Jersey Tomatoes are the Best Read online

  I move in close to see what’s so interesting.

  It’s the day’s lineup: who’s playing whom, and where. I try to read over their shoulders, to find Henry’s name in the 16-and-Unders. One of the gagglers lets out a little scream.

  “Oh my god! The bitch is here!”

  It’s weird to hear a girl who might be all of ten years old say “bitch.”

  “Who? What are you talking about?” the others ask.

  “This really mean girl,” she replies, pressing her finger to a name on the paper. “She’s not in our division. She’s older. My sister knows who she is.”

  “What’s she do that’s so mean?” one asks.

  “Mind games,” the girl explains. “Like, she calls people for footfaulting even though you know she can’t see that far. She questions calls. She bounces the ball, like, twenty times before serving; then, on the next serve, she’ll do it real fast. Junk like that.”

  “My coach says you have to ignore that sort of stuff,” says one.

  “Yeah, but this girl won’t let you ignore her,” the other replies. “She talks to you. My sister said if you make a mistake, like hit it out? She pretends to feel all sorry, ask if you feel all right … you know, make out like you’re some loser. It makes you really angry, and next thing you know, you’re making all these mistakes.”

  “God, I hate that,” sighs one.

  “She’s not even that good, you know?” The gaggle has rounded the corner passing from the hallway into the restroom proper. “My sister says her strokes are okay, but she wins all these matches by making her opponents mess up.”

  The restroom door closes on their conversation. I can finally get a good look at the paper. My eyes scan rapidly down the list.

  I find Henry halfway down the sheet. Court three, eleven o’clock. It’s not easy to read ’cause there’s a chocolate fingerprint smudge right on Henry’s name.

  Our eyes meet, and she doesn’t have to say a single word. She’s been listening to the whole thing, bladder distress and all. Her blue eyes are cloudy with some emotion I don’t recognize, and I don’t know what to say, or how to reassure her.

  Except to simply be here.

  Chapter Five

  HENRY

  Halfway through my first set of the day, it’s clear: I’m unbeatable today.

  I know it when I toss the ball overhead for the serve and it looms as big as the moon, each thread of fuzzy yellow sharp, distinct. The racket head lasers through the air, and the ball explodes. I don’t have to look: I imagine the target, and Wilson, Dunlop and Penn obey. I am in the zone of tennis dreams, and my opponent has lost ten consecutive points.

  The audience, which started out politely clapping, grows silent. They came to watch a game, not a massacre. “Go, Brenda!” a voice calls when we switch sides. My opponent turns to the voice and miserably shakes her head. People begin to leave, to pack up and search for a real match on a different court.

  Meanwhile, I concede nothing. Not a single shot. Unsmiling, silent, I claim what belongs to me. This game is mine. And I dare anyone to say I’m just “okay.”

  Even Dad looks subdued when it’s over. He, Mom and Eva join me courtside as I’m zipping my racket into its case. I have bageled Brenda in just under one hour.

  “Geez, could you at least have tossed her a point?” Eva says, throwing her arms around me and giving my shoulders a tight squeeze. “I mean, hit it out once or twice just to make her grandma in the stands happy?” I stare at her.

  “No, actually,” I say, abruptly. “Not today.”

  “I think that’s the best I’ve ever seen you play,” Dad says, picking up my bag. As we turn to walk off the court, we almost knock over some guy who stands right behind us. He’s dressed like Dad, got the golf-shirt thing going, but there’s a lanyard around his neck with a laminated ID card. He sticks his hand out.

  “I’m Jerry Goss,” he says. “Chadwick Tennis Academy. We spoke on the phone a couple weeks ago.”

  “Mark Lloyd,” Dad replies curtly, shaking the hand.

  “Congratulations on an impressive first round,” Jerry says to me. “I think that was one for the record books. You didn’t lose a single point.”

  “Thanks—” I begin, before Dad cuts me off.

  “We’re going to find some shade for Henry and get a little lunch into her,” he says abruptly. “You’ll have to excuse us.” Dad shoulders past Jerry.

  “Sure thing,” Jerry Goss replies, his face reddening. “Why don’t I catch up with you folks when the tournament is over?” Mom, trailing Dad, smiles apologetically.

  “Yes, please look for us later,” she says. Eva and I follow quickly behind them.

  “What was that about?” she says under her breath to me.

  “He’s that recruiter from the tennis school in Boca Raton, Florida,” I explain. “Basically, a control-freak parent’s nightmare.” Eva bursts out laughing.

  “Hope Jerry likes getting chewed alive by a lion,” she says.

  “Wouldn’t be the first time,” I sigh.

  He’d called our house after I won the northern final. Wanted to come over and talk about this residential tennis academy. Dad was beyond rude to him over the phone.

  “Mark, why can’t we simply hear him out?” Mom argued afterward. “This could be a marvelous opportunity for Henry.”

  “Marian, these are the sorts of people who ruin kids like Henry!” Dad insisted. “They make ’em pros when they should still be junior amateurs. The tennis world is littered with their disaster stories. Remember that kid with the pigtails, when we were growing up? Andrea Jaeger. Whatever happened to her? And that other prodigy. Tracy Austin. They ruined that kid’s back. And what is she today?”

  “A very wealthy TV sports commentator,” I called out from the other room. They didn’t know I was listening in.

  “A has-been!” Dad barked back. “A talented kid who never reached her potential because people were trying to make money off her!”

  “I wouldn’t mind people making money off me,” I replied, “as long as I get to keep some.” It’s a strange thing about my dad: he’s sort of anti-money. Running down people in our town with big houses … McMansions, he calls them … or assuming rich people got there by cheating somehow. The good news is he’s not materialistic. Suspicious, controlling, bad-tempered, ill-mannered, but not materialistic.

  Jerry Goss pushes all his buttons. But I’m interested in hearing him out. I get the feeling Mom is, too.

  As it turns out, my bionic powers don’t extend to winning every single point for the rest of the day. I do manage, however, to win every game. Every set. The whole enchilada. By five o’clock that afternoon I am the newly crowned 16-and-Under New Jersey State Champion.

  When the last point is played out, I walk toward my opponent to shake hands. She stands at the net, still panting. She’s short and muscular and she hit the ball like a man. Rockets, one after another, most of them fired into my backhand. A bit too predictably into my backhand. She’d revealed her strategy only a couple of points into our first game: she was going to blast me off the court, slam me all the way to Pennsylvania on the sheer power of her strokes.

  So I made her run. I took the pace off every shot, moon-balled them deep to her corners, followed by short drops over the net. Two games into it, she’d probably run a mile, and her balls were firing a hell of a lot slower.

  I never spoke a word to her; I let my shots do all the talking. “You’re out of shape!” they screamed every time she raced for the ball but didn’t quite make it. “Power is no substitute for placement!” they laughed, as she exhausted herself with her slams.

  “Henry Lloyd owns this tournament!” they crowed, finally, when it was all over. No mind games. No distracting comments. Just tennis, pure and simple. It felt great.

  When I reach her, hand extended, I notice she’s got a little fan club walking across the court toward us.

  It’s the Reese’s gang. The ones who think “the bitch” i
s just “okay.”

  They watch me, slyly, as we shake. One whispers into the other’s ear, stifles a giggle. Something inside me turns, and the great, floaty feeling I just had evaporates into something more familiar.

  “Nice game,” I say, grasping her hand.

  “You, too,” she says. “Congratulations.” That’s usually it, so she tries to pull away from me. But I don’t let go.

  “You hit that ball so hard!” I say, smiling. “Almost like a man.”

  “Thanks,” she says. She actually tugs at this point, but I hold her in a death grip.

  “Do you lift?” I ask her. She looks puzzled.

  “You know, weight-room stuff. Because it shows. You look like you could bench-press … what?… a hundred fifty?” I flash her my most brilliant smile and release her hand. I don’t wait for a reply. Her mouth has opened into a perfect little O. I glance behind her and give a short, perky wave to the gaggle.

  “See you around, girls,” I say, before turning on my heel and striding to the umpire’s chair for the obligatory handshake. Eva and my parents are off to one side of the court. A few paces from them, I see Jerry Goss.

  When our eyes meet, he smiles calmly, and nods. Once.

  * * *

  He tracks us down at the hospitality tent, where we’ve gone to find cool drinks. I’ve located an icy lemonade for myself and am considering a very chewy-looking chocolate-chip cookie, when I feel a hand on my elbow.

  “Henry, do you think we could talk?” Jerry asks. I glance at Mom, who nods assent; Dad has taken a trip to the Porta Potties. Jerry Goss and I find a quiet table and chairs outside the tent. We sit, and he gets right down to it.

  “I enjoyed watching you play today,” he begins. “You have a good game.”

  “Thank you,” I reply. But it’s not lost on me that he says “good.” Not “great.” It occurs to me he’s seen a lot of players win state tournaments.

  “So let me ask you,” he continues. “What are your goals?”

  “My goals?” I repeat.

  “For your tennis,” he says. “What sort of player do you imagine becoming?”

  “The best I can be,” I say automatically. What does he expect I’d say?

  “And that means … what?” he asks.

  “Well”—I smile at him—“how about winning the Jersey 16-and-Under?” He shrugs.

  “Seriously,” he says. Then waits. Which surprises me.

  “You don’t think this is serious?” I reply, my voice rising a bit. “Those girls crying into their lemonade over there?” I gesture toward the hospitality tent. “They thought I was serious.”

  “If you think beating the stuffing out of a bunch of prep-strokers is serious tennis, then I’ve been misinformed,” he deadpans back at me. His eyes glitter like hard, blue marbles.

  “Let me fill you in on a little secret, Henry. Your opponents today? They suck. They’re high school athletes whose parents have paid for a lot of expensive lessons. They’ll collect a few plastic trophies, fill scrapbooks with clippings. One might even play in college. Which is fine. But I don’t think that’s what Henriette Lloyd has in mind for herself. Or am I wrong?”

  The player in me says not to respond right away. Not to reveal how insulting it is that this dude thinks the girls I beat are a bunch of losers.

  I take a long pull on my lemonade before answering him.

  “What if I told you I like cheap plastic trophies?”

  Jerry Goss throws back his head and laughs.

  “I’d say, ‘Sayonara, sweetheart.’ ” He grins. I smile, too. In spite of myself.

  “So, if everyone in this tournament sucks, why are you here?”

  “To see you,” he replies. “People like me are in the business of checking out kids like you.”

  Whoa. There’s no disguising my total shock. A scout from a tennis school in Florida … a school I’ve never heard of … has come all this way just to see me? I assumed he was watching lots of people.

  “So, back to my question,” he continues. “What are your goals?”

  Goals. Sure, I’ve got a few. I want to get my permanent driver’s license. Date a really hot guy. I want my own television for my bedroom. I want to finally get my ears pierced. Maybe I can use this championship as leverage with Dad, get him to say yes, at last.

  Of course, Jerry doesn’t want to hear all that. He’s talkin’ game, and beyond winning the match I’m playing on a given day and massacring whoever is across the net from me at the moment, I haven’t thought much about it. I love to hit balls; I love to win. But lately the only “goal” has been to do whatever Dad says so he’ll get off my case.

  Then, for some reason, I remember the Reese’s girls. And I think of something I want.

  “I want to be different.”

  I am different. Always have been. Always have felt. Thing is, Jerry Goss, I don’t want to be hated for it. I want a trophy for it.

  “Chadwick players are different. They’re the best,” he says. “I think Chadwick can help you reach your goal. I think you should consider coming to Chadwick.”

  I stifle the impulse to laugh out loud.

  “Mr. Goss, that’s really nice of you, but my parents don’t have that kind of money.” He waves his hand dismissively.

  “Money is no object for a talented student,” he says. The blue marbles are trained hard at me. “There are people out there who care about you and want to see you reach your potential.”

  “Okay, now you’re creeping me out. Who are we talking about?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say.”

  “Well, I’m not at liberty to sit here talking to you anymore if you’re going to get all CIA with me. All covert, you know?”

  Jerry chews on this for a little while. Then he sighs.

  “Fine. But I think when I tell you, you’ll understand why this has to go no further.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “Ray Giordano is a friend of mine. He told me, ‘Jerry, you don’t want to miss this kid.’ Told me you could really benefit from Chadwick.”

  I breathe in sharp, and deep. It all makes sense now. And he’s right. Even whispering the name of my former tennis coach, Ray Giordano, in front of Dad would be disastrous.

  This has to go no further.

  Chapter Six

  EVA

  Madame DuPres was far too evil to end the torture immediately, and just tell me on the spot that I wasn’t qualified to mop the floors at her school, let alone study there.

  No, she promised to “be in touch,” which means that for the past two weeks, every time the phone rings in our house, Rhonda responds like she’s been tasered. She jumps up and races to it, answering in this unnatural, high-pitched voice that also has a trace of sickly sweet in it, “Helloooo?”

  I just feel like I’m gonna hurl.

  It’s not like I’ve never been rejected. Take the time I tried out for Coppelia, an epic disaster, not because I danced poorly or even deserved the part (it went to a girl three years older than me, who entered the Joffrey Ballet School that year) but because my mother went psycho. When the casting director gave the lead to another girl, Rhonda drove to the theater parking lot during rehearsal one night and carefully deflated all four tires on his BMW.

  She told me this herself, a little triumph in her voice.

  “No one crosses my daughter,” she said, smiling and putting her hand over mine.

  It felt like I was living with Michael Corleone’s female alter ego, capable of unspeakable acts of retribution behind a cool facade. I didn’t know how to tell her the part hadn’t meant all that much to me.

  Unlike this audition with the New York School of Dance. For the first time in a long time, I’m hungry. Not for fame or attention or bragging rights; that’s Rhonda’s territory. For … perfection. For achieving the highest level of artistic perfection possible, whether that happens on a stage or in a rehearsal studio.

  I want it. And that’s scary. Because what do I do if I don�
�t get it?

  The ride home from the audition for Madame DuPres was a total Rhonda stress fest. The usual speeding and weaving in and out of traffic, plus the interrogation.

  “Did she say anything about how you danced?” Rhonda pressed.

  “Ambitious, Mom. She said it was ambitious.”

  “Well, I would think she wants her dancers to be ambitious. To challenge themselves. So that might be a very positive thing. Did she seem positive?”

  “She was completely unreadable.”

  “Was she friendly? Did you chat?”

  “Nope.”

  “Did she ask you about yourself? Try to get a sense of who you are?”

  “Nope.”

  “So she didn’t ask you any questions?”

  “She asked me if I’d ever seen Swan Lake.”

  “And what did you tell her?”

  “I said yes, probably a dozen times.” Rhonda paused.

  “And?”

  “And what?”

  “What did she say next?”

  “She said nothing next. She smiled, I danced, she said she’d be in touch. That’s it.”

  “She smiled?”

  “Yes, she smiled.”

  “Well, that’s good, isn’t it? She was probably impressed that you’re so familiar with the ballet.” Pause.

  “Did she say whether she thought you pulled it off? The interpretation?”

  “Ambitious, Mom. She said it was ambitious.”

  Weirdly enough, I haven’t mentioned the audition to Henry. Partly because I don’t want to jinx things. But partly because … well, she wouldn’t understand. Henry thinks I’m great, and she’d say something like, “Eva, you’re amazing. Of course you’ll get in.” She never appreciates that I’m completely average and rejection is a real possibility. Sometimes her confidence in me is hard to take.

  But I decide to tell her today: cake day. I haven’t done one of my cakes in ages, and this baby’s long overdue. Not that I’ll be able to eat it. I’ve barely been able to manage much besides Pink Decadence since the audition. It’s not intentional. I just can’t swallow when I’m nervous or upset. My throat sort of closes up, a little door shuts and this voice says, “No! Don’t eat that!”