Sugarpill

21- Red Hands & White Knuckles

WARNING: This chapter contains scenes of an intense sexual nature. Reader discretion is advised

Red Hands & White Knuckles

               I pulled into the parking lot of the “Pip” Moyer Community Recreation Center. It was 10 AM, and the heat hadn’t started to get irritating yet. I carried a small duffle bag to the bench, and started to stretch. An older, tall, lanky man with some old Adidas sweatpants, and an Ocean Pacific tank tee looked to me as he was practicing his jumper. “Hey! It’s that crazy white boy!”

               I laughed. “Sup, Marvin…Byron. Y’all still got y’all old asses out here shootin, eh?”- I gave them daps, as we laughed.

              “Gotta stay in shape, Mitcha…and we still got the sweet shots,” said Bryon. He wore one of those hats like J.J. Evans from Good Times, with a faded Jackson 5 t-shirt, and some old gym shorts. He also had on some retro Magic Johnson Converse.  He was an older black guy, so he couldn’t quite say my name correctly…he always called me “Mitcha”.

               “I’m just here to polish up my skills,” I said, as I took off my sleeveless hoodie sweat vest. I had on a white cut off muscle tee with the words NAVY on front, dark blue nylon mesh knee-length shorts, low cut socks, and a pair of black and grey Nike Hyper Zooms. I took the ball from Byron, made a couple of set baskets. “So what’s been goin on with you two old coots?”

               “Old? I’ll outplay you any day!” barked Marvin, as we laughed. Marvin and Byron had taught me almost everything they knew concerning basketball. With what I had learned from them, and also practicing on the church leagues, I was pretty solid as a player. I had a nice burst of speed, excellent three point skills, and my game in the paint wasn’t bad either…but I never tried out for the school team. Like I said earlier, I didn’t want to be the atypical “athletic monkey” for the school, so I kept my ball skills on the low.

                “Well…my sista Renita died. We had to go to her funeral in D.C.,” said Marvin. “Then I come back here, and I found out Haddie Mae died,”

                “Yeah,” I breathed. “I went to Ms. Haddie’s funeral,”

                “Yeah, so Mitcha…you still like Haddie Mae’s granddaughter, Jassandra? That girl is stacked!” serenaded Byron, like he was thinking about food.

               “Um…yeah. Jassandra and I are talkin,” I said.

               “Yeah…Dre done threaten her brother- Kendryk. Said he was gonna kill him if he came back to the court,” said Marvin. I gritted my teeth…

              Others were starting to show up at the court. We started to play teams, as Marvin and Byron took the bench. I was on a team with El Simpson, and Marlon Dexter. El, whose real name was Elgin, was shorter than me, and Marlon was 6’5”…El would go inside, or get the short jumpers, Marlon was dukin it out in the paint, and I was poppin threes, and pullin fadeaways. We were playing against Marco Jenkins, Ray Halliday, and Shayne Marland- Dre’s boys. I came in and hit Shayne in the mouth with a hard shoulder.

               “FOUL!” yelled Marco.

               Shayne jumped up. “You betta watch yo step, white boy! I will get in that ass like we did in Hilton Head, nigga!”