The light was not switched on in the room. Helen Pepe was alone. She leaned against a sofa. She looked through the huge floor-to-ceiling windows and looked outside at the moon and stars in the sky.
In the past year, Helen Pepe had been plagued by severe injuries and her performance had greatly suffered. At the beginning of the Australian Open, she had only made it to the quarter-finals. Later at the French Open, she had been eliminated in the quarter-finals. After that, at Wimbledon, she lost in the third round. In the U.S. Open, although she got through the first round, her injury made it so that she was unable to play the second round, so she had to withdraw.
