“You do not need to hit through him,” Andre said, his dark eyes intense and focused. “You need to move him. He is anticipating your cross-court forehand. You are hitting it too often. Go down the line. Make him run.”
Blake looked at him, surprised. Andre rarely offered tactical advice. He usually left that to Doug.
“You saw that?” Blake asked.
“I see everything you do,” Andre said simply. He reached up, his thumbs brushing over Blake’s cheekbones. “You are playing beautifully, Blake. You are so close. Do not let him take this from you.”
“I won’t,” Blake whispered.
“Good.” Andre leaned in and kissed him, a brief, firm press of his lips against Blake’s. “Now go finish it.”
When play resumed under the closed roof, the sound of the ball echoing loudly in the enclosed space, Blake changed his tactics. He stopped trying to overpower the world number two and started moving him, hitting sharp angles and unexpected drop shots.
He broke serve in the eighth game of the fourth set and served it out, forcing a fifth set.
The final set was a clinic in aggressive grass-court tennis. Blake served brilliantly, dictating the points, refusing to let his opponent settle into a rhythm.
The Serbian, exhausted and demoralized, tried to change his tactics. He tried to serve and volley, but Blake’s returns dipped sharply at his feet, forcing difficult half-volleys that Blake easily put away. He tried to engage Blake in long baseline rallies, hoping to wear him down, but Blake was a wall, returning every ball with interest, his stamina seemingly limitless.
In the third game, Blake hit a running forehand passing shot that clipped the outside edge of the line, bringing the crowd to its feet. In the fifth game, he chased down a perfectly executed drop shot, sliding on the worn grass and flicking a backhand winner cross-court that left his opponent staring in disbelief.
He broke the Serbian in the third game, and again in the seventh, his dominance total and unquestionable.
Serving for the match at 5-2, Blake didn’t hesitate. He stepped up to the line, bounced the ball three times, and fired a 135-mph serve out wide. 15-0. A heavy kick serve to the backhand, followed by a crisp forehand winner. 30-0. An unreturnable body serve. 40-0.
He paused, looking up at the player box. Andre was standing, his hands gripping the railing, his eyes locked on Blake.
Blake smiled, a small, private expression. He tossed the ball, arched his back, and brought his racket down with explosive force.
Closing out the match with a thunderous ace down the T, he won the set 6-2, securing his place in the Wimbledon final.
The final was on Sunday. Centre Court. The world number one.
It was a match that tested every ounce of his physical and mental reserves.
The Australian was a machine — a six-foot-four wall of muscle with a serve that touched 140 miles per hour and a forehand that seemed to gain speed with every passing hour. Blake took the first set 7-5, playing the best tennis of his life, his volleys crisp, his movement fluid and precise. But the Australian adjusted, as champions always do. He pushed Blake backbehind the baseline, denying him the net, forcing him into long, punishing rallies that sapped his legs and tested his resolve.
The second set went 6-3 to the Australian. The third was a brutal tiebreaker that Blake lost 9-7, a single missed backhand volley the difference between the two men. By the fourth set, Blake’s legs were heavy, his first serve percentage dropping, the fatigue from five sets against the Serbian two days earlier finally catching up with him.
He fought. He saved three match points in the eighth game, hitting two aces and a forehand winner that brought the crowd to its feet. But the Australian broke him in the tenth game, a perfectly placed drop shot followed by a lob that Blake could only watch sail over his head and land on the baseline.
Game, set, match. 5-7, 6-3, 7-6, 6-4.
Blake stood at the net, shaking the Australian’s hand, his body aching, his eyes burning. The crowd gave him a standing ovation as he walked to his chair, the applause rolling down from the upper tiers like thunder.
But when he walked off Centre Court, holding the runner-up trophy, he didn’t feel the hollow despair he usually felt after a major loss. He looked up at the player box. Andre was standing, clapping, his face full of pride and love.
Blake smiled. He had lost the match, but he had won something far more important.
He had his life back.
Chapter twenty-three
The Rain
The months after Wimbledon had passed in a blur of contentment. The autumn brought the US Open (a semifinal loss that stung less than it should have), then the off-season, then the Australian summer. Blake won Indian Wells in March, his game sharper than it had been in years. Andre delivered the Paris commission in October — all four canvases — and immediately began a new series for the same collector, larger and more ambitious. The restlessness that had characterized their first years together — the constant travel, the long-distance ache, the tabloid scrutiny — had finally burned itself out. What remained was something simpler and better: a life that fit.
The rain in London had been falling steadily for three days, a relentless, miserable drizzle that turned the streets slick and black, reflecting the neon signs of the city in distorted, watery pools.
