BASELINE ✸ Art Donaldson

‎‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎One.‎ If You Leave The Light On

        TATUM NICHOLS WAS A LEGEND. Is a legend. After all, she was born to be. Her mother was an infamous, record-breaking Tennis player. Helen Theron and her 15 titles. With her 12x US Open-winning husband, Steve Nichols. They were a power duo, indefinitely. The future of tennis, they said. Which is why when news broke that they were having a child, there was only one thing it could mean. That a tennis legend was about to be born.

Tatum was handed a racket practically as soon as she could walk, and was breaking records ever since her 8th birthday.

And now, she was the one that held 18 titles by the age of 30.

But it wasn't at all what she wanted. Not in the slightest. Tatum didn't want to be some world-renowned tennis player. In fact, all she really wanted was to start a family and live the closest to normal life she could get.

One more season, she'd remind herself. Just one more.

"You excited for your challenger?" Aaron questions, sliding a plate across the table and right in front of Tatum.

Excited was far too much of an overstatement. Tatum was dreading it — she was tired of hitting felt balls with wire rackets. She no longer yearned for that feeling of when the ball hits against the racket and it'd vibrate every nerve in the palm of her hand and would tingle all the way down her arm. Now, she dreaded it.

Keeping her gaze low, narrowed on the overdone eggs on her green porcelain plate, she hummed. "It's for washed-up has-beens. What's there to be excited about?"

Aaron narrowed his gaze on his sister, giving her a sheepish smile as he sat down beside her. "You were in an accident, T. You have to start somewhere again."

That accident was the best thing to ever happen to me.

She bites her tongue.

The taste of the words is bitter because what cruel masochistic woman would be glad she was in a car accident?

Tatum Nichols was. She thought that, finally, just maybe, it was her ticket to retirement — to getting away from this sport and finally starting a life of her own.

"Besides," he nudged his sister's bicep. "You'll be at the US Open in no time."

Hopefully not.

Tatum finishes toying with her food and pulls out from the chair beneath the glass table. "I have to train."

Tatum dropped the plate in the hotel's sink, the food remaining attached.

She grabbed the black hair tie around her wrist and used it to pull back her fist full of hair and before she knew it, she was pressing the button to go down the elevator.

The walls were mahogany with golden lining and marble tile floors. It was the Ritz, after all. The hotspot for rich people — for rich tennis players.

The walk down to the Gym from the elevator wasn't long at all, but the gym was particularly tiny. It reeked of sweat and not at all like the freshened air throughout the entirety of the rest of the hotel.

But it was... doable.

"Hey, you're..." a voice called from behind her. "Tatum Nichols, right?"

She turned on the heel of her shoe to see a short-haired man in nothing but a gray tank top and shorts that barely met his knees.