His opening serve I didn’t see at all. It fizzed past me, losing its definition for a moment on the centre line, before thwacking first bounce into the green canvas behind my back. The passage of the ball seemed to leave a comet’s trail of yellow against the artificial green of the court.
‘Nice one,’ 1 called, and trudged across in my black socks and checked Bermudas. This time I managed to get a line on Fielding’s first serve: it smacked into the tape with a volume that made me whimper — the sound of a strong hand slapping a strong belly. I edged up a few feet as Fielding daintily removed the second ball from the pocket of his tailored shorts. I twirled my racket and swayed around a bit… But his second serve was a real dilly too. Hit late and low with what I guessed was a backhand grip, the ball came looping over the net, landed deep, and kicked like a bastard. It jumped so high that I could return it only with a startled half-smash. Fielding had come sauntering up to the net, of course, and angled the ball away with acute dispatch. He aced me again at thirty-love, but on the last point of the game I got another crack at that second serve of his. I stood my ground and lobbed the brute, quite accurately, and Fielding had to stroll back from the service line to retrieve it. That lob was my last shot, really. I was never a contender after that. We had a rally of sorts: Fielding stood at the centre of his base line while I hurled myself around the court. Put it away, I kept telling him, but there were a good few strokes exchanged before he chose to place the ball beyond my reach.
We switched ends. I didn’t meet his eye. I hoped he couldn’t hear my hoarse gasps for air. I hoped he couldn’t smell — I hoped he couldn’t see—the junk-fumes swathing my face like heat-ripple. As I took position I glanced up at our audience in their high aquarium. They were smiling down.
My opening serve flopped into the net, six inches from the ground. My second serve is a dolly and Fielding murdered it in his own sweet time, leaning back before putting all his weight into the stroke. I didn’t even chase his return. The same thing happened on the next point. At love-thirty I served so blind and wild that Fielding simply reached out and caught the ball on the volley. He pocketed it and strolled forward a few paces – several paces. I moved wide and, in petulant despair, hit my second serve as if it were my first. And it went in! Fielding was less surprised than I was but he only just got his racket to the ball — and he was so insultingly far advanced that his return was nothing more than a skied half-volley. The yellow ball plopped down invitingly in the centre of my court. I hit it pretty low, hard and deep to Fielding’s backhand and lumbered cautiously up to the net. A big mistake. Fielding chose this moment to untether a two-fisted topspin drive. The ball came screaming over the tape, skipped a beat, regathered its tilt and momentum—and punched me in the face. I toppled over backwards and my racket fell with a clatter. For several shocked seconds I lay there like an old dog, an old dog that wants its old belly stroked. Now how’s this going to look? I got to my feet. I rubbed my nose.
‘You okay, Slick?’
‘Yeah. I’m cool,’ I murmured. I bent down for my racket, and straightened up. Behind the glass wall the sea-creatures watched from their pool. Sharp faces. That’s right, get your staring done with.
And so it went on. I won about half-a-dozen points — from Fielding’s double-faults, from net-cords and shots off the wood, and from telling lies about a couple of the calls. I kept wanting to say: ‘Look, Fielding, I know this is costing you a lot of money and everything.
But do you mind if I stop? Because I think I might DIE if I don’t.’ I didn’t have the breath. After five minutes I was playing with a more or less permanent mouthful of vomit. It was the slowest hour of my life, and I’ve had some slow hours.