by Paula Chase
The two players with the slowest drill times, Cappy and Squirt, started putting the balls away and mopping up the sweaty floor. They worked fast with their heads down, ashamed of the duties. Every week somebody had to do it. It was inevitable. But nobody liked coming in last. Having to clean had the stench of loss that you couldn’t get off you until the next practice when somebody else skunked on their drill.
Simp stayed by Coach Tez’s side. He watched Rollie chat up J-Roach and Reuben, then nodded toward the cleanup crew. “We got wait for them finish or you ready talk to us now?”
“They know what to do,” Coach Tez said, walking off.
Simp grabbed his stuff and threw it in his duffel without getting dressed. He strode, long legged, behind Coach Tez. He looked to make sure Rollie was right behind and was relieved when he was.
Nobody talked while they walked to a large shed behind the rec center. It was only an equipment shed, but let people tell it, it’s where Coach Tez kept all his money from hustling. Simp had never seen evidence of that, but he’d never done nothing to stop the rumors. Only ’Rauders players were allowed in the shed. He liked that people was always guessing at what was real and what wasn’t.
The shed was bigger inside and cleaner than some row houses. The gray wood panels and door framed in white wood made it look like a miniature version of a house you’d see in the country. Except it didn’t have any windows and was only one big space inside. A space that was bigger than his bedroom. He’d never measured it, but he was good at counting and guessing at distances. His room was small. Five steps in and you were at the back of it. The shed was definitely bigger—at least twelve steps to the back, maybe more. Every time he came out to the shed, to put equipment away, he thought about what it would be like to have all that space to himself.
Coach Tez took a key out of his pants pocket and unlocked the heavy-duty lock that kept the doors together. It was both a storage area and Coach Tez’s office. The other rumor was the walls were bulletproof. Simp couldn’t see anything special about the walls. They were plywood. Not even painted. But anything was possible with Coach Tez.
On one wall, shelves were stacked neatly with basketballs, extra nets, and uniforms. Two short file cabinets were against the back wall behind a wooden desk that sat in the middle of the shed. There was a chair, plush black leather that looked too fancy and out of place on the concrete block floor. It barely fit behind the desk.
Coach Tez plopped into the chair and nodded at two folding chairs, the only things leaning against the third wall of the shed. Rollie handed Simp a chair. They unfolded them at the same time and sat, quiet.
Coach Tez’s teetered back and forth. He steepled his hands and put his thumbs underneath his chin. Simp wondered if they were supposed to talk first. He didn’t know about what, though. He swallowed over and over trying to make his mouth ready when it was time to say something.
Finally Coach Tez’s lips parted with a tiny pop. “You know, I can’t figure y’all out.”
The words made Simp’s nuts crawl into his stomach. He hadn’t expected to hear anything like that. He was barely breathing as Coach Tez went on. “When I recruited y’all, it was ’cause I thought y’all was a team. You was always together so—” He shrugged. “I ain’t usually wrong about people. But maybe this time, I was.”
Simp wanted to shout, “No, you wasn’t wrong. We a team. Ride or die.” But a small part of his mind knew this was part of the game. He kept his eye on Coach Tez and remained wordless.
After a few seconds that ticked on like eternity, Coach Tez leaned his elbows on the desk, looking from one to the other. He burst out laughing, and the sudden sound made Simp’s shoulders jump. “I ain’t gonna lie, y’all some tough little bastards,” Coach Tez said. “Even some grown men would have confessed to a crime they ain’t commit after too much quiet. Relax, little soldiers. Relax.”
Simp’s shoulders sagged. He turned his mouth up into what he hoped was a smile. There were two small knocks and one thump on the door—’Rauders signal. He was so on edge it took a deep breath for him not to jump at the sound.
“Come in,” Coach Tez said, eyes on the door.
Squirt walked in with two big netted bags full of basketballs. He walked them over to a hook on a wall, securing them so the bags wouldn’t jostle, then tried to slip out. “You lock up?” Coach Tez asked, stopping him mid slink.
Squirt nodded, then seeing Coach Tez frown added, “Yeah. We good, Coach.” He tried to dismiss himself one more time, then stopped again when Coach Tez’s voice called out, “Ay, hustle next time. Let somebody else do the scut work.”
“Yes, sir,” Squirt muttered.
“Where Cappy?”
“He had to go home,” Squirt said, sinking his hands into his coat pockets. “He helped. I just told him I’d bring the stuff back here.”
“Let me find out he bailed and his butt gon’ be cleaning up the gym after practice all season,” Coach Tez threatened before waving Squirt away. He stared after the door a few seconds longer, then jumped right back into his talk. “All right, the thing is, y’all two are special. It’s been a long time since I had a package deal like y’all.” A smile lit his face, showing a platinum cap on his incisor. In the center was a T outlined in tiny diamonds. “The way y’all control the floor together is one of the reasons we been able to keep the streak at the ’Peake going. I ain’t never think that would happen once Roman and Carlos graduated.”
Simp sat up straighter.
Coach Tez had just compared them to the two best players in ’Rauders history. Both of ’em was locked up now. It had been their dumbness, though, as far as Simp was concerned. Ain’t nobody tell them to turn into stickup boys robbing convenience stores. He waited to hear the words that had to come after that: I’m promoting y’all.
Instead, Coach Tez’s eyes fixed on Rollie. “I need to know what’s up. Y’all still in it together or what?”
Simp jiggled his foot, willing his mouth not to answer. Rollie gotta soldier up on this one, he thought, at the same time praying, Come on man, say the right thing. Please.
Rollie’s answer wasn’t what Simp had hoped.
“TAG make it hard for me to get to practice on time.”
Coach Tez waved off Rollie’s words. “Yeah, I know. You told me that back in November. I don’t mean that, though.” He squinted into Rollie’s face from across the desk. “I’m asking, are you still committed to the whole game and nothing but the game?”
Simp swore he heard his own heart beating. He opened his mouth, hoping to get more air in. At the same time, Rollie blew out a big breath. He slumped an inch in the chair and adjusted his skullie on his head. His voice was so low, Simp leaned his way to hear better. “Man, it just feel like too many people want something from me,” Rollie said.
Coach Tez’s eyes were now soft and curious. He pulled his lips in until they disappeared, pooched them out, then pulled them in again. Simp found himself sucking his lips in, too. He’d come back here thinking they were getting promoted, and now Coach Tez was questioning Rollie.
He fought the frustration rising in his chest. He didn’t want to blame Rollie. His mother and grandmoms had probably pushed him into TAG. Coach Tez would work it out, though. Rollie just needed to be helped through the hustle. He breathed easy, confident it would all work out.
“I know what that’s like,” Coach Tez said. “I’m not trying be one of those people pressuring you, though. The work you do for me should be helping you and your family. Know what I mean?”
Rollie nodded slow, like he was in a trance.
Simp looked from Coach Tez to Rollie. The fear in his stomach settled into rabid curiosity.
“I always told you, if you not wit’ it no more, you need be real with me and let me know,” Coach Tez said. “You saying you want out?”
At this, Rollie’s head seemed to snap up. Simp’s body jerked upright like they were connected. No, say no, he screamed in his head.
“Ay,
Rollie, I ain’t gon beg you to be on my team,” Coach Tez said, his voice cold.
“It ain’t like that.” Rollie sat up straighter but didn’t raise his voice. “Naw, I don’t want out.”
Coach Tez walked around to where they were and sat on the edge of the desk, between their chairs. “So, something else on your mind then. You know you can tell me,” he said.
“I got my moms and grandmoms on me about school and doing good in TAG. My TAG teacher trying hook me up with auditions to be in bands.” Rollie blew out another breath, slumped. He folded his arms as he lifted his face up to Coach. “It just feel like a lot going on. I’m not trying slip up or nothing, just ’cause everybody all on me at once.”
Coach Tez patted his shoulder, then squeezed. To Simp it looked like a good grip. If it was too tight, Rollie’s face didn’t betray any pain. “Ay, we a team. A family. We hold up for each other,” Coach Tez said, before letting go. “We ain’t gonna let you slip. Right, Simp?”
Eager to please, Simp nodded, then forced himself to speak with confidence. “Got that right.”
Coach Tez winked at him. The warm tingle that usually made Simp’s spine feel like he could jump a mile high if Coach Tez wanted—’Rauders All Day—wasn’t there this time. ’Cause Rollie was saying the right stuff, but Simp didn’t believe him. And if he didn’t, no way Coach Tez did.
Rollie
Once Tez dismissed them, Rollie couldn’t get home fast enough. And why had he mentioned auditions for bands? Mr. B had told him not to say anything. He hadn’t even told his moms yet.
Worst, Tez had given him the chance to say he was done. Why hadn’t he?
Every time the question raced around his brain, he heard himself telling Tez how he was still down.
Stupid. That was just stupid.
Simp’s voice came from far away. “Everything all right, son?”
Rollie jammed his hands into his jacket pockets and nodded. He didn’t feel like talking.
“Look, I need keep it one hundred wit’ you,” Simp said. Their steps were in sync. He easily kept up with Rollie’s fast but shorter stride. “Don’t take this wrong but . . . was you lying to Coach just now?”
Rollie stopped dead, inches from a streetlight. In the slice of light, he and Simp stared at each other. The worry on Simp’s face was the only thing that kept Rollie from going off on him.
Any other time he would be straight up with Simp, but things were getting complicated. He laughed inside at the lie. Getting complicated? It always had been. The second he held three creased and crumbled twenty-dollar bills in his hand after four hours of sitting on the fence near the Cove’s entry and “whoop whooped” any time a cop patrolled, it was complicated. That was the first favor Tez had ever asked him and Simp to do. They had been in the sixth grade.
Had it really only been two years?
He knew then it was wrong. But hanging out near the entry or at center court was just something they did to pass time anyway. If Tez wanted to give him sixty dollars just for that . . . why would he have said no?
Whether they sat out there for one hour or three, the payoff was always sixty dollars. Always in twenties. Twenty dollars an hour—more sometimes. He wasn’t even sure his mother made that much, and she had been an administrative assistant at the Haven House forever.
But then Tez started asking them to do it more regular. Next thing he knew, him and Simp had a schedule. They were legit lookouts. They had the two-to-six slot on Saturdays and right after school on Tuesdays and Thursdays, unless they had basketball practice or a game.
Rollie made so much money there wasn’t enough candy, pizza slices, and hot dogs he could buy from the Wa to spend it. Eventually, he started buying new clothes, then hiding them at Simp’s house. He’d break out a few new items every now and then. Whenever his moms or g-ma would ask about the new clothes, he claimed it came from the rec’s lost and found. If they ever checked, they’d find out the rec purged lost items every single month by leaving unclaimed clothes on a table for people to take. It wasn’t a total lie.
He knew he could only do that so many times. Now he had only God knows how much money stashed in his room deep under his bed in an old duffel bag. He was scared to count it. But he was pretty sure he could help his moms pay rent a few months and still have some left over.
Complicated.
When he got into TAG, he had a plan. Play ball with the ’Rauders this last year, then quit once he got to high school. He’d seen other people do it. Most of them did it because they played ball for Sam Well High and couldn’t really do both. And if that’s what it took, Rollie would go out for the Sam Well junior varsity. Whatever it took to leave the ’Rauders without trouble.
Only, leaving the basketball team wasn’t the problem and he knew it. Just like he knew that Tez wasn’t talking about balling with all that “you want out” mess. If you wanted out from a team, you quit. Tez wasn’t talking about that. And for a second, Rollie had almost answered yes. But the way Tez had grilled them, leaving all those empty spaces, waiting on somebody to spill their guts. That stopped him.
He knew two things—everything was a test with Tez and Simp worshipped him.
So, he’d lied and said he was still down.
“What I need lie to Tez for?” he said, his voice a tick above a whisper, the tone they used anytime they talked about their hustle. He pulled his skullie down until it touched his eyebrows and held Simp’s gaze.
“I ain’t saying you did,” Simp said. He shrugged his duffel onto his shoulder more securely, threaded his fingers over the handle to grip the bag. “Just saying you been late to practice a lot. You know Coach. Don’t really matter what the reason is. He feel like if you want get there on time, you do . . .” For a second his eyes pierced Rollie. “Even if you gotta hit somebody up to pick you up from TAG instead of waiting on the bus. Know what I mean?”
Rollie only laughed to get the bile churning in his belly under control. “Is that a hint? Did Tez tell you that’s what I need to do?”
Simp brushed his face with his hands. “Rollie, man, I just don’t want him start questioning where your loyalty at. You know Reuben or somebody would roll out and get you soon as TAG ended. It would get you here on time is all I’m saying.”
Simp wasn’t wrong. Rollie knew he had to show that he was down. But wasn’t he already doing that by staying on the “team”?
“I’m good,” Rollie said. There was still a question in Simp’s face. Rollie let his duffel drop to the ground. He shivered a little inside the black satin Marauders jacket, a gift from Coach for winning the ’Peake. They were cool to look at but not built for warmth. “Can I keep it one hundred?”
Simp’s head nodded, eagerly. “Always.”
“Iouno if I can keep doing this—”
Simp broke in. “Reuben can come get you after—”
Rollie shook his head at him. He took a step closer to Simp. No one was near them, but he lowered his voice more. “Not practice, son.” When Simp nodded once, Rollie went on. “It’s cool that Tez think we ball like Rome and ’Los, but ain’t no secret they was his top two boys back in the day.”
Simp leaned back an inch like Rollie’s words were a sneeze he wanted to avoid. “What’s wrong with that?”
Rollie’s head thudded softly. He wanted to have a real conversation about the game— about what they do for Tez. How’d they’d got in and how to get out. He also knew the first rule of the game was you don’t talk about the game. Not even with a dude you’d been down with since first grade.
“Nothing wrong with it if we about graduating to the pen.” He scooped his bag back onto his shoulder, ready to get out of the cold. “I’m just saying I’m not. Know what I mean?”
“I ain’t either, son,” Simp said. His brows furrowed in confusion. “They was stickup kids. What that got do with us?”
“Naw, you right. You right,” Rollie said, tiredly. “I got a lot going on, that’s all. I don’t want my game to start slippi
ng.”
“Never that. You know, I got you,” Simp said. He put his fist out. Rollie tapped it with his own.
When they had first joined the team, Rollie had been with it—Tez’s advice on how to keep the hustle on the low, how not to get caught. It had felt good being in the “family.” But they were eleven years old then. He couldn’t remember when he’d stopped believing. But he had, and he wanted Simp to see they were getting in too deep. It wasn’t going to be today, though.
He wanted to tell Simp about the audition for TRB. It was their favorite band. Until TAG, him and Simp had always done everything together. He didn’t want Simp to think he was bragging. Plus, it was barely real to Rollie. And it wasn’t like he might really make it. Was it?
He’d tell him eventually.
He reached in, gripped Simp’s hand, and pounded him on the back.
“It’s all love,” he said. “Late to practice or not, I’m ready to ball. We gonna roll through and take the J. Martins. Number one seed, believe dat.”
Simp shouted into the air, “They knoooow.”
“We knoooow,” Rollie shouted back. They gripped hands and went their separate ways.
Later he sat in his room. The smell of frying pork chops flirted with his nostrils. Through the smooth jazz floating throughout the house he heard the door slam, announcing his mother was finally home from work. He forced his legs to take their time and walk normal into the kitchen where her and G-ma sat talking. The chops sat center stage of the table, a bowl of mashed potatoes and steaming string beans beside it. Normally he’d be anxious to guzzle down a meal, but his stomach was balled with even more jolts of joy than after he made TAG.
His mother looked tired, but she smiled when he kissed her cheek.
“Hey, baby.” She rubbed his arm. “Ready to eat?”
“Can I show y’all something first?” Rollie asked.
G-ma shooed him. “Yeah, while you setting the rest of the table.” She fanned herself like it was blazing. “I been cooking for the last hour. G-ma tired.”
Rollie handed his mother the paper, then gathered plates and forks, silently, while she read over it. His grandmother’s lips pursed as she waited for someone to fill her in. When it didn’t come fast enough, she prodded. “What is it? He not in trouble, is he?” She gave Rollie a side-eye before focusing on the paper in front of his mother’s face.