Slam Dunk (6 page)

“Barry will be happy to see you,” she said. “Sit down. They only let in two visitors at a time, and Barry’s dad and Coach Valenti are in there. But they’ll be out soon.”

“How is he?” asked Grady.

Mrs. Streeter sat back down with a sigh. “He’s doing well, all things considered. He’ll be out of the hospital tomorrow, and he’ll begin physical therapy in a few days.”

“That’s great,” Julian said.

She smiled. “He keeps talking about how he wishes he could play ball.”

“We really miss him, too,” said Julian.

Grady nodded. “But the main thing is, he’s going to get better, right?”

Before Mrs. Streeter could reply, the coach and Mr. Streeter walked into the lounge.

“Hey, boys, glad you’re here,” Mr. Streeter said, shaking their hands. There were dark circles under his eyes, and he sat next to his wife and took her hand.

“Good to see you,” said the coach. He looked as if he hadn’t had much sleep either.

“We hear Barry’s okay,” said Grady.

“The doctors sound more encouraging than yesterday,” answered Mr. Streeter. “Barry’s going to have some tough months ahead of him. But if he works hard with the therapist, he should be fine. Why don’t you go in and see him?”

Julian and Grady started out, but Mrs. Streeter called, “Don’t stay too long, boys. He needs plenty of rest, and there’ll be a lot of friends and relatives stopping by today.”

“We’ll make it quick,” Julian promised.

Grady knocked on Barry’s open door, and he and Julian went inside. Barry was sitting in a wheelchair, with his injured leg propped up in front of him. He no longer had an IV in his arm, and his dressings were smaller.

“Hey, guys,” Barry said, sounding as if he’d just woken up out of a deep sleep. “What’s happening? Sit down.”

Julian was determined to be cheerful this visit. He pulled out a chair and sat. “Practice is at four on Monday, dude. And you better be on time.”

Barry smiled. “Right. Listen, if I sound a little fuzzy, it’s because I just took a pain pill.”

“It hurts a lot, huh?” asked Grady.

“Not as bad as yesterday,” Barry replied, making a face at the memory. “But at least I’m going home.”

Julian said, “I hear you’ll be doing physical therapy soon.”

“I start Wednesday. I met the guy this morning. He looks even tougher than the coach. It won’t be fun, but he says it’ll be worth it.”

“Sure it will,” Julian said. “Does that mean you’ll be able to play again... sometime?”

“Probably,” Barry said. “I guarantee one thing — if working hard makes any difference, then I’ll play again for sure. Anyway, it’s good to see you two here together.”

Grady and Julian looked at each other. Julian said, “I should have come with Grady the other day. I was really dumb not to.”

“No biggie,” Grady said. “But this way, Barry doesn’t have to waste much time on us.”

“Good thing, too,” Barry said. “My schedule is really full today. There’s lunch and dinner. And that’s about it.”

“We’ll be around to hassle you a lot while you’re home,” said Julian. “You’ll be sick of us.”

“Yeah, and I can’t even run away when I get bored.” Barry started to laugh and winced. “I have to remember not to laugh too hard.”

“We won’t make any jokes,” Grady said. “And if we do, I promise they won’t be funny ones.”

“So, how do the Tornadoes look?” Barry asked. “I mean, I know it’s early, but you think you might have a good year?”

“I don’t know why not,” Grady said.

“Too soon to tell,” said Julian.

“The coach thinks you have some real talent,” said Barry. “If you could only find a decent center and a point guard, you might have a fantastic season.”

His friends smiled.

“I’m going to go to all your games,” Barry said, “so you better be good.”

Grady grinned. “If we lose, it’ll be your fault for making us nervous.”

Mr. Streeter stuck his head in the door. “Excuse me, some other people are waiting to see Barry, so if you boys could wrap it up...”

Julian stood up. “We were just leaving.”

“Yeah,” said Grady. “We know when we’re not wanted.”

“Later, guys,” Barry said. “Thanks for coming. And thanks for coming together. I appreciate it.”

“You should,” Grady said. “You think I
like
hanging out with this doofus?”

Julian gave Grady a mock glare. “Try to pretend you like it. Like I do.”

“I told you two not to make me laugh,” protested Barry.

Julian was feeling a lot better about Barry and about himself when the boys returned to the visitors’ lounge. Mick and Len were there, waiting to visit Barry.

“Hey,” Mick said. “The coach and Barry’s folks went out for a while. How’s Barry doing?”

“Pretty good,” said Grady. “He’ll be glad to see you.” As Len and Mick got up, Julian said, “Uh, after you see him, do you guys feel like getting something to eat before practice?”

Mick looked surprised, and then pleased. “Yeah, that’d be great.”

Grady said, “We’ll wait for you and talk about it when you’re done.”

Len nodded. “Sounds good.”

After Mick and Len left, Grady turned to Julian. “Wow. You were actually nice to them. You feeling okay?”

Julian sat down on a couch and looked up at Grady. “Sure. I’m just being a team leader and making sure that my teammates eat their lunch.”

From the hospital, the four boys went to a nearby fast-food place for burgers. As they unwrapped their food, Len said, “What does he have to do for physical therapy, does anybody know?”

“I don’t have a clue,” said Grady, picking up his shake.

Julian nibbled on a French fry. “All I know is it sounds like it won’t be fun.”

“My cousin hurt his leg skiing,” said Mick. “He was in PT for three months. He said it was really tough, especially for the first month or so. And the therapist was, like,
really
in his face about not letting up, working through the pain and all that stuff. Cousin Donny says that for a while he didn’t think it was worth going through it, but he kept at it, and later he was happy the therapist wouldn’t let him quit.”

“What kinds of things did he have to do?” Julian asked.

“Exercises to build up his leg muscles and keep the joints from getting all tight. Stretching for flexibility, leg lifts, exercises for his hip and his knee, a lot of stuff. Even with light weights, it was really bad at first, but the therapist made him stay with it, and his leg is normal now.”

Len whistled. “Man.”

“Barry’ll do it,” Grady said. “He’s tough enough.” Julian wondered how he’d manage if it happened to him. He hoped he’d be tough enough, too. Barry’s situation was giving him some food for thought.

They arrived at the gym early for practice. Julian changed quickly and went out on the court to work on his free throws. Last year, he’d spent a half hour every day shooting from the free-throw line, but he hadn’t felt like doing it yet this year. Shooting free throws can be pretty monotonous, after all. But Julian decided that he would put in half an hour a day from now on.

The other three joined him and worked on different phases of their own game. Grady was trying to improve his left-handed dribbling. Len practiced outside jump shots from different spots around the key. Mick started throwing up hook shots, launching himself off his left foot, extending his left arm to ward off defenders, and releasing the ball from his outstretched right hand.

“Pretty smooth shot,” Julian said after watching Mick sink one.

Mick smiled. “Thanks; sometimes it’s on, and sometimes it’s off. You ever shoot hook shots? You’d be tough to stop. You have the hands for it, too.”

“I should work on it more,” admitted Julian. “Last year, I mostly shot jumpers and layups.”

Other players had drifted in and were loosening up as practice time got closer.

Mick handed Julian a ball. “Try a hook shot. Let’s see how it looks.”

Julian took the ball and looked up at the basket. He was just to the left of the key, about ten feet from the hoop. He dribbled once and took a step to his right, turning to bring his left shoulder toward the basket. Jumping off his left foot, he extended his left arm for balance and threw up a shot. The ball hit the front rim and caromed off.

“Great,” he said. “That was pretty bad.”

“You need to loft the ball more, get more arch into the shot,” Mick said, flipping the ball back to Julian.

Coach Valenti’s whistle echoed through the gym, and the players got ready to work.

The coach said, “We have a week before we open the season against the Falcons, and we’re going to spend more time from here on doing intrasquad scrimmages. The Falcons were a pretty good team last year, and almost all their players are back this time around, so we’ve got our work cut out for us. But let’s do some stretches, and then we’ll start just like we always do, with layups.”

When the Tornadoes got in line for a layup drill, Julian felt pretty good. Layup drills weren’t fun, but they could be useful. He knew he needed to work on his passing. He was the first man in line to set up the shooters. When Warren, at the head of the shooting line, went in with the ball, Julian set himself, watching as Warren’s shot hit the backboard too hard, clanged off the rim, and bounced toward the right sideline. Julian darted after the ball, grabbed it while it was still barely on the court, and threw a bounce pass to Cal, who caught it in midstride to go in for his layup. Cal gave him a grin as Julian trotted to the end of the shooting line.

When Julian got to the front of the line, Grady was there to feed him the ball. Grady flipped a high pass that Julian snapped up as he took off from his right foot. He put the shot in off the glass and didn’t pause to look, heading straight for the other line. When his turn came again to pass to a teammate, he pulled the ball down just after it went through the netting and lobbed it gently to Mick, who caught it on the run and laid it up.

As the drill went on, Julian realized that when it was all in sync, as it seemed to be now, even a drill like this could be... well, maybe not fun, exactly, but definitely satisfying.

“Nice assist, Julian,” called the coach. “Warren, watch the steps there. You can get away with two steps before laying it up, but they’ll get you for three.”

After layups came the hated sidestep drill. The coach called it, and Julian made a face.

“Got a problem, Julian?” the coach asked.

“No problem,” Julian said. “I
love
doing sidesteps.” Coach Valenti grinned. “I thought so.”

The drill seemed to go on forever, but Julian was determined to stay with it until either he collapsed or the coach ended it. He faced Cal, who was probably going to be the backup center. Thin and rangy, Cal had less trouble moving from side to side than he had keeping his hands high in the proper defensive position. After a minute or so, Cal’s face showed the strain, and he was gasping. Julian was feeling it, too, but he forced himself to stay with it. Cal’s arms began to sag, until his hands were at waist level.

“Come on, hang in there,” Julian whispered to the other boy. Cal gritted his teeth and brought his hands up again. “Not too much longer, now. That’s the way! Stay tough!”

Finally, the coach clapped his hands. “All right! Take a break!”

Cal’s arms flopped to his sides, and he bent over, panting. Julian wasn’t feeling a whole lot better, but he leaned over to the other boy.

“You did it! You okay?”

Cal straightened out and nodded. He flexed his arms a little and bent over again.

“Very good,” the coach said. “I already see an improvement in this exercise. Those of you whose arms feel like they’re going to fall off, don’t worry. They won’t. But some of you may want to work out with light wrist weights. I keep a couple of sets in the phys. ed. office, if you want to borrow them, or you can find them at any sporting goods store. Take a couple more minutes, and then we’ll get back to work.”

Grady came over to Julian and said, “You remind me of a guy we had on this team last year. Always hustling, giving everything he had. He was a center, too. Let’s see, what was his name again?”

Julian said, “You remind me of someone from last year, too. He was a wise guy, thought he was funny, until one of his teammates stuffed him in a basket and left him there.”

“Seriously,” Grady said. “What happened between last practice and now?”

Julian didn’t answer right away. Then he looked Grady in the face and said, “Barry’s going to be working hard, harder than he ever has, probably, just so he can come back and do these drills. How can I slack off, knowing that?”

9

A
fter the break, Coach Valenti split the team into squads for a five-on-five scrimmage. Julian’s squad included Grady at point guard; a stocky boy named Anthony, who had a surprisingly soft touch, at shooting guard; and Mick and Roger, another newcomer, at the forward positions. Cal would work against Julian at center for the other squad, which also included Len and a wiry guy from last year named Brandon as the guards, along with Warren and another new face, Terrell, at forward. Terrell, tall and long-armed, looked as if he had good defensive instincts.

“Julian’s squad will open on offense to start,” said the coach. “For the moment, I want both squads working on their zone defense. Later, you might go man-to-man instead, but we need work on our zones. The Falcons moved the ball around well last year; they’re sharp passers, and I’m thinking zones could be effective against them. I’ll be calling any fouls. Okay, let’s go.”

Grady took the ball under his squad’s basket and passed to Mick, who flipped it back to Grady to bring it into the offensive zone. Brandon, the opposing point guard, shadowed Grady to the midcourt line. The defenders went into a 2–3 zone, with the guards on either side of the key, a few feet in front of the foul line. The forwards set themselves five feet from the baseline and five feet from the sides of the key. Cal, the center, was about eight feet from the basket, to the right of the key.

Brandon moved in on Grady, who fired a chest-high pass to Roger to his left. Julian moved inside with his back to the basket. Cal slid over to pick him up. Grady came around behind Roger, who tossed him the ball and ran toward the baseline, his hands held high as if to take a pass. Terrell darted between Warren and Roger to block a pass, but Grady passed to Mick instead. Mick faked a shot and bounced a pass back to Grady as Julian pivoted around Cal toward the basket. Grady tossed the ball too high for Cal to reach, but Julian grabbed the ball and lofted it up over the rim and into the net for two points.