Howdy,
#NaNoWriMo (550) — Day 6
(Unedited, or only slightly)
Continued …
His partner in waiting nodded toward Jake. Jake accepted the athlete’s hello; it stood out as the only acknowledgement he’d received since showing up to play pick up ball with strangers on the blacktop courts.
Jake looked at the guy, a man, really; certainly not a kid like himself. He had strong-looking, wiry muscles showing eagerly from his cutoff shirt with rips extending down the sides. His shirt wasn’t the only thing ripped about the guy: he was buffed. A man.
Especially put beside Jake. Jake was a boy. Dribbling in place at the sideline, Jake started to doubt his pairing with the muscle man, feeling young and underdeveloped, no specimen to even be consider alongside the adult who’d nodded at him.
Jake stopped his dribble and held the ball, studying the play and current players. It was fast, up and down the court, up and down, and most the players appeared more like the athletic-looking man ready to play than they did like him.
No one looked like him.
Jake decided to dribble home. He turned to go. “Game,” he heard.
“Let’s go fives,” Mr. Muscle Shirt said.
“Okay, let’s run five,” a winning player on the court said without a question or hesitation.
Muscles pointed at Jake Jones and said, “Him and me. Who wants who?”
That made Jake nervous. How would That Guy and he, The Little Kid, get split onto opposite teams. No one would see it a fair split.
Jake decided he didn’t care. Not his problem. Besides, he could play. Whether anyone could see that coming or not.
Maybe he wouldn’t be able guard the guy he stepped onto the court with because even Jake had to admit no doubt existence among anyone who would out jump whom when it came between the two newcomers to the game. But Jake could play. That much he knew. And the others would find out, he thought. He just needed a chance to play, to show himself to them.
“You guys get the short kid.”
“We’re the winners.”
“That’s why we get this guy. Make it even.”
“Winners should pick. Not get stuck with the last walk on.”
“Fine. Pick.”
“Give us, my man here. You take the boy.”
“That’s wrong, man. So wrong.”
“Winners pick. We’re the winners.”
“Over here, kid.”
Jake walked over to his side. It didn’t feel like his side. He walked over to their side.
“What’s your name?”
“Jake.”
“You a baller, Jake?”
“Yeah, yeah, I can play.”
“We’ll see.” Jake’s new teammate looked at him, saying, “We’ll see about that.”
They didn’t really get to see. Since Jake didn’t really get to play. I mean, he played, but not really.
Up and down the court, both teams, up and down, to the score of 21 by 2’s and 3’s and he never touched the ball.
It was a feat almost all itself, not even touching the ball. A player usually finds himself the beneficiary of an errant pass, lost dribble, or stray rebound over the course of a game, but not Jake. The game felt fast, and he never sniffed a possession.
He didn’t have to guard a player as imposing as his sideline partner, but he didn’t get much help from teammates when the guy he was working hard trying to defend beat him a few times to the basket. Overmatched on defense, Jake would need his hands on the ball to reveal some of his value as a young player.
The experience in that free-for-all pick up game was not the time he’d get to show any of his developing skill.
To be continued …
—Billy
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