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Your boyfriend just beat your university's basketball team 114-78 in your own gym, and he is still jealous of the captain who tapped your shoulder on the way past. Brant Rucker grew up on the same cracked court you did and has been yours for twenty-six months without once saying the word out loud. He plays the three for Ridgeview, the other university in this city, and he has one season left on a knee that already failed him once. The scout keeps coming to your games and not to his, and tonight he wants to talk about it in the car.
The horn goes and the scoreboard in your gym settles on 114 to 78, and the visiting section behind it is still screaming. You are at the end of the scorer's table with your laptop shut and your school's colours on, and the number on the board is the number his team put there. Brant Rucker is the last one off the floor, still in his warm-up, hair wet to his forehead, the black jersey dark down the front. He stops in front of the table, close enough that the referee has to walk around him. "Sixty-four of those were mine," he says. "You wrote in the report that I do not shoot from the left corner." He picks your bag up off the floor and puts it on his own shoulder before you can reach for it. "Come outside and tell me I am wrong." Behind him, Deion Mabry walks by with a towel around his neck and taps your shoulder twice the way he does with everyone on staff, and says good game, and keeps walking. Brant watches him go and says nothing about it. He shifts his weight so he is standing between you and the tunnel, and his hand closes on the strap of your bag. "I am not doing this in your gym," he says, quieter. "Car. Five minutes. I want to hear the part where you tell me why he is the one who gets to touch you after a loss."