Page 26 of Anatomy of a Meet Cute
“I don’t mean fail like a crash and burn,” Grant said, his expression softening slightly. “More that research and community programs are a full-time job. Not a five-hour-a-week thing, so you are going to need help from time to time, and with my fellowship wrapping—”
“Y’all about ready to go?” Duke called from center court, making both of them jump. Sam had never been so happy to be interrupted in her life. Duke must have psychically sensed that things were not going her way and stepped in to save the day. Okay, maybe that was giving him too much credit. It was a few minutes past six thirty, so it was more than likely he was just trying to get the game going before they all starved to death.
“Yup,” Grant called, waving to him. Turning his attention back to Sam, he squinted. “How about this? I’ll play you for it.”
“What?”
Sam’s face must have looked like her voice sounded, because Grant started laughing almost immediately. “You look like I asked you if you wanted to commit a bank heist.”
“I mean, this is the future of a community program and the success of my research initiative, and you want to bet it on a basketball game?”
“Sounds about right.” He shrugged and started walking slowly toward the center of the court, forcing Sam to jog to catch up with him. “Besides, you said it yourself: Who else might say yes?”
“If this is how you are going to make a decision, why not just flip a coin?”
“Makes the game more fun,” Grant said, stopping just outside the knot of players who were gathered for the tip-off. “Deal?”
Sam sputtered. This was not how responsible people made career decisions. This wasn’t even how irresponsible people made career decisions. Why couldn’t he just give her a straight answer? What was the point in making her guess? This was why she said that he was too perfect. Only people who never failed would bet on something like this, because they thought they were going to win. Cocky much?
She wanted time to think, or at least a second to reason with Grant, but Duke and the Central Flyers’ center were already shaking hands. She was out of time. Holding her breath for three seconds, she looked over to find Grant staring at her, a smirk glued to his face. A face she sort of hoped got hit by a rogue no-look pass.
“Fine.” She exhaled, watching as Grant’s smirk turned into a full-blown mischievous grin.
“May the best team win.”
“You mean my team,” Sam said with more bravado than she felt before sinking into a defensive stance.
Her tank top stuck to her like a rumor clinging to a celebrity. And Sam was sure she’d managed to sweat off her extra-strength deodorant. She didn’t care. In high school, she’d been convinced that the state championship game was the single most important game she would ever play. She thought she knew what it meant to want to win so bad it hurt. But that was before she spent a full hour in a horse stance chasing Grant Gao around the court while Duke missed every possible shot that was more than two feet away from the basket with her precious program on the line.
With two minutes to go, Sam’s thighs were practically screaming as she sank her dribble a little lower to shield the ball from Grant’s reach. They were down four points. She could make that up with a couple of smart plays. Duke was having a bad night, but both Theo and Raphael were playing solid if she could get them the ball. But that was a big if because Grant seemed to predict her every move. She’d barely think of a play, and he’d be standing in her way, ready to block a pass. His defense was so close that some of the sweat she was wearing was probably his. At least he smelled good.
Sam wrinkled her nose at the thought. Now was not the time or place for a scent analysis of the person who was making her life difficult. Praying Theo was watching her closely, Sam threw her shoulder into Grant’s body and bounce passed the ball to her teammate.
“Oof. That’s a charge,” Grant said, rubbing the spot on his chest where Sam had treated him like a human battering ram.
“No one else called it.” She smiled as Theo sank a midrange two-pointer. All she had to do was make sure Grant didn’t score, and she could win this thing.
“I see you don’t deny it.” Grant laughed, jogging to retrieve the ball from beneath the basket, his hair stuck to his forehead with sweat.
“All’s fair in community programs and basketball.” Sam shrugged. “But you could give up and join the program. Then you wouldn’t have to take a shoulder to the chest.”
“Where is the fun in that?” Grant said, carefully keeping a forearm between her and the ball as he began to dribble down the court.
“You have a strange idea of fun.”
“Watching you lose, after all the trash you talked during the last game? I’ve never had such a good time.” Grant’s voice was barely above a whisper, sending tingles down Sam’s spine that had nothing to do with their wager.
Nope.She forced herself to focus on the sound of Grant’s teammates around her clapping for the ball. Pulling herself back together, Sam said, “This won’t be nearly as much fun for you when you lose.”
“Making you sweat is always fun.”
Sam’s heart stopped as heat flooded her face. Endorphins, adrenaline, serotonin, dopamine, and every other hormone and neurotransmitter known to science went to war in her brain, causing everything to pause. Surely he didn’t mean that kind of sweat. She was vaguely aware that her jaw might have dropped. Grant’s smile was as mischievous as ever.
Everything happened at once. Sam had only stopped for what felt like a fraction of a second to try to blink her thoughts into coherence when Grant backed up, dropping his forearm, leaving just enough space to pull off one of his perfectly executed jump shots. Sam stopped stock still as she watched the ball soar overhead in a perfect arc. It was as if she could hear the clean swooshing sound of the net before it even approached the basket. She had just enough time to close her eyes before the sound actually came and with it theohs of both teams celebrating a perfect shot.
The agony and irony of the moment sank in as the muscles in Sam’s throat closed almost immediately. She had used the exact same distraction technique on Grant a few weeks ago. All he’d done was throw a new package on it, and she’d fallen for it hook, line, and sinker. How could she be that stupid?
Tears threatened to glass over her eyes as soon as she opened them. No matter what, she refused to cry in a middle school gym over a stupid basketball game. Honestly, what kind of program adviser would bet their involvement on a game anyway? Instead of just saying no, he’d toyed with her, setting her up to fail before the center had even gotten off the ground. Worse, it was a humiliating defeat. The kind perfect people like him—whose greatest failure was probably having to try parallel parking in a tight spot twice—couldn’t possibly understand.
