Young Writers Society

Camillo had also turned round at Maderic’s entry. He waved and said, “Hey man, how’d it go?”

Maderic sat down where I had been and started chatting to Camillo, which tensed up a little ball of envy in my chest. It tended to do so whenever Camillo had talked to someone else in the past couple of weeks. The peace I’d come to with us just being friends had been ripped to shreds by that night at Indian Wells.

I glanced at Koji, who was desperately trying to get his breathing back to normal. Well, at least we were both being ridiculous now.

There was a couch against the wall at a right angle to the wall the TV was hanging from, so I nudged Koji towards it and settled down to watch the rest of the match. It was in the second half of the third set, but hopefully that would be enough time to calm myself. I was sure some conversation would follow it.

Koji was still fidgeting with his watch strap for the entirety of the match, even at points where the rest of us were held completely still by the tension of a second-serve break point. If it meant this much to him maybe I’d try to catch him later and tell him that, as far as I could tell, Natalie was happy.

But he also kept glancing at Maderic, which was a little worrying. I wished so badly that I could talk to Camillo right then.

When the match was over, Maderic said he had to go do some research on his next opponent and strode out the room. Koji’s eyes followed him like locked-on radar and I almost wanted to stop him as he sprang from the couch and started to follow.

What the name of hell was going on?

“You realise I heard all that?” Camillo said, snapping me out of the rising panic in my chest.

I blinked and looked round at him. His right eyebrow was raised and there was nearly a smirk on his lips.

“All of it?” I said, my voice coming out frighteningly thin and weak.

“Well, enough to grasp the gist.” He shrugged. “Koji’s a weird dude.”

I breathed the tension out slowly, not wanting to sound too relieved about the fact Camillo was willing to talk about this.

“So that was odd, yes?” I said. I nearly chuckled, but couldn’t quite bring myself to.

“Yeah,” he said, “Very odd. Why wouldn’t he want to talk to Max?”

I shrugged. “Why’s he asking about his ex at all? He broke up with Natalie, right?”

Camillo frowned. “Natalie’s never told me either way. I figured she talked to Max about all that stuff.”

“Huh.” I sat back on the couch and looked up at the ceiling for a moment. Then I jerked myself back upright and said, “I guess I am her friend.”

“Apparently.”

Camillo’s frown was deep and his eyes were staring so hard into mine I thought lasers were about to come out his sockets.

“Can I be your friend again?” he said eventually.

I gasped, and just left my jaw hanging open for a moment. He was the one who was likely to be mad, surely? I’d thrown his winning streak off.

Instead, I just grinned at him and said, “Yes, please.”

He sighed and stretched as he got out his chair, coming over to sit next to me on the couch.

“Your first act back as friend, then,” he said, “Is to tell me what the fuck to do about this.”

He handed me his phone, which was opened on a text from his mum.

Cam, your dad’s dr’s appointment is tomorrow. If you get a chance, could you skype him after it? Love you, Mum.

“Uh… You’re unsure whether or not to do this?” I didn’t mean to sound quite as sarky as I did, and he grabbed his phone back quite sharply.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he hissed, “What if I cry, Léo?”

“Then he’ll know you love him.” I shrugged. “Dude, your dad must expect this to be hard for you, but it’ll be even harder on him if you’re not there for him.”

What was I today, the ATP Agony Aunt?

Camillo sighed. “Yeah, you’re right. Okay, yeah, sorry. Let’s talk about something more fun.”

I hesitated for a moment, unsure how smug I was about to sound. Then I just went for it. “Did you hear my live ranking’s twenty? I’m in the top twenty, Cam!”

Camillo grinned. “About time! I’ve had you scouted for the top twenty since Rotterdam!”

I titled my head to the side. “What, since you added me to that WhatsApp group?”

He nodded and laughed, a proper body-shaking gleeful laugh. “Of course! Chat groups are the official badge of honour for someone who’s going places. None of this hashtag next gen nonsense.”

I giggled and smiled so wide I must have looked deranged. I had smiled that wide two times in my life. One was my first ever match on the ATP tour; the other was my seventh Christmas when my mum got me the remote control car I wanted. I did feel like a little kid. There was something magical and wondrous about the way Camillo was looking at me, like when you watch a Christmas movie and feel yourself swept up in the spirit of it.

Within seconds we were kissing.

I haven’t a clue who started it, could barely even tell at the time. But my arms were around his shoulders and his hand in the small of my back. My mind was so clear, as clear as it had ever been deep into a tennis match. All there was was him, and while I was holding onto him none of the questions that could have been bugging me mattered.

But then I heard shouting, and I sprang away from Camillo as if he’d been lit on fire. I noticed immediately that we were both sweating. Then I saw the hurt in his eyes. But that didn’t matter. Not right now. We were fucked if somebody walked in on us.

But nobody did walk in. It occurred to me that the shouting could have been Koji and Maderic. Maybe Koji had caught up to Maderic and had some sort of argument with him. It didn’t seem ridiculous that they’d go off in opposite directions – one of them off down the corridor and one of them back in here – but still nobody came in.

My breathing was heavy, and not for the reason it had been a moment ago. I looked at Camillo, who was staring at me as if I’d been lit on fire. I’d jumped back all the way to the other end of the couch, so fast I’d managed to bruise my back on the arm of the chair.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “I just-”

“It’s okay,” he said. He shrugged, a slight grin creeping up one side of his face. “PDA isn’t for everyone.”

“Definitely not for me,” I said with a shudder.

I moved back towards him on the couch, desperately forcing myself to keep at least a foot of space between us. It might actually have looked a little awkward to be that far apart, as if I was in a huff with him. But it wasn’t exactly headline-worthy. I was terrified of what the papers would do if they saw me all over him, which would definitely have been what I was doing if I didn’t hold myself back with all the mental caging that I could.

“Do you want to go somewhere?” he said after a while.

I shook my head. “Someone’ll follow us, surely.”

He shrugged. “What are they going to suspect? The idea of two male tennis players getting a room is so unheard of it probably wouldn’t even cross their minds.”

I chewed my lip and avoided his gaze. “I know, I know, I just – ah, no. Please, I don’t want to risk it.”

“Okay, okay,” he said. “Hey, look at me. We don’t have to do anything.”

“Okay,” I said. I took a deep breath and looked up into his eyes. The next words out of my mouth were not going to come out easy. “We could go running tonight.”

He grinned. “I’ll text you somewhere to meet.”