Walkin’ them greens, you can hear yourself again, Ray had said.
Zaire heard himself now and didn’t like half of what came up.
He turned over again and checked his phone.
Missed texts from Ertan. A link from some sports blog with his face on the thumbnail. He tossed the phone aside before he read more than the headline. They loved to talk about him. They just didn’t like to listen to him.
The glow from Meadow’s window went dark.
He stared at the black square for a minute. He was tired, but sleep stayed just out of reach. His body felt wired. He felt that old edge that never fully left since Crescent…since he watched people bleed out on cracked sidewalks and memorized which cars slowed down at the wrong time. You didn’t unlearn that. Not even with a million-dollar swing.
Sighing, Zaire looked over at his gun.
He hated the part of himself that needed it close by just to settle in for the night...hated the part of himself the league would never understand…hated that no matter how much money he acquired, he still went to sleep with his fist ready in case he had to fight- to protect himself.
The same fist that had him in Juniper to clear his head when clearing his head wasn’t even possible.
He lay there until the ceiling fan started to make him dizzy…until the ache in his wrist blended with the restlessness crawling under his skin.
Finally, he swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood up.
His whole frame protested the movement because it was just as restless as his mind.
Grabbing a tee, Zaire slid it on, shoved his feet into slides, and snatched his headphones off the little nightstand.
The greens called to him louder than the bed ever could.
The night air hit him with that country chill. He swallowed it in anyway, the cold cutting through some of the fuzziness in his head. Stars sat low, and bright as hell without the city lights trying to drown them out.
He followed the path Ray had shown him earlier, hands tucked into his pockets, shoulders hunched a little. Crickets chirped from the trees. Something rustled in the field, probably some country ass animal he’d never seen in real life because Cali didn’t have shit like that. At least, not the part he was from.
He made it to the small shed and eased the door open. It squeaked the way it had that morning. He grabbed one of the loaner clubs Ray said he could use, then walked out to the open stretch of grass where he’d been working earlier.
The dark didn’t bother him. He’d grown up with worse things hiding in the shadows.
He slid his headphones on and scrolled until the right song hit. Something with bass and a lazy drum that matched his pulse. That Nar track Meadow had been listening to in the house replayed in his head. The way she hit every bar under her breath, not caring who heard.
He lined up without a tee, dropped the first ball on the grass, and set his stance.
The ball took off, arching into the dark until he lost track of it. The sound of impact cut through everything.
He exhaled, some of that buzzing in his body releasing.
Another ball.
Again.
He wasn’t practicing. He was punishing his body into quiet. Trying to out-swing the video clips, the think pieces, the comments, the men in suits talking about “cleaning up the sport” while hiding their own shit.
You’re better than them, his Mama’s voice echoed in his head. But the league stayed acting like he wasn’t.
Sweat collected at his hairline. His wrist barked with every follow-through but he didn’t stop. His breath came out louder between songs, the headphones barely keeping up with the sound of his heart thudding in his ears.
After God knows how many swings, he finally let the club drop and bent at the waist, hands braced on his thighs. His chest rose and fell rapidly. The world felt a little less tilted.
The light in the house, on the top floor, flickered on again. He straightened, squinting. The outline of a body crossed in front of it…curvy…familiar.
He stilled, watching her move around her room. It felt wrong to stare, so he didn’t let himself do it long. Just enough to catch the way her shadow paused at the window like she sensed him out there, but she never pulled the thin curtain back to look.
