Open: An Autobiography

The jacket of my new Dunhill tuxedo is soaked. Even my shoes squish when I walk. They’re also fitted with lifts, another non-negotiable demand from Brooke. She’s nearly six feet tall and she doesn’t want to tower over me in our photos, so she’s wearing old-fashioned pumps with minimal heels, and I’m wearing what feel like stilts.

Before we leave the church, a decoy bride, a standin for Brooke, leaves first. To throw the paparazzi off the scent. The first time I heard about this plan, I tuned it out, refused to pay attention. Now, as I see the Brooke look-alike leaving, I have a thought no man should have on his wedding day: I wish I were leaving too. I wish I had a decoy groom to take my place.

A horse-drawn carriage is standing by to whisk Brooke and me to the reception, at a ranch called Stonepine. But first we have a short car ride to the carriage. I sit in the car beside Brooke, staring into my lap. I feel mortified about my attack of hysterical sweats. Brooke tells me it’s OK. She’s very sweet, but it’s not OK. Nothing is OK.

Into the reception we go, into a solid wall of noise. I see a whirling carousel of faces - Philly, Gil, J.P., Brad, Slim, my parents. There are famous people I don’t know, have never met, but vaguely recognize. Friends of Brooke? Friends of friends? Some of the Friends from Friends? I catch sight of Perry, my best man and the self-anointed wedding producer. He wears a Madonna headset so he can be in constant communication with the photographers and florists and caterers. He’s so jacked up, so high-strung, he’s making me more nervous, which I didn’t think was possible.

At the end of the night, Brooke and I stagger up to our bridal suite, which I’ve arranged to have filled with hundreds of candles. Too many candles - the room is an oven. It’s hotter than the church. Again I start to sweat. We start to blow out the candles, and the smoke detectors go off. We disable the smoke detectors and open the windows. While the room cools we go downstairs, back to the reception, to spend our wedding night eating chocolate mousse with the wedding party.

The following afternoon, at a barbecue for friends and family, Brooke and I make a grand entrance. As per Brooke’s plan, we wear cowboy hats and denim shirts and arrive on horses.

Mine is named Sugar. Her sad glassy eyes remind me of Peaches. People surround me, talk at me, congratulate me, slap me on the back, and I need to run away. I spend a good portion of the barbecue with my nephew, Skyler, son of Rita and Pancho. We get hold of a bow and arrow and take target practice with a distant oak.

While drawing back the bow, I feel a sudden twinge in my wrist.

I PULL OUT OF THE 1997 FRENCH OPEN. Of all the surfaces, clay is the worst on a tender wrist. There is no way I can last five sets against the dirt rats, who’ve been practicing and drilling on clay while I’ve been getting manicures and riding Sugar.

But I will go to Wimbledon. I want to go. Brooke has landed an acting job in England, which means she can accompany me. This will be good, I think. A change of venue. A trip, our first as husband and wife, to somewhere other than an island.

Though, come to think of it, England is an island.

In London we spend several happy nights. Dinner with friends. An experimental play. A walk along the Thames. The stars are lined up for a good Wimbledon. And then I decide that I’d rather jump in the Thames. Out of nowhere I can’t bring myself to practice.

I tell Brad and Gil I’m pulling out of the tournament. I’m in vapor lock.

Brad says, What the hell does vapor lock mean?

I’ve played this game for a lot of reasons, I say, and it just seems like none of them has ever been my own.

The words come tumbling out, with no forethought, just as they did that night with Slim.

But they sound remarkably true. So much, in fact, that I write them down. I repeat them to reporters. And to mirrors.

After pulling out of the tournament I stay on in London, waiting for Brooke to finish filming.

We go out one night with a group of actors to a world-famous restaurant Brooke is eager to try. The Ivy. Brooke and the actors talk over each other while I silently hunker down at one end of the table, eating. Grazing, actually. I order five courses, and for dessert I shovel three sticky toffee puddings into my mouth.

Slowly, an actress notices how much food is disappearing at my end of the table. She looks at me, alarmed.

Do you always, she asks, eat like this?

I’M PLAYING IN D.C. and my opponent is Flach. Brad tells me to go out and avenge last year’s Wimbledon loss, but I can’t imagine anything mattering less. Revenge? Again? Haven’t we been down that road before? It makes me sad, and weary, that Brad can be so blinded by his Bradness, that he can be so oblivious to what I’m feeling. Who does he think he is - Brooke?

I lose to Flach, of course, then tell Brad I’m shutting down for the summer.

Brad says, The whole summer?

See you in the fall.