✅ My Sister's Problem

132. Game On

Half a dozen games later, I was starting to get tired. But one of the guys who seemed to be organising everything was still offering a chance to see how much skill Nadine had picked up in all the time she had been practising with Hugo. In the end, it ended up being the two of us up against an older guy who I barely knew. I think I'd faced off against him before with Hugo on my side, but it was weird to think that it would just be me and Nadine, facing somebody who I thought was on the school team.

I'd never done two on one either. But as we lined up at the start, I looked over at Nadine and saw that she was enthusiastic, if not confident. It was a strange way to test us; I hadn't expected we would be on the same side. But I could see Hugo, Chains, and Jaycen were all watching us now. I didn't know if they'd seen Nadine practice when she was with Hugo, but I wanted to show them that I wasn't just relying on Hugo to show me what to do.

"There's one of him, two of us," I said. "You can dribble, right? One down each side. If he gets too close to you, just make a slow pass over, keep him running back and forth."

It was a sound strategy; but as it happened we just didn't have enough experience to make it work. I'd only been playing for months, and Nadine hadn't paid any attention to Hugo's attempts to teach her. I wore myself out trying to catch her passes, and a couple of times she fumbled even if I could get it right into her hands. I didn't blame her, but carrying a match without any other strong players was too much for me now. It was pretty close, and I was happy to shake the guy's hand at the end. But I knew that I would need a lot more practice before I could actually tell myself I was good.

"Wow," Nadine said, as we left the court. "I maybe get it now. I should play a bit more."

"How about we see what we can do?" Hugo asked with a chuckle. "I'll take Nadine, right? Against Jay and Sally." I nodded to that. It was what Hugo had suggested before; a chance for me to compete against my best friend, without out difference in experience making it too unbalanced. This way, we could have fun however it turned out. Hugo was unquestionably the strongest player on the court, and I wasn't sure if he would be better playing on his own than trying to help Nadine, but winning wasn't the point of this match. It was all about learning, finding out how good we were, and putting on a good show for what remained of our audience.

As it turned out, the match was pretty fairly balanced. There was quite a difference between Hugo and Marco, but the guy was still pretty confident. At times it felt like Hugo was facing us two-on-one, but Nadine was pushing herself harder each time she got the ball now. She really wanted to prove that she could do this; and even if she hadn't paid much attention to the lessons she'd had in the past, it seemed like motivation had been the thing letting her down. If I didn't pay attention to her, she might turn up where I wasn't expecting and cut down my options.

I got past Hugo a few times, because he was trying to mark two players at once. So did Marco, especially once we started trusting each other more and could toss a quick pass across without hesitation. But on defence, I was always trying to keep up with Hugo while Marco guarded the basket to stop Hugo sending off a snap three-pointer from wherever he happened to be. That meant that Nadine was always open, and once she got the ball there were too many options. Half way through the match, we paused to have a drink, and to congratulate our opponents.

"Damn, you're good," Nadine said, smirking at me. "I feel like a spare wheel here."

"You're making it unpredictable," Marco said. "You're good enough that we have to pay attention to you when you get the ball. I don't know how it's going to go."

"I don't know," she said. "I'm enjoying it, but you'd probably find it hard enough with just Hugo here. I mean... he looks so good when he's playing, but I didn't realise before just how good he is. Am I making a difference?"

"Don't undervalue yourself," I said. "He's good. But Marco's good too. You'll have to try hard to beat us."

"She's right," Hugo said. "You know Marco's got the attention of the Beavers scouts? And Sally's getting pretty good too. It's a challenge when you put them together. Besides, you're enjoying it, right? And I wouldn't have offered to teach you if I didn't see some potential there."

"Okay, let's play on!" she said, and I could see a smile there. Maybe she could actually learn to play, and then I'd have another excuse to hang out with my best friend. That had to be a good thing, right?"

But as we were heading back to our own ends of the court, I saw that somebody had started a chant in the audience. I could barely make it out, but Hugo translated for me.

"They want to know what we're playing for," he said with a smile. "We're not regular teams, so there's no kind of reputation on the line. Somebody out there thinks we should have a wager."

I looked around at the crowd, and wondered what we could bet. I knew it wouldn't be money; that wasn't what people did on these courts. But I still thought that it could be interesting if we were actually playing for something.

"What kind of bet?" I yelled, wondering if any of the people watching might have some idea. I already felt that this was a crazy idea, but I knew that if we were the entertainment for these people, we should at least try to put on a show. I didn't know if I expected a response, but there were a couple of shouts from different places outside the fence. Some of them seemed to have figured out that Hugo was my boyfriend; and there were a couple of joking shouts of things that I'd only ever want to do in private. I felt like I was on a stage or something; was this how celebrities always felt? But I guessed that Hugo had come up against a lot of situations like this when he was younger, and I was determined to throw myself into it. Still, I couldn't do any of the things our fans were suggesting. And then I heard another shout, from a girl in the corner.

"Tell him your biggest secret!" a voice shouted, and I guess there were a lot of people who liked the idea, because it wasn't long before the chant in the crowd turned into "Secret! Secret! Secret!" I wondered if the people playing on the other courts could hear that, and how many of them had similar suggestions.

"Seems good enough," I said, giving a little shrug. "I mean, I don't even know what my biggest secret is. But I'm not planning to lose."

"Me neither," said Hugo with a smile, and turned to the crowd. "Okay, guys! You want some stakes, you got it. The loser has to share her biggest secret with us all. One point in it now, but I think we'll open that up now."

I shook his hand, and immediately started to wonder if I should regret playing to the crowd so much. But it was the first time so many people had really cared about the outcome of one of my matches, and the thrill from that was something I wouldn't have given up. Then I glanced back at the corner where that suggestion had come from, and saw a couple of shorter spectators behind let through to the front so they could see. I knew who had called out that idea now; a girl called Niall, who would be starting high school this year, and who had recently moved from another town so that I didn't recognise her voice. Standing beside her, I saw Lindy smirk at how easily she'd been able to put me on the spot.

It didn't matter, I told myself. It wasn't like I was going to lose.