What’s her secret? Serena only compromises with herself.
“I’ve thought it would be cool to have a baby young,” says Serena. “You know, be my road dog—like my dogs, they travel the world—but there’s always something you have to give up for success. Everything comes at a cost. Just what are you willing to pay for it?”
Good question.
Serena and Venus Williams share a house in a gated community in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, where the rest of the residents have been enjoying the early-bird specials for years. They like it that way; it keeps out the riffraff. On a misty March morning, Serena answers the door in sweats and a T-shirt, her long hair flowing in about seven directions.
“Come on in,” she says, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. “I’ve got to practice, ugh.” Then her face brightens. “But then we’ll go get my nails done. I’m getting them done in colors that change with my mood. Now, that I’m looking forward to.”
She turns around and sarcastically sings a few bars of “Oh What a Beautiful Morning” in a not-bad voice. The sisters have lived here for a decade, but the house still has a transient, hedge-funder’s-second-home feel. Amazon boxes and dozens of shoes sit stacked in the foyer next to a giant painting of Venus. (She’s not around.) There’s a sparkly chandelier and a massive antique mirror leaning against the wall. But the action takes place in the kitchen, where a cook hands Serena a green potion. She drinks it reluctantly.
“I had chicken and waffles the other day, so I’ve got to make up for it,” she says. “Ai-yi-yi.”
An assistant brings in some new Green Day T-shirts—they’re her favorite band. Serena reanimates and does a bunny hop around the dining room. “These are cool, so cool!”
Patrick Mouratoglou, her newish French coach and possibly her boyfriend, emerges from a back room. He’s handsome in that dark-haired Frenchman kind of way. He says nothing but carries a bagful of rackets.
Serena sighs.
“I guess it’s time to do it.”
We head over to some nearby courts in my rental car (there’s a white Rolls in the driveway).
“That’s Casper,” says Serena. “I like to name my cars. And, you know, Casper seemed obvious for that one.”
Like most everyone in modern America, Serena travels with an entourage. There’s Mouratoglou, the cook, the physical therapist, and Aleksandar “Big Sascha” Bajin, her much-put-upon hitting partner. The caravan heads to a court about a half-mile from the house and begins loading out the gear. It’s two days before the start of the Sony Open in Miami, one of the circuit’s premier nonmajors and the first significant test for Serena since she was upset in the quarterfinals at the Australian Open after spraining an ankle that had ballooned to three times its normal size.
Serena was beaten by the beautiful and—for sportswriters—conveniently black Sloane Stephens, leading tennis commentators to call her the “New Serena.” Stephens proceeded to lose seven of her next 10 matches and earned Serena’s annoyance when the press suggested that Stephens regarded Serena as a mentor. Stephens objected, saying no way in hell was Serena her mentor, and questioned whether Serena had dissed her on Twitter, proving the tennis tour is much like Mean Girls with prize money. (“I don’t know where all that mentor stuff came from,” Serena says. “I am definitely not that girl’s mentor.”)
She’s been recovering from the ankle injury for two months, but if anyone is feeling the pressure, nobody shows it. Jackie, Serena’s beloved old white dog, curls up in her tennis bag and goes to sleep. Serena changes from the Green Day shirt—she doesn’t want to get it sweaty—and slips on an Incredible Hulk T-shirt festooned with six-pack abs.
Bajin is ready to warm up, but Serena has other things on her mind. “I had a dream last night,” she says to no one in particular. “My dad was in the Mafia, and he’d done something bad, and there were body parts everywhere, but I didn’t want to see them.” Bajin stops stretching and listens in. “Then the Mafia came over to our house, but it wasn’t our real house, and they had grenades and rifles.”
Everyone in the entourage looks at their collective feet, and Serena goes on. “My dreams always have a twist. Then I was swimming with Venus, and then she was holding a shark in her hands pushing at me. I mean, what does that mean?”
This seems like an easy one. The Williams sisters are known inside the tennis world equally for their on-court achievements and for being the offspring of one Richard Williams, who was raised by a single mom in Shreveport, Louisiana, and schooled the girls for hours on the glass-strewn courts in Compton, California, from the age of seven. Richard turned two children of the ghetto into legends in a gilded sport run by Veuve Clicquot–sipping country-club types. This has not always gone over well. Richard has steamrolled other players and tour staffers—hence the dead bodies—to get his girls their just due. Sometimes, he’s been heroic—he gave the black-power salute at a tournament in Indian Wells, California, a decade ago—after the crowd shamefully booed Serena with racial overtones. And sometimes he has been insufferable—dancing on the broadcasting booth at Wimbledon, proclaiming his daughters the best ever.