On The Run

So Tashi wants to be seen as a tennis player. She needs someone who understands just how good she was, and just how much she’s lost. Tennis was her ticket out of mediocrity, it was her identity, and it has taken her a long time to figure out how to exist outside of it. She takes Art’s last name.

She loves and cares about both Art and Patrick, but she’d murder them both in a heartbeat for a second chance at tennis, and she probably feels a bit guilty about that.

Art gives her everything she should want from a relationship—a devoted husband and a theoretically fulfilling job—but it’s not enough for her, and she feels guilty about that too, and then she resents Art for making her feel guilty, and then she feels worse.

Art relies on her a lot emotionally, and she probably finds herself constantly having to be the strong one between them, to be his rock—a reliable coach. This can be exhausting, though she might prefer it this way because being vulnerable in front of him will forever recall the injury that ended her career. He’s seen her at her lowest and she can’t bear to be reminded of it. She would rather let Art worship her than be subject to his pity.

Part of her is afraid she really is only using him to live vicariously through his career; part of her is angry that Art would let her do that to him; part of her loves tennis too much to care.

It both thrills and scares her how much power she has over him. She looks at the meek, exhausted shell of a man her husband has become and she’s afraid she’s ruined him. She thinks coaching him better at tennis will fix things, but doesn’t realise it’s only making everything worse. She doesn’t realise it’s a really bad idea to withhold affection as a form of training.

Art wants to make Tashi happy. Both because he’s in love with her, and also because he feels guilt over her injury, over how he messed with her and Patrick’s relationship before that game. He also needs Tashi because she’s his last connection to Patrick, because if Tashi continues to cheat on him with Patrick it’ll mean at least he’s still close by. Art pushes himself to play tennis because somewhere in his mind he’s convinced Tashi would only want him if he’s a good player. He’s still insecure about being her second choice. A part of him is also desperately chasing the high that playing tennis used to make him feel, back when he played with Patrick.

Art likes making people happy—he asks Patrick to let him win the juniors finals because his grandma would be watching and he wanted to make her proud. It’s only when he’s playing against Patrick for Tashi’s number that he starts seriously wanting to win for himself. That game was maybe his first time actually seeing Patrick as a rival. For Art tennis is a vehicle for love. “I’m playing for the both of us”, he says to Tashi, like a normal person. Tennis was the setting for the relationships that mattered most to him, with Patrick first and then with Tashi.

He loses his passion for the game because he’s realising that tennis has begun pulling him away from his loved ones instead of bringing him closer. Patrick is gone. He’s not spending enough time with his daughter. He wants Tashi to be his wife and not just his coach. Tennis is no longer enough, but feeling that way feels like a betrayal of the amount of work Tashi has put into him.

In the sauna Art asks Patrick “what the fuck else do I have to talk to you about” in an act designed deliberately to hurt him, and Art knows exactly how much it will hurt Patrick because it’s probably just about the most devastating thing he can imagine Tashi ever saying to him. (Which then she basically does, though she only does it because she thinks it will help motivate him.)

Patrick brings out the part of Art that fights back, the part of him that is assertive and selfish and petty and mean. Maybe it’s because, consciously or not, he’s secure in the fact that Patrick will love him no matter what. Patrick brings out the version of Art that Tashi can love in the way Art wants to be loved by her.

Patrick is able to see Tashi as a person beyond her career as a tennis player, something she despises him for (because she still desperately wants to be seen as a tennis player), but also finds comforting (because he doesn’t define her identity through her loss of that career). He sees through the layers of corporate branding and gets who she is, maybe because he’s been desensitised to that kind of artifice as someone who grew up a one-percenter.

He doesn’t pity her. He doesn’t idolise her. He sees her as an equal. Art asks Tashi to be his coach because he wants to make her happy. Patrick asks Tashi to be his coach because he thinks they can be each others’ ticket to greatness. He’s willing to call out her bullshit. Patrick won’t compromise on his own needs just because he loves her. (He’ll only do that for Art.)

He’s probably been in love with Art since they were children, since before he realised it was possible, and by the time he did it was already too late. He wants Tashi, because he does love her, and also because he can’t bear the thought of her taking Art away from him (which then she basically does, though that’s not really her fault). And he’s probably gone after a lot of girls that Art’s been interested in over the years.