my heels down near the foul line. If he wants to rise up, I let him. I can still challenge from here. But it’s not enough cushion. He blows by left. I can’t do a thing to stop it.
There’s still time to meet him at the rim, but Jones gets there first. Clean up top, but he bangs him pretty good with the body, drawing a whistle. Cox manages to spin in the bucket too. A chance to tie at the line. The gym roars to a fever pitch, their crowd sensing blood.
Jones nods, not complaining about the call. It’s his fourth. We all look to the bench to see what Murphy’s going to do. With two and change left, it seems like a no-brainer to stick with Jones, but it’s his first crunch-time decision as a coach.
Then we get a surprise. The ref holds up his hand, signaling that it’s the fifth on Jones. Murphy, who was talking to Gibson on the bench, wheels around in disbelief. “It’s just four,” he says. He’s not angry. It’s like he’s trying to direct a lost person how to get back to the highway. “That’s only four.”
Jones turns to appeal to another ref. He starts rattling off his previous fouls on his fingers, but then I see him stop. It dawns on him. He got a cheap whistle early in the quarter we all forgot about. The first ref is breaking it down to Murphy too. By this time the Warren Central crowd is clued in on our mistake, and they’re heckling Jones pretty good with a Sit down! Sit down! Sit down! chant.
That’s a killer. Senior big man gone in crunch time. And totally avoidable. If Jones had known he had four, no way would he have challenged so hard. That’s on Murphy—it’s a coach’s job to remind his players in foul trouble. Jones doesn’t say anything, but on his way back to the bench he gives Murphy a stare that speaks volumes—just in case anyone in the gym was doubting who should be held responsible.
Murphy does what he can. Instead of subbing in with Tony Harrison, he sends in Gibson, opting for small ball. Gibson saunters onto the deck and tells everyone to slide up a spot in size—me at the two, Reynolds at the three, Fuller at the four, Xavier at center.
I’m still shaking my head in disbelief—first we lose our big, then Coach slides me to off-guard—as Cox coolly drains his freebie.
Our ball. Tied. Instinctively, I clap for the in-bounds, but Gibson’s right there. “Uh uh, Bowen,” he seethes. “You running the two.”
He walks it up, a little swagger to his stride. We run offense for a little while, nothing much happening. Everyone’s a little too tight to pull the trigger, especially playing out of position. I figure it’s time for me to ice it. So I break off a cut and flare out top, calling for the ball. Winning time.
That’s when Gibson does the thing that makes me want to strangle him right there between the circles. The kid waves me down. “Flatten out,” he says. “Stay wide.” Thing is, I can’t fight it. What am I gonna do, try to rip the rock from my teammate? So I set up behind the stripe on the right baseline, ready for the rock if I get a chance.
Gibson sizes Cox up, then darts left. It’s all set-up. As soon as Cox moves his feet, Gibson spins on him, ducks his shoulder past, and scoops into the lane for a sweet deuce. Cox just shakes his head. In the front row, a few old-timers whistle like it’s the baddest thing they’ve seen in years.
Gibson bobs his head like he owns the place. “Gotta get a stop,” I shout. But he’s all about that too. He may look like he’s not paying attention, but when the in-bounds pass floats a little, he jumps it. Taps it away from Cox. Chases it down by the baseline. Then puts a no-look laser on me that almost catches me by surprise. I take a power dribble to the rim and gather. But when I rise I don’t have that same old burst. Instead of an emphatic throwdown I have to try curling one in around the D. It rolls harmlessly off, but I get the whistle.
“Gotta bring the hammer on that,” Gibson tells me.
I don’t even respond. No way I’m giving him the satisfaction. Instead, I stroll out to the mid-court stripe and pull myself together. It’s game one back from my injury and instead of feeling the flow, my head’s full of noise. There’s so much up in the air: late night texts from Jasmine, the schools relentlessly recruiting me, Mom about to burst with a baby. And now my back-up point guard showing out on me.
Fuller comes out to me, puts a hand on my shoulder. “You got this, D. Bury these and let’s walk out of here with a win.”
I turn to look at him. All last year, I tried getting him to loosen up, but now he’s the one talking me down. I give him the best cocky smile I can muster, then head to the stripe. Once I get there, I remember the one good thing about a knee injury—lots of time to work on the form. That leather hits my hand and I feel it all come back—it’s just basketball, the thing I do best in this world. I take my dribbles. Exhale. Bury the first.
The next one’s easy. Straight bottom. And through it all—the mix-up by Murphy, my trouble corralling Cox, Gibson giving me static—we’re gonna start the season 1-0.
I can live with that.
D-train. That’s the word everywhere. Hell, even Coach Murphy dropped that on the bus ride home. “No way I should have let Jones foul out, boys,” he said. “I’ll have to get an assistant to keep track of those things. But thanks, D-train, for bailing my ass out.”
It seems to echo in my head even as I try to chill with my girl.
“You can’t let that get to you,” Lia says.
“You don’t understand.” She always says the right thing, but sometimes I resent her for it. I don’t know why. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I didn’t mean it that way.”
“It’s okay.”
Then we sit there in silence for a while. We’re taking in a late Sunday breakfast at a diner on College, the place an even mix of churchgoers and neighborhood folks and hungover college kids. At the next table, a white hipster with his hair mashed up sighs over the crossword. Recently, my friend Wes has started to complain about the invasion of white people into what he calls “our blocks.” Who knows where he’s getting that put in his head, but he talks like he’s the first person on earth to notice. But to me, if it’s just diners and second-hand stores, they’ve got just as much reason to drop their dollars as anyone else. But our basketball courts? That’s a different story. It’s just not right. And what I keep turning over in my head is this—Why? Why is Darryl Gibson even enrolled at Marion East? Why would a white family have moved to our district?
“You want to catch a movie later?” Lia finally asks.
“Sure,” I say. “What’s playing?” She pulls out her phone to check some listings, but then I remember that tonight’s a sit-down with Coach Murphy and my folks. “Ah, forget it,” I say. “I can’t tonight.”
Lia’s thumb freezes over her phone. We’ve been here before. She doesn’t want to act all fragile, but she’s not thrilled about coming second to basketball. “What is it this time?” she asks.
“I’ve got to figure out when to make official visits,” I say. I try to sound tired out by the whole thing, letting her know that if I had my way I’d be with her instead. “Most guys have already made all their visits. And, I mean, I can make it down to Indiana any time. But Alabama? Clemson? Those are some hauls.”
Lia nods. But she’s not
