Page 17 of Courtside

Piles and piles of nasty, sweaty laundry.

But, for Sage’s part, Armie was getting her up to speed on what she, as team manager, was responsible for, especially when they went on the road, where she would have to handle all of the equipment herself.

She felt a vague pang of jealousy at the little conveniences the college athletes had access to: laundry service, branded sweatshirts and jackets, team t-shirts, and the new Nike team shoes, complete with green accents.

It looked pretty damn nice to be a college athlete.

She also was in email communications with the admin guy who handled the nuts and bolts of travel bookings. There were eight teams in their conference, and while three of them were reachable by bus, five required a flight. As a smaller, Division III school, they flew commercially, but bus rides were chartered for the team. Additionally, there were hotel rooms to book, food budgets to consider, and a whole slew of other things that she would be responsible for keeping track of. It all kept her busy, but it wasn’t quite enough to completely dull the shadow of dread that hovered just out of reach.

It was the end of September, and she’d just finished her last class for the day in the Business and Marketing building. She rushed across campus toward the Humphry Center, where she was meeting the team for the first time.

She’d received an email from David —fuck, Coach Hughes — asking if she’d come to an open gym to meet the team. While the start of the season was still a week or two away, the team was going to be running an after-school basketball camp at a local recreation center. When she’d suggested the idea of the team doing community service there to Coach Hughes, he’d immediately jumped at the idea.

She pulled on her hoodie as soon as she walked in the front doors, silently cursing the temperature swing from sweltering outside to freezing inside.

The team was playing in the practice gym. She could hear the bouncing balls and echoing shouts before she reached the wooden doors. Pausing for a moment with her hand on the handle, she took a practiced deep breath before pulling the doors open.

The scene before her was so achingly familiar that it felt like a blow to the stomach. For a second, she couldn’t breathe. Tall, leanly-muscled bodies wearing team-issued shorts and practice jerseys ran up and down the court, while other players sat on the bleachers watching the game.

God, the sounds…the squeak of shoes, the heavy breathing, the shouts of “I’m open,” and “ball” and “screen right” were the soundtrack of her life up until four and a half years ago.

She spotted David and Coach Dixon sitting apart from the players, heads bowed together in conversation.

Adjusting her bag on her shoulder, she walked toward the two men.

David looked up. She watched as his jaw tightened, and his gaze dipped down to her bare legs.Why the fuck was she wearing running shorts?For a moment, she stopped, unable to get her feet to keep moving.

You’re a grown-ass woman Sage. You’ve kept your shit together around hot guys before. Even if they didn’t have his arm hair or tree-trunk thighs or an almost shy smile that threatened to melt her.

Forcing a smile onto her own face, she walked toward him, raising her hand in a wave.

Coach Dixon must have noticed that David’s attention was elsewhere, because he turned to look over his shoulder, giving Sage a nod when he saw her.

“Miss Fogerty,” Coach Dixon said, adjusting in his seat so that he faced her. “Good to see you.”

“Thanks, Coach,” she replied, lowering down to the bleachers next to him. A few of the players had turned to watch them, obviously wondering who she was and why she was there.

“Hey.” David gave her a tight smile, leaning forward to brace his forearms on his knees. She noticed that he’d kept the facial hair, although it was trimmed a bit closer to his face. His dark hair was still too long, even though she could tell he was trying to hide that fact by wearing a baseball cap.

“They’ve only got six points left to finish this one,” he continued. “They’re playing to twenty-one.”

Sage nodded in understanding, turning her attention to watch the team play.

She’d done her research. There were fifteen guys on the team, which was pretty typical for a college roster. Four seniors, three juniors, four sophomores, and four freshmen.

Immediately, she picked up on a few players who were obviously freshmen, based on their hesitation on the court and their tendency to pass instead of looking for a shot. She also picked up on the guys who were shooting the ball way more than they should. There was one guy who looked to be almost 7 feet tall with the body of a true center, who, while he didn’t seem to be the most skilled with the ball, played with a huge grin on his face and had an obvious knack for finding the open man on the court. Another player, with bleached twist-braids pulled up into a knot at the top of his head and legs so skinny that it looked like his ankles could snap at any moment, commanded the outside, showing speed and handles that identified him as a point guard.

One player took more shots than any of the others. He looked like a military kid: tall, muscle bound, with short blonde hair and the kind of rigid posture that looked like it’d been drilled into him from a young age. She could see the tension in his body from the sideline, and watched how he grew more and more stiff with every shot he missed.

That guy needed to meditate orsomething.

The game ended on a breakaway layup that had the other team groaning and cursing.

Sage watched David’s face, noting the furrow in his brow as he watched the team in the first moments after gameplay. She bet that he was watching which players turned to each other, exchanging fist bumps and high fives as they talked through the game. There was also no way that he missed the ones who turned away, standing alone. The blonde kid was one of those, his practice jersey pulled up over his head as he walked, alone, to the wall.

“Alright, circle up,” David’s loud voice called out as he pushed to standing, walking onto the court. His physical presence, even among the young players, was commanding, and he had a few inches on most of the team.

The guys shuffled over, not seeming to be in a particular hurry. It struck Sage in that moment, watching how the players responded to their head coach, that David was still actively working to earn their respect. In their eyes, he was still the unproven new guy.

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