me. Totally useless. Are you really dropping out of school?”
Tashi let out a deep breath. “As long as you’re both here. It’s not like I talk to anyone else anymore. My parents are freaking out, but I’ve checked with the bursar and my advisor and the athletic department. At this point in the semester, I can take incompletes across the Board and we won’t owe anything against the scholarship. I came here because I wanted to learn. What I learned is we’re all one wrong step away from fucking up our careers.” Patrick’s phone buzzed, but he ignored it. "I can rehab this knee in six months but one inch in either direction and I might never have played again. I’d be done with tennis and lose my chance at the pro tour and for what? The shot at a banner on the gym wall that nobody cares about and a few credits toward a degree I could finish any time.”
“Now you do sound like Patrick,” Art said. “I guess I’m wasting my time in college, too.”
“No, you’re not. You’re growing your game in college. Patrick’s wasting his time on tour because he's not even trying to learn anything.”
“I played Indian Wells yesterday!”
“You lost Indian Wells yesterday. Your second serve was a fucking embarrassment. You won’t keep getting America’s-special-est-boy wild cards forever, just because you won one junior tournament in 2006. You have to actually win on the tour, or you'll be stuck playing challengers forever.”
Patrick's phone buzzed again, and this time he looked at it. “Fuck, it’s my coach. I have to get this.”
When Patrick went into the hallway, Art turned back to Tashi and tried to make his voice gentle. “Forget what I said. Forget whatever’s going on with Patrick. Everybody just wants you to make the choices that are best for you.” Art didn't want her to go away now. If she went away he was sure he'd never see her again. He wanted to kiss her, but he didn't know how to say that now. Not with Patrick here. Not with the reminder that Patrick had always been part of this.
“Who’s everybody? Coach Laura agrees with me. My teammates barely tolerated me in the first place. At this point they fucking hate me, and they don't even try to hide it.”
If Art was supposed to contradict this, he didn't bother. “Your family, then.”
“My family? Why do you -- My dad fucking called you, didn't he?”
“It’s not like I told him to.”
“Bullshit. You absolutely did.” The imitation she did next, of Art’s voice and mannerisms, was meaner than it really had to be. “Sure, Mr. Duncan, absolutely, Mr. Duncan, whatever’s best for your daughter, Mr. Duncan, I’ll be right here while she’s rehabbing, Mr. Duncan, if you want anybody to drop in on her pretending she asked for a Jamba Juice, Mr. Duncan.”
“Excuse me for giving a shit. If you didn’t scare most people off, then I wouldn’t be the only one left who--”
Patrick made a sort of screaming grunt, and bounded back into the room. He had his phone covered with one hand, then lifted it and pointed before moving it back to his ear. “Yes, yes, that sounds -- eleven, yeah. I'm absolutely good playing Carlos Moyá tomorrow at eleven -- No, I checked out after -- Can you make sure I have a room? -- Thank you thank you. Where am I now? San Diego. A thing came up in San Diego. A couple hours drive. I can check back in tonight. Do you think my friends could get passes? . . . Two friends. One of them might be able to warm up with me. He plays for Stanford -- Perfect. See you -- seven in the morning?” He looked at his watch. “Could we do eight? Just to catch up with sleep. I know I know. Thank you thank you thank you.” He flipped the phone shut. “Some Chilean dropped out, so guess who’s playing Carlos Moyá in -- twelve, fifteen -- sixteen hours."
Tashi frowned “You think you’re ready for that?”
“He hasn’t been world number one for ten years now. How hard could it be?”
“Seven years,” said Tashi. "Also you’re not in San Diego, which is two hours on the other side of Indian Wells from where we are, which is eight hours from Indian Wells."
“I wasn’t supposed to leave town. I was supposed to stick around in case -- in case this happened. But I didn’t feel like it, so I left and --” He shrugged. “San Diego sounded less egregious.”
“In other words," Tashi said, "It was the best lie that came into your head. But yeah, you’d better believe I'm coming with you. Anna Muller’s playing Azarenka tomorrow, and I'm gonna sit there and wave while Vika kicks her ass.” Everything forgiven for a free visit to tennis paradise, apparently, and what did Tashi care? She was quitting school and couldn’t get out of there fast enough.
Art drew in a breath. “As I’m sure you both know, I have practice tomorrow. And class. And tutoring. I just got yelled at about how I need to go tutoring.”
“Jesus," Patrick said. "You're sleeping with your tutor and you can't get her to lie for you?"
“Emilia??” Tashi’s eyes got big. “I thought you broke up.”
“We did. And she wasn’t my tutor anymore when we --”
“Is she hot?” Patrick interrupted, but he directed the question to Tashi.
She shrugged. “If you like ‘em tiny and mean.”
Patrick cackled. “He sure does. Average height of a Donaldson love interest --” He held his hand to the middle of Art’s upper arm, touching him casually as he did. “You broke the mold, Tashi."
Art pulled his arm away.
"Broke the mold because I'm so nice?" Tashi asked.
"Because you're freakishly tall. Not that you two ever --” Patrick left the innuendo hanging in the air, which was monstrously unfair. He knew Tashi and Art had kissed. He had been there.
Art grabbed the rest of the cheesy bread and what was left of his smoothie. “I can't go anywhere. You two get in Patrick’s car and if you ever come back to town, call me if you feel like it.”
“Right,” Patrick said. “There’s just one thing."
***
Patrick didn’t have his car. He had left it in long-term parking at the Palm Springs airport, booked a one-way flight to San Francisco, and taken Caltrain into Palo Alto. None of them were old enough to rent a car; Tashi couldn’t drive until her knee got better so she had lent her SUV to a cousin who really did live in San Diego. Art’s Jeep belonged to his father, and Patrick was specifically banned from driving it since what was known as “the Everglades incident.” In order to get a flight back to Palm Springs tonight out of Oakland, SFO, or San José, Patrick should have left forty minutes ago. He was working on an elaborate plan where he could get to LAX and then maybe Amtrak, or one of his sometime hitting partners could pick him up, of course it wouldn’t be as fun as going with Art and Tashi, and it was possible he wouldn't make it on time and then Patrick's coach would probably dump him and instead of playing a match against a former world number one, his career would basically be over and he knew Art was mad at him but did he really want Patrick's future to be totally ruined just because . . .by then, it was time for Art to sigh and say, fine.
They loaded up Art’s Jeep and got on the road around 7:30. Art filled a bottle with Patrick’s semi-warm Coke, which should keep him awake (right?) for the (seven? eight?) hour drive. Art claimed he would take a quick nap in Patrick’s hotel and drive back in time for afternoon practice and most of his classes, but nobody believed him. He didn’t believe himself. He’d text Coach Petrovic in the morning and say ‘so sorry this came up at the last minute, my friend the reigning junior US Open champion asked me to practice with him at the best tennis venue on the West Coast,” and Coach would tell him to be sure and wear Stanford gear, it looked good for the program, they’d work things out with his academic support team if he had to make up a class. The only person mad at Art for going on this trip would be Art, because he still hadn’t figured out how to say no to Patrick Zweig.
Tashi claimed shotgun -- “Lie down on the backseat, Patrick, you need some sleep.” When they got out of town and merged onto the 101, the last neon pink rays of a California sunset sent tendrils over the foothills. Tashi cracked a window. The breeze hit just right, and Art remembered why he’d fallen in love with this part of the country. It was a road trip with friends -- something to remember. It was supposed to be fun. Tashi plugged Art’s iPod into the speakers.
“No emo!” Patrick protested.
“The Killers aren’t emo,” said Art, at the same time Tashi said, “There’s nothing wrong with emo!” She cranked up the volume and shared a pleased smile with Art. Patrick groaned in the backseat, but he lay down, while Art and Tashi sang together (intermittently, mumbling the words they didn’t know, holding the long notes -- “I know if destiny's kiiiiind, I've got the rest on my miiiiiind.”) Art didn’t really know what counted as emo; he’d never understood the point of having loud arguments about that kind of thing. He liked the churning pulse of the guitars, and he liked driving a little too fast and feeling in sync with Tashi.
Traffic slowed down as they got near San José. Tashi peeked in the back seat, then turned the music down to a low murmur. “He’s actually sleeping,” she said, then with a long-suffering sigh. “What a fucking idiot.”
Art let that hang in the silence for a second, before he decided he didn’t care if Patrick could hear them or not. “You’re definitely not getting back together.” He wanted it to sound more like a fact than a question, but he wasn’t sure it worked.
“That has nothing to do with whether he’s an idiot,” she said, which wasn’t exactly an answer. “You’ve been friends since you were kids, you must have noticed him being an idiot before.”
“I’m not sure we’re still friends.”
“Would you be in this car if you weren’t?”
“See, that’s a classic Patrick Zweig psy-op. We’re doing something friends would do so we must be friends.”
This got a little laugh out of Tashi, but she didn't say anything else about Patrick. After they rode quietly for a while, she asked, “What happened with you and Emilia?”
“Does everybody know about this?”
“She tutors for the whole athletic department. We’ve met.” She started to turn sideways to see him better, then flinched and touched her knee.
“Why did you call her mean?” He didn’t like Tashi’s silence. Maybe she had been, a little, at the end, but why would Tashi know? “Did she say something?”
“I just wondered what happened.”
“We were -- we were together for a while. It didn’t work out.”
“Together together.”
“Yeah. Sure. Together.”
“It’s funny.” Tashi let a small laugh out again. “It’s funny you’re scared of me knowing you’ve had sex. I’d known you five minutes when you and Patrick were telling mutual masturbation stories --”
“Okay, that’s not what mutual masturbation means -- as I made very clear, we didn’t -- we were on opposite sides of the room.” He was trying to make it funny, like everything that had happened in that hotel room was a big joke. This wasn’t the road Art was ready to go down, or it must not have, because he blurted out. “She didn’t like me, all right? And it wasn’t about -- the sex was fine. I think?” Emilia wasn’t his first, but it was the first time he’d started to feel like he knew what he was doing the whole time.
“You mean she wasn’t in love with you.” Art almost flinched when she said that, but he had given her the ammunition that day in the cafeteria. “Were you in love with her?”
“Sometimes. I don’t know. I said I was.” He’d said it while he was inside her, in the guest bedroom at her parents’ house in Sacramento. She hadn't said it back to him, and he'd kept away from the whole subject after that. He probably hadn't meant it anyway. How could he? He loved Tashi. “That wasn’t why we broke up.” Art tapped the steering wheel. “She didn’t think I was very interesting.”
“That bitch!” Tashi yelled, but she sounded like she’d won something -- not a tennis match but a bet or a card game or a lottery scratch off in a small denomination.
Patrick sat up in the backseat. “What are we yelling about?”
“Art’s bitch ex-girlfriend.”
“The tutor?” he said, then to Tashi, aggrieved, “He didn’t even tell me they broke up.”
“It wasn’t your business,” Art shot back.
“He used to tell me everything,” Patrick complained at Tashi. He had, of course. Patrick used to tell Art everything too, before Tashi came into the picture.
“Yeah, I wonder what changed,” Art said, and this actually shut Patrick up for a second. It shut them all up, and Art discovered he didn’t want to ride in the silence. He had, at least, both of their attention. “When she -- when we broke up, she told me she had wanted to try being with an athlete, you know, for the experience, but after a while she felt like I didn’t do much -- I didn’t have much going on. Outside of tennis.”
“The fucking nerve, right!?” Tashi twisted around and leaned into the back seat to say this to Patrick. “That woman has no respect for what we do. The discipline, the intelligence, the skill it takes to play tennis at this level? The work we put in. We don’t have time to join the glee club or go to film festivals.”
Art had, actually, dropped his sports management elective and signed up for World Cinema instead, hoping that made an impression on Emilia. She’d dumped him anyway, and now he had to avoid sitting with her during screenings. He was enjoying the class much more than he expected, but so far he hadn’t found anybody else who wanted to talk about the Czech New Wave.
“It sounds like you’re taking this a little bit personally,” said Patrick.
“It is personal.” Tashi kept looking at Patrick, but she put her hand on Art’s shoulder now. He let himself enjoy it.
He was even ready to defend Em a little bit. “It’s not like she doesn’t work hard. She’s on scholarship, and she still washes dishes at her parents’ restaurant during breaks. That’s why she’s serious about getting her finance degree and --”
“Finance!” Patrick said.
“Right?" said Tashi. "She thinks we’re not doing anything worthwhile, and she wants go work for Morgan Stanley and get rich scamming poor people into mortgages they’re not going to be able to pay when the bubble pops.”
Art’s parents had both worked at Morgan Stanley when they met, then left to help run his great-uncle’s hedge fund. Patrick and Tashi knew this, but if they didn’t remember, he wouldn’t bring it up. The two of them started arguing (or loudly agreeing?) about a business story Patrick had heard on NPR. Art thought again that maybe he did need to know more about the world outside tennis, but even when he couldn't follow it, he liked the sound of the two of them talking to each other.
Patrick slapped Art on the shoulder. “We need to get back to how our girl wanted to fuck an athlete for the experience?”
“I don't know what she was talking about." Art kind of did, though, and he wished he hadn’t brought it up. Most of the boys he’d been around in the important years were tennis players; all of the girls he’d hooked up with were tennis players who had mostly hooked up with other tennis players. He didn't know how to feel when Em kept touching him and saying, Jesus Christ, your body. Art's body was a flawed instrument, it was the thing he fought against more than he fought the other players, more than hecklers in the crowd.
“I know what she meant.” Patrick slid his hand down from Art’s shoulder and pressed a palm against his chest muscle. Putting a rumble in his voice, Patrick said, “Mr. Donaldson, have you been working out?”
“Jesus, Patrick, I’m trying to drive!” Art tried to shake his hand off, but Patrick didn’t listen. His arm crossed Art’s body, close to his face, and Art did what he had to do.
Patrick absolutely shrieked. “He fucking bit me!”
“You deserved it!” Tashi snapped. “You could have got us killed,” though the car had barely swerved. Art was a good steady driver.
Patrick kept convulsing with laughter. “I can’t believe you fucking bit me. I’m gonna be at the trainer tomorrow, and he’s going to ask what happened and I’ll have to tell him. Donaldson is an absolute cannibal. It’s not the first time either, back in ninth grade we were supposed to be wrestling and –”
“Shut. Up. Patrick!”
Art watched Patrick’s shrug in the rear view mirror. What? Who? Little old me? “All I was saying –This is a proud moment, buddy. You’ve made it. You’re getting girls who are in it just for your hot body. Congrats, man, that’s a milestone.”
Patrick wouldn't get it. Patrick loved the body he lived in and always had. He liked touching and flexing, showing off in photos and lounging around with his dick out. “Not really,” Art said.
“Not at all,” Tashi snapped in Patrick's direction, and that finally shut him up. He lay down in the seat.
After they drove a while in silence, Tashi touched the back of Art’s hand. “Don’t let shitty people get in your head. You deserve better.”
“You mean Emilia?”
“Sure.” Her fingers lingered over his skin for a few precious seconds, and then she turned the music up again. The playlist had cycled back around to the Killers' song. My lips they don't kiss they don't kiss the way they used to and my eyes don't recognize you no mooooore. This time they didn't sing along.
***
The most direct route to Indian Wells went through Pasadena, a massive freeway that skirted the busiest part of L.A. Art’s mom used to go to L.A. sometimes for work, and she’d told horror stories about the state of the Southern California freeways, day or night. He messed with the GPS and came up with a route through Barstow. He guessed they'd be able to zip through and make good time even if the route was longer.
They stopped for gas outside Bakersfield around midnight, and Art didn’t even have to stare at Patrick very long before he pulled out a credit card to pay. “I can expense it.”
"Okay, Big Spender," said Tashi.
“It's legit. I’m driving to work.”
“Art’s driving you to work! You should be paying him.”
“I’m happy to drive,” Patrick answered. “I’d be too on edge to sleep tonight anyway.”
“Just buy me a Red Bull," Art said. "I drank all your warm Coke.” It was that or re-litigate the Everglades incident.
Patrick bought a six pack of Red Bull, four stale donuts (all for him) and three plastic wrapped hard boiled eggs (all for Art). Tashi bought her own protein bar and yogurt smoothie. She took over the back seat to stretch out her knee, leaving Patrick with shotgun. Once they got on the road, they ended up sharing dueling narratives about the Everglades anyway. Real Rashomon energy, Art thought – thanks, World Cinema – but saying it out loud would have been pretentious.
Patrick tried to switch the Killers out for Linkin Park, but Tashi vetoed them both, plugged her ipod in, and put on Rihanna. She sank into the backseat, and Patrick settled down as well. Art drove for a long time, alone with his thoughts. Never his favorite thing. He had time to turn over what he'd told them about his breakup. Maybe he ought to regret oversharing, but their reactions were oddly comforting. So many nights he'd crashed facedown on his dorm room bed and confessed some romantic fuckup to Patrick. The exciting stuff, too, the fun stuff, and Tashi was right that they'd known her for an hour and started telling the same kind of stories to her. It hadn't scared her off; she'd asked them both to come to her. She'd kissed them both and they -- In a way, that was the last time everything felt right to Art. When Patrick and Tashi went off on their own, everything felt broken. He wanted to heal it, but he couldn't imagine a way for them all to heal together. So he'd tried to break things and put them back in another configuration. Send Patrick away; put Art and Tashi together. It felt like the only way at the time, yet things felt better now with the three of them together. That couldn't be the answer (why?) (don't be stupid, things don't work that way).
He ought to say something to Patrick. He looked at the GPS and decided to wait until they had exactly one hour until their destination. That would be enough time to talk through whatever they needed to, then cool down, so it wouldn't be unbearable for the three of them to have to crash together in one hotel room.
One minute before Art was -- he swore -- going to say something, Patrick stirred. “You could have called me anytime,” he said.
Tashi seemed to be asleep in the backseat. Probably.
“We don’t have to do this,” Art said.
“We don’t have to do anything. We’re adults. You didn’t have to call me, but you could have. You didn’t have to drive me tonight --”
“Really, because you made it sound like I’d be single-handedly responsible for ruining your career if I didn’t.”
“Oh right right. I forgot I psy-oped you. You’re one to talk, Mr. ‘I didn’t get the impression she was thinking of it as a serious relationship.’”
Yes. That. Well, whatever Art might be guilty of, he was sure he didn’t deserve Tashi and Patrick doing impressions of him in the past twelve hours. “Tashi’s me was better,” he mumbled.
“You’re the psy-op king,” Patrick said. “Since forever. I have to be like this to keep up with you.”
“What happened to ‘we’re adults we don’t have to do anything’?”
“Exactly!” Like he’d never contradicted himself. “If you cared so much about going to practice and class and tutoring -- “ Patrick drew the word out suggestively, the only man in the world who could make ‘tutoring’ sound dirty -- “If you cared so much, if you really wanted me out of your life, you would have run off and left me. Again.”
“Left you alone with Tashi?”
“Tashi’s also an adult. Jesus. Stop acting like we cheated on you. Have you even made a move on her?"
“She’s hurt!”
Patrick laughed, started to say something, stopped, then decided to say it anyway. “You came closer to fucking me that night than you’ve ever gotten with her.”
“I did not! I --I --”
“Sprinted to the bathroom so you could jerk off.”
“You --!” He stopped himself from saying ‘slapped me in the dick.’ “You jerked off in the bed and then called Melissa.”
“Oh yeah.” Patrick laughed appreciatively at his past self. He didn’t bother protesting that he’d broken up with his girlfriend before he and Tashi did anything; he’d tried that before, and the timeline never made sense. “It’s weird --” Patrick looked back at Tashi, who hadn’t stirred. “It wasn’t just us and her. It was you and me, and you act like that part of it never happened.”
“ I act like. . .? If I actually gave a shit about -- about that part. If I did -- you think it would make it better for you to abandon me ?”
“Abandon you?” Patrick yelped, and Art was about to tell him to stop yelling he was going to wake up Tashi --
-- when the right side of the car let out a loud thump, then a thwack thwack thwack as everything shook. Art jerked the wheel to the right, but then his instincts took over, and he guided the car more carefully onto the (fortunately) wide and flat shoulder of the road. Patrick, helpfully, yelled, “What the fuck?” the whole time, and jumped out his door before the car had fully stopped.
“Did we hit something?” Tashi still sounded half asleep in the back seat.
“I”m not sure, I --” Art tried to keep his breath under control.
Patrick stuck his head back into the passenger door and said, “Flat tire.”
“Fuck.” Art looked out to the highway. It was two in the morning, and thanks to his detour, there were no lights in either direction. He reached for his phone.
“Do you have Triple A?” Patrick asked. “If you don’t have it, I think you can just give them a credit card number over the phone and they’ll send somebody.”
“What happened to you paying all the travel expenses? Anyway I don’t have a signal.” Art shook his Blackberry, like that would help.
“Triple A would take forever." Patrick went for his phone. "Maybe there's somebody in Indian Wells who could pick us up.”
“Or you could just change the tire.” They both looked back at Tashi. “You’ve got a spare, right? I know you have a spare. This is a Jeep, you’ve got a fucking spare on the back.” When neither of them answered, she groaned. “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me. You’re telling me you got your license, your parents let you drive that car to California -- hell, they let you leave the house and you didn’t have to get on your knees and show them that you could change a tire?”
“It never came up,” Art admitted.
“I definitely could,” said Patrick.
“Somehow, Patrick, your confidence is even scarier than Art’s learned helplessness. I feel like we’ve all discovered something important about each other’s childhoods tonight, but if we actually want to get Patrick to his hotel before the sun comes up --”
“You’re gonna change the tire with a busted leg?” Patrick sounded impressed.
“No.” Tashi sounded like she was talking to a couple of particularly dense preschoolers.
Art sighed. “She means she’s going to tell us what to do.”
“That’s right. And you’re going to fucking do it.”
To Art’s relief, the spare tire did seem to be functional. After some digging around, he and Patrick also managed to find a tire iron, a jack, and even a large flashlight, which was a relief because their other best option was a penlight from Tashi’s purse. (They also found a lamp his stepmom gave him for Christmas, still in the box; a Green Day CD Patrick swore he’d been looking for since last June, and three right tennis shoes with busted soles; the situation could have been much worse but Art had just dejunked the car trying to find his chemistry textbook, which turned out to be in his gym bag.)
Art took Tashi’s overnight bag from the back and set it on the ground. She hopped over to sit on it and pointed the flashlight at the pile of tools. Patrick tried to sit beside her, arguing that changing a tire was “by definition a one-man job.”
“Help him,” she said, and Art laughed. Maybe he should have been insulted that she didn’t trust him to do this on his own, but his nerves were a mess of Red Bull and adrenaline, or whichever neurotransmitter got set off when you were stressed and scared. He’d need to figure that out before the sports science midterm.
“Now,” Tashi said, “put the tire iron on the lug nut. And if Patrick laughs every time I say ‘lug nut,’ you can hit him with the tire iron.”
“All part of your plan to bury me in the desert and have Art replace me at the tournament.”
“Nah," Tashi said. "We could dye his hair, and you've both got the ears, but Art couldn't imitate your fuckass serve.”
Patrick laughed, and then he stood over Art, blocking his light. “Are you sure you’re doing that right?”
“Yes!” Art swatted at Patrick’s leg, and for once he took the hint and moved out of the way. After a few tries, the hubcap was coming loose; only once did Tashi have to say, “Spin the nuts by hand,” and that time Art laughed too. Tashi talked Patrick through attaching the jack, and they both had fun applying pressure to move the Jeep off the ground.
“I think I could do that again on my own!” Patrick announced, once they'd put the spare on.
“We still have to put the nuts back on, dumbass.” Art went back to the tire iron. This time it jammed, and Patrick -- trying to help, probably -- got back into his light again. “Stop!” Art slapped Patrick's hand away. He finished on his own, then turned around to see Tashi leaning against Patrick’s shoulder, so she could bend down and inspect it. She touched the tire and declared the work good. Art felt an embarrassing rush of pride. He’d still be sitting by the road trying to get a signal if he was on his own, but then he wouldn’t be in the desert after midnight if it was just him.
Patrick touched the tightened bolt, looked at the grease on his finger, then reached over and rubbed it off against Art’s forearm, and somehow that was the breaking point.
“Stop fucking touching me!” Art pushed Patrick against the car, harder than he meant to. (Harder than he meant to, right?) Tashi stumbled forward -- he forgot she was still leaning on Patrick -- and Art rushed over to hold her up. “Sorry, you okay?”
“Jesus Christ!” Patrick banged the top of the car. “You knock her over so you can save the day. Fucking typical.” He crossed his arms and leaned back. To Tashi, he said, “Art’s been hitting me all night, but I can’t --”
“Rub your hands all over me? Tashi, you’ve seen him.”
“I’ve seen both of you act like little babies."
“But in a sexy way?” Patrick raised an eyebrow hopefully.
“Shut up and get in the car.” Art tried to wipe the grease off his arm. “She’s never going to speak to either one of us after tonight.”
“It was your idea to shortcut across the desert,” Patrick mumbled.
“My idea?” Now Art kind of did want to hit him. “We wouldn’t be driving you across the state in the middle of the night if you could think ahead for more than five minutes. You could have hung around the tournament for one day to see if you got in, and instead you drag us all through this stupid ordeal because you don’t bother to think.”
“Fine!” Patrick let out a strangled scream and looked at the sky. “I didn’t think I’d get in, all right? You know why? Because nothing good ever happens to me! I lost and I felt like shit and I just wanted to get out and see somebody who would actually listen to me, I don’t know why I thought it would be you guys. You’ve wanted me to fail since I beat you at Juniors and and --” He gestured at Tashi. “And she didn’t want you, which was not my fault. Now she doesn’t care about me either. We’re even.”
Tashi cleared her throat. They both looked at her. "If I don't care about either of you, why exactly do you think I'm here?"
“Same reason he is, I guess! We’re tennis junkies and we don’t have any other friends. Art got dumped by his math tutor, I’m getting my ass kicked all over tour and I’m rushing across California in the middle of the night to get my ass kicked again.” He sat on the ground, arms curled around his knees. "Tashi’s here because she’s temporarily out of commission, and she’s scared to tell her family she’s going back to work making them rich. We all fucking deserve each other.”
“All right," Tashi said, "Fine. Art spilled his guts about his breakup, Patrick's stopped strutting like the king of the world, so I may as well. You know why I don't want to tell my parents I'm dropping out? Because I'm failing. I'm basically failing everything. Even if I take incompletes in all my classes, I doubt I could catch up. I was barely hanging on before the injury, and now --.”
That sounded impossible. “You’re so smart,” Art protested.
“I know I’m smart.” Of course. Tashi had faith in herself that way. “I just forgot how to do school without my parents looking over my shoulder and -- everything got in my head, and it was too much. I want to be far away where I can work everything out and figure out who I am again. The last time I can ever remember when things pointed in the right direction was --” She looked from Patrick to Art. "Was with you two idiots. Both of you. And I think you know that too."
Art looked at Tashi, tired and humbled Tashi who smiled when he dropped by her room, even while she was ducking calls from her family. He looked at Patrick, breathless and miserable Patrick. The moon came out, and he thought of them all sitting in the Long Island moonlight when everything was possible. He leaned against the Jeep they’d repaired together and looked across at the two of them. "Come here." he said.
“Which one of us?” Patrick asked.
Tashi nudged him, leaned on his shoulder, and they walked toward Art. He kissed Patrick first, because in the end it felt like Patrick had been waiting longer, but very soon Tashi found her way into the kiss. None of them were going to get enough sleep before Patrick’s match, but that was a problem for the morning.