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Miles is coming up dry, and Atlas is a step slow.
When I’m back on the bench, I look up into the crowd. There are thousands of faces, but none are the one I’m looking for.
Nova’s not there.
Not wearing my jersey, not cheering my name.
She’s in Paris with her sister.
I told her to go.
But I miss her.
She called earlier to wish me luck, plus sent a text right before warmups.
Now, with the eight-hour time difference, it’s the early hours of the morning in Paris. She’s probably fast asleep.
As my gut tightens, I wish she were here to give me one of those smiles that makes everything seem better. She reminds me how much I love doing this. I take a slow breath and imagine I can hear her voice. “You should try basketball. I bet you’d be good.”
I’m in the fucking playoffs with a group of guys who deserve to be here. We aren’t going down like this.
At half time, we’re up four.
“Just keep one step ahead,” Jay tells the guys in the locker room.
I nod. “They can rotate on us all they want, but they’re going to get tired guarding that hard. Punish them when they do.”
The third is evenly matched. I play half of it, winning our minutes even though my knee is twinging in protest by the end.
The start of the fourth, they pull ahead by a few. I can’t breathe until we get it back to a two-point lead.
But it’s too close. The clock can’t run out fast enough.
“Make ‘em work,” I mutter as I watch Kyle dribble around.
He gets frustrated, settling for an ill-advised three that bounces off the rim and into their hands.
Phoenix takes it to the other end for two points to tie it.
“Come on,” I repeat, my fists clenching at my sides.
It’s as if Kyle hears me. He grabs a pass from Jay and goes hard at the basket. The defender goes up to block him, catching Kyle’s leg with his own. Everyone on the bench rises in numb horror as Kyle goes down hard.
They take him off the court, the scoreboard overhead proclaiming under a minute remaining.
Tie game.
We get two free throws.
When the final buzzer sounds, our fans are ecstatic.
But it’s short-lived.
We got the win, but the loss might be greater.
We sleepwalk through media, everyone thinking about Kyle.
It’s an hour later when we get the update. Jay and I are still sitting in the locker room, processing what happened.
