by Randy Ribay
Bunny
I wake up in the dark and realize someone’s sitting on the foot of my bed.
“Bunny?” my dad’s voice asks. I feel him place a hand over my blankets on top of my legs like he used to do when he read me bedtime stories when I was little. “You okay?”
“Huh? Dad?” I rub my eyes and sit up, relieved it’s not some murderer. I reach for my phone, figuring I woke up late for school. The screen comes on, casting away a bit of the darkness with its blue glow. It reads 1:26 a.m. I leave it face-up like a night-light. My next thought is that something real bad has happened. I remember when Grandma died a few years back, my parents woke me in the middle of the night to deliver the news. “What’s going on? Everyone all right?”
“Yeah,” he says. “But you shouted—are you okay?”
“I did?”
He nods. “Just a moment ago. Bad dream, maybe?”
I try to remember. There’s something there. Fragmented images. Missed shots. People in the crowd booing. Wallace and Nas trapping me in a double team and snatching the ball. Nas standing on the bleachers in an empty gym. But I feel the details slipping away as my mind reaches for them, tries to connect them. It’s like how when you’re a little kid at the beach, you chase the receding water, except that next wave’s never coming.
“Yeah,” I say, rubbing my eyes again. “Bad dream, I think. We won tonight, right?”
“Sure did,” he says. “Sixty-two to forty-four.”
“Were you there?” I know he wasn’t even as I ask. Guess I’m still out of it.
He shakes his head. “Sorry, Bunny.”
“Oh, yeah. It’s cool.”
“But I’ll be at the next one.”
“Cool,” I say again.
As he rises and starts to walk out, another image slips into my head: Nasir’s face in the crowd, watching like he wanted me to win, watching like he wanted to be out there with me.
“Dad?” I call after him.
He stops, silhouetted in my door frame. “Yeah, Bunny?”
“Was Nasir at my game tonight?”
“I don’t know, son. You can ask him tomorrow. Get some rest now.”
“Thanks for checking in on me,” I say, like I’m still a little boy.
“That’s my job.”
He leaves, closing the door behind him. My phone’s screen goes dark.
20
Nasir
After school on Thursday, Wallace and I decide to walk down to the courts before heading home. Clouds hang overhead like they’re ready to dump some snow on us for real, but it’s not happening yet. It’s not even that cold. Maybe thirty-something degrees. Which I know is barely above freezing, but it’s like spring compared to the single digits we’ve been getting. And everybody else must feel the same because people are walking down the streets and posting up on the corners like it’s July.
“You want to try to run a game, or you want to watch?” I ask. Neither of us is dressed to ball. Under our winter coats, we’re still wearing the khakis and purple polos of studious Whitman High academicians.
Wallace has his earbuds in, so he doesn’t hear me at first. I shoulder check him. He takes one out and drapes it over his ear. “Huh?”
I repeat the question.
He shrugs. Pops his earbud back in and digs his hands deeper into his coat pockets.
“Cool,” I say, and we continue walking in silence. We pass a few kids we know along the way, but Wallace doesn’t stop for any of them, so I offer nods of recognition.
I know something’s weighing on him, but I’ve learned when Wallace gets like this, it’s best to give him space. Otherwise, he’s likely to snap for any little thing. Maybe the reality of that whole eviction action is finally hitting him, since the end of the month’s less than three weeks away.
We arrive at the park and find five-on-five games running full on both courts, with like a couple dozen people on the sidelines waiting for next. A few people are watching, and a couple homeless dudes are checking the garbage cans for bottles. Wallace heads straight for one of the empty picnic tables on the far side of the courts, and sits down on the table with his feet on the bench.
I wander over to the sideline and ask this junior I know called Chops—either because he’s got these real bushy sideburns, or because he’s kind of shaped like a pork chop with his barrel chest and skinny legs—who’s got next. Chops says his crew does, and then someone else tells me that their squad’s after that. I ask if they need a point and a center, but both dudes tell me they’re good. My guess is we’d have to wait at least an hour to see some action, so I join Wallace over at the picnic table. For some reason, he’s picked the one that’s busted and marked up with graffiti instead of the one people inexplicably keep clean, so I find the spot that seems least likely to give me tetanus.
The game running on the court in front of us is nothing to write home about. The same dudes as usual trying to relive their glory days for an hour or so. It’s not long before someone throws a hard elbow and the game stops so everyone can run their mouth about whether or not it’s a foul. Things settle down eventually, and the game resumes. Wallace and I watch in silence.
“I forgot how good Bunny is,” I say after a while.
Wallace takes out his earbuds. “Huh?”
“Bunny,” I say. “I forgot how nice he is.”
Wallace spits. “Man, fuck Bunny.” And even though he’s expressed similar sentiments before, his words feel laced with a new level of malice. Maybe he’s mad I went to the game last night. I wonder if he’s afraid I’ll start hanging with Bunny again and leave him behind.
But that’s not going to happen. I only went because my mom laid that guilt trip on me.
“You ever end up getting into his Facebook?” I ask.
But Wallace doesn’t answer. He spits into the dirt again and sticks his earbuds back in.
And then I hear something beneath us. Almost like a tiny baby crying. I hop off the table and peer underneath.
“What’s up?” Wallace asks.
The thing can’t be more than a few weeks old. It’s about the size of a softball. Skinny and shivering. Gray fur all matted. It keeps mewling over and over. “It’s a kitten.”
Wallace hops off the bench, stuffs his earbuds into his pockets, and crouches down next to me. “Damn.”
He reaches underneath the bench. The kitten backs away and bares its teeth, which are so tiny they’re like pointed grains of rice.
“Careful,” I say. “It might have rabies. Actually, I don’t know if cats get rabies. Do they?”
Wallace doesn’t answer. He shakes his coat off and slips his hoodie off over his head. Using the sweatshirt, he scoops up the kitten. Though it looked like it was going to put up a fight, it lets Wallace lift it up. He even wraps the hoodie all the way around until only its face is peeking through, and then he holds the bundle to his chest.
Big-ass Wallace snuggling this kitten like it’s his baby is such a funny sight I want to snap a picture with my phone. But he’s all in protective mode, so I’d rather not have him tear my arms off my torso.
“Let’s get her home,” he says, shedding his sullenness for concern. “Poor thing’s probably starving.”
We leave the courts behind, walk back to Wallace’s car, and drive to his apartment. All the while, I’m thinking about how funny it is that people can act so hard and then turn around and give you a glimpse that there’s more to them. I know some people around our way have it rough and have to toughen up to survive, but my theory is they’re putting up the same front as Wallace. I wish we could all agree it’s dumb and drop the act. Then everyone could go around doing stuff like saving stray kittens instead.
Now, we don’t go to Wallace’s apartment very often. There’s not much to it. It’s a nice neighborhood that’s been getting nicer the more the city develops the university and the hospital, but he lives on the third floor of this house that somebody bought and split up into apartments. His apartmen
t number’s 202¾. No joke. Wallace sleeps on the old couch in the living room because the only bedroom belongs to his grandma.
So I kind of expect it to smell like old person when we walk in. And it does. I try not to wrinkle my nose or show that I notice. I keep my coat on because it’s chilly in here, like at Bunny’s when their heat’s broken.
I sit down on the threadbare couch—a.k.a. Wallace’s bed—and wait as he takes the kitten to the small kitchen just off the living room. He opens a cabinet with his free hand and pulls out a bowl that he fills with water. Then he sets it down on the countertop along with the bundled-up kitten.
The kitten crawls out of the sweatshirt and approaches the water like it’s a trap. She sniffs with this little pink nose, and then decides to go for it. She lowers her head and begins lapping it up with this tongue the size of a pinky fingernail. When she finishes, she looks up at Wallace and starts mewling again.
“Not too much, little kitty,” he says in this real soft voice.
As if it understands him, the kitten stops making noise and starts exploring the countertop. Its legs are all unsteady as it pounces around and goes right up to the edge like it’s trying to decide if it should hop down.
“Gerald?” his grandma’s voice calls from her room like a croak. “That you, boy?”
It’s always kind of weird for me to hear my cousin called by his real name. Long as I remember, we’ve all called him Wallace because he looks kind of like Rasheed Wallace.
“Yes, ma’am,” Wallace/Gerald calls back, eyes still on the cat.
“You pick up my pills?” she asks.
Wallace pulls a paper bag from the pharmacy out of his jacket pocket and then waves it in the air so she can hear it. “Got ’em right here, G. Stopped before school.”
His grandma doesn’t reply. I imagine she has fallen asleep or died.
“What are you going to do with the cat?” I ask, once I figure their conversation’s not going anywhere else.
“Keep it. I’m gonna call it Bunny.”
I let out a small laugh. “Why Bunny?”
Wallace grins. “It’s a pussy, ain’t it?”
And I can’t argue with that.
21
Bunny
It’s Thursday, and I’m back at Whitman High staring into the trophy case that lines the wall outside the main gym. Coach Baum ended practice a little early as a reward for us winning our state group, and since Keyona plays point for Whitman’s girls’ team, I swung by to catch the end of their game. Unfortunately, it didn’t go so well, and that’s it for their season. At least she’s got track to look forward to. That’s her main sport.
But saddest thing to me isn’t the loss so much as that it was their group championship and there was hardly anyone watching it. A handful of parents, a few friends, and siblings. No cheerleaders or band like for the boys’ games. Place was so quiet you could hear every dribble, every sneaker squeak, every girl calling for the ball or the switch on a screen.
But they played their hearts out, and I respect that. Sweating for the sake of the game. And both teams were grinding—it just wasn’t Keyona’s that came out on top. That’s how it goes sometimes.
I haven’t been able to make it to any of her other games this season because they’re usually over before I make my way back to the city after my own practices, so this is my first time inside Whitman High in a minute. And even though it’s kind of weird, it feels nice. Like slipping on an old shirt. Being back and sitting in those stands with mostly people of color feels right in a way I haven’t felt at St. Sebastian’s.
I let my eyes slide over the familiar line of basketball trophies behind the smudged glass as I wait. On the left are the oldest, dustiest ones, with the newer ones to the right. Team photos propped up against the sparkling bases track the racial history of the city: all white from the first half of the century, a trickle of color in the middle, and then nearly all Black or Puerto Rican or Dominican in the newer photos. All connected across time and race by nothing but a game.
The trophy farthest on the right is from our conference championship last season. I’m in the middle of the back row, looking a thousand years younger than I feel these days. Wallace stands directly to my right. Nasir, almost always the smallest on any team we’ve ever been on, is on a knee at the far left of the front row. I laugh a little, remembering how much he hated it when photographers would direct us to line up by height.
But the longer I look at that photo and trophy, the more I’m feeling like I called the wrong play in the middle of a close game. I miss all of this real bad, and maybe deciding to transfer to St. Sebastian’s wasn’t the right move. There’s something about feeling like you belong, feeling like you’re home, that nothing can replace. But when I made the decision over the summer, I kept thinking about what it’d be like on the other side. To have better facilities. More gear. More challenging academics. More scouts watching.
More.
Of course, things always look different from the other side. St. Sebastian’s simply doesn’t feel like this.
“It’s not too late to help us put some more in there,” someone says from over my shoulder.
I tense up, but relax as soon as I turn around to find Coach J smiling wide.
We shake hands, then he says, “I’m just playing. But, man, I still can’t believe that season you had last year. Not even Moore put up those kinds of numbers his freshman year.”
“Thanks, Coach,” I say, my eyes drifting over to one of the tallest trophies in the case. It’s from ninety-eight, the last time Whitman brought home a state title. Coach Campbell was only an assistant then, and Coach J was the team’s starting two-guard. But Clark Moore, their starting power forward, was the star of the show. Led the team in about every stat and, after a year at Duke, went on to play a few years for the Clippers before heading overseas.
“You ask me,” he says, “I think you’re three or four times the player he ever was.”
I wish people wouldn’t say things like that. I know they mean well, but it makes me feel like if I don’t play how everyone expects, I’ve let them all down.
“Nah,” I say. “Maybe half on a good day.”
“You’re too modest, Bunny Thompson,” Coach J says, laughing. “Congrats on the group championship, by the way. Saw your line, and looks like you just keep getting better and better. But we all knew you would. You’ve got a great future ahead of you. The Unstoppable Bunny Thompson. You see, you’re going places. I know you had to do what’s best for you, but I’m glad I’ll be able to say I knew you when.”
Again, I don’t think he’s trying to lay the guilt trip, but all those feelings I was having—about how maybe it was a mistake transferring to St. Sebastian’s—they feel like they’re expanding. Like they’re filling my chest and making it hard to breathe.
Thankfully, Keyona comes out of the gym right then, bag slung over her shoulder and hair still up in that tight ponytail she wears to keep it out of her face while playing. I can tell by her face she’s disappointed her season’s over. She hugs me without saying anything, then greets Coach J.
“We’ll chat later, Bunny,” Coach J says. “I’ll leave you kids be. Good luck on Sunday with St. Agnes. I know you know what to do, but keep an eye on number twenty-one. Dude’s got a nice J. Keyona, great game tonight. You win some, you lose some. You’ll get ’em next year. I know you will.”
“Thanks, Coach J,” she says, still holding on to me.
“See ya, Coach,” I say.
Coach J winks at Keyona. “Take care of our boy.”
“I will,” she says.
After Coach J leaves, I squeeze her tighter. We sway back and forth for a bit like we’re slow dancing and kiss briefly a couple of times.
“Really, Key,” I say, “you played hard tonight. You fought hard.”
“Thanks,” she says, her cheek pressing into my chest, making some of those bad feelings I had earlier melt away.
“Coach
J is right, there’s always next season.”
“True.”
“And track,” I say.
“And track,” she says. “Besides, we can’t all be Bunny Thompson.” She smirks.
I laugh. “I hear that guy’s a chump.”
She pulls away from the hug. “Hey, watch what you say about my man.”
“Your man? Oh, so it’s okay for you to claim me?”
She socks me in the shoulder, and I act like it hurts real bad. We laugh a little and then start walking side by side, my arm around her shoulder and her arm laced around my waist. We’re moving real slow, and the rest of her team files past us on their way out the building. I try to ignore the side-eye some of them throw my way, which makes me feel like when that egg hit my window.
I shake it off as we leave the trophy case behind, walk past the empty classrooms, and push through the main doors. As they click shut, we stop on the top step. It’s warmer out than I expected. The sky is clear, and there’s even a couple of stars up there.
We haven’t said anything this whole walk, because I know Keyona’s like me in that she likes to have some silence for a bit after a loss. I don’t know what she thinks about in that space, but I always get stuck on what I should have done differently. The shot I shouldn’t have taken. The bad pass I made. The misstep I took on defense. But once we’re outside, Keyona slides her arm from around my waist and takes my hand in hers.
Keyona. The girl who wouldn’t let me go. I may not know if I made the right decision about transferring and all, but I know this is right, that this feels like that moment after the shot drops. What the hell was I thinking, trying to break up with her?
“What are you up to now?” I ask.
“Shower. Homework. Bed.”
“Maybe I can come over, and we do some homework together?” I suggest.
“I wish. But it’s a school night. You know how my parents are about that.”
I sigh. “Thought I’d ask.”
She sneaks me a quick kiss. Makes me smile like someone pressed a button. “If you’re that bored, maybe you could try hanging with Nas again,” she says.