Work In Progress—Fiction

The Comeback

by William Jelani Cobb
Special to SeeingBlack.com

This one went down over on Second Street, Northwest, in that park between the water treatment plant and those projects on Elm. His name was Greer or Burrell or maybe Wilkins and right then his arms were stretched in front of him like a blind man feeling for a light switch. The aged blue jersey, pulled tight over a forty-one year-old belly was just low enough to show naps of chest hair at the neckline. The shorts were a reincarnation of an aged pair of sweat pants. His hair was a tribute to another era, this in spite of a hairline that had abandoned his forehead years before. His wife used to call it a Halfro, back when he was married.

Before him was a sun-bleached Spaulding and an antagonist who hadn't even been born back when he'd scored fifty-four against Dunbar. A little, hazel-eyed, pretty negro, a whole head shorter than the man; probably paid more for his sneakers than his elder paid for a week's rent on his room.

The boy stepped back and threw up a fade away, three inches above the man's yearning fingertips. Instinctively, the man shouted "Brick!" even though he knew better, even though he'd known that it was pure net, known that the boy would punctuate the shot by saying "Little Man's world!" for the fourteenth time. Twenty-eight, twenty-four. Check. Now the boy put on a dribbling clinic, hypnotized his rival, arms swinging wide, then shifting back inside and faking the drive. The man nearly broke his ankles trying to stick the left side, but the drive, when it came, was on the right. Youth spanked experience, stole the lane, but blew the easy lay-up. Youthful arrogance. Rebound. Now the man takes the easy lay. Twenty-eight, twenty-six. Check.

He wiped the burning sweat from his eyes with the edge of his jersey and received the ball. Took it with the right hand and drove to the left side, stopped abruptly and threw up an outside J. Short. The rock hit the rim and bounced back to the left corner, now both were chasing it down, but the boy was quicker. Time to go to school; he took him, this time with the left hand, slipped past him to the rim, but long adult arms go up to reject the lay-up. The elder swings, but the ball is not there. He is swatting at a ghost. The boy slips beneath the rim and takes the reverse lay-up. Commits to it with the left hand. Point game. Little Man's world.

This is gut check time. He knows the years have stolen his legs, knows his lungs are full of gunpowder and his shoulders feel like a napalm eyewash. Check. Keep the pressure on his little ass. Instinct sends him to the right and divine intervention lands two fingers on what would have been the fatal J. Short. Push the legs up for the rebound, now take it up. The easy shot rolls off the rim. The boy takes it up, full body contact, but out here there ain't no such thing as an offensive charge. The shot is a brick. The man owns the low post; he pushes off the boy and takes the shot. Point, twenty-eight.

It had come down to this. Sweating for the small wins and working your way up to the big ones. Check. He took this one from the foul line, the rock bounced on the rim twice before deciding to sink. Point game; now all is equal and the elder was not above winning ugly.

He received with his right hand; muscle memory switched off to the other, the one that had been home to his wedding band seven months earlier. Take it to the hole with the left; the mind visualized perfection, but the flesh was untutored. The left was not swift enough to avoid the terrible hand interrupting his dribble. Now the ball bounced backward, he pushed after it, knowing that there is more at stake than the ten-spot pinned under a rock behind the court. He snatches it up at mid-court. Momentum damns him, though; he takes one step too many, now he's stranded in hostile territory, far beyond the three-point line. Can't move an inch 'cause the child will call him for travelling, take away the ball and slay him from the foul line.

The boy moves backward, stands at the top of the key smiling, knowing that this man will miss the jumper, that he will take the rebound and he will slap the backboard with his right hand just after he releases a perfect finger roll. And then he will say, "Little Man's world."

The man sees the rim, sees nothing else, not the multicolored glass reflected on the playground, not the water plant behind it where tomorrow he will get a line on a 90-day job. He does not know the burn of his muscles or the cramp beneath his ribs, but simply the metaphysical perfection of circle and sphere. He takes the shot and watches it arc the way Reggie Jackson used to watch a white speck fly out into the infinite darkness of the Bronx night. The words came, even before the ball had slipped perfectly through the net and he spoke them as if they were the truth: "My World, son. You just payin' rent."

-- April 9, 2001

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