Home Court by Amar'e Stoudemire Read Free Book Online

just going to say it: Ledge was one greasy dude. He sweated a lot and when he got sweaty he looked sort of oily .
    His hands were always moving, too, slapping at the ball, slapping at the air, and sometimes slapping at Deuce. You could see it was bothering him. Would you want some greasy guy slapping at you all game?
    â€œTurn on the jets, D!” I called out.
    Deuce gave Ledge that lightning-fast first step and managed to get a little space. I made a move to get in front of Carlos.
    â€œNow!” I raised both hands in front of me, palms up.
    But Deuce waited a little too long to make the pass. Ledge recovered and slapped the ball loose. I have to admit, he really did move fast. Must’ve been all that grease. The bullies scored two more points before we got the ball back. When we did, I posted up near the basket and got us on the board with a skyhook of my own.
    â€œLucky,” said Carlos as the ball rattled in.
    â€œYou think you’re the only one who’s ever hit a hook shot?” I said.
    There was a little bricklaying by both teams after that, but we managed to get three more points down the stretch. We got it to 6–4, but they kept playing dirty the whole time.
    On one play, Yeti clobbered Deuce on a moving pick. It was the biggest player on the court taking out the smallest, and it was hard to miss the foul. But mostly they were trickier than that. They specialized in borderline fouls, things that a real ref would’ve called, but that weren’t obvious enough to get out here on the playground. It really got to us after a while.
    â€œGet off me, man,” Deuce said as Ledge pawed and slapped away.
    He passed the ball off to Mike, who had pretty good position to the right of the basket. But as soon as Mike got it, Yeti started grinding his forearm and elbow into Mike’s back.
    â€œOver here!” I called, because I could see he wasn’t going to be able to back in any closer.
    Mike fired the ball to me as I flashed into the open. I tried to swing wide as I came around to the left side of the basket. I had to keep an eye out for Carlos’s long arms, so he couldn’t reach in and grab the ball, and I had to keep an eye on his long legs, so he couldn’t trip me again. I guess I just ran out of eyes because I tripped on a crack in the pavement.
    The worst thing about it was that I knew there was a big crack there on the left side. Carlos had been going to that side all game because he was a lefty. I’d just gotten so distracted by all of his cheap shots and hacks that I’d forgotten about it.
    I didn’t go down, but it didn’t matter. I stumbled and lost control of the ball. Carlos shot forward and took possession. He threw a quick pass back to Ledge at the free throw line. Ledge launched a laser to Yeti under the basket, and he knocked into Mike on his way to another layup. That was it, game over, 7–4.
    Being a sore loser is one thing, but being a bad winner? That’s just low.
    â€œNever in doubt,” said Carlos, acting like he’d already forgotten the points I scored against him.
    Yeti pulled a can of soda out of his bag. “Too easy,” he said, in between long gulps.
    Ledge was licking his lips like a frog and watching Yeti guzzle his warm soda.
    The only good thing was we got Deuce’s good ball back. I jumped up and grabbed it as it came through the hoop. It felt weird to rebound a ball that had already gone in, but I knew it was the only way we’d get it back.
    â€œAt least this one was close,” said Deuce.
    â€œHow many points did you guys score last time?” I said.
    â€œTwo,” said Mike.
    I’d scored two points myself this time, and Mike and Deuce had one apiece. But it was hard to feel good about the improvement when the rest of us felt so bad.
    â€œOw, my back,” said Mike as we headed off the court. “I’m going to be feeling those elbows all week!”
    â€œFor