Murphy starts us in another drill—one-on-one at the top of the key, offensive player only gets three dribbles—and then heads back to the bigs. As he goes, he calls to Green—“Hey, now, X-Man, let’s get with it”—like they’re long lost pals.
A bad start.
And it gets worse. I’m up first against Rider, my back-up from last year. Easy pickings. I give him a shot fake, lean right, and then just duck past him left. I don’t even have to explode too hard, just get my shoulders past and scoop to the rim. Then I turn to see who’s on deck for me. It’s Gibson, straight out of the gate. He’s got a little sneer when I bounce him the rock.
He waits for me to come out to check him. Then he tucks the ball into a triple-threat position and I lower into my crouch. He takes a lazy dribble to his left—death in this drill, where you can’t waste any motion. I hop to cut him off.
Then boom. He’s vapor. Hits me with a simple cross-over, but it’s so quick—violent, really—that I don’t have time to recover before he’s to the rim. He can’t dunk it. Just a lay-in. But his point’s made. A few of my teammates murmur and whistle.
As I walk past him to the end of the line, Gibson gives me a parting shot. “D-Train’s comin’ down the tracks, old man. Best step out the way.”
4.
We’re hanging at Lia’s place. Her dad’s gone. That ought to mean taking things back to her bedroom. But it’s been ten full minutes since either of us said a word. I made some snarky little comment about Gibson, Lia told me to let it go, I told her I wasn’t just gonna “let go” of my senior season. And that puts us here. Watching a movie on her couch—but both of us kind of eyeing the other, waiting for an apology that isn’t coming.
Then, at a commercial, Lia stretches her leg over and jabs my calf with her toe. I don’t react, so she does it again. “Come on, Derrick,” she says. “We don’t have to give each other the silent treatment just because the night got off to a bad start.”
That’s all it takes for me to thaw. For whatever reason it’s like I want us to be mad at each other sometimes. But as soon as she gives an inch I cave. “Awww, I’m just being a pain in the ass,” I say.
“No,” she says, “I know how much ball means to you.” She’s letting me off the hook easy, I know. But right now I’ll take it. “But, D, this kid Gibson can’t be all that, right?”
I nod. It’s the same stuff I’ve been telling myself. But then every day at practice it’s the same old—we get iso’d on the perimeter and he rips it past me. “I guess,” I say, trying to sound more confident than I am.
“I’ve been to your bedroom, D,” she says. I smile. A little too big. “Okay, big man,” she goes on, “you just enjoy that one. But I’m not talking about that. I mean the stack of recruiting letters in your room. You think Darryl Gibson has that kind of notice? You think anyone’s gonna have a press conference for him when he announces where he’s going to school?”
It’s a nice ego boost. And I know I should be a lot more grateful than I am to have a girlfriend like Lia.
She jabs me with her toe again. Playful. “Come on, boy,” she says. “Lighten up.”
I glance at her and grin. “How much longer your dad gone?”
She smiles right back, and I know it’s on again. But as I follow her to her room, I still can’t shake the knowledge—I flat-out can’t keep Gibson in front of me. The only other point I’ve ever had trouble with like that is Dexter Kernantz down at Evansville Harrison, and they’ve won State twice in a row. I think—I know—I’m a better all-around player than Gibson. But every time Gibson goes by me I feel an extra ounce of that thing no baller can stand—doubt.
We’re in Lia’s room now, lights dimmed. “Look, Derrick. You want to mope out there”—she points to the living room—“fine. But in here you better be with me a hundred percent. Got it?”
“Oh, I got it,” I say. And when she kisses me I’m not lying.
“For the love of God, just clean up your room!”
I hear that all the way from the other side of the front door. Makes me want to turn right around and speed back to Lia’s. We called it a night after her dad came home, but still—ten o’clock is late to be arguing about cleaning the house.
I turn my key and go on in. Mom—her finger in mid-air while she hollers at Jayson—freezes and then points that finger at me instead. “There he is,” she says.
I run a quick inventory of things that could have made her mad. I’ve steered clear of real trouble since last year with Wes. I bombed a history quiz, but it didn’t kill my mid-term. There’s what Lia and I just finished up an hour ago, but it’s not like that would be some shocker to my mom. “What?” I finally ask.
“The deal was you had the kitchen this week and Jayson had the room,” Mom snaps.
A quick glance at the kitchen reveals that all the dishes are cleaned and put away. All the pots scrubbed spotless. I open my mouth to point this out, but Dad leaps in. “Son, you’ll want to clean the counters like you promised,” he says. He loops his arm around my shoulder and leads me to the kitchen. Behind us, I hear Jayson’s footsteps thump toward our room as he finally obeys Mom.
When she turns the television volume up, I lean toward Dad. “How long is she gonna be so crazy?” I ask.
Dad leaps back like I just rolled a grenade at his feet. “Son, how stupid are you? Your mom’s pregnant. There are rules to follow.” He starts clicking them off on his fingers. “First, whatever she asks, do it. She wants an ice cream sundae at three in the morning, make it. She wants the kitchen cleaned, do it. Second, we do not complain. Any man who complains about a pregnant woman isn’t a real man. And finally—most importantly—you never ever refer to a pregnant woman as crazy. You might think she’s crazy, but really she’s just been made acutely aware of all of our shortcomings. She’s saner than she’s ever been, okay?”
I nod, then laugh a little, but even that gets the spooky eye from my dad. I mean, he’s right. As I scrub down those counters, I think that it can’t be an easy draw—pushing forty and pregnant, crowded into a house with Dad and me and Jayson and Kid? I guess Mom can be however she wants to be.
In my room, Jayson hasn’t even started on the mess. He’s sitting on his bed, thumbing through a script for a school play. He looks up for a second, offers me a ‘Sup, and then goes back to his thing.
Truth is, I can’t blame him. Since Uncle Kid had to move in with us, Jayson and I have been crammed into what used to be just my room. And with the baby coming, nothing’s going to change—except for Kid getting booted to the couch or, maybe, finding his own place—until I split for college. We’ve got the beds pushed against two walls, our clothes spilling out of drawers, our school books and papers fighting for room in the corner. That leaves a few feet for Jayson’s X-Box, its wires snaking up to a little hand-me-down T.V. on the dresser. We could clean, but first we’d need twice the space. I step over Jayson’s book bag and go toward the closet so I can peel off my clothes and get into something clean for night-time. Even there, I’ve got no room. Jayson’s got a lifetime’s worth of dirty socks and underwear piled in the center. And scattered around that is my recruiting mail. When it first started rolling in I kept it in organized boxes, but somewhere along the way it just spilled into an avalanche. You can see the school logos on the envelopes—Purdue, Georgetown, UAB, Dayton. Thing is, there are a few names that aren’t adding themselves to that stack anymore. When I tore up my knee last year, the flood of letters—and texts and tweets and calls—diminished to a stream. I still have an offer from Indiana, but the other elites have cooled on me. I’m damaged goods.
I kick at Jayson’s pile until there’s some free floor space to set down my bag. I scan the room. We’ve got to at least make a dent, or Mom’s going to come in here in the morning and blow the place up. But first, I plop down next to Jayson. He scoots over, annoyed.
“It’s not like we’ve got privacy anymore,” I say. “Might as well just tell me what you’re checking.”
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He sneers. “Man, they’re making us do A Raisin in the Sun. Like there hasn’t been a black play written in the last fifty years or something.” He acts too tough for it, but here he is memorizing lines. He doesn’t want to think of himself as an actor, but he can make you a believer the minute he steps on the boards. “What about you?” he asks. “Hook it up with Lia?”
“Shut up,” I say, but he laughs. Like I said, no privacy. I can’t keep track of how many times I’ve caught him snooping through my texts.
He sets his script down. “How’s hoops?”
“All good,” I say. Only I’m not as good an actor as Jayson.
“For real?” he asks. “You been sighing around this place like you’re about to cry.”
“Nobody’s gonna cry,” I say. I scan the room again. “Unless Mom sees this room and whips both our hides.”
That spurs him into action. We do what we can—cram clothing into drawers, combine our dirty laundry into one pile, stack our books on the shelves, tuck his X-Box to the side of the dresser. But as we do it, all I can think about is that stream of recruiting letters. And what I wonder is how much of it would dry up—even from my main schools like Indiana and Clemson—if they knew I was getting turned inside-out by some scrub white boy in pre-season practices.
It’s 2:00 in the morning when I hear it. The ka-thunk of a basketball being dunked—the sound of an incoming text on my phone. I fumble for my phone in the dark.
You up?
I smile at the message, though I probably shouldn’t. I yawn, then tuck the phone under the sheet so the light won’t wake Jayson. Am now, I hit back.
The text comes back quick, and I try to muffle the sound by shoving the phone under my pillow. Too late. “Who the hell is that?” Jayson asks, his voice annoyed and raspy with sleep.
“None of your business,” I whisper.
“Good luck with that,” he says.
I take a quick peek at my phone: Just up. Thinking about you. Want to get together soon? It might be the middle of the night, but that’s all it takes to get my pulse racing.
Jayson keeps after me. “It’s Lia, isn’t it? She sending pics? Man, if she’s sending pics you’ve got to let me see.” He’s getting louder every second. The last thing I need is for Mom, sleepless again, to come in here and start asking questions.
“It’s not Lia,” I seethe. While I whisper-shout at Jayson, I knock out another text. A simple Sure. Not too eager. No definite date. Just enough to keep the conversation open.
“Oh, come on, D,” Jayson says. “It’s Lia. Ain’t nobody gonna text you in the middle of the night but her.” He climbs out of his bed now and stands over me—hand out, expecting the phone.
I slap his hand away. “Get back in your bed,” I say. “It’s not Lia.” He just stands there, hands on his hips, not believing me. “It’s not,” I insist. “It’s Jasmine.”
“Jasmine Winters?” he asks.
I don’t have to answer that one. Then there’s a heavy footstep in the hallway. Probably Mom. Maybe Kid or Dad prowling for late-night eats. Either way, it saves me from more questions. Jayson slips back into his bed soft as a free throw finding nothing but net.
I turn to the wall and check my phone again. On cue, the text comes back—Cool. Soon then. It kind of pulls back on her previous urgency. But there it is—texts from Jasmine. The first I’ve heard from my ex in months. Ex. Crazy to think about her in that term because, somehow, it always feels like we’re still together, even when we go forever without talking.
I don’t text back. I just try to be quiet and get some sleep. But not before I delete the whole conversation so Lia never sees it.
5.
I know better than to pay attention to a list. What matters is what happens between the lines. But I can’t help it.
The Indianapolis Star, with the season starting tonight, has listed its “Top 20 Indiana Basketball Prospects.” When I was a freshman I popped on these very pages, listed as the top underclassman. Now? Well, they’ve got it in black and white.
I stand in our kitchen and stare at it. I got up early this morning, even before Mom, because I knew this would be in the paper, and I wanted to see it before anyone else. So now I’ve got some quiet time. Except all I want to do is scream. Ten guys in front of me? Two from Pike and two from Evansville Harrison? Two sophomores in front of me? And four guards? Kernantz has at least earned it. He’s a two-time champ and Ohio State bound. And Drew’s a beast at Pike. But Holliday? Stanski? I could have turned those guys inside-out on my crutches.
I don’t scream, of course. Waking up the house won’t help a thing. I slide open the drawer next to the sink instead. Pull out the scissors. I flatten the paper on the counter and start to snip into it. I might as well make this my hit list. Knock ‘em off one at a time. Hell, I’ll post it in my school locker so it’ll be there first thing every morning.
I hear the creak of a floorboard. I wrap my hand around the scissors, turning them into a dagger in my hand. Pure instinct. Then I wheel around, ready to face the intruder. There’s Jayson, yawning. “You scared the shit out of me,” I say. “What are you doing up this early?”
He sneers at me. “You’re not as quiet as you think,” he says. “And my bed’s only about five inches from yours.”
We stare at each other in the dim light of the house for a few seconds. I hear rustling from the room that used to be Jayson’s, the one Kid now takes. Kid’s got to get his own place before the baby comes. He says he’s on it, but there’s no evidence of him looking for apartments as far as anyone else can tell.
“What you doing there?” Jayson asks. He points to the scissors.
“Nothing,” I say.
Jayson takes a few steps toward me, squinting as he walks. He sees the paper on the counter behind me. “What you clipping?”
I just point to the paper, let him see for himself. Jayson taps the list of players. “You could ball out over all these guys,” he says.
“I know,” I say, but I can tell Jayson’s just trying to pump me up. “I was gonna tape the list to my locker. Motivation, you know?” But as I explain it, I feel embarrassed. Every player has their motivational tools, but explaining it to a non-player is like trying to convert a non-believer to your religion. You realize you must just sound crazy.
“I’ll do you one better,” he says. He walks to the stove and slides open a drawer beside it. Out comes a book of matches, and Jayson holds them overhead like they’re some kind of trophy. “Make it a burn list.”
I see that old mischief in his eyes. We’re so on top of each other these days we’ve forgotten that we used to have fun together. Still, I shake my head no. “I’m not setting fire in our kitchen.”
“Oh, come on,” he pleads. He points toward the bedrooms. “All Mom does is complain about this paper anyway. How many times a week does she threaten to cancel her subscription because of some racist nonsense this rag puts out?” He’s got a point. I’m still not up for burning the thing, but Jayson takes my hesitation as approval. He opens the matches and strikes one. Then he holds it up in the air like a torch. “Come on,” he pleads again.
I look at that list. Ten guys in front of me. Ten. Some of them not even going to high majors. “Fine,” I say, and I grab the paper impulsively. I hold it over the sink while Jayson lowers the match to it. It catches immediately, the edges blackening and curling up. I hold it for a while longer, watching the names surrounding mine get swallowed by the flame. Jayson shakes the match down into the sink. It lands in a cup of water with a hiss. Then, once I see every name above mine reduced to ash, I drop the list and the rest of the Sports section into the sink, too. The flame moves faster, engulfing the whole section. Smoke twists up from the sink. I look at Jayson and wink. I have to admit there’s something cathartic about this.
“Only one thing to do now,” I say.
“What’s that?”
“Turn the heat up on Warren Central tonight, too.”
We bo
th laugh, trying to keep our voices down. Any minute now people will start getting up for the last day of a workweek, but there’s no sense in waking them early. Then the alarm goes off—not from some bedside table, but the smoke alarm above the sink. I’d forgotten about it, but now it screeches insistently. Jayson starts to scramble for a chair, but I just give a quick jump and press the button to stop it. Then we open the kitchen window and the smoke starts escaping to the cold air outside.
The damage is done. I hear Dad hollering for my mom to stay put while he checks it out. He’s the first one to the front of the house, with Kid on his heels. They both look around frantically, their eyes on high alert for danger, death and destruction. Soon enough their gaze lands on me and Jayson where we stand by the sink, guilty as hell.
Dad runs his hand across his face angrily. “Please have some kind of explanation for this!” he demands.
I start to sputter out a response, but the more I explain the more ridiculous I sound. I watch my dad’s face grow darker and angrier. Behind him, Kid just shakes his head, stifling a laugh. Finally, Jayson steps up. “It was my idea, Dad. I’m sorry.”
Somehow that pacifies Dad. An admission of guilt goes a long way with him. Instead, he hollers to the whole house. “No fire here! Just two dumbass teenage boys doing whatever dumbass teenage boys do!” Then he thumps his way to the kitchen, muttering something about at least deserving some coffee before the day goes haywire.
Mom comes in and surveys the scene, hands on her hips. She looks bleary and beaten down. “I live with morons,” she says to nobody in particular.
That sends Kid over the edge. He starts laughing in short spurts, then just lets it out. Jayson’s not far behind, then finally Dad, and even Mom. Finally I feel safe enough to laugh, too.
Then Mom makes her way to the kitchen and starts making breakfast for everyone. She’s clearly exhausted, but she’s still smiling to herself at the absurdity of it all. I’ve known it all along, but it makes me realize it all over again—my mom is a true saint on this earth.
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