"Oh, you have a home game, I thought it was away..." She seemed disappointed.
"You don't have to come, you don't get that many nights off. I can pick you up after, or just call..."
"No, I'll come. I don't like watching basketball. I like watching you."
"What you like about me playing basketball and no one else?"
"You're like a little military man down there. They go exactly where you want them too."
"Little? I'm a foot taller than you." Actually, I was probably a little over a foot taller than her five foot two inches.
"No, not military--you're more like a director and it's your movie...on the good nights anyway. Your hissy fits are fun too, on the not so good nights." She laughed at herself.
"Well, you're no longer my good luck charm then."
"I don't wanna be."
"That kinda breaks my heart a little, Jordan."
"Why? I'm not responsible for a ball going through a hoop; and I hope I mean more than chance and aribitrary circumstance to you." She shifted in the bath to see my eyes.
"You've meant more to me than 'arbitary circumstance' since I first met you...whatever 'arbitrary circumstance' means." She remained with her necked craned, hands on the edge of the bathtub.
"You're the one that's about to graduate college. What sorts of things have they been teaching you at that 'excellent' university?" Her tone was mildly sarcastic, she liked to tease me about being the type of student/athlete who took pottery and poetry classes. Both types of classes I actually did take, but that's not the point. She knew I took my school work seriously. She might of been jealous too, she never went to college, and had only recently taken a few nursing classes at the local community college.
"I've learned that I can achieve my hopes and dreams if I work hard enough and that knowledge is power." She laughed hysterically at my amalgamation of the best Ad Council spots from the early Nineties. She settled her naked back against me in the now lukewarn bathwater.
"The thing about watching you play now is you know I'm watching, and you know I don't like basketball. When I was fifteen I watched every one of your home games and you never even made eye contact with me."
"There were a lot of people in the stands, plus you never mentioned that you went to any of them. It's not like we weren't friends and never spoke until the day I decided you were gonna be mine." She wiggled against me. I realized that I'd been continuously aroused for our entire bath conversation.
"I didn't want you to think I was a desperate sophmore automatic hand job and maybe more." I laughed, she elbowed me then continued, "Actually, at the time I was desperate for you and would've given you a hand job and maybe more..."
"I wish I knew that then, cuz I would've accepted the 'maybe more'." She pinched my forearm and covered her breasts.
"You chased me that summer, so don't go re-writing history." I remember looking for her on the last day of my senior year, couldn't find her to say goodbye. She appeared out of nowhere at a graduation party weeks later--petite, adorable, all smiles asking me a million questions. I asked her for her phone number at that party, but she wouldn't give it to me, and I told her I wanted to hang out with her and she said yes but wouldn't agree to a day. Which actually made me think about her more and develop a more than insignificant infatuation for her.
"God, I could write a book about wanting you...and getting you. I broke up with a sweet girl just for the idea of you." After no word of her for a few weeks I arranged to get invited to a friend of hers birthday party; she didn't show because she was out of town but got word of my program through said friend. She called me a few days later and said she'd go to the movies with me if I taught her how to drive. Which was fine with me, because it meant I'd get to see her all the time, which I did, and when she turned sixteen that August we were entirely together.
"Oh, you mean the last vagina before mine?"
"Yep, there've been no other vaginas since."
"Ahh, don't talk about it. I don't want to think of all the other ones... I've only been with you."
"I didn't bring it up. I'm just saying, yours is the best by far." I laughed until she elbowed me again.
"Maybe that's not a good thing. Think of all the sluts and not-so-slutty girls you could've been with since." She was pushing me away, something we were both doing more of. She was as frightened of my impending graduation as I was. She continued,
"You could be playing professionally, whether overseas or not, you'd be making a ton of money. They talk about which teams you might play for in the NBA on the radio."
"You listen to sports talk radio?"
"Quit it. I know you could of transferred to one of those colleges that get to the Final Four every year."
"We got to the Tournament last year. -I didn't know you were such a talent scout." She got up and out of the tub, wrapped herself in a towel and stared at me lounging in the room temperature water.
"I don't want you to make decisions that you'll regret because of me, that's all." She looked genuinely sad, no more sarcastic quips.
"You don't have to either, you know. This isn't a one-sided deal we've got going here."
"I know, but it's different cuz your deal's a lot bigger than mine." I got out of the tub and began drying off, she just stood there.
"You're my deal, there hasn't been anything bigger since I was eighteen." She smiled then turned serious again. I started to dress, she didn't move.
"It just seems like we can't be as ideal for that much longer. You've been all mine since even before you got me all naked." She dropped her towel, her little breasts jutting out toward me, she wanted to make a point.
