The Point Guard I Was Supposed to Hate

The Point Guard I Was Supposed to Hate

Norah Fabis

Maya

The first time Jace Navarro came to my gym, he stepped over a puddle of rainwater and asked which basket was regulation.

I told him the one hanging from the ceiling.

He looked up. Both baskets were hanging from the ceiling, which was the point. Harborline Courts had been built in 1968, when children were apparently expected to grow strong by playing basketball beneath industrial lighting and a roof that leaked directly onto the free-throw line. The gym wasn’t pretty. But the lines on the floor were straight, the rims were ten feet high, and the girls in my program would have defended it against an invading army.

The famous point guard was twelve minutes late.

My thirteen-year-old player Lina had been checking the door every thirty seconds since three. I would have preferred to disappoint her myself rather than watch her realize that the man she’d spent an entire summer imitating couldn’t make a free clinic on time. Then again, I’d seen Jace Navarro on television. Arriving late and looking mildly offended by the existence of other people seemed to be part of his routine.

“You’re Maya Bennett,” he said. Not a question.

“Coach Bennett to the kids. Maya to people who have earned the privilege.”

His mouth moved, almost a smile. “Jace.”

“I recognized you. There are posters.”

There weren’t. I’d taken down the promotional banner when the foundation representative said the man pictured on it would be arriving late from a shoe commercial. The girls deserved a court that belonged to them, not a shrine to someone else’s endorsement deal.

Jace glanced at the twelve players in matching gray practice shirts. Half of them were pretending not to stare. The other half had stopped pretending. He wore plain black warm-ups, no entourage, no headphones. He was taller than I expected, with a narrow scar cutting through his left eyebrow and the peculiar stillness of an athlete who knows exactly how much room his body occupies.

“Sorry about the time,” he said. “Traffic from the arena. A delivery truck lost its entire load of oranges on the bridge.”

“That’s oddly specific.”

“I took a picture if you need evidence.”

I didn’t laugh. Lina did, loudly, and every other girl joined her. Professional athletes and thirteen-year-olds had that in common: they knew precisely when an adult was determined not to be entertained.

“We were doing footwork,” I said. “Can you work with that, or does your contract require a photographer?”

“I can work with footwork.”

“Good. Start at the baseline. No cameras.”

He looked at the row of phones on the front desk. “Yours or mine?”

“Everyone’s. This gym is a place where kids can miss without becoming a clip on the internet.”

That took the amusement out of his expression. He nodded once, left his phone with our volunteer coordinator, and crossed to the court.

I’d coached the Harborline girls for four years, first on weekends after I left the university athletic department and then full-time when our director retired. The program was for girls between twelve and sixteen who wanted serious basketball without the expense of a private club. Some went on to school teams. Some came because it was quieter here than at home. All of them learned to box out, read a help defender, and speak up when somebody grabbed their wrist.

I’d been a college point guard once. A torn ligament had shortened my final season and ended my professional dreams, though people still described the injury as the reason I coached, as if I hadn’t had a mind before my knee gave way. Now I was thirty, with a whistle, an old brace in my office drawer, and more arguments about transportation budgets than I ever had about playing time.

“Line up,” I called. “We’ve got a visitor. That doesn’t change how we work.”

Jace took the ball Lina offered him and spun it in his hands. “Show me your closeout.”

Lina sprinted toward him with both arms raised.

He didn’t move. “Why are you flying at me?”

“Because you’re going to shoot.”

“Am I?”

“You’re Jace Navarro.”

“That’s not a scouting report.”

Lina planted her feet, considering him. Then she backed away two steps and came forward again, slower, hips low enough to change direction. He nodded. He faked a shot and drove right. She moved with him.

“There,” he said. “Don’t guard the poster. Guard the person.”

I hated how good that was.

We ran a closeout-and-recover drill. Jace never made the girls demonstrate something he hadn’t explained, and when one player stumbled he asked whether she’d been taught to decelerate before demanding more effort. It was the kind of question experienced coaches ask. I watched him lower himself to Mia’s eye level and correct her foot position without touching her. Then he passed her the ball and told her to try again.

He was gentle. Not performatively gentle. He was almost careless about being seen doing it.

At four, the roof began to drip.

The puddle on the west sideline grew until I blew the whistle and shifted the drill to the other half of the court. Jace glanced upward.

“You need a new roof.”

“We need a roof that stays where it is.”

“How long has it done that?”

“The roof? Sixty years. The leak? Longer than anyone will admit.”

He studied the bucket I’d placed beneath it, the one our youngest players had decorated with a smiling cartoon fish. “Somebody coming to look?”

“A contractor. We have to keep the court dry until the inspection.”

“I know a—”

“If you’re about to offer me a number from a guy who owes you a favor, please stop.”

His eyebrows rose. “I was going to say I know what wet hardwood does to an ankle.”

I felt heat climb my neck. “Then yes. We agree.”

He did not ask about my knee. He simply moved the drill another six feet away and told the girls why. Safety was one thing I didn’t negotiate.

At the end of the session we played three possessions of four-on-four. Jace defended Lina without giving her a free path, but he didn’t use his height to humiliate her either. She drove left, drew his weight toward the baseline, and passed behind her back to Mia in the corner. Mia missed the three. Suri pulled down the offensive rebound and scored.

The girls erupted. Jace pointed at Lina. “That pass. Keep that.”

“I learned it from Coach,” she said.

His eyes found mine across the court. “I can tell.”

For one ridiculous second I wanted to thank him.

Then the foundation representative arrived with a manila folder and an expression that made my stomach sink. Ruth Mercer was a small woman with large glasses and a talent for delivering bad news gently. She’d told me she’d come Friday to discuss our renewal. It was only Wednesday.

I sent the girls to cool down. Jace started collecting balls without being asked. Ruth waited until the last player was beyond hearing.

“The city approved the temporary safety restriction,” she said.

I looked at the wet sideline. “We’re already using one basket.”

“This is about the lease. The roof inspection triggered a wider review. They won’t renew our current occupancy agreement until the building passes.”

“How long?”

“The inspector thinks four to six weeks for a decision. Repairs longer. I’m sorry.”

Our winter season began in five. The girls had paid no fees, because there were no fees. The gym was their place to go after school, and for some, the only place they were trusted to arrive on their own. We couldn’t move twelve players, three volunteer coaches, and four youth teams into a commercial club with a forty-dollar drop-in charge.

“Can we use the east court?” I asked.

“Not without a revised occupancy plan.”

Jace stopped stacking balls. He wasn’t pretending not to listen. I respected that more than I wanted to.

Ruth opened the folder. “The community foundation has an eight-week pilot grant for youth sport. Shared facilities, transport, coaching. If Harborline partners with an established athlete program, the application could fund space while we work on a long-term solution.”

I saw exactly where this was going.

“No,” I said.

“Maya.”

“We built this program without putting a famous face on it. The girls know it’s theirs.”

“The proposed partnership doesn’t change the ownership. You would remain program director. But the application closes Monday, and we need an eligible partner with a current facility agreement.”

“I have one,” Jace said.

We both turned toward him.

“My team’s training annex sits empty every weekday after one,” he said. “The Falcons let me reserve time for clinics. I can ask for eight weeks.”

“We’re not a photo opportunity,” I said.

“I know.”

“And you don’t get to walk in and decide what these girls need.”

“Then tell me.”

He didn’t smile this time. He stood in the middle of my shabby court, holding a mesh bag of basketballs like it mattered, and waited for an answer. I wanted him to be arrogant. That would have made this easier.

Behind him, Lina pressed her palms against the glass of the gym office. She couldn’t hear us, but she was watching me. She would ask tomorrow whether we still had practice.

I could disappoint my pride. I wasn’t sure I could disappoint her.

“Eight weeks,” I told Jace. “We write the program together. The girls get the same coach, the same rules, and no compulsory publicity.”

“Okay.”

“You haven’t heard the rest.”

“I can wait.”

Ruth looked as if she might hug us both.

Jace held out his hand. I stared at it a moment longer than was polite, then shook it. His palm was warm and rough beneath the tape on two fingers.

“For the record,” I said, “I still don’t like you.”

“That’s all right,” he replied. “You haven’t seen my worst drill yet.”

Before I could answer, his phone vibrated on the desk. The screen lit up with a headline about last night’s game: NAVARRO SAYS YOUNG PLAYERS ARE TOO SOFT TO COMPETE.

Lina looked from the headline to the man standing beside me.

And for the first time all afternoon, Jace Navarro seemed to have no idea what to say.