Page 14 of High Baller

“I hate you,” I hear Sky tell him as they both go to the back.

“These two might be more fun than I thought.” Derek says with a chuckle. “Do you want to know the plan for the week?”

“Sure, I suppose I need to know what I have to do.” I love traveling out of America to talk about Basketball. I feel like it doesn't get spoken about enough to the kids that like watching it.

“You have to speak to some kids at two different schools. You’re meeting the England soccer team, going on a few TV shows to talk about the teams to be watching out for this season, then—”

“Do I get to go out at all this week?” I ask, cutting him off.It seems like every day is booked up with one thing after the other.

“You have parts of the day free—not a full day. Then, we go back home on Monday,” he replies. “And I wanted to ask you, what do you think or Ariel?”

I’m surprised that question wasn’t asked yesterday. I suppose it was hard to talk when he had his tongue in her mouth for most of the day, and I'd choose her over spending time with the guys.

“She looks like a nice girl, but it won’t last—”

“Why do you think that?” Derek snaps before I can finish.

“As soon as the season starts, you'll barely see each other,” I explain. “Then they leave—they always leave. And you picked a girl that has a job, a job that won’t let her take that much time off work, so it’s either dump her, or you find a job close to her.”

I’ve never had a long-term relationship; I couldn’t. The moment October hits, I’m on the road until June. If we’re playing home I get to see them. But, the next day, we're flying to the away game, so not that easy to have a girl stick with you through all that; I wouldn’t expect them to. A relationship works two ways. There's no way I could ask them to do all the work—they have to come see me all the time—that’s not the man I am. My ma taught me better than that, and I'll make sure that when the time is right, I’ll make the time to see my girl.

“I’m not dumping her, I'll figure something out,” Derek says, interrupting my thoughts. I look up as the seat belt sign comes on, and Sky and Calvin walk out to make sure we all have fastened securely. “Plus, the sex is amazing. Like the songs says, you find an animal in bed, don’t let them leave.”

“When did you have your way with her?” I ask. “The last time we spoke, you hadn’t touched her.” We don’t usually ask about each other’s sex life, but he’s being unusually open about it.

“She said it was a little going away present,” Derek says with a huge grin. “And, hey, who am I to turn it down? Fucking hell, man, Ariel has to be the best I've ever been with.”

I nod my head to agree with him about the animal part. That’s what we've always said, find an animal in bed, but a lady out of it.

I give him a fist bump. “What are you going to be doing this week?” I ask.

“A lot of fucking phone sex.”

I laugh as Sky reaches us. “Shorty, when do you fly back out?” I’m hoping it’s Monday and on the same flight as me.

“I’m not sure yet. Do you have your belt fastened?” She looks at me, as she can’t see it.

“No,” I say with a smooth grin. “I think you need to fasten it for me.” She presses her lips together and I can see that she wants to smile. “Don’t worry, all the sexy stuff I like to do is done behind closed doors.” When she doesn’t move, I grasp the straps and fasten my belt, then she walks back to the area she came from.

Once the belt sign comes off, I’m out of my seat and walking towards the curtain to where Shorty is. I look in as she talks to Calvin and some other guy.

“Shorty, I was hoping—”

“You know I think I feel a little better. Calvin and I will do the first round of services.” The guy looks at me and smiles. “I’m Dave.” I shake his offered hand.

“Nice to meet you,” I reply, and I wait for them to both leave before I turn back to Sky and take a step in front of her. “As I was saying, I was hoping that we could have lunch or dinner, if you just give me the time to get to know me.”

“You know it’s not that. Calvin told me about how the season is, so I don’t think it would work, anyway.” She moves a little to the side.

“You can’t say that—”

“I can. I’m all over the place, never knowing where I'll be week to week, month to month… I already find it hard to meet a guy, never mind date them. How would it work for us?” She folds her arms over her chest. I take a step closer to her, opening them up again.

“Don’t cross them like that—it’s a barrier and I don’t want anything in between us,” I say as I run my hand down her arm. “You know it’s August. The season doesn't start for another nine weeks, so how about you give me that time and see how it goes? The other thing, I promise that no one will know about you. This'll go so far under the radar that no one will know about it.” Taking her hands in mine, I lean down a little so that I can see into her eyes.

“Aren’t you a little curious why I want no one to know?” she asks.

“Yeah, but that’s your business, not mine—not yet, anyway. If it were anything I needed to worry about, I think you'd have told me yourself,” I reply. I run my hand up her arm up to her neck and I hear the gasp she takes in as I bring my mouth closer to hers.