by Kennedy Ryan
“A little.” He starts his double-dribble again, too. “She says you guys are together, but hasn’t given much detail. To be honest, Iris is so preoccupied with the baby coming, she hasn’t dug as much as she usually would.”
“So you’re digging for her?” I ask, cocking one brow.
“Something like that.” He flashes a grin. “I mean, some dirty old man is after my wife’s young cousin. It’s my duty to investigate.”
“I wondered when the old man jokes would start,” I say, laughing and shaking my head.
“Expect more of those,” he laughs.
“You guys got a secret, or would you like to share with the rest of the class?” our new coach yells from the other end of the court.
He’s not exactly new. He’s our former assistant coach, Ean Jagger. Coach Kemp, who has led the Waves since we started as an expansion team a few years ago, is battling prostate cancer. Of course, we wish him the best and want him to get better, but it’s also exciting to have such a young, brilliant mind at the helm this season. With his reputation as a master strategist and his off-the-charts basketball IQ, Ean could have any job in the league. We’re grateful, and slightly confused as to why he stayed with an expansion team with no hopes of making the playoffs its first four seasons.
But we’ll take it.
“No secret, Coach,” I reply. “I’m having the sex talk with Rook here. He wasn’t sure how his wife ended up pregnant. I was explaining where everything goes.”
The team laughs, and I have to stop dribbling and bend over laughing myself at the look August levels at me.
“Wow,” Ean says, taking his time crossing the court to reach us. “I expected more from the team captain.”
August is the franchise player and the future of the team, but he’s only got a few seasons under his belt. They brought me in because of my reputation for discipline, my on- and off-court leadership, and because of my two championship rings. I know how to win. All attributes they’re hoping I can pass on to my younger teammates, especially August.
“Since you and West seem to have so much to chat about,” Ean says once he’s standing right in front of us, “let’s see if you can climb and talk at the same time.”
August groans, and I’m with him. Nobody likes climbing the rope. It’s old school and not one of our standard drills anymore. But that is part of what makes Ean so coveted. He’s a great blend of old-school sensibility and cutting-edge innovation.
“I hope you kept in shape over the summer break, old man,” August jibes as we head for the two ropes hanging at the far end of the court.
“Summer break?” I ask blithely. “What’s a summer break? I think I heard about those. Maybe I’ll take one some day.”
“Apparently, this isn’t the best way to shut down the chatter,” Ean says dryly, “since both of you are still running your damn mouths. Go at the whistle. Touch top and mat. Touch top and mat again.”
“Shit,” August mumbles. “Last time I’m talking to you during drills, Glad.”
“Well that’s one bright spot.” I give him a dead face and curl my hands around the rope.
I’m gonna smoke his ass.
The whistle blows.
August is out of the gate like a thoroughbred, racing up and inches above me. I pace myself, but never let him get too far ahead. No way I’m letting this kid show me up.
He’s still slightly in the lead when we touch the mat and start back up for the second climb. That’s when I make my move, digging deep for a burst of speed I keep in reserve. I’ve also got nearly three inches in height, six inches in wingspan and a good fifty pounds of muscle over him. My reach is longer, and I pull myself up higher with less effort. I tap the top and start back down milliseconds before he does. When my feet touch the mat half a breath before his do, I’m relieved I held my ground. I’m the guy with the rings. I’m the team captain, but in this league, you’re never done proving yourself.
“Age before beauty today, Rook,” I tell him through harsh puffs of air.
“Don’t feel too bad,” August says, swiping Gatorade from his lips. “I’m sure your girlfriend Lotus thinks you’re beautiful.”
That sparks the curiosity and jokes I’m sure he knew it would.
“Glad got him a girl?”
“When do we meet her?”
“Bet she’s a dime.”
I can barely focus for the rest of the practice with all the grown-ass men asking me nosy questions about my girl.
“Bet you wish you’d let me win, huh?” August asks, grinning like a thirteen-year-old while we walk to the parking lot after practice.
“No, but you do.”
“Nice whip,” he says, whistling and walking around the Urus. “That max contract money is long, huh?”
Banner negotiated a max contract deal for me the year before I left Houston. Lucky for me, since I traded the following year. It gave me a nice paycheck before I left.
“You should talk.” I click the truck open. “You got that franchise tag money.”
“We both know which is longer,” he says with no spite and much humor. “You’ve earned it.”
“Get it while you can,” I tell him, sobering. “Too many of us live high on the hog, and then when it’s time to retire, the butcher is closed. Make your money. Invest your money, and then make more money. Banner told me that from the beginning, and is riding me about it at the end.”
“The end?” August goes still, leaning against the truck and frowning. “You ain’t trying to leave now, are you?”
I shrug. “Everybody hangs it up at some point.”
“You’re in better condition than everybody on the team.” August huffs a wry laugh. “Including me. You could play till you’re forty if you want.”
“The operative word being want.”
“Why wouldn’t you want?”
“There’s a lot more to life than ball. You know that, August.”
“Yeah, for sure, but I was hoping you’d help me win a ring before you hang up the ol’ gym bag.”
I chuckle and settle against the truck beside him. “I don’t know about that. I’ve missed a lot with Simone. This life is hard on families.”
“Yeah. I have to be really intentional about being present when I’m home since I’m gone so much.” He shakes his head. “Man, we had a great summer. So much time with Iris and Sarai. Iris had a great pregnancy.”
“You ready to be a dad again?” I ask.
“I guess. I’ve had Sarai since she was so small, she barely remembers anything before Iris and I were married.” He laughs. “Why? You got pro tips?”
“Shiiiiiiit.” I shake my head and offer a wry chuckle of my own. “I’m the last one handing out advice on fatherhood. I’m not exactly Simone’s favorite person right now.”
“How’d things go over the summer?”
“Okay. We were in family counseling while I was there. She’s still really struggling with the divorce. She thought we might get back together.”
“You?” August asks, his eyes wide and his brows up. “And Bridget? Get back together? Why would she think that?”
“She’s a kid and wants her life back.” I suck my teeth, disgusted with my ex. “And this Baller Bae show premiering soon won’t help. I’ve got a bad feeling about it. You know Bridget had the nerve to show up at Lotus’s job? Poking around and trying to scare her off.”
“Scare Lotus off?” August asks, his tone incredulous. “She obviously doesn’t know her. Lo doesn’t scare easily. I certainly wouldn’t cross her. And Simone’s not a fan?”
“Nope. Not at all.” I shrug and open the door to toss my gym bag in the back seat. “But she’ll have to get over that because Lotus isn’t going anywhere.”
“So details begin to emerge,” August says with some satisfaction. “You really are into her.”
“Like you haven’t known that since the day I first saw her in that hospital room.”
“True.” August’s grin is wide and teas
ing. “Bruh, she walked in and you were shook.”
I smile despite the ache in my chest. Shook? Over Lotus?
I still am.
34
Lotus
“You can do it!”
My throat is raw, but I force the words out one more time, praying that something will end my cousin’s agony soon.
“I can’t,” Iris say, tears running from the corners of her eyes. “I can’t, Lo.”
“Yes, you can.” I mop the sweat from her brow and hand her a cup of ice chips. “You will.”
“I want August.”
“I know, honey.” I glace at the clock on the wall. “He’s on his way.”
“I hate basketball,” she says, her bottom lip quivering.
“I been trying to tell you,” I joke. “Took labor for you to hear your girl.”
Her mouth twitches the tiniest bit.
“He’s really almost here?” she asks again for the one hundredth time.
“He is. The team landed a little while ago and he called from the airport.”
It’s pre-season, and the Waves had a game in Toronto. Iris wasn’t due for another few days.
“First thing I’m gonna do when little man gets here,” I say, giving her a smile, “is tell him to synch his schedule. Got all of us thrown off.”
I wasn’t supposed to fly out to San Diego until the weekend, and was planning to spend a few days in Hawaii with JP. Fortunately, I got the call before we left for the airport and was able to change my flight.
The upside is that I’ll get to see my boyfriend before the team leaves for China in two days. When Kenan said his schedule would be brutal, I didn’t think he was lying, but even the pre-season is intense.
“Ahhhh!” Iris bellows. Rivulets of sweat sluice her forehead, making the fine hairs at her temples curl.
“How’s Sarai?” she pants once the pain passes.
“Good. I got an update from your friend a few minutes ago. She says Sarai’s playing with dolls.”
Iris smiles, her eyes shifting past my shoulder. “Dr. Matthews, hi.”
“Hi, Mrs. West,” Iris’s obstetrician, Dr. Matthews, says from the door. Her voice is calm, but carries a hint of urgency. “We need to talk. You’ve been in labor for eight hours and have stalled at five centimeters dilated. I’d like to do a scalp test.”
Iris has been given some drugs for pain, though she didn’t want an epidural. I know she hasn’t been sleeping much for weeks. Dark shadows rest beneath her eyes. Between contractions, her lids droop drowsily. She’s exhausted. I need to be alert on her behalf.
“What’s a scalp test?” I ask.
The doctor looks at me questioningly and then to Iris, whose head has lolled to the side.
“I asked you a question,” I remind the doctor with soft firmness. “What does the test involve, and why do you need to do it?”
“Tell her,” Iris whispers. “She’s my only family.”
Technically not true. We both have mothers alive and well in New Orleans. Neither of us have seen them since MiMi’s funeral. I haven’t spoken to mine since I was twelve years old.
“And Mr. West?” Dr. Matthews asks, brows up.
“En route,” I reply, my stare unwavering. “The test?”
“We place a plastic cone in the vagina and against the baby’s scalp,” she explains. “We take a small blood sample, which will be analyzed, and tell us in minutes if he’s getting enough oxygen.”
“You okay with that, Bo?” I ask. “Did you hear the doctor?”
Iris nods weakly and licks over the teeth marks on her lips. “Okay,” she says. “Do it.”
They get Iris in stirrups and conduct the test quickly.
“I was afraid of this,” Dr. Matthews says when she comes back a few minutes later. “We need to get that baby out. We should start discussing other options. Possibly a C-section.”
“No, I don’t want . . .” Tears course down Iris’s cheeks. “We wanted to do it naturally.” She looks at me, distress and panic flooding her eyes. “Where is he, Lo?”
My phone rings and it’s August. Thank God.
“It’s him!” I laugh and hold up the phone before answering. “Dude, how close are you?”
“I’m around the corner,” August says, frustration in his voice. “But there’s an accident. Hoping this clears soon. How’s she doing?”
“Great,” I say, smiling reassuringly at my cousin. “She’s doing great. They’re a little concerned the baby may not be getting enough oxygen and are talking about a C-section.”
“No, she doesn’t want one,” he says.
I walk a few feet away from the bed and turn my back to Iris.
“She may have to, August,” I say, pitching my voice lower. “She needs you. I don’t care if you have to get out of that car and run, get your ass here.”
I look over my shoulder and give Iris another smile. “Wanna speak to him?”
“Yes.” She nods, her dark hair fanned out in a tangled mess against the pillow. “Please.”
I can’t make out August’s words, but she draws a deep, calming breath and blows it out.
“I know,” Iris says, her voice wavering. “I remember. I just want you here. I’ll get the C-section if I have to, August. I don’t want to do this without you.”
Her voice breaks, and fresh tears roll over her flushed cheeks. “I want you. Please don’t miss our son’s birth.”
When they hang up, I take my phone back and sit beside Iris’s bed. Just as I’m about to find something to distract her while the doctor goes to make arrangements, another scream tears through Iris.
“Dammit!” she yells, screwing her face into a pained mask. “This shit hurts. It didn’t hurt like this before.”
With Sarai, Iris had a difficult pregnancy, but the delivery itself was relatively easy. This time the pregnancy was a breeze, but the delivery is being a little bitch.
“I can’t do this, Lo,” she whispers. “God, I’m so tired.”
“Yes, you can.” I grab her hand and lose the train of what I was about to say when Iris grips my hand so tightly I fear it might break. Damn, that hurts.
Iris grits her teeth and sits up to push as Dr. Matthews walks in with a team to prep for the C-section.
“What’s going . . .” She checks between Iris’s legs and peeks back up, beaming. “That’s what I like to see. Not sure what you did, Mrs. West, but you’re at eight centimeters.”
“I am?” Iris asks, a smile breaking across her pretty face like sunshine. “How? I didn’t do anything.”
“I guess your body just needed a few more minutes to recover and move things along,” she says with a wink. “You had a power surge. Now let’s push.”
Iris is on her second hard push, and the scream is bloodcurdling. I’m not sure how much more I can take. For as long as I can remember, her pain has been my pain, and my pain has been hers. Tears prick my eyes, but I never release her hand, even when my fingers go numb from the pressure. She unleashes another screech when August barrels through the door.
“I’m here, baby,” he says, rushing to her side.
I start to move so August can take my place, but Iris won’t let go. She shakes her head that I’m not to leave.
“Hopscotch,” she whispers tearfully. “Don’t leave me, cuz.”
We’ve always been there for each other, done what the other needed, and that word has been our touchstone through the hardest, darkest things life had in store for us. Emotion scalds my throat, but I manage to nod, determined to withstand the bone-crushing grip for as long as it takes, for as long as she needs. She’ll do this for me one day.
Our eyes hold and our gris-gris rings lock together like our lives, our destinies, have remained entwined. It could be my imagination, but as she bears down and squeezes my hand for one final agonizing push, I feel that power surge the doctor mentioned. The power in our veins passed between two little girls in the Lower Ninth. We held it in a field of rotting cane, even when w
e were torn apart. It flows between us now through years and heartache and unconditional love. The power of an unbroken line.
We are the magic.
35
Kenan
Is it really only the pre-season?
I sink into the ice tub I keep at the Waves arena. Even though it was only an exhibition game, I gave it my all.
There are definitely times when we have to ease up and play conservatively. Tonight wasn’t one of those. Cliff, my one-time friend and teammate, bounced around the NBA like a rubber ball kicked all over the playground after I left Houston. This is probably his last year, and despite winning one ring with us, he hasn’t prepared for retirement as well as I have. He hasn’t had the career I had or the success. He doesn’t have the money.
But he had my wife right under my nose for weeks, and we played his team tonight. No way I was taking an L from that motherfucker. It’s not even about Bridget. It hasn’t been for a long time.
The first time I faced Cliff after everything came out, people thought I might fight him on court, or erupt in violence. I did the opposite. I froze him out. I froze them all out, encasing myself and my game in a wall of ice. Many in my position would have taken the fine for not being available to the press that night. Not me. Every time a reporter asked a question about Cliff, about Bridget, their affair, I just stared at them in wintry silence until they sat down and the next question came.
Now reporters know better than to ask questions about my personal life. They haven’t for the last two years. Depending on how much of our dirty laundry Bridget decides to air on her reality show, that could change.
The door opens, and I glance over my shoulder to see our president of basketball operations, MacKenzie Decker, stroll in. He recently turned forty. An injury forced him into retirement a few years ago, earlier than he would have liked, but I doubt he misses those last seasons he could have had. He’ll be first ballot Hall of Fame, and after just a few years out of the league, he’s already a front office exec poised for partial ownership of the Waves. Not bad.
“’Sup, Deck?” I ask, sinking deeper into the icy water.