Page 144 of Scoring the Player
“Thought you wanted your name etched in the annals of NBA history,” Aiden taunted, sweat plastering his black hair to his forehead. “It’s this. Mastering the boring little things.”
“The principles,” I mocked, on cue.
I set up again and reached in, and his elbow blocked my reach. I tried every maneuver in the bank but came up short. I knew he was doing that thing where he scans every shift of my face to read me. I saw an opening and pushed in, hands swiping the air, as he switched up and got past me to the rim.
“You’re reading what I want you to read instead of anticipating and watching the weak-side movement.”
“Whatever, man.”
“Get back here! We’ll stay here all night if we have to!”
“It’s already past ten,” I fired back.
“You want to throw in the towel or you wanna get drafted?”
I stopped walking.
“Let’s go again,” he said.
And we did. Again and again. Defensive play after defensive play.
My phone died just shy of midnight, and that was hours ago.
My frustration grew every time he got to the rim. And he got to the rim eight out of ten tries.
He told me to channel it, and I tried, repurposing the fire and sweating out the shame.
After fighting and pushing and launching the ball across the fucking court, just to hang my head and drag myself after it, not twice or ten but seventeen times, it clicked. I felt the rotations, ignored the misdirections, and started to dictate the play, makinghimadjust tome.
My power as a defender grew with each successful steal until he was barely getting to the rim. And then he was never getting to the rim.
He stood, chest heaving, ball digging into his tapered waist, and smiled at me with so much pride I almost couldn’t bear to look at him. But I did look at him, and it soaked in—the late nights, early mornings, speeches, exasperation-fueled arguments, excavating what he saw in me until no other voice spoke louder than what he fleshed out. Rushing from vapid conversations and stale class lectures to him, bent over his desk, bleary-eyed and serious. At the awareness of my presence, a curve of his lips, a glint of life in his eyes, like a greater obsession than game footage or complex court strategies stood before him. And every time, I would look over my shoulder, certain someone else was standing there, praying someone else wasn’t standing there, to explain the surge of electricity that filled the space between us and the sudden relief that my lungs held air, that I wasn’t slowly being vacuumed into an expanding emptiness.
Now, there he was, bright gaze slipping, and my tongue edged to the bow of my lips, wanting to taste him there. A sharp rise of his nostrils and squeeze of his jaw, which on the nextbrush of my tongue, he forgot how to use—mouth parting, then closing, then parting again.
Lines of fresh sweat streaked his temple.
“Arnaz—”
I was already closing the distance and slamming my lips against his.
He froze.
“It’s okay,” I whispered before kissing him again.
He moaned, mouth spreading in a gasp, and then his calloused hands were pressing into my waist, pulling me closer. My hand lowered and ghosted against his hardened dick, and he shuddered. The force of it shattered the moment.
I rip awake and blow out a breath. Turning to my side, I bury my head under the pillow and imagine I’m back at the cabin in Salem’s arms as I drift back to sleep.
Teetering on the edge of a building, the wind blowing zigzags of wet salt from my eyes across my lips.
Crescent craters dug into my palm.
The steel-beamed titan and its blue-tinted glass towered over me, and I counted again. Down from fifty-two until I reached twenty-three, then I swept left to the corner office. I couldn’t see inside from this distance, but I knew she was there. Giving her all to the only thing she’d known how to nurture. She’d hear the sirens, see the crowd form, and watch lines of yellow tape inconvenience evening plans that don’t involve going home to her children.
A balloon of excitement lifted her heels, forehead pressed against glass, maybe it was her lucky day and the bastard with their innards plastered to the street—that poor misguided soul—would have a story that was sad, stirring, shocking because it was sweeps week, and those ratings needed to soar, baby.
And when her phone rang, she’d ignore it—how else would people learn to call her assistant? Even the school knew not tobother her on her cell. Even the children, who were old enough to feed themselves and thus old enough to figure out a flu or a fever.
