Quicks

by Kevin Waltman

  I stand at mid-court, dribbling a rock back and forth between my legs. Around me, my teammates get loose. Gibson’s good on his word from the other day. He sees Xavier hoist up a twenty-footer and he gets right in his grill. Over the thrum of the crowd, I can hear him yell “Game shots!” Then he turns to Reynolds, trying to get him amped a little. I can’t hear any of that conversation, but I know the drill—he’s letting Reynolds know that we need him ready to roll the second he subs in. Then he’s off to check on Fuller, who’s sporting one of those old plastic masks to protect his broken nose. Even through the plastic, you can see how nasty the bruise is. With Fuller, Gibson’s calm. He even reaches up and adjusts one of the straps on Fuller’s mask. Then he must crack some kind of joke, because they both laugh a little.

  “You okay, D?” It’s Kid, coming out to mid-court to check on me.

  “Yeah, I’m straight,” I say. It’s about the most we’ve spoken to each other since we had our big dustup. Other than to help break the news about Wes, Kid’s barely set foot in our door. I know he still sleeps there because I see the blankets on the couch every morning. But I only see him at practice. I know we’ve got to get settled with each other, but now—front and center on Muncie Central’s court, two minutes left in warm-ups—just isn’t the time.

  “You even take a chance to get loose?” he asks, motioning toward my teammates who are all working up a little lather.

  “I’m good,” I say. Then I think about that knee. It’s felt better lately, but the last thing I need is to aggravate that old injury. I flip the ball I’ve been dribbling to Kid. I bend down for some hammy stretches, paying close attention to the injury. It feels “normal,” I guess, warm and loose below the wrap I still wear. But my whole body feels tired. Part of me feels like walking off that court and heading home. The schedule demands to be played, but maybe someone else should be playing it at this point.

  Murphy walks over, making his rounds. “Let’s get after it tonight,” he chirps. Then, as I’m all the way down in a stretch, he gives me a hearty pound on the back.

  It’s almost callous—how can a coach be that ignorant of what’s going on with his player? But maybe that’s the point—it’s Murphy’s way of telling me to lace ‘em up tight and forget about everything else. Whatever. At this point, the whole thing feels like a crazy joke. I laugh once and continue stretching.

  It takes me less than a minute of live action to forget all the other noise—not because of what Murphy said, but because I don’t want to get my ass embarrassed. Muncie’s 13-1. Got their best squad since the days when Kid was suiting up against them, and they bring it at us pretty quick. Their main man is Jeff Stanski. And he knows it. They control the tip, and he sprints to the left wing. Catches at about twenty-three feet and—zap—rips off a trey that’s so pure the net doesn’t move. Then, as Gibson brings the ball up, Stanski checks me—he’s naturally their point guard, but they must want to put best on best on the defensive end.

  I’ve got two inches plus some bulk on the guy. Every instinct tells me to forget running the set—just race for the block and post this kid up. But I know better. Our squad’s barely holding together right now. One wrong move could shake us apart. So I widen to the wing and wait for Gibson to bring it up. Then I do the right thing—rub off a back-screen from Jones and then look to cross-screen for Fuller. Same old set.

  Muncie’s done their homework. They beat us to every spot, get out in front of every cut. Plus, we’re moving in slow-motion, like our legs are still heavy from the holidays. Finally, I get a touch just off the elbow. Again, the instincts—I see a little crease and know I could power dribble and then rise up over Stanski. But on the wing Gibson claps twice quickly. “Ball!” he snaps. He’s doesn’t have that old sneer to his voice, but he’s pretty adamant. I know that I’ve got to give it up. Besides, might as well save up some moves for crunch time.

  So I rifle it out to Gibson and we plow through more offense—ending with a tough leaner from Jones that clangs off the back iron. Could have gotten a better shot than that any time, I think. What I say, though, is “Keep at it, Jonesy. They gonna fall.” That last part’s a lie, but it’s one I feel compelled to tell.

  It gets late early in Muncie. Late early—that phrase Kid would always use when you could feel a game hanging in the balance even though there were more than five minutes left on the clock. And here we are, down 46-39 with 5:30 left. Our ball. It’s only seven points, but Muncie Central’s been so efficient and crisp it feels like a dozen. Stanski’s got 19 of theirs, and I know in crunch time they’re going to get him touches every trip. I’ve got 13, though I know if I forced it I could have twice that. Gibson knows it too. As he brings it up, he whistles at me. I stop where I am, and he dribbles toward me. “You get a look, take it,” he says. “No more waiting around.”

  “Got it,” I say.

  Then we both jog into the front-court. First move is still the back-screen. Then I sprint across the lane to set a screen for Reynolds—he’s basically split minutes with Fuller, who’s clearly uncomfortable playing behind that mask. Reynolds comes flying off my screen. I see it in his eyes—he thinks he’s supposed to be the one to step up and bury the big shots. He’s got a little space off the screen too. Gibson hits him in stride as Reynolds flashes to the free throw line. He’s so eager to fire that he doesn’t even set his feet. I spin back toward the lane, sealing Stanski behind me. I race toward the right block, knowing Reynolds is going to miss in the direction he was leaning. I snatch the ball between their bigs, but once I grab it they basically give me the put-back—the last thing they want to do is foul me.

  All it takes sometimes is seeing the rock find bottom to get the blood flowing. Murphy’s quick to react from the sideline. “Full! Full! Full!” he screams, urging us to pick them up in a press.

  Gibson darts into the passing lane, cutting off the entry to Stanski. I plaster to my man. That leaves Muncie Central’s three man as the next option. He’s trotted past midcourt, and now has to sprint back to the ball. Reynolds—shaken out of his sluggishness—sprints with him. He arrives with the ball and tips it away. Gibson’s the quickest to it. He scoops the ball up near the right wing. Any other year, I’d be rolling straight to the rim, looking to receive an alley-oop. But now I just jab step that way to get my man leaning. Instead, I flare back to the wing. Gibson spots me immediately and rifles the rock cross-court. I catch with plenty of time to set my feet. Show off that stroke I’ve had all the time in the world to work on. That thing falls and all of a sudden we’re in a two-point game.

  Muncie Central calls time. Their players jog to the bench. A few of them shake their heads, bothered by our sudden burst. Stanski squints up at the scoreboard once. He shrugs real quick, unfazed. Meanwhile, our bench is all up and into it. Fuller strides out to meet us, thumping his chest with his fist. Even through his mask I can see the fire in his eyes. Kid’s about fifteen feet onto the court. He fires off two chest bumps for Jones and Xavier. In his heart, Kid wants to throw on a uni and throw down on the deck.

  Murphy springs into coach-mode for real. Finally guys are juiced enough that he doesn’t have to go through his rah-rah routine. He just uncaps his marker. “You know they’re looking to Stanski,” he starts. Then he diagrams what he thinks they’ll run—a fake double for Stanski, where he peels back to the wing on a back-screen. My man would be the one setting the back-screen. Murphy jabs his marker at me. “Don’t give it away early,” he says. “But you can anticipate and jump that pass to the wing.”

  We break, feeling good—like we’re destined to win, even if we’re still trailing. We have our teeth in this thing now and we’re not letting go. Sure enough, Muncie Central runs the exact play Murphy drew up. Ball’s out top and Stanski goes flying to the lane toward a double screen. My man crosses to the spot Stanski vacated. Then, two steps from the screen, Stanski reverses for that back-screen from my man. I cheat just an inch, waiting for my chance. And when Stanski comes ripping off that scr
een, hands outstretched for the rock, I peel off with him. I turn my head, see ball. It’s in mid-air, waiting to be plucked. I reach for it, get a hand on it—but it just skims off my fingers, rolls harmlessly out of bounds. Everyone on our bench ooohs at the missed opportunity. They immediately snap back to attention, clapping and encouraging. But everyone saw that—a pick of that pass and I had a free run to tie it. Instead, we’re going to have to dig in on D and grind it out.

  The Muncie players seem to relax a bit. They know they dodged a bullet. They just run their normal sets. No hurries and no worries for them. The clock just runs and runs, then after about a full minute, they get a quick look to one of the bigs. Jones fouls to prevent the easy deuce, but give their guy credit—he steps right up and sinks his freebies. Back to four.

  Gibson brings it up for us again. All the Muncie guys are puffed back up with confidence. They chatter away on defense, suddenly as fresh as they were in the opening minutes. That means we have to work too. It would be great to get a quick score, but we know we can’t take bad shots now. Even trigger-happy Reynolds passes on a glimpse from range. We work to the post. Back out. Reversal. Another reversal. Finally a reset to Gibson out top. Talk about getting late early—suddenly we’re under three minutes. We need a bucket now.

  I catch on the wing, but there’s no room to work. Jones comes out to set a ball-screen, but I wave him down to the block. I dribble back so my feet are behind the three-point stripe. Then I just give a twitch—my man lunges at it, scared of that stroke from three. That’s enough to let me get by. The bigs challenge, I drop to Jones, and he gets hammered for an obvious foul.

  Only problem is he splits his two instead of getting both. Down three.

  We can’t get any closer than that for the next two minutes. I get a deuce in the lane. Gibson drops a little runner. Xavier even muscles in a bucket. But Muncie Central keeps getting bailed out with whistles on the other end.

  Finally, Gibson brings it up with only forty seconds left. We’re down five again. For some that’s desperation time. For me, it’s winning time. I don’t even use a screen. I just flare to the wing, clap for the ball. Gibson delivers it, but my man gets up into me. I drop my shoulder and give him a little rocker step like I might drive. He doesn’t really bite, but he has to give me some room so he doesn’t foul. All I need. I rise up with him in my grill but drain a deep one anyway. Two-point game.

  Then it’s Gibson’s turn to make a play. He stays with Stanski on the press, mirroring every cut. Muncie Central’s got timeouts left, but their man panics. With the five-count coming, he forces the orange toward Stanski—and Gibson’s all over it. He deflects the pass, then races after it before it bounces out of bounds. He lunges and flips the ball up over his shoulder to save it. The ball carries all the way out toward mid-court. Xavier hustles and outleaps everyone to grab it.

  We’ve got our chance. Xavier looks lost for a second, not used to having the rock that far from the rim. But Reynolds is on top of it. He sprints to the ball and bails out Xavier. Instead of forcing, Reynolds waits for Gibson to untangle himself from where he landed in the second row of bleachers. Meanwhile, I station myself on the block, waiting. As soon as Gibson touches it, he attacks. He gets by Stanski, but the D pinches down as he finds the paint. This is an easy read. I just pop out to the corner and get my feet set. Gibson finds me, whipping a no-look laser for a little flavor. Even before I let it rip, I hear the Muncie crowd groan. They know this trey’s finding bottom.

  I do not disappoint.

  Timeout Muncie Central. Our lead. Twenty seconds to go. The whole gym is a murmur of disgusted fans seeing a victory snatched away from them. Well, the whole gym except for our bench. It’s one big explosion. I get mobbed—a frenzy of guys shaking my shoulders and hugging me and bumping chests.

  Murphy gets us calmed down enough to talk us through the final set. But when we break, it’s obvious right away there’s no “play” to defend. Muncie Central just flattens out and gets the rock to Stanski up top. I thought they’d try to get a quick one—give them a chance for a put-back or a foul if they missed—but Stanski’s got nothing like that in mind. He dribbles leisurely, glancing at the clock now and then. Their crowd starts screaming for him to go. But he waits. And waits. And waits. Ten seconds left. Eight. Six. Five.

  Stanski attacks. Gibson’s got the quicks to stay with him. He cuts Stanski off at the right elbow. Defends a cross-over to the left. Two seconds to go. All Stanski has left is a crazy-hard turnaround from seventeen feet—with Gibson’s hand right in his face.

  It doesn’t matter. Stanski drains it at the buzzer.

  The crowd storms the court. Someone hoists Stanski up in the middle of the mob and he pumps his fist in the air, triumphant.

  Us? We hang our heads and slink to the locker room. A loss, even when everything went right. Big shots fell for us. Gibson and I worked together. Even Reynolds and Xavier made hustle plays. But it’s another L around our necks. And this one feels heavier than all the others put together.

  By all that’s right in the world, I should be with Lia. Who was there last year when I had my surgery? Who was there the other night when I visited Wes in the hospital? Lia.

  But when Jasmine texted me, I mashed it right back for her to come over. I didn’t even think about it. Well, I did think a little—I knew if she came to my place we couldn’t get up to anything we’d regret.

  Grace merely whimpers in her sleep now and then, rather than her full-out cry. So after Mom and Dad whisper through some small talk with Jasmine—shooting disapproving glances at me the whole time—they excuse themselves to try for some shut-eye. Jasmine coos to them about how adorable Grace is. Even through their heavy-lidded gazes, Mom and Dad light up at that. But Dad throws me another warning look. It’s not that he dislikes Jasmine. But he doesn’t want me doing something crazy to screw it up with Lia.

  Luckily for Dad—and maybe for me—Jayson has no intentions of giving us privacy. As soon as Mom and Dad ease their door shut he turns up the volume on the T.V. It’s garbage—some slasher flick he’s seen before—and any other time I’d be pretty annoyed with him. For once though, I’m not trying to get busy even though Jasmine’s perched next to me on the couch.

  She turns to me, leans in a little. “How you doing, Derrick?” she asks sympathetically.

  Like an idiot, I start talking hoops. “Ah, I’m good,” I say. “That’s how basketball is. You can play your heart out for thirty-two minutes, play well enough to win, and then get iced at the buzzer. Besides, we got time to—”

  I stop when I finally register Jasmine’s reaction. She’s shaking her head at me, a slow and pitying move like a teacher gives when some student pops off an ignorant answer in the classroom. “I’m not asking about that,” she says. “I mean about Wes.”

  Even Jayson sits up now. He knows this is sacred stuff. He mutes his movie.

  I measure my words carefully. If I just let it go—let it all spill out about Wes—then I’m worried I’ll end up crying like a fool in front of Jasmine. “What happened to Wes,” I start, “is on Wes. I know he had a bad run of it, but he had chances. He had people there for him. I was there for him.”

  I’m not sure how true that last sentence is, so I pause. Jasmine leaps in to fill up the silence. “I’m not talking about whose fault it is,” she says. “Whose fault? How about the guy who shot him? Or the guy who sold him the gun? Or the people in charge who let things get so wrong we need guns to feel safe where we live? Don’t get me started on that, Derrick.” She takes a deep breath to slow herself. When she gets worked up, she can rival even my mom in a lecture about how dirty we’ve been done in Indianapolis. “What I want to talk about,” she begins again, “is how you feel about it. I’m here for you, Derrick.”

  I’ve known Jasmine long enough to know I’m not getting away without some kind of answer. The girl’s a pit bull sometimes. Jayson leans forward too. “I’m fine,” I say. “For real. It sucks, but I’ve got to keep my ow
n head straight.”

  “Oh come on, D,” Jayson chimes in. “You know I’m not all, like, let’s share our feelings and shit. But don’t lie to the girl.”

  I glare at Jayson. He knows teaming up on me is a cold move. He knows that I’d like to cross that carpet and shove the remote down his throat. And he also knows I’m not going to so much as touch him with Jasmine around. “Fine,” I seethe. “It’s not like Wes and I have been tight lately. Not since last year, but you know that story.” Jasmine nods. She heard about it all—Wes getting busted with weed in my car, then almost getting me capped when I had to stand up for him after he ripped off a dealer. “But we go way back, you know? And now he just sits up there”—I motion up the block toward his house—“smoking up and wasting his life. And I get it. That’s what half the guys our age do. It’s just that he won’t even talk about it. Not even to me. Forget cops or counselors or any of that garbage. But if he could just, like, acknowledge it to me, then maybe we could cope somehow. I can’t fix his world for him, but we could still be friends, you know? But this silence! It’s like he’s already dead.”

  And on that last word, it happens. My voice cracks. I don’t fall out into a full-on cry or anything, but Jasmine and Jayson have what they want. They see now how raw it is with Wes.

  “Derrick,” Jasmine whispers. She reaches over and puts her hand on my knee. Used to be that touch would electrify me. Now it just offends. I spring off the couch, leaping as fast as I would for a rebound.

  “Don’t!” I snap. It’s loud, but when I listen out, I don’t hear Grace stirring. “I don’t want your pity. I don’t want any of this.”

  Jasmine backs into her corner of the couch. She looks hurt by my outburst. “It wasn’t pity, Derrick,” she says. “You always think the worst of people.”