I'm playing tennis. My body is moving slowly. My arm feels heavy. My coordination is remarkable for the lack of it. I break a sweat easily enough but I am not giving a good game to my partner. 30 minutes pass and the heat and humidity is wearing me down. I look across the court next to us and behind the chain link fence is my daughter. Except she isn't four, she's fourteen. She is watching me. She is seeing right though me. I turn to my partner, turn back, and my daughter is gone.

I take a sip of water and start to feel like I must have had a strange deja vu moment.  We keep playing, I lose another service game. I turn and walk back towards the baseline. Its then that I see my daughter again, still behind the chain link fence. I see her say something but I hear no sound. Is she whispering? Doesn't seem like it. I call her name just as my partner in her rush to keep momentum yells the set score "5 serving 2" she says. Our voices are muffled and in the confusion my daughter disappears.

I lose the final game quickly, hence the set, hence the match. My partner meets me at the net and says "thanks for the game" and we are done. I feel a little bit dazed as I leave the court.

My daughter is waiting for me on the other side of the gate. Her eyes cold and still.

"Don't be too late. Be here", she says.

And then she is gone.

I know exactly what she means and what I need to do. Will I?