and served the match out to love.
“Cheers, Chantal! God Bless You!” Lewis whispered as he raised his glass in salute.
Having made his toast with the remains of his vodka, Lewis ordered one more, before turning his attention to the other image at the opposite end of the room. He had seen it before, a few times in fact, and had to concede it captured the moment really well... It was of himself, Lewis Macleod, on a gloriously sunny Fourth of July, kissing the Men’s Singles Trophy at Wimbledon.
Chapter 2
Lewis took a sip of his second vodka and allowed the memories to come back. It wasn’t difficult. It was only eighteen months ago after all, and not something he was likely to forget, what with all the fuss that surrounded the achievement, and the celebrity status it immediately bestowed.
Fame, fortune, and don’t forget notoriety! That last one more than anything was the legacy he earned by coming through the rounds and eventually emerging as ‘The All England Lawn Tennis Club Single Handed Champion of the World’.
Long title! But notoriety went with it?
Too true! It should have been his first name, for notoriety had certainly preceded Lewis Macleod to his first appearance in the main draw at SW19. He’d been to Wimbledon before and made a bit of a splash, but that was as a junior before his fall from grace, getting to the ‘boys’ semi-final where he lost to the eventual winner. A bright future beckoned. Then it appeared to go up in smoke. Well not smoke as it happens – cannabis didn’t feature in the blood sample he gave a few months later. But cocaine was there along with GHB, and that earned him a ban for two long years and serious notoriety at a precarious age. Lewis already knew about notoriety, although he didn’t know about the drugs. That came as a hell of a shock when he was informed of the results. Of course he worked it out pretty damn quick. A sexual encounter with a man twice his age, involved a weird tasting drink and a thumping head the following morning, residual pain and a hazy memory – the bastard had slipped him a Mickey Finn and in doing so seemingly screwed his career as well as screwing the naive young Scotsman. An explanation would have helped, but Lewis didn’t feel inclined – pig-headed obstinacy and homophobic fears causing him to keep quiet on the matter. Instead he retreated into his shell and spent the two years perfecting his grass court game. As far as Lewis was concerned, there could only be one way to atone for the disgrace he’d brought on the family name. And at the tender age of twenty-one he did exactly that, returning to Wimbledon as a fast rising star, whose brilliance was still relatively unknown to the unsuspecting British public – a state that was due to change in the most dramatic fashion!
After only six months on the main ATP tour he wasn’t even seeded. But for those in the know the promise was clear having claimed some big scalps and made a final in Dubai with an attacking style of tennis that took opponents by surprise. Serve and volley! It was an approach that supposedly belonged to the past when three of the four slams were played on grass. With much of the turf now dug up and replaced by cement or synthetic polymers, the modern game had slowed down and was played mainly from the baseline... except that is during the last three weeks of June and the first few days of July when lawn tennis makes its annual return to its green grass roots of home.
It started low key – well the first ten minutes was fairly tame, after that it was an explosion no one could have predicted. The organisers put him on an outside court, which was only fair and proper. He was lowly ranked at just inside the top fifty, not yet a household name - and there was that inglorious reputation involving recreational drugs that made for an unfortunate taste in the mouths of the powers that be within the sport. There was also the ‘sleeve’ that Lewis had acquired during his two
“Cheers, Chantal! God Bless You!” Lewis whispered as he raised his glass in salute.
Having made his toast with the remains of his vodka, Lewis ordered one more, before turning his attention to the other image at the opposite end of the room. He had seen it before, a few times in fact, and had to concede it captured the moment really well... It was of himself, Lewis Macleod, on a gloriously sunny Fourth of July, kissing the Men’s Singles Trophy at Wimbledon.
Chapter 2
Lewis took a sip of his second vodka and allowed the memories to come back. It wasn’t difficult. It was only eighteen months ago after all, and not something he was likely to forget, what with all the fuss that surrounded the achievement, and the celebrity status it immediately bestowed.
Fame, fortune, and don’t forget notoriety! That last one more than anything was the legacy he earned by coming through the rounds and eventually emerging as ‘The All England Lawn Tennis Club Single Handed Champion of the World’.
Long title! But notoriety went with it?
Too true! It should have been his first name, for notoriety had certainly preceded Lewis Macleod to his first appearance in the main draw at SW19. He’d been to Wimbledon before and made a bit of a splash, but that was as a junior before his fall from grace, getting to the ‘boys’ semi-final where he lost to the eventual winner. A bright future beckoned. Then it appeared to go up in smoke. Well not smoke as it happens – cannabis didn’t feature in the blood sample he gave a few months later. But cocaine was there along with GHB, and that earned him a ban for two long years and serious notoriety at a precarious age. Lewis already knew about notoriety, although he didn’t know about the drugs. That came as a hell of a shock when he was informed of the results. Of course he worked it out pretty damn quick. A sexual encounter with a man twice his age, involved a weird tasting drink and a thumping head the following morning, residual pain and a hazy memory – the bastard had slipped him a Mickey Finn and in doing so seemingly screwed his career as well as screwing the naive young Scotsman. An explanation would have helped, but Lewis didn’t feel inclined – pig-headed obstinacy and homophobic fears causing him to keep quiet on the matter. Instead he retreated into his shell and spent the two years perfecting his grass court game. As far as Lewis was concerned, there could only be one way to atone for the disgrace he’d brought on the family name. And at the tender age of twenty-one he did exactly that, returning to Wimbledon as a fast rising star, whose brilliance was still relatively unknown to the unsuspecting British public – a state that was due to change in the most dramatic fashion!
After only six months on the main ATP tour he wasn’t even seeded. But for those in the know the promise was clear having claimed some big scalps and made a final in Dubai with an attacking style of tennis that took opponents by surprise. Serve and volley! It was an approach that supposedly belonged to the past when three of the four slams were played on grass. With much of the turf now dug up and replaced by cement or synthetic polymers, the modern game had slowed down and was played mainly from the baseline... except that is during the last three weeks of June and the first few days of July when lawn tennis makes its annual return to its green grass roots of home.
It started low key – well the first ten minutes was fairly tame, after that it was an explosion no one could have predicted. The organisers put him on an outside court, which was only fair and proper. He was lowly ranked at just inside the top fifty, not yet a household name - and there was that inglorious reputation involving recreational drugs that made for an unfortunate taste in the mouths of the powers that be within the sport. There was also the ‘sleeve’ that Lewis had acquired during his two
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