Stay Away

up and down

I win my next tournament, the Libéma Open. It's in the Netherlands, and so Fleur watches with Papa until she has to go to the Leeuwinnen training camp. I think Mum visits some of her friends in England.

This camp is the last one before they play the Euros, Leah informs me, and is supposed to be the final moment in which the players impress their coach and confirm their places on the squad. With Leah being England's captain and Fleur being the Dutch version of Alexia Putellas, I reassure them both that they have time to watch me excel in the tournament. Neither of them need to worry about their international careers.

After an (admittedly) easy time in my home country, Juan and I make the decision to fly back to London earlier than we had originally planned, giving us a week to train in England before Wimbledon starts.

Leah texts me to say that St. George's Park has tennis courts. I turn my phone off, not wanting Juan to catch on to anything. (Not that there is anything going on.)

Our plane leaves in the morning, just after breakfast, and we get to London an hour later, beating the rush of professional tennis players at Farnborough Airport – I think most people are getting here tomorrow if they haven't been playing at the tournament in Birmingham.

Wimbledon have arranged for my usual suite at the Park Plaza hotel, but Marcus agrees to drive me to St. Albans to see what Leah has been waxing lyrical about before we check in. Next stop, as I find myself liking the vibe of the place, may be Milton Keynes, if Scarlett replies to my message and answers why everyone else in England hates it.

We train effectively, but not so much that I am exhausted going into the tournament. It's almost boring, I would say. The calm before another stressful Grand Slam. Luckily, Leah is often bored at camp, and provides entertaining retellings of what she has done each day. I often fall asleep to her typed paragraphs, smiling as I bury my face into my pillow.

I might be developing a little crush on her, but that doesn't change the nature of these conversations. They are simply to balance work and other things, to distract me just enough to enhance my performance. There will come a time, if it grows into something more than what it is, that I will end it and delete her number from my phone.

This has happened before.

Four years ago, I dated Fleur's national teammate, Jackie Groenen, for a bit. It was never supposed to get as serious as it got. She was injured in a match once, and I wanted nothing more than to get on a plane from Melbourne and fly straight to her. That, of course, freaked me out a bit. I deemed her one of the biggest distractions I could possibly have, and broke it off. Thankfully, she wasn't too fussed.

My cousin, Lize, on Papa's side, texts me that she'll be accepting the offer to watch me play that I had extended to my family in the Netherlands. Her and her husband have a toddler who they'll be bringing. We meet up a few days before the tournament starts for coffee.

Lize is an English teacher, and her husband, Finn, is a journalist. She tells him about how I've always been so determined, recounting our childhood visits to the lake near our grandparents' house in which I'd make sure I knew the way blindfolded at nighttime to prevent us from getting lost. She knows that I probably don't want to stay out too long this close to the start of the tournament, but when I see her daughter, I can't help but text Juan to say I'm taking an extra hour's break. I love children.

"We're staying for the Euros, too," Lize informs me with a soft smile. In the worst case scenario in which I get knocked out early, I'll accompany them to the family and friends section of the stadiums to watch my sister play. "Noa's obsessed with football, and Fleur's promised to get her shirt signed by the whole team, isn't that right?"