Full Court Press (8 page)

“My mom is a housewife most of the time, but she helps manage functions and things for my dad’s company. He owns a small power sports chain that operates here in Washington. He used to just operate it from Maine but he opened up a couple new stores so he wanted to be closer.”

They went inside the house and into the kitchen. Anderson sat on the counter while she got the steaks out of the fridge.

“Power sports, huh? Have I heard of it?”

“Hamilton’s Power Sports.” She poked the meat to see if it was still frozen.

“No shit? There’s a store in town. I’ve been there.”

She nodded. “Yep. HQ is up in Molson though, and he goes to Seattle a lot for meetings.”

“Washington is good country for power sports though, a lot of snow and mountains.”

“I noticed.” She fidgeted with her T-shirt. “Okay seriously, this is bothering me. What the hell is Beck’s problem? I mean, I know he doesn’t like me, but I haven’t done anything to get on his bad side, have I? And is he really going to just call up some random girl to have sex with?”

“Um, yes to the last part. No to the bad side part. And I don’t think he has a problem, that’s just Beck. We’ve talked about this. He’s not a nice guy. Why are you so worried about it?”

“I don’t know. It’s just, when I first met him: jerk. When I played ball with him: nice. When he beat someone up: crazy. When I bailed him out: jerk.”

“Looks like ‘jerk’ won the poll.”

“I know but...I just don’t understand.”

Anderson found this all amusing. “You so have the hots for him.”

“I do not!”

“You so do. I get it. Tall, dark and asshole. Lots of girls are attracted to that.”

“Well, I’m not, it’s just...” She wasn’t sure.
Did
she have the hots for him? “I don’t like him, okay?”

“Sure, sure, you keep telling yourself that, honey. Let me know when you’ve realized the truth.”

After practice the next day, Car looked outside the back door of the locker room to find the snow still coming down hard. There was a good six inches just in the parking lot. There was definitely no way she was getting home.

She was now sitting with a few of the girls watching the boys’ practice wrap up. She liked watching the boys practice, though she didn’t really have a choice. It would be weird to go to Anderson’s house without him being there.

She had really started to make friends with the girls. Kendall was nice. They always raced during sprints since they were the fastest girls on the team. Torie was very loud and hilarious. She even made the coach laugh during practice.

The girls headed downstairs as the boys left for the locker room. Most of the girls left but a few hung around. Kendall and Torie stayed with her, chatting about their first opponent.

“They were fourth in state last year but they lost three of their starters, so I don’t know how they are going to be now,” Kendall said, leaning her back against the wall.

“Four starters actually, three to graduation but one got knee surgery and hasn’t been the same since. She’s not a threat anymore. But I think I remember them having a lot of fast young players last year,” Torie said.

Kendall agreed. “Yeah, definitely.”

“What about height?” Car asked. “Got anyone like Tor or Syd?”

Kendall looked at Torie. “I dunno. They had some tall girls but I think they might have been some of the ones who graduated.”

Torie nodded. “Their main center did, but last year they had a six-foot freshman. She was all bones though. I’m not sure if she’s playing this year or not. She wasn’t that good but she could have bulked up during the summer.”

Kendall nodded, opened her mouth to speak but then stopped and glared over Car’s shoulder. “Yes?”

“Chill, Ken,” Beck said, standing behind Car.

Car turned around and saw that he was dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt. What a shame, no arm muscles to look at.

“What do you want?” Kendall asked.

“Hamilton, can we talk?” Beck said, looking like he didn’t care either way.

Car glanced around. “Sure.”

Beck leaned down. “In private.”

“Oh, right.” She grabbed her bag off the floor where she had set it and slung it over her shoulder. She shot a look at the two girls as she followed Beck down the hallway, but they just shrugged at her.

Beck stopped once they were around a corner where they couldn’t be seen or heard.

He turned to face her but didn’t say anything, just looked her.

“Uh, is this where you pull out the ax and murder me?” she asked.

“Hardly.” He shrugged his bag off his shoulder and pulled an envelope from it.

“What’s this?” she asked, looking at the thick envelope in her hands.

“Your money.”

She slipped it open and found crisp hundreds. “Oh, okay, thanks.”

He nodded.

She waited a few more seconds. “Was that all, or...?”

“No.” He played with his keys. “Okay, so Anderson told me that you were looking for someone to help you with your post moves.”

“Umm, I sort of said that. He’s helping me out with ball handling skills and he mentioned that he thought I would benefit from learning some post stuff...are you offering?” she asked, confused.

He looked annoyed. “Yes.”

“Uhh...why?”

He jingled his keys a little and looked at the ceiling before meeting her eyes. “I need some help with school work.”

“Uhh...”
Whoa, unexpected
. “I’m really not a good student. I’m not tutor material...seriously.”

“I don’t need a tutor,” he snapped.

“Uh...okay? But you just said—”

“It’s not that I don’t get the material. I need...help getting it on paper.”

“I don’t understand...you can’t write?”

He was getting tenser by the second. He obviously didn’t want to be asking her this. “I can write.”

She waited for him to continue, but he didn’t. “I’m confused.”

“Will you do it, or not?”

“Do what?” she asked.

He was really getting irritated. “Does it matter right now? Just an hour or so whenever you’re free and I’ll work with you on post moves whenever you want.”

She was a little overwhelmed but he was so on edge, she was afraid to say no. “Okay...yeah, sure.”

The tension went out of him. “Okay, good. Are you busy tonight?”

She was thrown off guard. “Uh...uh, no, I guess not. I mean, I have a little homework but—”

“Bring it with you and come with me to my house now.”

He beckoned her to follow and waited for her by her locker while she got her books. Car almost cracked up but managed to shake her head as she walked out the door. She definitely did not get this guy.

Anderson was in the parking lot unlocking his Charger. “There you are, Car! I’ve been looking for you.”

“She’s coming over to my place,” Beck said.

Anderson automatically looked worried. “Uh, why?”

Beck strode quickly to Anderson and whispered something into his ear, but he was done by the time Car reached them.

Anderson looked relieved and nodded. “Ah, okay. What time do you think she’ll be done?”

“Less than an hour.”

“I just don’t want to worry about her getting stuck in a ditch or something with this snow.”

Car shook her head. “Yeah, okay, Dad. I’ll call you if I’m going to be later, okay?”

Anderson nodded. “All righty, see you in a while then.”

Beck and Carmondy got into their cars. She followed him out of the parking lot and the short distance to his house. They pulled into the driveway but instead of parking in the garage or beside the other cars, he drove into a small driveway that led behind the house. He finally stopped in front of what looked like a smaller version of the house they had just driven around, a guesthouse with red bricks and crisp white shutters. She parked beside him and they got out.

“Why’d we park back here?” she asked. The main house was a good fifty yards away.

He looked for a key on his key ring. “You don’t want to be walking through that house, trust me.”

“Don’t you live in there?”

“I live here.” He pointed toward the small house. “Guesthouse.”

“But you’re not a guest. Why don’t you just have a room in the other house?”

He snorted and unlocked his front door but didn’t answer. He flicked the lights on and she saw that the small house was surprisingly clean. It looked like a dorm room though, with big comfortable-looking furniture and a big TV, and not a whole lot in the way of decoration.

“This is cool. You pretty much have your own place.”

He nodded and dropped his bag near a table.

She set her bag next to his. “Do I get a tour?”

He didn’t look overly excited but led her to the back of the house, which seemed to open into a bedroom. There was no door on the extra-wide opening but the layout provided a good amount of privacy. “That’s pretty much it.” He pointed to a couple doors. “Closet, bathroom, washer and dryer.”

She nodded. “I like it, very open.” There was also a large kitchenette in the corner.

He nodded. “Thanks.”

“Okay, so...what’s the deal?” She turned to address him.

He motioned her over to the table, and they sat down. He picked up his backpack and started pulling stuff out. “I just need someone to write for me. I have something called dysgraphia.”

She didn’t know what that was. “Is that like dyslexia?”

“Similar. A lot of younger children have it, but most grow out of it. I didn’t.”

“What does it mean exactly?”

“Pretty much just really bad handwriting.”

She was skeptical. “There has to be a little bit more to it than that.”

“I mess up some letters, like p, q, d and b. Some people mess up spelling but I don’t have that problem. I just...it’s hard for me to write. My parents put me through years of occupational therapy for it in elementary and middle school. It fixed my spelling but...” He started tapping his fingers on the tabletop. “I just can’t write well. It takes me forever, looks terrible, and gives me headaches. There isn’t a way to fix it, not all the way. But it’s not...I’m not dumb. I get really good grades, and I understand everything perfectly.”

She nodded, starting to get it. “Okay...I see.”

“It’s a legal disorder, you know. I’m supposed to have a scribe for all my school work. I use a laptop for whatever I can.”

“So it’s not typing? You can write sentences and everything, it’s just writing longhand?”

He nodded. “I type all my assignments, even math.”

“Okay...so what do you need me for?”

“Accounting class mostly. I’m good with numbers, but I can’t do it on the computer because...” He pushed the sheet toward her, a lot of little boxes and lines that each number had to go into. He was right. There was no way to do it on the computer.

“I just need you to write.”

“Okay...yeah. Sure. I just...I guess I don’t see how you can type but not write. I mean, I believe you, I’ve just never heard of it, is all.” He obviously didn’t like asking her for help, and she didn’t want to put him in a bad mood.

“I’ll show you.” He picked up a pen and the accounting paper, then started filling in his name, the date and the class. He held the pen in a weird position and seemed to be focusing hard. He did okay on his name. It was readable. The date took him a long time to write and was slanted weird and barely legible. His whole body was tense as he labored over the piece of paper. By the time he got to the class line, he looked frustrated and his grip on the pen was tight. He wrote incredibly slowly and carefully but the letters still didn’t look right. Some were even in capital letters when they weren’t supposed to be.

She wanted to tell him to stop, that she understood now, but he was determined to finish the word.

When he finished, he sat back and looked at his handiwork, and shook his head. “I’m told it’s got something to do with the inability to visualize and learn the motor patterns of letters.” He shrugged. “Anyway, so that’s my problem. It’s got nothing to do with being dumb or—”

“You said that already, and I believed you the first time,” she assured him. “But...who used to do this for you?”

“I’d do it myself, sometimes, but other than that it was Anderson...but if I don’t have to ask him...”

“Yeah, I get it.” She nodded, liking this Beck better in some ways. “So, shall we get started?”

“Do you want something to eat while we work? I don’t have a lot but...” He stood up and walked into this small kitchen.

“Actually, do you have any sugar?” she asked. “Candy or something?”

“Umm,” he looked around, “a bag of Skittles?”

“That’ll work,” she said with a smile.

“All right.” He dumped the bag into a bowl and set it on the table.

She leaned forward. “I only like the red ones.” She picked a couple out and popped them into her mouth.

“I only like the yellow ones.”

They munched on their Skittles as they got started. He moved his chair closer to hers so that he could see the paper as she wrote. He had the textbook and a calculator in front of him and she had a pencil poised over the paper. He started listing off numbers and told her where to put them. It was easy for her, of course, to just copy down numbers as he said them.

Her mind started to wander, getting lost in his voice even though he was speaking softly. His shoulder was against hers, and she could feel the heat radiating from his body. His knee brushed hers as he leaned in and corrected where she was putting a number.

She didn’t know why he affected her so much. Beck didn’t scare her but he had a certain quality that made her uneasy but attracted to him at the same time. Maybe it was the mystery. He could be a total jerk but when he needed something, he got uncomfortable. It was almost endearing.

She tried to shake the thoughts out of her head and focus on what she was doing. Beck was fast at this, whatever it was, and named off the numbers almost as fast as she could write them. It was a lot of writing and Car knew it would have taken Beck forever to do it himself.

Once they totaled the columns of the worksheet, she set down the pencil. Beck let out a breath and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his eyes.

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” she asked.