On the Line (20 page)

For whatever reason, I called. He didn’t answer, but he called back a short while later. He said, “Hey, this is So-and-So.”

I said, “Hey.”

He said, “I wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed meeting you the other day. You put out such a positive energy.”

I said, “Thanks.”

Not exactly the most romantic opening exchange in the history of opening exchanges, but we kept talking. At the other end
he said, “If you’re ever in town, maybe we can get together. I’d really like to get to know you a little better, and I’m hoping
you feel the same way.”

As it happened, I was in D.C. just a couple weeks later, visiting Isha. I called So-and-So to tell him I was in town. We went
out to lunch. We talked. We promised to get together again. And we did. We went back and forth like that for the next few
months, every time I came through town, until finally he suggested we move things along on a more serious path. I resisted
at first, but he wore me down. We had a lot of fun together. We went to King’s Dominion, which is like the D.C. version of
Magic Mountain. We went on all the rides. Isha came with us, and she liked him well enough. She didn’t come back to me later
and say, “Serena, you can do better.” He seemed fine.

And that’s how it went for the next while. So-and-So didn’t come down to Florida that often—maybe once or twice—but when his
football schedule allowed he did travel to meet up with me wherever I was playing. In fact, he was at Indian Wells that day
the crowd turned on me and my family, and he told me afterward how much respect he had for the way I handled myself. He said,
“I wouldn’t have been able to keep playing, if people were yelling at me like that.” He said, “I already knew you were an
incredible athlete, but this tells me you’re an incredible person.”

I thought that was really sweet.

Next thing I knew, I was in love. Or, I thought I was in love. (I just
hate
that word, don’t you?) Let’s just say I was hooked, so it felt good and right and comfortable to be squirreled away with
him during those tense few days right after September 11. The world was going crazy, but we could just shut the door and wish
the world away.

And then he got sick. Really, really sick. Out-of-nowhere sick. So I dug in and took care of him. That’s what you do, right?
I made him soup. I changed his sheets. I brought him cool compresses and everything else you’re supposed to do when you’re
taking care of someone in a relationship. To this day, I still don’t know what was wrong with him—some killer flu bug or virus
or something. Whatever it was, it finally got to where I had to take him to the hospital, and they hooked him up to an IV
because he was superdehydrated, so I kept visiting him there for another couple days.

When he was better, and back on his feet, I made plans to leave. The airports were open again, and people were returning to
their lives, and I had to get back and start training for my next tournament, so we said our good-byes and that was that.
I figured I’d talk to him later that day, to tell him I arrived home safely, or maybe the next morning—you know, whatever
you do when you’re part of a couple.

But that was
really
that, it turned out, and things went from sweet to sour in a foolish hurry because I never heard from So-and-So again.

Can you imagine? I called and called, but he never picked up. It was right before my birthday, so I thought surely he would
call. I convinced myself that maybe he’d lost his phone or something to explain his sudden silence, but he never did. I left
him message after message. I said, “This is Serena. Your
girlfriend.
” I said it like it was in quotes, like I was asking if that was really what I was to him.

For the life of me, I couldn’t figure what had happened to set this guy off, but I wouldn’t let it rest. I couldn’t. It was
clear he was avoiding me, but I kept calling and calling. Once, I blocked my number so he couldn’t see that it was me on his
caller ID, but I didn’t say anything when he answered. I just hung up.

I didn’t know what to do. I’d just turned twenty years old. This was my first serious relationship. I had no road map to follow,
to tell me how to respond when someone you thought you loved wouldn’t even return your phone calls. For no apparent reason.
After you’d just dropped everything to nurse him back to health. In the middle of one of the most difficult, uncertain times
in our nation’s history. Everything seemed upside down—another cliché, I know, but it seems to fit those tentative times.

It’s superfunny to me now, because I’m past it, but this guy tore my heart in half. Then he ripped up those pieces and stepped
on them and backed his car up over them. And the worst part was he left me thinking it was on me. He left me thinking I was
ugly, that I didn’t deserve to be in a loving relationship. Heck,
I
didn’t even love me anymore, after So-and-So got done with me. So what did I do? I went to Germany to play in a tournament.
I wasn’t planning to go, but I went. Tennis would be my salvation, I decided. Tennis would see me through. I would not be
beaten down by this guy, I vowed. In the little match book I keep, I put his name in the margins. It reminded me I had something
to prove to him. To myself. From there I just kept winning. I won that tournament in Germany, and it led right up to those
four majors I won in a row. The Serena Slam, they called it, but I’ve always thought of it as my So-and-So Slam, for the way
it came on the back of this bad breakup. I wanted So-and-So to regret how he treated me. I wanted him to see me everywhere,
doing well. That became my focus. Nothing was more important.

It seems fair to note that it wasn’t such a deep or talented field at that tournament in Germany, but I did beat Justine Henin
in the quarterfinals. That was something. And I was all set to face Lindsay Davenport in the finals, but she withdrew at the
last moment, so I won in a walkover. That was something, too. Personally, I never minded too terribly much when my opponent
withdrew. I always feel bad for the other girl, that she doesn’t get a chance to do her thing, but then my competitive streak
kicks in and I start to think, Hey, I still get the points. I still win the tournament. I still get the money. And I don’t
have to work as hard. I know a lot of players don’t feel the same way—they’d rather win a match outright—but I’m not like
most players. My goal is to come out on top. Doesn’t really matter to me how I get there, as long as I get there. That sounds
a little cold and unsportsmanlike, I know, but that’s what I get to thinking when this kind of thing happens. I think,
That’s okay, Serena. You can use the rest. And, there’ll be more in the tank for the next match.

After that first taste of So-and-So revenge, I looked ahead to the start of the 2002 season with great anticipation. I was
still determined to stay in this guy’s face, to be a constant reminder of what we had, to rise above his shabby treatment
and stand as tall as I possibly could. That tournament in Germany was just a start, I told myself, and after that I was off
to Sydney the first week of January 2002, for an all-important tune-up for the Australian Open. The plan was to keep my perverse
revenge mojo going at full tilt.

I got off to a good start, dusting Anna Kournikova and Amelie Mauresmo on my way to a semifinal showdown against Meghann Shaughnessy,
but then the wheels fell off my plan. I was up 5–4 in the first set when I had to retire with an injury to my right ankle.
Now it was Meghann Shaughnessy’s chance to get some extra rest and fuel up before
her
next match. I hadn’t counted on that—and it was especially disappointing because it felt to me like I had so much to prove.
To So-and-So. In my head, it had gotten to where it was all about him, about lifting myself from the dirt he left me lying
in after the way he treated me.

Looking back, I have to think I was playing for all the wrong reasons—but what did I care, if all the wrong reasons ended
up taking me to the same place as all the right ones? Remember, the goal was to come out on top, no matter what, only here
my bum ankle cost me some of my payback momentum. Not a lot, but some. I rehabbed like a demon, and I was back at it soon
enough, winning my next tournament in Scottsdale, Arizona, and finally getting the measure of Jennifer Capriati in the finals.
I took it to her again the following month, in the finals at Miami, and then again the month after that, in the semifinals
in Rome, on clay, before beating Justine Henin in the finals.

Each victory helped me climb a little further from the hole I’d allowed this guy to dig for me, but I wasn’t done yet. Dang,
I was just getting started. From Rome, it was on to Paris and yet another run-in with Jennifer Capriati, this time in the
semifinals of the French Open. Once again, I prevailed. And, once again, So-and-So loomed in the shadows, egging me on. He
didn’t know it, but I was playing for him. Despite him.
To
spite him.

That semifinal win at the 2002 French Open was significant because it put all the right reasons for competing back in play.
All along, back as far as I could remember, Daddy used to talk about how he was raising the two best tennis players in the
world in me and Venus. It was drummed into us from the very beginning, like it was our shared destiny, and Venus had just
reached the number one spot for the first time. This was huge, of course. Huge for Venus. Huge for our family. Just plain
huge. But underneath the sheer
bigness
of the moment was some more of that silent fuel that’s kept me going throughout my career. I’d always wanted what Venus had,
so right away it set in motion this whole other piece of motivation, which ran alongside this weird, revenge-mojo piece regarding
So-and-So. I wanted desperately to taste what Venus now had. Once again, she was first and foremost in our family. First to
the top. First among equals. First, first, first. Once again, I was the little sister, clipping at Venus’s heels. You better
believe it, Venus’s success was a powerful motivator for me—certainly as powerful as anything that was going on with me and
my ex-boyfriend.

The way it shook out, after I got past Capriati at Roland Garros and earned a spot in the finals against Venus, was I would
climb to the number two spot in the rankings, no matter what happened. Venus would hold on to her number one ranking, no matter
what happened, so here we were on the cusp of a great, historic achievement for my family. It was such a long time coming.
Daddy was always telling reporters and anyone else who’d listen that someday we’d be number one and number two in the world.
He believed this deeply, with all his heart—that Venus and I would dominate the game—and I remember feeling so happy for him
when it finally played out just as he’d foretold. We’d all prayed for this day, and worked hard for it, and now that it was
upon us it was such a rich, purposeful, validating moment. We were all so proud. Of course, I would have much preferred that
it was me in the number one spot and Venus in the runner-up position, but I wasn’t about to quibble.

Honestly, at just that moment, I didn’t care if I won the championship, because the true victory, the family victory, was
already at hand. We’d come so far from those run-down courts in Compton to become the two best tennis players in the world,
and nothing else seemed to matter. Not the French Open title. Not So-and-So. No, the moment was bigger than any of that. It
was about making history.

As it played out, I managed a straight-sets victory over Venus to win the tournament 7–5, 6–3. I wish I could focus here on
the mixed emotions I surely felt in beating my sister in a major final, but the triumph wasn’t about that at the time. It
really wasn’t. It was about cementing our legacy as a family. It was a win-win, for all of us. Venus was still number one,
so she got to feel like the true champion she was. And I won the French Open, so
I
got to feel like a champion, too. (Pretty great, huh?) I still remember Venus taking pictures of me holding the French Open
trophy. It was such a Williams family moment—so much so that I nearly forgot all about So-and-So and the way he’d treated
me. But
nearly
doesn’t quite get you all the way there, does it? Deep down, I guess I was still in revenge mode, still fixed on showing
this guy what he’d missed and reminding him how badly he’d treated me.

No, it’s not the healthiest approach to the game—but in fairness to me, it was layered in with this other, more positive take,
and now that I look back on it I think,
Hey, whatever works, right?
Healthy or not, my twisted little payback mind-set was certainly working. And it kept on working. It worked in Wimbledon,
where I beat Venus again in the finals and earned my first number one ranking—which I held for a thrilling fifty-seven weeks!
(That win knocked Venus into my number two spot, so the Williams sisters were still on top, only the other way around!) It
worked at the U.S. Open, back in New York, where as fate would have it I powered past Venus again in a final round rematch.
And it worked in Melbourne the following January, more than a year after this guy dumped me and sent me on this career-stamping
momentum run. Once again, it took beating Venus in the finals. (And, once again, I’m
so, so, so
sorry, V! Really, really, really!)

Four Grand Slam tournament titles in a row. Each on the back of an unfortunate piece of rejection and dejection—and each a
reminder that it’s in the picking ourselves up and dusting ourselves off and pushing ourselves forward that we find our will,
our drive, our purpose.

Tell me “No” and I’ll show U I can! Tell me “No”
because
I can! Tell me “No.” Go ahead, tell me. Just tell me I can’t win.
Just tell me it’s out of reach. Come on, I’ll prove U wrong! Just tell me “No” and watch what happens.

—
MATCH BOOK ENTRY

Y
etunde Hawanya Tara Price. My big, big, big, big sister. (That’s four
bigs
, because she was the oldest of the five of us, and I was the youngest.) She was almost like a mom to me, Venus, and Lyn.
She was closer in age to Isha, so they didn’t have the same caretaking, mentoring relationship—but her little sisters all
looked up to Tunde. She was so perfect. She was so slim, so pretty. I remember she used to wear this one miniskirt all the
time, and we always admired it. We wanted one just like it, but of course they didn’t make miniskirts like that in little-kid
sizes.