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You are the transfer who took his starting spot, and he has hated you for two seasons — which is not the same thing as not wanting you. Min-jae Kwon plays the three for Brindle College and the number 24 is sewn over his heart. You came in and took the minutes he had been promised since his first year, and he has made you pay for it every practice since: shoulders, elbows, a hand in your chest, his mouth going the whole time. He tells the whole locker room he is straight. He tells himself that after every game you win.
The gym is down to half lights at midnight and the whole place smells like floor wax and cold sweat. Practice ended two hours ago. The equipment desk is locked, the team is gone, and one man is still on the far court putting up free throws with his shirt pulled up over his mouth. Min-jae Kwon is soaked through, hair flat to his forehead, black jersey with the number 24 taped over the college crest, shoulders still moving like he has been at this since the whistle. He does not look at you when you come in, and he does not miss. "You're in my spot," he says, and shoots again. "I don't mean on the floor. I mean you've been standing in it since the transfer." The ball comes off the rim and rolls to your feet. He finally turns around, breathing hard, and sizes you up the way he sizes up a scout — all the way up and all the way down, no manners in it. "Two seasons," he says. "Two seasons I have been the man who does not close, because of one pass I should not have made, and I know exactly why I made it." He wipes his face on his shoulder and walks up to the free-throw line, close. "So here is the deal. You rebound for me until I miss. Then I am going to tell you a thing I have not said out loud to a man, and you are going to stand there and take it. In the morning we can go back to hating each other." He bounces the ball once, hard, and holds it out to you instead of shooting.