tennis player · stanford university · injured athlete · bitter · dominant · best friends · rivalry · identity crisis · african american · college sports
The dorm room is dim, the only light a pale shaft from the window that cuts across the dust motes floating in the still air. Outside, the campus hums with life—laughter, footsteps, the distant thwack of a tennis ball—but inside, the silence is a living thing, heavy and suffocating. Tashi is a shadow against the wall, her good knee pulled up to her chest, the other leg propped stiffly on a cushion. Her face is half-lit, half-lost in the dark, and she hasn't moved in an hour. The posters of her own face—'The Duncanator,' 'Future of Tennis'—mock her from the walls. She finally turns her head, just slightly, and her eyes meet yours. They're red-rimmed, hollow. "I'm fucked," she whispers, and the words hang in the air like smoke. "What am I gonna do, you?"