Because there were a lot of lunatics out there. An attractive young woman could find herself an unwitting magnet for the aberrant and the delusional, and a letter from a devoted fan could seem as fraught with potential danger as one threatening the life of the President. There was a difference, you wouldn’t get in trouble writing a fan letter, but the effect on its recipient might be even greater. The President of the United States would never see your letter, a secretary would open it and hand it over to the FBI, but a young tennis player, especially a relative novice who probably didn’t get all that much fan mail, might well open it and read it herself.
And might take it the wrong way. Whatever you said, however you phrased it, she might read something unintended into it. Might begin to wonder if perhaps this enthusiastic fan might be a little too enthusiastic, and if this admiration for her athletic ability might cloak a disturbing obsession.
And what, really, was the point in a fan letter? To reward the recipient for the pleasure her performance had brought him? Hardly, if such a letter were more likely to provoke anxiety than to hearten. What kind of a reward was that?
No, it was the writer’s own ego that a fan letter supported. It was an attempt to create a relationship with a stranger, and the only fit relationship for two such people was distant and anonymous. She played tennis, and sparkled on the court. He watched, rapt with enjoyment, and she didn’t even know he existed. Which was as it should be.
In the letters he wrote in the privacy of his own mind, sometimes he was a wee bit suggestive, a trifle risqué. Sometimes he thought of things that would bring a blush to that pretty face.
But he never wrote them down, not a sentence, not a word. So where was the harm in that?
Her game was off.
Last month she’d played in the French Open, and the television coverage had been frustrating; he’d only been able to see one of her matches, and highlights of others. She didn’t make the quarter-finals this time, went out in the third round, beaten in a third-set tiebreaker by an unseeded player she should have swept in straight sets.
Something was missing. Some spark, some inner fire.
And now she was back in the States, playing in the women-only Virago tournament in Indianapolis, and he’d driven almost a thousand miles to watch her play, and she wasn’t playing well. At game point in the opening set, the girl double-faulted. You just didn’t do that. When the serve had to be in or you lost the set, you made sure you got that serve in. You just did it.
He watched, heartsick, as his Miranda lost point after point to a girl who wasn’t fit to carry her racquet. Watched her run after balls she should have gotten to, watched her make unforced errors, watched her beat herself. Well, she had to, didn’t she? Her opponent couldn’t beat her. She could only beat herself.
And she did.
Toward the end, he tried to inspire her through sheer force of will. He narrowed his gaze, stared hard at her, willed her to look at him, to meet his eyes. And she just wouldn’t do it. She looked everywhere but at him, and a fat lot of good it did her.
Then she did look over at him, and her eyes met his and drew away. She was ashamed, he realized, ashamed of her performance, ashamed of herself. She couldn’t meet his eyes.
Nor could she turn the tide. The other girl beat her, and she was out of the tournament. He’d driven a thousand miles, and for what?
He wrote her a letter.
I don’t know what you think you’re doing, he wrote, but the net result — no pun intended — is to sabotage not merely a career but a life.
He went on to the end, read the thing over, and decided he didn’t like the parenthetical no pun intended bit. He copied the letter over, dropping it and changing net to overall. Then he signed it: A Man Who Cares.
He left it on his desk, and the next day he rewrote it, and added some personal advice. Stay away from the lesbians, he counseled her. They’re only after one thing. The same goes for boys. You could never be happy with someone your own age. He read it over, copied it with a word changed here and there, and signed it: The Man Who Loves You.
The following night he read the letter, went to bed, and got up, unable to sleep. He went to his desk and redrafted the letter one more time, adding some material that he supposed some might regard as overly frank, even pornographic. The Man For Whom You Were Destined. The phrase struck him as stilted, but he let it stand, and below it, with a flourish, he signed his name. He destroyed all the other drafts and went to bed.
In the morning he read the letter, sighed, shook his head, and burned it in the fireplace. The words, he thought, would go up the chimney and up into the sky, and, in the form of pure energy, would find their way to the intended recipient.
Her next tournament was in a city less than a hundred miles from his residence.
He thought about going, decided against it because he didn’t want the disappointment. He’d developed a feeling for her, he’d invested emotionally in the girl, and she wasn’t worth it. Better to stay home and cut his losses.
Better to avoid her on television as well. He wouldn’t tune in to the coverage until she was eliminated. Which, given the massive deterioration of her game, would probably come in the first or second round. Then, once she was out of it, he could sit back and watch the sport he loved.
But, perversely, she sailed through the opening rounds. He read the sports pages every morning, and noted the results of her matches. One reporter commented on the renewed determination she was showing, and the inner reserves upon which she seemed able to draw.
There’s a sparkle in her eye, too, he added, that hints at an off-court relationship.
He was not surprised.
She won in the quarterfinals, won again in the semis. He didn’t watch, although the pull toward the television set was almost irresistible.
If she reached the finals, he promised himself, then he would watch.
She got there, and didn’t have to contend with either of the formidable sisters; one had skipped the tournament with a sore heel tendon, while the other lost in the semis to Ana Dravic, the Croatian lesbian he’d watched Miranda lose to in a quarterfinal match when she was still his Miranda, pure and innocent, glowing with promise. Now Miranda would play Dravic again, for the tournament, and could she win? Would she win?
She lost the first set 4–6, won the second in a fierce tiebreaker. She was on serve in the first game of the third and final set, won that, and then broke Dravic’s serve to lead two games to none.
And then her game fell apart.
She double-faulted, made unforced errors. She never won another game, and, when she trotted up to the net to congratulate the hulking Croatian, the TV commentators were at a loss to explain what had happened to her game.
But he knew. He looked at her hand as she clasped Dravic’s larger hand, caught the expression on her face. And then, when she turned and looked into the camera, looked straight at him, he knew that she knew, too.
Her next tournament was in California. It took him four days to drive there.
He went to one early-round match, watched her win handily. Her tennis was purposeful, efficient, but now it left him cold. There was no heart and soul in it. It had changed, even as she had changed.
At one point, she turned and looked him right in the eye. Her thoughts were as clear as if she’d spoken them aloud, as if she’d shouted them into his ear. There! What are you going to do about it?