It was a classic game of pick-up basketball during lunch in elementary school. After eating part of a mushy peanut butter and jelly sandwich, eating my cookie and throwing away the apple (so when Lisa checked my lunch she thought I ate it) I hurled my lunch box back towards the classroom and sprinted out to play. I was in second grade and our lunchtime activities consisted of basketball, football, hide and go seek tag, four square and handball. It was a glorious time, elementary school recess.
It began like any other basketball game. The game started with us yelling “first captain, second captain!” to determine the teams. Poor little Ben was always picked last, but that’s just the way it went. It was a huge game with around fifteen pipsqueaks clamoring for the ball and clumped into a big circle. We played on an eight foot hoop; we knew that in a couple years we would get to play on the ten foot hoops, but now was not our time.
My bud Tony and I formed a formidable duo and quickly excluded our teammates as we got into a scoring rhythm. The other team had Owen, Will and AJ, who weren’t too shabby themselves. It started out like a normal game with Biz packing Ben, Tony traveling every time he shot, Clay being a ball hog and Kevin ripping the ball away on defense.
Andre drained a long shot over Peter and punctuated it with an emphatic “Oooohh!” A possession later he hit another deep shot and yelled again.
“Peter, switch with Ethan on defense,” I yelled, trying to shake things up a bit.
Andre hit shot after shot and grew more annoying with each “In your face!” he yelled after making each one. Angry at my teammates for letting AJ run wild over us, and even more angry at AJ for being obnoxious, I guarded him. As the play progressed I drifted away from him trying to help out a teammate, only to frantically close out as Andre loosed another long shot from the left corner. It was a perfect swish.
“Oh! Oh! You can’t stop me!” he yelled as he ran across the black top gloating.
“Shut up, Andre!” I replied and ran towards him. I shoved him hard in the chest and he staggered backward. He gave me a blank stare and then started towards me. I could tell what he was going to do, but didn’t think he had the nerve to do it. He popped me in the chin.
The game stopped and the bell rang right after that. We all ran back to class. For the rest of the day I anxiously waited for my name to be called over the class intercom, asking me to report to the principal Ms. Malen’s office. But no such call came and neither of us got in trouble.
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