“I’m going... I’m going. I’ll bring you some juice when I come back.”
“Nuh uh. I already gotta pee.” Her teeth chatter against each other.
“You haven’t drank anything all day.” I push up from the bed, rolling my eyes. “You gotta drink something.”
And eat too, but I didn’t want to fuss about it. Ace’s elite combo wasn’t working so good anymore because that’s how shit is on Earth—one bad thing happens right after the other.
Mama’s been hot for two days and I’m having my first real fight with a man I hate and like—a man who says he’s mine.
“No. Ju—just take me to pee after you get the door.”
“Okay,” I whisper, keeping my eyes on her while backing out of the bedroom.
When I round the corner to the entryway, Bryson’s curly head peeks from between the crack I left in the blinds.
He doesn’t smile when I yank the front door open and push the screen.
“What you doing here?” I ask, eyeing his slides and grey sweats. “Don’t you have a game?”
“I’m not going. I came to check on you.”
“Well, you checked and I’m good.” I pull at the knob on the screen, but he sneaks his fingers between the crack.
“Don’t be like that, man. I’m missing my game to come see about you.”
“I ain’t tell you to do that.”
“It’s been weeks, Phat.Weeks.We ain’t never beefed this long and you ain’t never been down this bad—especially not over a dude who really don’t give a damn about you.”
“Yeah and you never abandoned me at a party or lied on me but there’s something about college that got you smelling yourself.”
I skirt around his dig at Ace. He sounds like all those faceless people on Twitter. He didn’t knowshitabout me and Ace.
“I told you I didn’t lie on you. Come on.” He pokes my cheek and some of the ice around my heart thaws. “I’ll take you to get bear claws. The cool cup lady was closed.”
After being holed up in the house with a delirious mama for days, even the simple things that make me smile sound grand—all the bear claws, cool cups and pokes to my fat cheeks.
I suck up more of the outside air while Bryson waits with his hands shoved in his sweats. For a second, I want to forgive him and forget about the wedge that college and peer pressure drove between us, but as usual, my brain and body aren’t in sync. They’re fighting each other for control.
“What about your game?”
“What about it? I know you ain’t been in there staring at the walls. Your man is all over TV and the news. Him and his daddy got what they wanted. It’s no point in me going to a game I’m not gon' play in.”
“‘Myman? What theywanted?’” I raise my eyebrow. “What you talking about?”
“Come on. Don’t stand up here and act like you don’t know what this whole thing was about? All this performative bullshit is to get him back in the spotlight.” He scoffs, looking up. “The black girl, the black college, the underdog bringing a losing team back to life. Don’t tell me you actually believe he’s your man? It’s all a media stunt and don’t give me that bullshit about Coach knowing your daddy like Marcus does. Coach ever ask you anything about Marshall?”
My body isn’t like putty for his rosy cheeks anymore. For the first time in a while, he’s not thrusting a cool cup at me through the door, begging to talk. He’s just here with a pale face and his chain glittering under the setting sun, calling Acemy manin the ugliest way, like it’s impossible for a guy like him to want a girl like me. He sounds like he did that day we watched Ace swagger into the bookstore.
I chuckle. “This what you came here for? To complain about not getting any playing time and shove your conspiracy theories down my throat like the rest of the world? You wanna complain about Ason more?”
“Oh, it’s Ason now? What, he called you to brag about starting the past three games to get you back on his side? You know Chelsea told me you and him wasn’t talking.”
“Seriously, Chels.” I huff to myself, rolling my eyes. “Brag about starting? Ace don’t brag about dumb shit like that.”
I can’t help myself. What we have on Planet Ace is sacred, but the words pour out just like all the other ones concerning him. Ace doesn’t brag about basketball. He brags about Mama eating all her food, about me adulting without him, about Marcus’ dumbass going to work, and about Angie being Angie. For a boy that looks like he’s handling the world in his hands when he’s playing basketball, he hardly even talks about it.
Bryson’s Adam’s apple jumps as he swallows. “So you think starting is dumb?”
