Inside the gym, Mrs. B settles herself into the bleachers. “You’d better get in there with your team,” she says to me. “And find yourself some dry socks. It’ll be hard to get many rebounds with your feet soggy, now, won’t it?”
I nod. “Yes, ma’am.”
She laughs and pulls needles and yarn from her bag. “Wallace, will you buy me some of those Dots from the concession stand before the game starts?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he echoes.
I walk with him across the gym, and somehow, instinctively, we both pause before parting ways. “It’s quite a game, isn’t it?” Coach B asks. When I look over, he’s watching the court with pure joy carved across his face.
The Panthers have taken the floor and begun their warm-ups, dribbling down, laying it up, passing the ball to the next player in an endless figure eight. It’s hard to judge how we’ll match up with them by layups and warm-ups, but all at once, it doesn’t matter. In that moment, I see the game through Coach B’s eyes and even think of it in his words: the fluid beauty of it all, the effortlessness that comes at the culmination of all those years of effort.
“It’s quite a game,” I agree. “Like poetry.”
Then he starts reciting in his gravelly voice.
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too…
He trails off, like he only just realized he was speaking the words aloud. I know the poem—we studied it in AP English a few weeks ago, and Daphne said something about the poet’s sexism and imperialism and rewrote the ending with her own feminist twist. But now I remember the ending the way Kipling wrote it, like I need it to face this game.
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
Coach B still faces the court, but his gaze flashes to me as he smiles. “That’s right. There’s a lot hanging on that one word, isn’t there? That ‘If.’ ” He clears his throat. “Almost every lesson you need in life can be learned out there on the hardwood. Grit, determination, teamwork, loyalty, both winning and losing graciously. How to pick yourself up after you fall. But for me, one of the greatest gifts is that, even during the war, the game was the game. Whatever burden you’re carrying, you can set it down for a time and just play. And yes, it’ll be there waiting for you when you’re done, but it might not seem so heavy.”
I let the words settle on my wounds as our team streams from the locker room, Jake leading the charge, and then they begin the same fluid layup drill. But now, as my teammates circle past, one by one, I see the faces and know the stories of each player, and it strikes me how much I want to win this. For each of them, maybe even Jake. But also how much we’ll have gained, even if we don’t win.
“I suppose I’ve always seen him as Sirius,” Coach B says as Jake lays the ball up and in, gently as the last snowflakes falling outside. “The brightest star in the sky.”
Something inside me wants to close off, but then he continues. “I’ve been watching all season, you know. Teams are good when they have a bright star to build on. Even better when they have a comet, like Kolt, who’s everywhere at once. And they’re champions when they have a Polaris, a true north to follow.” He turns and looks me right in the face, lays a hand on my shoulder. “This is a team of champions, regardless of the outcome tonight. And let me add, young man, that it has been a pleasure to watch you play all these years.” He gives me a crooked smile. “Now go get some dry socks on and join your teammates. They need their Polaris, and I’ve got to find myself some Dots.”
So I go to the locker room, and I leave my burden there along with my wet socks. Back on the court, I slide into warm-ups as the team welcomes me into the flow of it all, as natural as stepping into a river on a starry night.
Jake stands in the stall and looks at the pile of pills in his hand. Two now and one at halftime will still leave enough to do the job after the game is over, if he swallows them all. It might give away his secret, but the way Seth spat those words at him just now—You’re hopped up on painkillers. Aren’t you?—he’s afraid they all know anyway.
He counts out three, putting the rest of the pills back in the small ziplock and shoving it inside the lining of his bag. His fingers find the few stitches that have come loose on his warm-up jersey, just the right size to slide the oxy inside. The last two still lie in his palm, staring up at him like blank, barren eyes. He wonders how he ever thought they were his savior from anything: pain or sorrow or the monster of Not Enough.
You won, he tells them. You’ll always win.
It’s a new feeling to Jake, but he’s seen something like it in opponents’ faces often enough he thinks he recognizes it: the moment you know with absolute clarity that you’ll never win, and you make peace with it because you’re too weary to try anymore.
And he is so, so tired. The sounds of the arena are dulled by walls and distance and the fog forming in his head, but the pull of the game is as strong as ever. He has to go out there. Do this one more thing, he tells himself, and then you can be done.
Jake opens his mouth and slaps his palm to it, letting the twin circles sit there a moment, bitter spots that will turn sweet inside his belly, inside his blood. Out in the arena, a new song blares over the loudspeakers, deep and thrumming.
It’s time. Jake crunches the pills once between his jaws. He closes his eyes and swallows, then stuffs the bag in his locker. The bass seems to follow his footfalls as he runs through the tunnel and onto the court.
Maybe it’s the pills, or the relief at finally having made the decision, but as the team warms up, Jake’s worries fall away like a shed skin. The game becomes as pure and perfect as it was all those years ago, when they’d rush outside for every recess or gather in Kolt’s driveway on summer nights until it got too dark to see the hoop.
It’s right to spend his last hours here. Whether driveway or playground or ten-thousand-seat arena, the basketball court has always been the most sacred place in the world to Jake, even though he’s been to church nearly every Sunday all his life.
At church, he has learned that he should be perfect, even as his Savior was perfect, and it seemed like a worthy goal. Be perfect, and the aching emptiness inside you will go away. Be perfect, and be loved, unconditionally and forever, by a Father who is perfect too.
But all his life, every time he fell short—barked at his brother, ignored his mother, felt so angry at his father he threw something, broke something—Jake knew he became less worthy of God’s love. Of anybody’s love, really. Because to really be worthy, you’re supposed to be perfect.
He sometimes looks up at the picture of Jesus in the church foyer, eyes kind and hands stretched out, and he knows, just knows, that he doesn’t deserve that love.
“Ask of God,” the scriptures have told him, and Jake wishes he could. It’s fine for the others to bow their heads and clasp their hands and pour out their hearts, asking for anything and everything they need. They’re not as flawed as he is.
How can he ask for help from the very Being he has disappointed most? The One who asked him to be perfect in the first place?
He’s had moments of perfection, he knows. Moments of goodness and clarity. In the beginning, the pills helped those moments last longer. They dulled the teeth of the monster of Not Enough.
But now, even with more pills, it never lasts. “There is no peace, saith the Lord, unto the wicked.” And here in this arena, before the starting lineups are even announced in the biggest game of his life, the monster has returned, teeth bared.
Coach B will know he stole the pills.
<
br /> Coach C will find the others in his bag, if he hasn’t already.
They’ll know, like his dad knew all along, that Jake isn’t worthy or worth it.
There’s no such thing as a Father who loves you unconditionally.
It doesn’t matter anyway. Jake is ready—head, hands, heart—to lay it all on the court one last time. And then he will walk straight into the monster’s mouth.
They did it. They won. And Jake had the game of his life. As I pull up to the after-game party, it still feels surreal.
Seth’s house pulses with music, the laughter inside louder because the season’s over and Seth’s dad will turn a blind eye to the fact that it’s not always Coke in our plastic cups. I watch eleven cars arrive but quickly lose count of how many people have piled out and gone inside. They make it look so easy: flirt and laugh and walk through the door. It used to be like that for me.
But I don’t want crowds or music tonight. And I definitely don’t want to see Jake. All I want is to talk to Seth, to tell him what happened in the training room—how Jake was so broken that I wanted to fix it any way I could, how I regretted it before it even really started.
Who would believe it, though? Who would believe that even before my lips met Jake’s, I knew I’d always care about him but I didn’t love him like that anymore?
It’s a lot to ask, even of Seth.
Still, I gather my courage and go to the door. As much as Seth’s dad likes to be in the middle of everything his players do (which is probably why he offered to host in the first place), Seth’s family lives on the edge of town. Their property backs up to a scraggly forest with a creek running through it. For me, it was love at first sight. Even better than our cabin, not because it’s nicer (although it is) but because they get to wake up to it every morning. How would it be, I wonder, to walk a hundred yards out your back door and see only what’s natural and wild?
Seth and I came out to the forest after a snowfall one night, and we sat silently for so long, just watching the flakes fall, that a doe led her fawn right in front of us, the spots on its back barely bigger than the flakes.
I never told Seth that I came here with Jake too, one night when Seth had invited us both to a party. I never told Seth that Jake was the first boy I kissed in these woods. Not because it was something to hide, but because I’ve tried so hard to leave everything about being with Jake in the past. In this moment, I wish I could erase it all. Wish these woods could only be the place where Seth and I watched the fawn in the snowfall, pure and simple.
It’s Coach himself who answers the door, smiling and waving me in. “You don’t even have to knock, you know. You’re welcome here anytime.”
Coach has always liked me. All parents seem to like me. Maybe it’s because my dad raised me to be polite and respectful, or maybe my name is in enough news articles for sports and academics that parents sort of pay attention. And okay, it probably doesn’t hurt that my dad is the judge.
Whatever it is, I’ve learned to work the advantage. To like it, even. Bad news is, high schoolers aren’t so easy to impress. I’m about to brave the crowd when I hear Coach’s voice calling me back. “Hey, Daphne,” he says, the scent of beer on his breath. “I meant to tell you, congratulations on your win tonight.”
My team won too—but in the consolation bracket. I was coming to the training room to get some ice for my ankle after my own game when the whole mess with Jake happened.
“Thanks,” I say. “And you too. Pine Valley got outplayed tonight, but they got outcoached too. You deserve to celebrate.”
Coach looks down into the red-and-white plastic cup in his hand. Warrior colors, even tonight. Especially tonight. “Oh, I’m having a great time,” he says, but it doesn’t sound like he believes it. “Seth’s out back.” I look past him and out the sliding glass door to see Seth with a plastic cup of his own and an arm slung over Kolt’s shoulders.
“Thanks,” I say. “And I meant what I said. They couldn’t have done this without you.”
Seth smiles when I come through the sliding door, but there’s something sad in it. I think of his smile as he stood between Jake and Kolt and hoisted the trophy above his head. It’s been only a couple of hours since the game. It seems so unfair that our worst moments stain for so long but our best fade so quickly.
“Hey,” I say, slipping my hand in his and giving it a squeeze. “Can we go down to the basement? To talk?” I give the last two words extra emphasis for Kolt’s sake.
“Maybe not tonight,” Seth says, his gaze flickering back toward the house. He doesn’t return the squeeze, but he doesn’t pull his hand away. “I just…Maybe not tonight.”
“Okay,” I say, steeling myself against the sting.
“Annnndddd Daphne gets shut down,” says Kolt. “Hey, don’t feel bad. It’s your night too! Congratulations on winning the loser bracket.”
“Thanks,” I say. “Congratulations on your two points tonight.”
“And twelve rebounds!” he insists, but by then we’re both laughing. “Hey, have you seen Jake?”
Seth’s hand tightens around mine, and when I look up, I wonder if he knows somehow.
I’ve got to explain. Got to fix it.
“No,” I tell Kolt. “Probably still got kids lined up for autographs or something.” I say it as a burn on Kolt, but I feel the way Seth tenses beside me. He’s never been jealous of Jake’s success on the court, but even Seth must have his limits.
Kolt laughs and goes to look for Jake, and Seth lets me pull him back into the house.
I keep hold of his hand and hope he won’t hate me when I’ve said what I need to say.
“I made a mistake.”
He unfolds his arms, starts to walk away. “Come on,” he says, not even really looking at me. “It’s too loud in here.”
If those words had come out of Kolt’s mouth, they would sound like a line. But even if nothing had happened in the locker room, even if nothing needed to be fixed between us, Seth wouldn’t have stayed long at his own party. Deep down, he’s an introvert. He loves that people are at his house, having a great time. He loves that he played a role in the victory that brought them all here. But he’d rather watch it all from a distance.
Seth grabs two quilts from the hall closet, and I follow him out the back door and straight onto a path that leads to the woods. (Of course, Kolt gives us crap on our way out.)
Once we’re alone in the cold clarity of the forest, Seth hands me one quilt and wraps the other around himself. We’re not wrapping up together, then. He sits, and I sit beside him, unsure how much space he wants between us.
“I made a mistake,” I say again.
“Okay,” he says.
Even through the blanket, I can see that his knees are bouncing, and it can’t be from the cold. I’m not sure there’s a right time to say it, so I start again. “Something happened before the game, and I—”
“Could we not?” he asks. He starts to stand up, changes his mind. “I mean, whatever it is, can we talk about it another time? I really want tonight to be about the win.”
“Okay,” I say, and I swallow it back down with one part relief and nine parts remorse.
After that, we just sit on the rough log bench at the edge of the tree line, watching the golden glow of the party from the cocoon of our separate blankets.
Eventually we talk, and even now it’s not as hard as it probably should be. But the topics are safe; we’re both guarded. He asks about my game, and we talk about what’s next. Track for me, baseball for him, AP prep for both of us. We don’t talk about what’s beyond that. We’ve applied to some of the same colleges, but neither of us has decided on our top choices. Even though graduation is months away, it feels like high school is winding down.
Seth watches as a new song begins and everybody dances, the music and laughter muted by
the distance and the windowpane. “It’s like a metaphor or something. Like we’re already looking back on the party, but not ready to step into the forest. You know what I mean?”
I laugh. “That is exactly what I was thinking, but not quite in those AP English–essay terms.” I lean my head on his shoulder, hoping he won’t pull away.
After a few seconds, I feel his temple against the top of my head. I draw the blanket closer around me. “Thank you for letting me share this metaphorical purgatory bench with you, Seth Cooper.”
It’s a more perfect moment than I deserve right now.
And yet Jake lingers like a ghost on the edges of this happiness. I can’t stop thinking of the way he looked in the training room, the desperation in his eyes. Even during the game—the greatest performance of his breathtaking high school career—there was something off. Something I’d been seeing glimpses of all season. For the first time, I think of the fact that he’s not here tonight and feel worry instead of relief. I hate to break the moment, hate that it might hurt him or us, but I look straight up at Seth, and I ask, because I have no choice.
“Will you check on him?”
Seth’s face tightens. “Check on who?” Of course he knows who, but it’s fair that he’s going to make me say it.
“Jake. I promise I’m over him. I know that more than ever. But something’s wrong, Seth. Really wrong. And he won’t answer my calls or texts.”
“You called him,” Seth says, pulling away. “You texted him. Tonight?”
I nod. “Before I came over.”
He closes his eyes and lets out a breath. “Yeah, I’ll check on him. How long do you think this will last?”
“I don’t know.” I’m not sure if he’s asking how long Jake will need us or how long I’ll feel like I have to help or whether he and I will stay together long enough to go off into those metaphorical woods side by side someday.
Fadeaway Page 17