Page 103 of Off Court Fix

Maxine shakes her head dismissively, her eyes trailing to the flat stones of the patio. I wonder if she still sees Mason’s blood on them, if the crimson stain is invisible to me but vibrant in her mind and heart.

I return her leg to the couch and lie next to her on my side, blocking her view. “Are you afraid you’re teasing the beast? Or are you just refusing the idea that you need help?” When Maxine doesn’t answer, I tilt her chin to face me. “With the kind of pain you have, this will barely make a dent in it. But it’ll help with the swelling and give you some more mobility and—”

“It’s not just that. If my ankle is better and I lose, I won’t just be an injured loser. I’ll be a loser, plain and simple.” Maxine takes her bottom lip between her teeth, and I tug it free with my thumb. “People love underdogs, not losers.”

“First of all, your ankle might never be better, Maxine. And I have a feeling you’re talking about one person in particular, and you know what? You’ve been thinking about making your dad proud for too long. The right people don’t just show up for you when youwin, Maxine. The ones who love you will be the first people by your side if you lose. They’ll be the first by your side when you need them.”

I think back to Cincinnati and how it felt when I saw Maxine go down, how hard and amazingly she struggled to not just get back on her feet but to continue playing andwin. But I imagine if I were watching that on a screen, even a thousand miles away like her father probably was, I would’ve been on my way to the airport to get to her without giving it a second thought.

I put the bottle of pills in her hand and wrap my fingers around hers. “The other stuff, what happened with your brother, I’ll tell you this. If addiction is in you, it will find you no matter what, and probably it’s going to be during a moment of weakness. But I don’t think you’ve ever been as strong as you are now.”

Maxine nods, pressing her lips together before she buries her face into my neck, flooding it slowly with tears. I don’t tell her to toughen up. I don’t tell her to stop crying. I hold her while she lets it out, the weight of the pressure she’s built up trying to be more than good enough when the reality is, Maxine never had to try to begin with.

Exactly who she is—determined, sensitive, and loyal—is perfectly imperfect.

When she stops crying, I loosen my hold on her and go inside for a glass of water. When I return outside, Maxine is sitting up, opening the bottle. She dumps a pill into a steady hand and reaches for the glass, swallowing the help she has been so reluctant to accept but so in need of.

It’s no true kind of fix. It’s simply what she needs—a little help.

“And we’ve confirmedeverything for the silent auction?”

I look up to find Susan from the First Step Group, who I’ve been liaising with more than I care to admit over the last few months.

“Everyone on that list I sent you has confirmed.”

“Wonderful,” says Susan, sliding her reading glasses to the top of her head. “I imagine we’ll bring in quite the number of donations.”

I agree. “You probably can tell this is a pretty generous crowd. I’m sure your organization will be thrilled with the results, and you can, um... do a lot of good with that money.”

I’m staring at my open office door behind Susan while she’s shuffling papers, eager to make my escape. It’s nearly eight, and we’ve been going over detail after detail for the gala for the last two hours. I look down, noticing I’m bouncing my knee past the point of annoyance, and stop it. When I sit back in my chair, Susan is staring at me.

“It isgood, what we at the First Step Group do.” Susan places her stack of papers in her lap. “We help a lot of people. We funded recovery for over three hundred addicts of all kinds last year. Alcohol, drugs, gambling,porn.”

The snort escapes me before I even have a chance to reel it in. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I can tell just by your tone you probably don’t believe in the cause.”

“No,” I clarify with half of a lie. “I just... can understand how difficult recovery can be. I hope of those three hundred people you helped, it stuck, that’s all.”

Susan leans back in her chair. “Recovery isn’t linear. Sometimes people need another chance.”

“And how many chances do they get?”

“However many it takes,” Susan says with a curt smile. “Every sober day counts, even the hard ones. They give people a reminder of what life can be like, how strong they are capable of being. So even if they fall off the wagon, so to speak, the hope is they don’t fall very far for long. It’s better to focus on one day at a time. For everyone, friends, families. You can’t really look at the big picture.”

I can though. I’ve lived through the big picture.

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

Susan and I look to the door where Maxine stands.

So did she.

“I... I wanted to see if Dave was still around, the net on the second court needs to be tightened. I saw the light on in your office.”

“Maxine Draper.” I stand. “Susan Holmes, she’s with the First Step Group, the organization the gala benefits this year.”

Maxine approaches as Susan rises from her chair. “Maxine, I’ll admit, I’m quite a fan. And I’d like to thank you for offering to donate your time for an auctioned lesson.”

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