Chapter 2

“Hey, you wanna go for a bike ride?” James asked casually.

“What!” Donna stared at him suspiciously for a moment. “What brought this on? It’s not just because of what Zack said the other night, is it?”

“No. Well, partly. I mean, I agree I’ve been neglecting you for a while, but you certainly know why. Now I’ve got more time to spend with you, which I’ll tell you all about later. But, right now, I need some exercise. It’s a beautiful morning. What do you say we ride down to the club and hit some balls.”

“Great! I’ll go get changed.”

As they rode down the street, James took his normal spot in the lead. He had forgotten how enjoyable it could be to get outside and put his body to work. The sun shining gently, the wind on his face, the blood rushing through his veins, helped to remind him of the simple joy of being alive. When he thought of how often he felt like death warmed over as he tried to drag himself out of bed and off to the office, he became very depressed. Even now he had a very slight hangover. He had been avoiding heavy drinking the last few days so he could change his ways, but it was hard to avoid it altogether. The pressures at work, the tensions of family life ... he still needed some way to relax.

The first mile and a half was pretty flat. James sprinted out ahead of Donna with great gusto, fueled by an adrenaline rush from the satisfaction of doing such great things for his body. The next mile was an uphill grade James had laughed at two years ago. Before he was a third of the way up it felt like a mountain, and Donna had pedaled steadily ahead of him. By the time he reached the top Donna was out of sight around a bend. James was glad she couldn’t see him panting like an old dog on a sweltering day. He was grateful for the downhill side. He gulped down some of the cold water in his bottle, then coasted as far as possible.

The last mile up to the club was a steeper slope than the first. He took nearly the entire length of it in first gear. By the time he reached the top his legs felt like Jell-O flambé and his lungs felt like an iron smith’s bellows. Claiming he saw an old buddy he wanted to talk with, James said he would go up to the clubhouse and sign up for a court. Donna was perfectly aware of his reason for disappearing. She was so happy he was finally getting a little exercise she was determined to remain cheerful no matter how long he needed to rest before getting on a court.

When he had sufficiently recuperated, they hit for nearly an hour. James was pleasantly surprised by how well he did after nearly a year without picking up a racket. Donna did her best to keep the ball in the middle of the court so he wouldn’t have to run too much. Their light banter, gloating about a particularly good shot, laughter over a silly mistake, reminded them both of years past. They walked back to the clubhouse arm-in-arm, ready for a refreshing drink.

Donna ordered a Juice Squeeze, and James decided to have the same. As he took a big gulp he wondered why he didn’t drink something tasty and healthy like this more often. He resolved that from now on after playing tennis, he would.

“How do you feel?” Donna asked solicitously.

“I feel great! I can’t tell you how good it feels to get back into action.”

“Not too many aching muscles?”

“Of course not! Those will come about an hour after I stop moving completely.”

Donna laughed appreciatively at the small jest.

“So what’s the big deal that you’re suddenly taking the weekend off? I mean, it’s been at least six months since you didn’t go into the office at least part of each day.”

“Oh, right,” James agreed. He took another large swallow of his drink, which somehow didn’t taste quite as nice as the first few had. “You know I’ve been working on a big proposal for months. Well, I finally turned it into the client yesterday. I may have to start working on a presentation soon if the proposal is well-received, but I’ll have at least a few weeks before that happens. In the meanwhile, I want to get back into shape so we can start playing in doubles tournaments together again. Would you like that?”

“No, I really enjoy being a work widow,” Donna gave him a light punch in the arm. Of course I would, as if you didn’t know! Do you think you could play in the club mixed doubles next month?”

“Whoa, let’s not push it too hard! I mean, sure, I’d like to, but that’s four hours of pretty serious tennis. After that bike ride up here, I’m not sure I could survive that much sweat in the summer sun so soon. Unless you’re really after that life insurance policy, of course.”

“No, I don’t want you to push it,” Donna assured him, only slightly disappointed. “When you’re ready for it. In the meanwhile, maybe I could set up a few matches with some of the people we used to play?”

“Sure. Go for it. But give me a couple of weeks to get some sort of game back together, okay?”

“Of course. I’ll start with the Collins, okay? They’re a nice old couple, and you can really ease into it with them.”

“Perfect. I won’t have to throw out my shoulder trying to blast them off the court with my serve.”

“Oh, yeah, they’ll be so thankful you aren’t blasting holes through them with your killer fast ball!” she laughed, only half mockingly.

“Hey, you know I always had a tough serve! Everyone used to say...”

“I know, I know. I was just kidding. In fact, you could start practicing your hard shots with Zack. He won’t mind the power.”

“Oh. Well, I don’t know about that,” he said hesitantly, his good mood evaporating quickly. “Zack doesn’t seem to want to do anything with me any more except argue.”

Donna also became more serious. “I think you need to make an effort to reopen communications. You were basically the one who quit doing things with him a couple of years ago when you decided to join that start-up company.”

“Now, I hope you’re not going to blame me for that. Besides which, he was already starting to blow off doing things with us to hang out with his friends. How many times did we have a family outing arranged and he yelled and screamed at the last minute he couldn’t go because some friend had called to go out to a movie or some such thing?”