AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“We’ll find out. I don’t know if I can stay without next year being covered, and I can only get it covered if I’m still on scholarship. That would leave me only one year to pay for, and I can take out a loan for that. I don’t know. We’ll see. I still haven’t even told my mom.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know. I wanted to have some of it figured out first, at least. She’s going to suggest that I stay here and that we figure out the money thing. She’ll want to help me, and I can’t let her do that. She can barely pay her own bills as it is.”
“Babe, she’s your mom. She wants–” Shay’s eyes went wide. “Sorry. Habit.”
“It’s okay,” Layne said.
“I just meant that she wants to help. That’s what moms do.”
“I know. But I want her to have a place to live, and if she’s trying to help me out here, she might not. I hoped the internship would work out so I could have a little money coming in. If I get another year of eligibility, I can stay in the dorm next year, but if not, I’d have to get a place off-campus or pay for a dorm in another building. It’s just a lot to think about, and I don’t want to put that on her.”
Shay shook her head.
“What?” Layne asked her.
“You still don’t get it, do you?”
“Get what?”
“You don’t have to do it all by yourself, Layne. You have… people in your life who want to help, even if it’s just to listen to you. You don’t have to do all of this on your own.”
“I have a person, Shay. I don’t have people. I have my mom, and that’s it.”
“You have me.”
“No, I don’t. You haven’t talked to me off the court since we broke up.”
“I’m trying, Layne.”
“You have to try now?”
“To talk to my ex-girlfriend? Yeah, a little. I’m trying to… I don’t know. Never mind. I’m just trying here.” Shay looked to the front of the room. “Shit. It’s about to start.”
Layne turned to see that the show’s intro just ended. The selection was about to begin, so they couldn’t keep talking about this, but Layne heard Shay, and she wanted Shay to know that somehow. So, as the university names were read and put into brackets, Layne slid her chair over a little. Shay didn’t even notice because she was so engrossed in the selection.
“That’s one side of our bracket down. One more to go,” the announcer said.
Over half of the teams had been selected. They started to announce the other side of the bracket, and Layne watched as Shay rubbed her probably sweaty hands over her jeans. She reached for Shay’s hand and placed hers on top of it.
“It’s okay,” she said softly, feeling Shay’s hand stiffen under her own.
Then, Shay flipped hers over and took Layne’s hand, entwining their fingers.
“And for our twelve seed, we have Dunbar University out of Indianapolis, Indiana.”
The room erupted, and Shay jumped up, letting go of Layne’s hand. Layne remained sitting, though, watching Shay jump up and down and scream excitedly. Shay was so happy. All Layne wanted to do was wrap the woman up in her arms and hold her all night long, but Shay needed to focus on basketball now more than ever, so Layne stayed sitting and watched as players and coaches pounded fists and gave each other high fives while one of the trainers hurried around the room with hand sanitizer, making everyone use it.
“Ladies, you did it!” Coach said loudly with her hands up in the air.
Layne saw Shay looking at her, so she smiled back at her. Then, she stood up and left the room. She walked back to the dorm alone, wanting a minute to herself in the fresh air before she’d be crammed back into her room by herself because she didn’t want to risk getting sick again and miss the biggest game of her entire life.
CHAPTER 31
It had been an interesting past several days. Shay had had a few exams and a paper to turn in, and she was still awaiting those grades, hoping she’d done okay but genuinely having no idea what she’d score. She’d been watching film in her room, practicing, attending team meetings, watching more film of their upcoming opponent, a team they’d never played before, eating, trying to stay hydrated, and sleeping. The travel day was upon them, and with COVID still being the norm, the tournament travel had been greatly reduced. They’d be spending their time in San Antonio, Texas, which meant a bus ride to the airport, a flight, and then another bus ride to the hotel.
Shay hadn’t spoken much with Layne outside of what they needed to talk about for basketball, which worried her because she’d thought that their talk on the night of their selection and Layne holding her hand might have meant that they were on their way back to something. She wasn’t sure what that something was, though, because they still had, hopefully, six more basketball games, and they both wanted to win as many of them as they could. Of course, it could all be over tomorrow night, and that was what had Shay thinking as she sat on the bus on the way to the airport, staring at the back of Layne’s head. If it was all over tonight, and she never played again, would she be okay?
