Antwan Dixon was steaming. He’d been steaming ever since he and Jayson had been to visit Chew that morning. Coach Calhoun had been peppering him with questions all afternoon because even he could sense something was wrong. It didn’t matter though, Antwan wasn’t going to let it get in the way of their game tonight. He’d worked too goddamned hard to let something like that from his off his game. Instead he’d use it as motivation, he’d play harder than he’d ever played before, show Chew what a fool he’d been for sending him away like that.

It had worked a little too well.

Antwan had played like a man possessed. He racked up fifty-two points, eight rebounds, and eleven assists and his team hadn’t trailed once. Entering the fourth quarter they had been up by nearly thirty-points and it was clear that barring some Old Testament-level catastrophe they were all but guaranteed passage through to the next round of the county tournament. But Antwan wasn’t done, he wasn’t even close to being done. He dribbled the ball up court furiously and took a quick glance up at the scoreboard as he began to weigh up his options.

From the sidelines he heard the sound of Coach Calhoun’s voice shouting out, “Timeout.”

A look of annoyance flashed over Antwan’s face. He bounced the ball to one of the officials and followed his teammates over to the sideline. He could see his mother and Jayson sat with one another in the stands as he joined the huddle.

“What say we let the backups see this one out?”

“Fuck that,” Antwan said with a shake of his head. “Leave me in the game, coach.”

“What? We’re up twenty-six points, Antwan, I’m won’t risk you getting hurt so you can pad your stats. You’re sitting down.”

Antwan could feel the eyes of his teammate’s boring into his skull as Calhoun talked in his direction. He was barely even listening, replaying his encounter with Chew earlier in the day over and over again instead, but caught the end of the sentence. Antwan shook his head, determined not to let himself be bossed around for the second time in a day, and began to wander back on the court.

“Like hell I am.”

“You’re done,” Coach Calhoun said, raising his voice a little, as he reached out to grab Antwan by the arm.

Antwan slapped it away instinctively, “I’m done when I say I’m done.”

He knew he’d stepped over the line, he could see the look of shock on Coach Calhoun’s face, but it was too late to go back. He strode out onto the court on his own without so much as a glance back towards the sideline and Calhoun reluctantly sent out four backups to play alongside him.

Antwan eyed the opposing team’s point guard as he dribbled the ball up court. He was shorter than Antwan by some way, dark-skinned, but slightly heavier and far less defined. Basketball was a game to him, Antwan could see that, his handles were sloppy, he sagged off every time he had to guard him, and his conditioning was terrible. Antwan thought back to all those hours spent running suicides with Chew, to the tears that had run down his cheeks out of exhausation, and how he’d forced himself to keep going despite everything. The fat fuck opposite him didn’t even have the self-discipline to get in basketball shape. It made him angry.

As he bore down on the ball, Antwan muttered to him, “Aren’t you tired of being shitted on all fucking night?”

There was a defeated look on the boy’s face, but he was determined not to let Antwan’s words get to him. “Just fucking play the game, big shot.”

Antwan knocked down a jumpshot in the boy’s face and then pointed towards the scoreboard. Fifty-four.

“Play the game? Have you seen the scoreboard, motherfucker? I’m the only person out here that has been playing.”

No response. Wordlessly the boy received the inbounds pass from his center and dribbled up the court, desperate not to make eye contact with Antwan. It wasn’t him that Antwan was angry at, he knew that, it was his uncle, but the words get tumbling from his mouth as he forced him into a bad shot. 

“That’s weak,” Antwan said with a smug grin. “You’re gonna need to do better than that.”

Antwan caught the outlet pass in transition and passed up on a wide-open dunk in order to wait for the struggling point guard to catch up with him. He dribbled the ball through his legs a few times, his eyes locked onto the eye’s of the boy opposite, before whispering across to him.

“You get a stop and I stop talking.”

He could see his taunting was getting to the boy, who reached out to swipe the ball from Antwan, “Just play, man.”

At the last second Antwan moved the ball away and lifted off the ground and flung the ball in the direction of the hoop.

“That’s money.”

Antwan turned his back on the basket and began to run back to defend before the ball had even passed through it. He heard that sweet swish as it passed through the net and the roar of the crowd. Fifty-six.

“One last chance,” Antwan said, his grin reappearing. “Come on, I’ll make it easy for your no-game having ass. Through the legs, half spin, drive the lane.”

He did exactly as he’d said, dribbling the ball through his legs into a half spin, and then drove the lane. The opposing point guard leapt into the air to contest the shot and Antwan rose over him, pushing him down with his free hand as he did so, and threw down a thunderous dunk that brought the house down. As the boy tumbled to the ground Antwan stood over him, glaring at him with intent. Fifty-eight.

From beside him, Antwan saw a giant pair of hands thrust in his direction. The other team’s power forward shoved him backwards away from his point guard and Antwan smiled, sufficiently pleased he’d got under the other team’s skin. The whistle sounded as the power forward was hit with a technical foul by one of the officials and Antwan stepped up to knock down the resulting free throw. Fifty-nine.

Coach Calhoun, red in the face with embarrassment, barked in Antwan’s direction and satisfied he’d made his point, Antwan wandered back over to the bench to take a seat. His teammates patted him on the shoulder as he stared across the court at the opposing team. The point guard looked broken, defeated, and for a moment a pang of guilt ran through Antwan as he considered that the footage of his dunking on him would be played nationwide for the next week. Antwan had humiliated him and for what? Nothing.

Fuck it. 

Fuck him, fuck Coach Calhoun, and fuck Chew Lewis. 

[center][b]*****[/b][/center]
Something was wrong with Antwan. He’d played the game of his life and that dunk at the end had been something else, but something was definitely wrong. In all the years Jayson Aaron had known Antwan he’d never seen him play with the kind of nastiness he’d played with tonight. It was almost hard to root for him at the end there. There was something perverse about the thought that it was [i]that[/i] Antwan the world would see when that dunk made it to Sportscenter that night. Whoever it was out there on the court tonight, it definitely wasn’t the real Antwan Dixon.

He’d sat in the passenger seat of Antwan’s Charger as they went for their customary post-game drive and mulled over whether he ought to say something. An hour and a half had passed and eventually Jayson found the courage to broach the subject with his friend.

“What was that back there, man? I’ve never seen you like that before,” Jayson said. “Talking trash, going after that guy like that, that’s not who you are.”

Jayson knew the answer to his question before it had even left his mouth. Antwan had been acting a little out of sorts since they’d left Dante’s apartment that morning but they hadn’t spoken about it at all since. Emotional availability wasn’t exactly Antwan’s thing. Heck, it wasn’t Jayson’s thing either when he thought about it. Talking about your emotions wasn’t exactly the done thing in Norman and he didn’t expect that to change anytime soon.

And then Antwan surprised him, “I guess that shit with Chew earlier got to me more than I thought.”

Jayson rubbed his chubby chin a little as he glanced out at the endless fields of Pickett. Their drive had taken them far from Norman, further even that they usually ventured, out here made Jardin look downright metropolitan. The isolation ought to have made talking about their feelings more comfortable but in a way the inside of the car felt even more restricting than a busy night in Norman.

“You wanna, I dunno, talk about it or something?”

“I’m good,” Antwan muttered. “You wanna hit this shit with me?”

Antwan reached across Jayson’s lap into the glove compartment and pulled out a small baggy of weed that he dangled in front of his face with a mischievous grin. Jayson hadn’t expected Antwan to want to talk, in fact he’d been shocked he was willing to even admit anything was wrong, but this was more shocking by a factor of a hundred. He couldn’t believe Antwan could be so stupid.

“What the fuck is that?”

Antwan shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, “What does it look like?”

“It looks like weed,” Jayson said, shaking his head. “But it can’t be weed because I know you’re not stupid enough to risk everything you’ve worked for your entire life to get high like every other dead-end nigga from Norman.”

It wasn’t just that either, Jayson thought, he couldn’t believe Antwan would go near drugs after what they’d done to his mother when he was growing up. He’d never mention it to him, he never did mention it, but it seemed counterintuitive to hate his moms for being addicted to the pipe if you were up for hitting a blunt. Jayson knew weed wasn’t exactly the same thing but they were in South Carolina, not Colorado, and the last time he checked it was still illegal. No amount of Chew Lewis-induced stress would change that.

Antwan looked at Jay as if trying to persuade him, “Come on, Jay.”

“Fuck that,” Jayson fumed. “Where did you even get that shit, man?”

“Roland couldn’t be at the game tonight. He said he had a meeting or something, so he hooked me up by way of an apology.”

“Yeah, well, Roland ought to know better.”

He’d thought Roland was cool the first time he’d met him. He’d come from nothing in Norman like them and made something of his life. More than that, he was more than happy to be there for Antwan, for all the talented kids in Norman, whenever they needed a little extra something to make ends meet or pay the bills. That took heart. But this? This was something else.

His heart pounding in his mouth, Jayson reached over and snatched the bag of weed out of Antwan’s hand.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m saving you from doing something really stupid, Antwan.”

Jayson rolled down his window and threw the bag of weed out of the window of the speeding Dodge. As he felt the bag leave his hand it was like a weight being lifted off his chest. If they’d been caught with that everything the two of them had spent the past decade and a half dreaming about would have turned to ashes in their mouths. 

It was only then that Jayson saw it. A flash of red and blue light in the rearview mirror that seemed to last a second too long. He was dreaming right? He had to be dreaming.

“Pickett County Sheriff’s Department,” boomed a voice over a speakerphone. “Stop the vehicle.”

Jayson glanced at Antwan’s face, white with terror, and began to shake his head in disbelief.

“Oh, fuck.”