"You know what, I'm think I'm just gonna quit school, tennis is so much more promising than grades, I swear..." Tiffany complained before pouting cutely.

We had received our "much-anticipated" results and...they weren't exactly great. Scratch that. They were terrible. To give you the general idea of how well we fared, the number of subjects both of us passed combined could be counted with one hand.

After the dreamy highs of our US Open campaigns, this was a crushing low. Well, what goes up has to come down...

"I feel you, we're lost causes..."

All of a sudden, Tiffany grabbed my arm, her eyes brightening up tremendously.

"Taetae, what do you say we quit together and just train full-time?"

Very frankly, I wouldn't mind that scenario one bit. The problem was that my parents had always emphasised to me the importance of education...they were going to need some convincing. However, it wasn't as if I could ever say no to Tiffany...

"I'm up for it, but my parents..."

"Don't worry, leave it up to me." Tiffany said with a glint in her eye.

Why do I have a bad feeling about this?

"I don't know, girls, you know it's much better to have a fall-back option just in case tennis doesn't work out." As expected, my parents didn't approve of me quitting school...

"But Mum, focusing on tennis solely increases our chances of going further in tennis! Even Federer only started to stand out after he left school to focus on tennis!" And perhaps just as expected, Tiffany was debating animatedly with them, making a clear and convincing stand. "Besides, it's not like we're going anywhere in our studies."

My father opened his mouth in protest but Tiffany just rattled on. "Dad, don't even try sugarcoating it, you know it's true. We failed almost all our subjects in the final exams."

My father looked as if he wanted to counter Tiffany's argument, but seemed to think better of it, sinking back into his seat with a deflated sigh.

"We'll continue discussing this, but I need you girls to promise me that if you quit school, you'll train as hard as you possibly can, I don't want your futures to be ruined by this decision." My mother said calmly.

"We promise." Tiffany replied instantly, to which I nodded in approval.

"You girls seem to have made up your minds already, haven't you?"

Tiffany and I exchanged glances before nodding.

"Well, you're old enough to make your own decisions, I trust you girls, I believe you will train hard, I give you complete say in this decision."

I couldn't believe my ears. My father, who always played it safe and hardly took risks, was allowing us to make a life-changing decision all by ourselves? The next thing I knew, pigs would be flying.

"Well then, Halep and Bouchard, look out, we're coming for you!"