The Singles Game

by Lauren Weisberger

  On the ESPN app on her iPad, she was watching a biopic on the complicated life and times of Todd Feltner’s coaching career. She fast-forwarded through the beginning years that showed Todd growing up on Long Island, and playing first singles for Great Neck North. She bypassed his time playing singles at the University of Michigan, his short-lived stint in the Morgan Stanley training program, and his discovery while on vacation in Florida of a thirteen-year-old tennis protégé who was making extra money caddying Todd’s golf game. Something about this child—Adrian Eversoll—so inspired Todd that he left his much-maligned desk job, moved to Tampa, and set about learning everything he needed to coach a young kid with a gift before launching him to the world number one in eight short years, despite not having any professional tennis experience himself. The coverage included plenty of scenes of Todd screaming at and berating Adrian and, later, other men he’d coached to the top. In one particularly unnerving US Open semifinal, tournament security had forcibly removed Todd from Adrian’s player box after he’d cursed the player so loudly and profanely that the television cameras couldn’t even broadcast the outburst on live TV. But then, minutes later, another scene: Adrian hoisting that champion’s trophy high above his head, kissing it, as the world cheered. Charlie watched, barely breathing, almost able to feel the weight of that trophy, hear the crowd roar its excitement, smell the sweat and the gritty Queens air as she was declared the best. Despite herself—despite Todd’s downright frightening fireworks display—she knew then and there that she wanted it. She wanted him.

  As though he was already tapped into the private recesses of her mind, her phone rang and a young girl with a high-pitched voice said, “Charlotte Silver? I have Todd Feltner on the line.” Charlie felt her pulse quicken and tapped the pause button on her iPad.

  “Charlotte? Todd Feltner here. Pardon my French, but I’m done dicking around with text messages. I fly into Long Beach on Friday at noon. I’m turning around again and getting on a flight to Hawaii at eight, and I’d rather not come to the boondocks, so what do you say we plan to meet in the lobby of the Standard Hotel downtown? I’ll give you my whole dog and pony show and you can run down your whole list of questions and we’ll get this knocked out. Two o’clock?”

  A million things raced through her mind. Charlie didn’t like how presumptuous he was. But she took a deep breath, remembered Jake’s urgency and her own burgeoning excitement, and said, “Two o’clock it is, Mr. Feltner. I’ll plan to see you there.”

  “Grand!” he said, managing to make it sound sarcastic. “And it’s Todd. ‘Mr. Feltner’ makes me think of my father, and if you’d ever had the pleasure of meeting that winner, you’d know that’s a pretty shitty thing.”

  “Todd, then,” Charlie said. Before she could feel awkward, Todd announced his assistant would confirm the details by email and hung up.

  She texted Jake It’s on with the time and place, and turned off her phone.

  • • •

  When Charlie walked into the Standard wearing jeans and a fitted blazer, she was deliberately fifteen minutes early. Relieved to have a little time to order a glass of sparkling water and get her notes in order, she assured herself nothing would deter her from her list. She’d neatly printed no fewer than nineteen bullet points—some questions, some conversation topics about which she wanted to hear his thoughts—on a sheet of light blue stationery. But when she walked over to the hostess stand in the lobby restaurant to request a table, Todd bellowed from his banquette near the back bar. “Silver! Over here.”

  Todd didn’t stand when she reached the table. “Sit,” he said, waving his hand at the remaining seats. “You don’t care if I call you Silver, right?”

  “Actually, I prefer Charlie,” she said, claiming the chair that was farthest from Todd even though the view it afforded was directly of the wall. “You’re here early.”

  “Todd Feltner, rule number one: if you’re not early, you’re late.” His laugh was a cross between a guffaw and a scoff. Charlie couldn’t decide which she disliked more: his asinine “rule,” or the fact that he was talking about himself in the third person.

  At only five foot ten, his strength as a college player came exclusively from his muscular shoulders and immensely wide, powerful thighs, lending him the strange look of being nearly as wide as he was tall. Now that he was well into middle age, the muscled, tank-like physique had been refashioned into a pear shape: nearly atrophied shoulders and upper body ballooning out into an enormous ass and belly, all of it perched on pale, skinny legs.

  “What are you having?” Todd asked, pushing a menu in her direction.

  A woman wearing leather pants and high-heeled booties appeared at their table, and it took Charlie a moment to realize she was their waitress. She glanced at her phone and saw it would still be thirteen minutes until Jake arrived, maybe more.

  “Um, just a cup of coffee now, please,” she said. She intended to order lunch but wanted to wait for Jake.

  “Decaf,” Todd barked. Both the waitress and Charlie turned to look at him. Did he want a decaf himself, or was he demanding one for Charlie?

  “For her,” he clarified.

  Charlie forced herself to smile. “Thank you, but no, I prefer regular.” She turned to the waitress. “Full caffeine, please. Extra, if you have it.”

  Todd laughed, the snake tongue darting at full speed. “Enjoy it now, sweetheart. You work with me and you can kiss it good-bye, right along with everything else that’s remotely enjoyable. But we’ll get to that.”

  Charlie knew if Marcy were there instead of Todd, they would have already ordered club sandwiches and fries and would be cracking up over the latest celebrity gossip. Charlie was wracking her brain to come up with some benign small talk to fill the time when Jake appeared like a vision before them.

  “I hope I didn’t miss anything,” he said, leaning over to kiss Charlie’s cheek. Todd didn’t stand for him either, but Jake walked around the table and clapped him on the back. “Todd, great to see you. Thanks for making time today.”

  Charlie was always a little surprised to see her big brother looking so professional. His crisp white dress shirt highlighted his tan complexion, and his whole look—European-cut navy suit with no tie, expensive watch and shoes—screamed successful Hollywood talent agent. No one would have ever guessed he lived in a walk-up studio apartment in Harlem—or that his one and only client at the sports agency where he worked was his own sister.

  They hadn’t ordered food before Todd clapped the table and said, “None of us have a lot of time here, so let’s cut right to the chase. Silver—uh, Charlotte—you’re a damn good player with a lot of potential. But so far that’s all it is. You’ve been on the tour now for nearly five years and you have no Slams, only two major singles titles, and a ranking that’s never gone above twenty-three. You also just had surgery. I’m sure plenty of people have recommended you retire.”

  “With all due respect, Mr. Feltner, being the twenty-third best female tennis player on earth isn’t too terrible,” Jake offered. Charlie shot him a grateful smile, but the sound of Todd’s fist meeting the table again startled her so much she almost knocked her coffee over.

  “Wrong answer!” he all but screamed, his tongue going a mile a minute. “Was that what you used to dream about as a thirteen-year-old who was winning all the tournaments you entered, who showed incredible perseverance and determination and who cleared her path of opponents like a fucking lawnmower? To be twenty-third best? I don’t think so. I sure hope not, because that is not the attitude of a champion. You think Steffi Graf used to hope and pray she could be ranked in the twenties? Or Evert or Navratilova or Sharapova or either of those Williams sisters ever turned to their coaches or their daddies or the mirror and said, ‘Gee, I hope I can be the twenty-third best girl someday?’ ” This last part was said in a hideously high-pitched imitation of a female voice. “Please. Spare me.”

/>   Charlie burned with shame—and something else. Todd Feltner was right. She did want more. She didn’t want to be a footnote in tennis history, not after all her hard work. “You’ve made your point,” Charlie said quietly.

  “If I’m going to come out of retirement to coach a girl, I am only going to do it for one who has the killer drive. Are you the one, Charlotte Silver? Do you have the taste for blood? Or are you happy to flounce from court to court in your little white tennis skirt with your cutesy braids and smile so big and wide that everyone just adores you?”

  Todd flipped open a magnetic screen cover on his fifteen-inch iPad, turned it to face Charlie, and began to swipe through images of Charlie through the years. Always the braid. Always the smile. Always the runner-up.

  “We are sitting here right now because I think that beneath the sweet little girl exterior, you really, really want to make it to the big leagues. To the top ten. To the Slam title. And personally I’m here because I think you have the best fucking one-handed backhand I’ve ever seen on a chick—er, a girl. You have an instinctive understanding of your placement on the court—trust me, you can’t teach that—and, at least from what I can see on tape, the mental toughness to come back when you’re down. That, Charlotte Silver, is why we’re here.”

  Charlie tried not to smile. Todd Feltner had honed in on her areas of strength, quite accurately in her mind. He’d done his homework. Still, the sequence of photos showing her as a friendly and happy dilettante had been devastating.

  “If we do this thing, first and foremost, you’re going to have to lose the sensitive girl crap. Like right now, I can see your eyes watering. We all can’t be worrying about your feelings every second or no one’s ever going to get anything done. I’ll talk straight to you and you talk straight to me. No bullshit, okay? Secondly, we need an image overhaul. We’ll take steps to banish the sweet girl in braids and replace her with the fierce, ballbusting competitor that other players fear and respect. We’ll employ an image consultant, since that’s clearly not my area of expertise, but one I do think in this case is important. She can advise us all on hiring the right PR people, stylists, social media consultants, what have you, that will get you all straightened out. I don’t want this to concern you too much—I will be in charge of your practice and travel schedule, and I guarantee you that none of this bullshit edges out what’s really important: namely, your game. It’s important noise, but ultimately, no one is going to give a shit what you’re wearing if you’re not actually winning.”

  Charlie nodded. Todd sounded crude, yes, but also fair.

  “We will immediately hire a full-time hitting partner.” When Charlie opened her mouth to protest, Todd cut her off by raising his hand. “I know you’re going to say you don’t need one, that it’s perfectly adequate to hit with the other girls for warm-ups and practice, and I’m here to tell you you’re wrong. Dead wrong. And don’t give me the whole I’m-only-number-twenty-whatever-I-don’t-deserve-my-own-full-time-hitting-partner BS. It’s a chicken or the egg thing, and I’ve seen too many times how players’ games go through the roof when they have someone good on staff, with them all day, every day, working them over. It’s non-negotiable.”

  “Okay,” Charlie said. She’d thought that same thing so many times but couldn’t justify the costs. She wasn’t winning enough to hire a full-time hitting partner and then pay for his travel as well.

  “I’m okay with you using tournament physios and trainers, so long as I can see that your fitness is improving and you’re sticking to the programs they set up for you. Also, a nutritionist. Not forever, just until you drop ten pounds from the lower body and build up your shoulders a little more. That won’t be a huge deal, but I’m not going to lie, Charlie: it’s going to cost money. The good news is, you’ll be winning more, and this up-front cash outlay is going to feel like pocket change if we all do our jobs right. You hearing me?”

  Charlie was trying hard not to focus on the ten pounds comment. He was right, of course; it just wasn’t easy to hear. She nodded.

  “Your brother will oversee the business end of things, like securing a big endorsement deal—something in addition to Nike, whose terms we will renegotiate once you break into the top ten—and from there? Let’s just say the path is lined in gold.”

  Todd folded his arms across his chest and gave Charlie a smug smile, while Jake nodded beside him. In all the years she and Marcy had worked together, they’d never had a meeting resembling this one. Everything they worked on was directly related to Charlie’s game: perfecting her slice, getting her more comfortable at the net, tweaking the spin on her second serve, adjusting the placement of her approach shots. When they weren’t actually on the court, she and Marcy were usually laughing in player dining or exchanging copies of US Weekly on a flight or binge-watching HGTV in random hotel rooms all over the world. Never had there been any mention of Charlie’s “image” beyond the importance of good sportsmanship. Marcy expected Charlie to take responsibility for her own healthful eating, which included lots of fresh fruit and vegetables, protein, and heavy carbs before matches; she consulted regularly with the tournament trainers to create good workouts, but she wasn’t standing over Charlie with a clipboard and a stopwatch, enforcing any sort of regimen. They were coach and player, first and foremost, but they were also dear friends, confidantes, and occasionally—when Charlie grew weary of the travel or depressed by the solitude of the sport—they were more like mother and daughter.

  “You’re right about not dreaming of being twenty-third in the world. And you’ve analyzed my strengths on the court fairly. I want to win, Mr. Feltner. Todd. I want to come back stronger and better than before. You really think you can get me there?”

  Across from her, Todd met her gaze. “I brought Nadal back from a horror show of a knee injury. I got Adrian Eversoll four Slams. I coached Gilberto to the number-one spot, and he was a pussy before he met me. My currency is winning.” He glanced at his watch. “Oh shit, I have to run. Listen, think it over and get back to me by the end of the week. We can do great things together, Silver,” he said, looking at Charlie. “Hah, gotcha! Just kidding. Charlie.”

  Jake laughed. Charlie forced a smile.

  “Just one more thing to toss on your plate. If I’m going to do this, you need to be free and clear. Don’t call me to accept until you’ve cut ties with that lady coach of yours. Capisce?”

  Todd stood up and opened his billfold, but Jake waved him off. “Please, this is on us. Thank you so much for taking the time to come meet with us. We’ll talk everything over and get right back to you.”

  Todd gave them both a little wave, either not noticing or not caring that Jake had stuck his hand out across the table. “You’ve got what it takes, kid, and I know how to make sure you reach that potential. Whatever you decide, I’ll be in your corner from now on. Peace.”

  Charlie watched him barrel out the door.

  “That was amazing!” Jake breathed, looking after Todd as though Michael Jackson had just left their table.

  “I didn’t get to ask him all of my questions,” Charlie muttered.

  “I think he pretty much covered it, don’t you? I mean, the difference between Todd Feltner and Marcy Berenson is unambiguous, you know? They are just operating in different universes.”

  Charlie couldn’t disagree. “I want him,” she said. “I’m pretty sure I hate his personality, but I love his plan and his fire and can-win attitude. Besides, I fully acknowledge that this is one of those fork-in-the-road situations, and there’s the potential for me to seriously regret not seizing this opportunity. Living legends don’t walk into your life every day asking to coach you.”

  Jake held up both hands in a sign of resignation, just as the model waitress brought out their food.

  “Do you serve champagne here?” Jake asked.

  The woman looked at him like he was deranged. “Of course.”

 
Jake didn’t seem to notice her tone. “Terrific, we’ll take two glasses then.” He looked at Charlie and grinned. “It sounds like we have something to celebrate.”

  • • •

  Charlie had just finished setting the kitchen table for two when the phone rang. It took her a minute to realize it was the landline.

  “Hey, Dad,” she said into the ancient receiver.

  “How did you know it was me?”

  “Who else would be calling here?” she said before she realized it wasn’t exactly the kindest way to put it. “I just meant, I’m sure all your lady friends call your cell.”

  “Charlotte, I’m sorry for the late notice, but I won’t be home for dinner tonight after all.”

  She waited, but her father offered no further explanation.

  “Hot date?”

  “Last-minute plans.”

  Charlie had planned to serve a nice, semi-homemade meal and ask calmly and confidently for Mr. Silver’s support in hiring Todd. She was going to do it regardless, but the whole thing would feel so much better if she knew her father was behind her.

  “Thanks, sweetheart, but why don’t you go ahead. I won’t be home until later. Or tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” Charlie asked, incredulous. Her father never, ever went out on dates when she was home, never mind slept over at some random woman’s house. She made a mental note to ask Jake if there was someone special.

  “I have to run now,” he said in answer. “Love you,” and he hung up.

  Charlie pulled a frozen garlic bread from the freezer and scanned the package for reheating instructions. Just as she popped it into her father’s surprisingly sophisticated toaster oven, Charlie’s phone rang.

  It was Marcy. As soon as Charlie had gotten home from her meeting with Todd, she’d emailed Marcy to ask about dates for a visit. Marcy lived in St. Petersburg, Florida, and it had been forever since Charlie had been to her home. The WTA offices were stationed nearby, and Charlie planned to meet with officials about her coaching change at the same time. It was going to be a truly hideous conversation, but Charlie knew it had to take place in person. On Marcy’s home turf. At the very minimum, Charlie owed her that.