Playing The Game

by Jeff Shelby

  He then spit out a couple of platitudes about playing hard on defense and looking for the break on offense. He mentioned the opposing team's best player, said we needed to lock him down. But there wasn't a whole lot offered in the way of strategy or game planning. I genuinely hoped that our opponents weren't that good because we were walking in blind.

  “Get yourselves together and I'll see you on the floor,” he said and strode out of the room.

  “Same shit, different year,” Ken muttered as the door closed.

  Nervous laughter filled the room.

  Derek walked to the middle and brought everyone together. I smelled toothpaste and deodorant and shampoo and pizza in the tight circle. He raised his hand and everyone lifted up a hand.

  “Starts tonight, boys,” Derek said. “This is our year. Let's make a statement. Tonight. On three. One, two, three!”

  “Cardinals!” echoed off the walls of the locker room and we hustled out into the hall.

  We formed a single file line behind the doors that opened into the gym. The noise on the other side was muted, and I was bouncing again on my feet, sweat already running down my neck and back. I felt like a bullet about to be shot out of a gun.

  “Get ready,” Ty whispered in my ear from behind. “This is the best part.”

  I nodded, focused on the doors, exhaling.

  On the other side, I could hear a guitar.

  AC/DC. Thunderstruck.

  Nice.

  Goose bumps popped on my arms as the guitar got louder.

  Then the doors swung open.

  SIXTEEN

  The screams of the crowd drowned out the music, which was already turned up to ear-shattering levels. We sprinted out through the doors, circling the floor and the guys from Edison, who were doing their best to act like nothing was happening.

  But everything was happening.

  AC/DC was screaming their heads off. One side of the gym, occupied solely by students, bounced up and down, making the gym seem like it was shaking. The other side was occupied by parents and other adults, nearly all dressed in red and white, all of them on their feet, clapping to the music. Waves of heat enveloped the entire building and the people who'd gotten there late crammed themselves against the walls. We circled the floor a second time and my heart thumped against my chest. It was hard not to smile.

  We went through our warm-ups, a series of shooting and passing drills, designed to do nothing more than keep us moving. I stole glances around the gym. Dad stood by the door, his tie loosened around his neck, his eyes locked on me, a small smile on his face. He'd switched up his shift at the restaurant so he could go in later, after the game. Cam was parked on the floor at the bottom of the bleachers, a red cardinal tattooed on each cheek. She wore a red T-shirt with my number on it and her long blond hair was threaded with white and red ribbons. She caught my eye and blew me a kiss and I was pretty sure my cheeks flamed as red as my uniform. Jake was up near the top of the bleachers, screaming my name like a banshee. My teachers were scattered on the adult side.

  My stomach twisted.

  No pressure.

  The horn sounded, the music died, and we dropped on to the bench. Some girl I didn't know sang a decent version of the national anthem and then Mr. Gentry, a math teacher, spoke into the microphone at the scorer's table. He welcomed everyone and then proceeded to read off the names of the starters for Edison with all of the enthusiasm of a guy reading divorce papers.

  His tone changed after that, exhorting the crowd to make some noise as he introduced the starters for their Cardinals, sounding more like a carnival barker. The crowd exploded after each name.

  Ty.

  Derek.

  Ken.

  Blake.

  And me.

  No pressure.

  We walked out to the center circle and I took deep breaths, the air exploding from my lungs like I was climbing Mt. Everest. I slapped hands with the Edison guys and took one last look at Dad.

  He gave me a thumbs up and I nodded.

  “Here we go,” Derek yelled into my ear as the crowd raised the noise level again. “Here we go.”

  We bumped fists.

  And we went.

  Ken won the tip and tapped it to Blake, who immediately zipped it to Derek.

  It was weird. I'd always been able to see a play or two ahead in basketball, ever since about sixth grade. I knew what was going to happen before it happened. Not like some crazy psychic or anything, but I could just feel it as soon as I saw the ball move. As soon as Ken tapped the ball to the other side of the floor, I took off. Because I knew it was coming to me.

  I was a step beyond the Edison player closest to me and three steps beyond when he realized he didn't have a chance to catch me. I sprinted to the opposite sideline and saw Blake pass it to Derek. Derek's eyes immediately swept the floor and I swear he smiled when he saw me. He took one hard dribble to the middle of the floor, drawing the last Edison kid back one step in his direction.

  Which gave me all the room I needed.

  Derek lobbed the ball over the Edison kid, who was now frozen at the free throw line. Two more long strides and I was up in the air, the adrenaline coursing through my veins lifting me up over the key. I caught the ball with my left hand, my body diagonal over the floor, and tomahawked it through the hoop. I landed on the opposite side of the key and the ball slammed down to the floor and over the baseline.

  As the crowd erupted—I mean, erupted—I did the same, screaming, letting all of the anxiety and excitement out in one primal scream. Ken was jumping up and down, dropping F-bombs as he backpedaled down the floor. Blake and Ty were laughing like little kids who'd just gotten away with stealing candy. And Derek was in my face, thumping me in the chest.

  “Here we go!” he screamed over the crowd, his eyes wide. “Here we go!”

  And we went.

  Edison never recovered from that opening play. They were rattled and couldn't do anything right. It was like quicksand. One bad play turned into six. And we couldn't do anything wrong. Everything we did went right. Just one of those nights. When the horn sounded ending the game, it was more merciful than anything else.

  We shook hands with them as the crowd continued to scream and holler. I caught Cam's eye and she blew me another kiss, her eyes bright, her cheeks almost the same shade of red as the cardinal tattoos emblazoned on them. Dad gave me another thumbs up. Jake gave me the finger from his spot in the bleachers, but he was grinning.

  If you'd asked me to describe the best outcome for the first night, this was pretty much it. A big win. Everyone was excited. No one got hurt. I played lights out. It was as good as it ever gets in sports, where you feel invincible, on top of the world, like you could grab a ball and go one-on-one with Durant and win. And it was as good as I'd felt in months, after the divorce and the move and all of the other shit that had forced its way into my life.

  I wanted it to last forever.

  But I should've known better.

  SEVENTEEN

  Amy wasn't back at school on Tuesday.

  I didn't know why it bugged me so much, but there was just something about her having ditched me at the party and then not showing up for our class together that made it feel personal, like she was hiding from me. Maybe I wasn't going to have the guts to ask her why she bailed on me, but I at least wanted the opportunity. With her nowhere to be found, it just agitated me even more.

  “What's wrong with you?” Cam asked.

  We were sitting in her car at lunch. Our campus was open, so we could run and grab fast food if we wanted during out lunch period. We'd grabbed burritos and I'd breathed a sigh of relief when she dug a five out of her wallet to pay for hers. I barely had enough cash to cover my own food, much less her burrito and diet Coke. And it sucked.

  I finished mine and balled up the wrapper. “Nothing.”

  “Doesn't seem like nothing.”

  “I'm okay. Sorry.”

  “You sure?”

  I nodded, ag
ain feeling guilty that I was thinking about another girl while I was with Cam. “Yeah. Just...I'm weird.”

  “You're not that weird.”

  “Ha.”

  Her phone dinged and she picked it up off the console. She tapped the screen. Then she grinned and shook her head.

  “What?” I asked.

  She eyed me. “Does it ever bother you that you don't have a phone?”

  I thought for a moment. “Yeah, sometimes, I guess. Like when I need to call my dad for a ride.”

  “Or when you might want to text your girlfriend,” she said, frowning. “That would've been the correct answer.”

  Girlfriend. She was making it official. I wasn't sure where I stood on that.

  “Or that,” I said. “But I've never had a phone. My parents didn't think I needed one and now it's just me and my dad and we just watch what we spend.” I shrugged. “It's fine. And I thought you were going to snag the walkie-talkies for us.”

  She smirked. “Funny. But, seriously. I mean, how do you find out stuff?”

  I wasn't exactly sure what stuff she was talking about, so I wasn't sure how to answer.

  Her phone dinged again. She thumbed the screen, then laughed again. I hated that I wanted to know what she was looking at and what was making her laugh.

  “I'll ask again, since I don't have a phone, as we've established,” I said. “What are you laughing at?”

  “Just...” she said, still shaking her head. “Remember when I told you about Amy Mitchell the other night? After you were talking to her?”

  A knot formed in my gut. “Yeah.”

  “And I said she went upstairs with Derek?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, she apparently had a really good time after that.”

  I wasn't sure what that meant. “How do you know?”

  “Twitter. Snapchat.” She raised her eyebrows. “I'll just assume you don't have these?”

  “Not really,” I said.

  “Well, you either do or you don't. I mean, it's not a gray area, is it?”

  “I have them. I don't use them. Twitter, I mean. Not the other thing.”

  I didn't do most of the social media stuff, mainly because I didn't have a phone. I had an Instagram account that I hardly ever looked at because I had no way to access it at home without a computer. And it wasn't like I was gonna go to the library just to log on and look at pictures. I'd signed up for Facebook and Twitter but couldn't remember the last time I'd signed on to either. And Snapchat just sounded stupid. I never cared about any of it. Until someone made me feel stupid for not using it. Like Cam was doing.

  “I'm sorry,” she said, like she was reading my mind. “I keep harping on it. Just tell me to shut up.”

  “It's okay.”

  “No, it's not,” she said, frowning. “You probably like not having one so you don't get yanked into all the school drama and crap. My parents would be thrilled if I'd break up with my phone.”

  I laughed. Cam was funny. Maybe I was being unfair comparing her to Amy in my head. Amy clearly wasn't interested in me. So maybe I just needed to focus on the girl that was interested in me.

  “My phone went off at two in the morning last night,” she said. “Janelle. Texting me that some freshman girl was scamming on the guy she likes. And I was like, what am I supposed to do with this at two in the morning? If you're texting me at two in the morning, something better be on fire.”

  I laughed. “You could turn it off.”

  “I probably should,” she said, looking at it. “Might make things a lot simpler.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Anyway. I guess she hooked up,” Cam said. “Amy, I mean. Not just with Derek. But with a couple guys. Like really hooked up.”

  The knot tightened in my gut. “I thought you saw her with Derek.”

  She glanced down at her phone and tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “I did. But apparently he wasn't enough.”

  “Who else was she with?” I asked.

  “Not sure yet.” She looked up and a smirk flitted across her face. “But I'm sure I'll find out.”

  I leaned back in the seat. “So she...slept with them?”

  Cam nodded.

  “How do people know?” I asked. “That doesn't make sense. How would they know what she did? That could just be a bunch of bullshit.”

  “Could be,” she said. “But there are a lot of people saying the same thing. And you know how it goes. Where there's smoke, there's fire. Feels like the rumor mill is almost never wrong.”

  “People were talking about us,” I said. “And I'd bet anything they think we did it.”

  Her cheeks flushed, then she nodded. “Yeah, probably so.”

  I turned away from her and looked out the car window. People were heading back toward the building. The bell was about to ring. I wasn't sure I believed the smoke and fire analogy or the accuracy of rumors. No place fed and watered misinformation better than a high school. It could grow and morph in seconds, depending on who got hold of it.

  Or maybe I just didn't want to believe it.

  “She wasn't in class yesterday or today,” I said.

  Cam snorted. “Probably didn't wanna do the walk of shame through the hallways. Now that everyone knows. Or almost everyone.”

  The bell rang, echoing across the parking lot.

  I pushed open the car door. “Yeah. Maybe.”

  EIGHTEEN

  “You got two letters today,” Dad said.

  We were sitting at the dinner table. I was in shorts and a T-shirt and he was in black slacks, a white button-down, and a tie draped over his shoulder. He had to leave for work as soon as we were done.

  I finished the pasta on my plate. “Oh, yeah?”

  He reached behind him on the counter and tossed two envelopes at me. “Oh, yeah.”

  I picked up the envelopes. Return addresses from Oregon and Arizona. I glanced over at the TV. Arizona was playing Syracuse and they were up by four. The same Arizona that apparently sent me a letter.

  Holy. Shit.

  I tore them open and even though they were addressed to me personally, I knew they were form letters. We like what we've seen, our school is awesome, we'd be interested in talking further with you, blah blah blah. They weren't offers and a ton of kids got them. But still. Colleges were talking to me about playing basketball.

  Holy. Shit.

  “Your grades are all right?” Dad asked, sticking a fork into the last of his pasta.

  “Yep. B in math, A's in everything else.”

  “Can you get the B to an A?”

  “I don't know.”

  “Try,” he said. “Talk to the teacher. See if there's some extra help available. Or see if—”

  “I got it,” I said. “I'll bring it up.”

  He hesitated, then nodded. “I think you're going to be seeing more of these.”

  “How do they know about me?” I asked. “Season's just started.”

  “You showed well during the summer,” he said. “They took note.”

  “But I washed out last year.”

  He looked down at his plate and I knew what was going through his head. That I hadn't worked hard enough. That I'd given up. That I hadn't cared. It was like he was replaying the moments in his head, like he could see me jogging on the court, disinterested, not engaged. Then screaming at me afterward.

  “That was last year,” he finally said. “You had a lot going on.”

  Understatement of the year.

  “But don't get excited yet,” he warned. “Keep your head on straight. Anything can happen.”

  “I know.”

  “And don't get lazy,” he said. “On the court or in class, alright? Keep grinding.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I know, Dad.”

  “Just do the right thing,” he said. “Play hard, study hard, and good things will happen if you do the right things.”

  “I got it, Dad,” I said, annoyed that he felt the need to say it over and over t
o me. “Really.”

  “I know, I know,” he said. “I just...I want you to have options.”

  I knew what he meant. He didn't want me to have to hang around and go to some junior college and then hope we could scrape together enough money to pay for my last two years of school. I wasn't the only one who needed a scholarship. We both needed it.

  I watched him pick up his plate and take it to the sink. His feet shuffled slowly, his back hunched, like the movement was an effort. His hair was salted with more gray than I remembered, and I felt guilt stab at me. His life consisted of work and me. He never had the time or energy to go for a run or shoot hoops at the park. He never had time for anything. His life wasn't much of a life at all. And the last thing I wanted him to do was worry about me.

  I immediately felt guilty for basically quitting last year. The divorce shook me. I couldn't stop thinking about it when I went to school every day. I couldn't focus. All of a sudden everything was changing and basketball had seemed unimportant. Classes seemed unimportant. I shut down and wondered if we were going to be okay. If I was going to be okay.

  I still wasn't sure.

  “Everything else good at school okay?” he asked.

  I thought about Cameron and Amy, but didn't feel like having some long, drawn out conversation with him. “Yeah. Fine.”

  He nodded. “And dinner was okay?”

  “No. Awful.”

  He laughed as he rinsed off his plate in the sink. Before he started managing restaurants, he was a cook. He could take the simplest things and make them about a million times better than anyone else. He'd made penne with his own tomato sauce—I wondered when he'd had time to make that—and tossed in some spicy sausage. Bought frozen, boxed breadsticks but brushed them with olive oil and seasonings before sticking them in the oven. It didn't suck at all.

  He set the dish in the drying rack. “There's more in the pot if you want it.”

  “I'll take it,” I said.

  He wiped his hands and tossed the towel on the counter. He cleared his throat. “Your mother called today.”

  A small twinge pinched my gut. “Oh, yeah?”