Playing Without the Ball (20 page)

Kaipo hits his sixth straight bucket, I make a driving layup, and he comes back and hits another. Alan calls time-out. Josh and Beth report in.

“Two minutes’ rest, Robin,” Alan says. “Jay, keep chasing that man.”

“I’m playing him full-court the rest of the way,” I say.

“How much time is left?” Peter asks.

“Lots,” Alan says. “Suck it up.”

I slow it down a little. Kaipo’s too hot; I’ve got to break his momentum. I get it in to Alan, and he goes up and pounds it in over Robinson, getting fouled in the process. The free throw gives us back the lead, 52-51.

I press, not going for the steal, but wanting to make Kaipo work for every inch. Then it happens, that rare mistake. He switches hands and slightly loses control, just enough for me to poke a hand in there and knock the ball away. It bounces toward our basket and we scramble toward it. I get a hand on it first, slide onto a knee, and come up with it, maintaining a dribble and stepping toward the hoop. Kaipo’s off balance and
can’t help fouling me as I shoot. The ball goes in anyway.

Alan and I slap hands hard as I walk to the foul line. “You make this sucker,” he says.

And I do. A four-point lead is big. We can win this.

I stay in Brian’s face. I’ve got this man now, I know every move. He makes a pass inside, cuts on the give-and-go, takes it back, and goes up for a jumper. And I know it’s coming, I know where it’s going. I time my jump right, get my hand up, and deflect the ball out of bounds.

Alan comes over. We bump chests. He’s steaming.

I stay glued to Kaipo. Robinson inbounds the ball to their other guard, who hasn’t touched it in I don’t know how long. He loses control and Alan grabs it. He cradles it in his arms. I can hear his fierce breathing as I take it from him and dribble.

The thing you’ve gotta know about basketball is that you can play as hard as you want, fight for every rebound, dive for every loose ball, run your ass off up and down the court, but you still have to put the ball in the basket. Shooting the ball through a hoop from eighteen feet away with a man in your face and the pressure on your shoulders is not an easy task in any situation. But somehow you do it, somehow you really can will it to happen. Somehow you don’t allow it
not
to.

Alan scores again. Robinson takes a time-out with us up by six. Alan tells Robin to get back in there. Four more minutes and we’re champions.

We don’t say much. I’m breathing heavy, my shirt is soaked, but I’m not tired, not at all. In fact, I have to tell myself to stay in control, to not overplay these last few minutes, to not let myself get burned.

We exchange baskets, with Alan getting a pair of layups
and Robinson and Kaipo hitting one apiece. Next time up, Brian plays off me a bit, ready to get inside and help out on Alan, who’s been unstoppable this half. I get greedy, I shoot the three. It bangs off the rim, and Kaipo soars for the rebound. He comes down on the run, and I’m caught flat-footed. He goes the length of the court and lays it in. It’s 61-57.

Kill some time, I tell myself. Be patient. I make safe passes, first to Peter, then Robin, coming right back to them and retaking the ball. When Alan gets open, he’s getting the ball. If he doesn’t get open I’m keeping it.

Kaipo finally fouls me. I turn and yell, “Time?”

“One-twenty,” comes the reply.

I sink the first one, miss the second. Robinson comes down with the rebound. Alan stays in his face.

Kaipo hits a three. I dribble up and look inside for Alan, then drive to the hoop, drawing Kaipo and Robinson to me. I spot Peter wide open underneath and send him a soft bounce pass. He fields it and makes the easy layup, the only player other than me or Alan to score for us this half.

It’s 64-60 and there’s about half a minute to play. Kaipo knows they need two scores. He won’t force a three-pointer, but he’ll take it if it’s there. Most important is to make him eat some time.

I hound him good, not giving him a path to the basket. He’s looking patient, but I know he’s aware of the clock. When he starts his drive, I stay with him. I hear Alan yell, “Screen,” and I collide with Robinson near the free-throw line. He shoves me off, the ref blows his whistle, and I figure that has to be an offensive foul. But the call is on Alan instead, who fouled Kaipo as he went up for a shot.

That’s four on Alan, but that won’t be a factor unless we go to overtime.

Kaipo hits both free throws, and they go into a furious full-court press, desperate to get the ball back. Nine seconds left and we’re up by two. They either have to steal it or foul somebody. Alan takes the ball out-of-bounds under their basket and looks at Peter. I yell “No!” and Alan turns toward me. Kaipo’s all over me, but Alan manages to get me the ball and I’m immediately fouled.

I take a deep breath and walk the length of the court to the free-throw line. Seven seconds left. No matter what I do, Kaipo is going to go down and hit a three-pointer. If I miss this shot, they’ll win the game. If I make the first I’ll get a second one, and the best they could do is send it to overtime. If I make them both, it’s over.

I bounce the ball three times slowly, concentrating on the rim. The sound of the spectators, the breathing of the guys waiting for the rebound, the rubbing of my fingers on the ball as I shut my eyes and inhale, it all finally matches the sound in my head, it all fits together.

Kaipo’s to my right, coiled and intense. I let it fly, softly over the rim, and it swishes cleanly through the net.

The referee slaps the ball back to me and I take another breath and three more dribbles. I squeeze the ball into a universe and send it toward the basket, and I know from the moment of release that it will make it.

I put up my fist as the ball ripples the net and holler, “Don’t foul!”

We’re up by four. They don’t have time to catch us.

Kaipo takes the long inbounds pass, dribbles three times on the run, and cleanly hits a twenty-eight-footer as the
final whistle blows. Not enough. We win it.

Alan embraces me. Robin and the others run toward us, yelling and pumping their fists.

Kaipo smacks my shoulder. “Hell of a game,” he says.

“You’re the man.”

Beth hugs me and kisses my cheek, and Kaipo smacks hands with me again. “Most fun I ever had on a basketball court,” he says. “Great job.”

Kaipo’s played bigger games before, and he’ll play plenty of others. This one may be out of his head in an hour, but it sure won’t be out of mine.

Alan and I had our highest-scoring games of the season. I scored thirty-one and Alan had twenty-nine. Kaipo finished with forty-two, but we made him work for every point.

Alan and I go downstairs and sit on the bench in the locker room. He keeps shaking his head, going, “Awesome game. Just awesome.”

I peel off my T-shirt and shut my eyes, still breathing hard. “Now what?” I say.

“Celebrate, man. They got a party set up at the church.”

“Oh.” I nod. I guess that’ll be okay for an hour. “Hey.”

“What?”

“You sure you want to go to Yale?”

He laughs, hesitates a second. “Yeah. Yeah, I do. I can play intramural. And there’s a summer league here. I’ll get enough basketball.”

“There’s never enough basketball,” I say.

He stands and starts getting undressed. “Let’s get out of here,” he says. “I’m psyched. That was awesome tonight, man. Just awesome.”

I
hang at the church for a while. They’ve got soda and cake hang at the church for a while. They’ve got soda and cake and stuff. They invited everybody from the league to come by, and most people did.

I’m standing with Alan when Kaipo and Beth come in holding hands. Alan whacks him on the arm. “No Catholics allowed,” he says.

“I’m an honorary Methodist now,” Brian says, holding up Beth’s hand as evidence.

“You wish,” Alan says. “This is the church of champions.”

Brian laughs. “Yeah. You kicked our butts.”

They joke around some more. I mostly listen. I’ll never be at home in this place, but I like walking through the light now and then.

When I decide to leave, I shake hands with Alan and some other guys. I want to get out. I hope I can find Spit, because I owe her a lot and I want to be with her.

I walk up to North Main Street into the wind and turn up a side street toward her house. I fully expect to find her; I don’t
know why. And as I turn onto her block, I see her approaching from the opposite direction.

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey.”

“Where you been?”

“Mike’s. From the band. Just jamming.”

“We won,” I tell her.

“Cool. I figured you would.”

“How come?” I ask.

“’Cause you deserved to.”

“Yeah? That’s not how it usually works.”

“Yeah, it does. You get what you earn, one way or another. That time I saw you play I couldn’t believe how good you were. It was pure.”

I shuffle my feet around, reach up and touch her face during the pause. “You wanna hear something stupidly poetic I’ve been thinking about?” I ask. “I mean, you might be able to turn it into a song or something.”

She sticks her bare hands into her pockets. “Yeah. Shoot.”

I blush and laugh. “I feel like I’ve been circling around this thing, this heat source, getting close to it three or four times and then blasting far away from it, almost out of orbit. But now I’m feeling the heat again. Feeling like I might even touch down.”

She just gives me that goofy smile of hers. She gives me a gentle push in the chest.

“Pretty stupid, huh?” I say.

“I don’t know,” she says. “When you get too close to the heat, you get burned, but I’d rather get toasted than frozen.”

“Yeah. How’s the sessions going?”

“Good. We’ll be ready.” The Prufrock’s thing is a week away. I know she’s been nervous as hell.

We’re both kind of glowing. We’re back where we were before, before we got our bodies tangled up and were just allowing our minds to engage.

“I still want to get on stage with you,” I say. “I wanna get up there and do it.”

“Anytime, babe,” she says. “Anytime you’re ready.”

“I’ll be ready soon,” I say. “I think the time is coming.”

“Just say the word,” she says. “You don’t have to rush it.” She brushes my hair from my forehead, then shakes back her own hair and smiles. “You’ll come with us to Prufrock’s? Help us set up and all? I think I’ll be better if you’re there.”

“Yeah. I’m there. Think we can sneak Julie in, too?”

“I don’t see why not. Can she sing some backup?”

“I don’t know.”

We start walking back down Main Street. I feel like I’m floating, like I’ve won an Olympic medal or something. I mean, we won the league, I’m in good with Julie, and Spit and I have reached a better level of friendship. We walk past Turkey Hill and the banks, and hang out in front of the pizza place. I see Alan and Robin and Beth and some others in there, but we don’t go in. We stay on the sidewalk and listen to the sound of human voices. People laughing.

Spit starts singing. I listen carefully.

I listen so I’ll learn all the words.