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  “Our game is that we’ve been playing ball together our whole lives. Isn’t this our home?”

  “Yeah,” said Michael and Dylan together. “This is our home.”

  “Then let’s play like it. Let’s relax and switch it up a little bit.” He grinned at his friends until they understood.

  “You want us to play that out there?” asked Dylan. “That’s just what we do when we’re messing around.”

  “Then let’s mess around,” said Elijah.

  Michael smiled. “Yeah. I’m with you.”

  —

  ELIJAH RECEIVED THE first pass and tossed it blindly to Michael, who was already in the middle of a short, looping run. He reached for the ball, turned one-eighty, and charged.

  The Brute Force defense, which had grown accustomed to Team 16’s weak, predictable patterns, backpedaled to fill the lane while Elijah shot forward, shouting “Switch! Switch it!”

  Instantly Michael reversed the direction of their passing and fed Dylan, who just as quickly fed Elijah; three steps later, he buried the ball with an old-school two-handed dunk. The crowd erupted.

  Thirteen to eleven.

  On the next play, the ball lofted high toward Big Al’s waving arms. It should have been an easy pass, but at the last minute, Michael threw a hip at the giant, knocking him off balance. Elijah was right there to capitalize. He plucked the ball from the sky and faked a jumper. But instead of shooting, he slid it across to Dylan, who stood wide open by the two-point line.

  “Oh shit!” said Skillz when he realized their mistake.

  Dylan secured the pass, tucked his toes behind the white line, and buried the ball.

  The score was tied at thirteen with less than a minute remaining. Quite possibly, the next team to score would be declared the winner.

  ELIJAH’S MEMORY OF the rest of the game was etched in flashes of light and movement.

  He remembered Dylan streaking across the court, pulling ahead of his man by an arm’s length.

  And in the microsecond of time that elapsed while the skinny white boy planted his right foot and launched, he saw his friend evolving, transcending his own game and becoming not just a better player but a different kind of player, a game changer. Dylan’s body hung in space, filling Elijah’s field of vision with outstretched arms and legs, a moving embodiment of athletic purpose, graceful and resolute. At the peak of Dylan’s ascension, his arm hung behind him, trailing the ball. And finally, near the end of his flight, he swung that arm up and over his head, and slammed the ball home.

  At the sound of the referee’s whistle, the score was fourteen to thirteen; Team 16 had won Hoops.

  —

  “LET’S GO CELEBRATE,” said Dylan.

  “Yeah.” Michael released his two friends from his bear hug long enough to examine their trophy. “What’s the most expensive place in town? We could have a three-thousand-dollar dinner if we want.”

  Elijah pointed toward the parking lot; Sam Lehigh waited with his mother outside his generic blue rental. “I’ll have to catch up with you guys in a little bit.”

  “What?” said Michael. “Can’t we at least get a couple hours to celebrate as a team? Can’t that dude wait?”

  “I’m sorry,” said Elijah. “He’s got a plane to catch tonight. I’ll come find you guys later. I swear.”

  “Fine.” Michael forced out a smile. “You’d better call. I might be jealous as hell, but I still want to hear all about it.”

  “Me too,” said Dylan. “Put in a good word for me, okay? I’m about to get my grades up.”

  “No, you ain’t. Don’t lie.” Michael grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him close. “Come on, man. Let Elijah do his thing.”

  —

  ELIJAH’S MOTHER GREETED him first, wrapping her arms around him in a big hug. “I’m so proud of you.” And then in a whisper, “You did the right thing, you know. I’m sure of it now.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” he said.

  Sam pumped Elijah’s hand in a firm shake. “Hell of a game, son. A hell of a game. I think you’ve got a great future ahead of you. How about we go for dinner and talk about it?”

  “Thank you, sir.” The word son practically exploded in Elijah’s head. He knew that certain men—coaches in particular—liked to use that term for anyone under the age of thirty. So it wasn’t personal, any more than it was for him to say sir. But the word had knocked something loose inside him. Because wasn’t this the time for his father to emerge from the crowd and acknowledge him?

  It’s me, Son, he was supposed to say. I’m here, and I’m so proud of you.

  He knew how unlikely it was, but still…He searched one last time because he couldn’t help himself. And then, for the time being, at least, he let it go. After all, there was a lot to be happy about. Team 16 had gone all the way. They’d won, and of that he was proud.

  “I don’t want to rush things.” Sam checked his watch. “But I went ahead and made reservations at a steak house; I hope that’s okay.”

  “Yes, sir.” But Elijah was only half listening. A man by the chain-link fence was staring at him, and he was of the right height and skin tone. Broad-shouldered, possibly in his late thirties, but age was hard for Elijah to gauge. The man smiled and nodded, but just as quickly he took a call on his cell and walked away. Could it be?

  “Excellent,” said Sam. “Let’s go.”

  SAM DROPPED ELIJAH and his mother off in the early evening with the promise that he’d return during the school season to watch him play again.

  “We’ll be in touch,” he said. “And it goes without saying that we’re very excited about the possibility of putting you in an orange jersey.”

  Elijah’s mother hugged him again, but all he felt was a spasm of disappointment about the man who had smiled at him. Of course it hadn’t been his father. Why had he ever thought his father was going to come see him play?

  “Syracuse University,” his mother said. “Can you believe it?”

  He shook his head.

  “But you know why I’m most proud of you?”

  “Why?” he said.

  “Because you and your friends took a stand today. You went out there dressed as yourselves, and you showed the whole world that you have integrity and can’t be bought.” She pulled back and regarded him with tear-filled eyes. “Today, Elijah, you’ve become a man. A strong man.”

  “Thanks, Mom.”

  Elijah set the brochures and folders Sam had given him on the kitchen counter. He checked his phone and saw, in addition to a voice mail from Michael (most likely telling him where they’d be meeting up), one brief text from Kerri.

  “Got your cell number from my dad,” the text said. “Hope that’s okay. How was baseball?”

  “Good,” texted Elijah. “Want to go for some coffee?”

  “If you still want to hear my plan,” texted Kerri. “What’s your address? I’ll pick you up, but no jokes about my car.”

  “Okay.” Michael’s message would have to wait.

  —

  THE INSIDE OF the Fiat felt like a carnival ride designed for ten-year-olds. No matter how he adjusted the seat, Elijah’s knees stuck up and into his chin. He sat folded in on himself, trying to make conversation.

  “You look nice,” he said.

  “Thanks. Are you saying that out of politeness or because you really mean it?”

  “Both, actually. Do you question everything?”

  “Everything. Thank you for being polite, and for meaning it. I hate shopping, but I moved in such a hurry that I didn’t even get a chance to pack. Most of my clothes are at my mother’s house in Virginia.” Kerri pushed a button above the rearview mirror; the roof slid back, letting in a flow of warm night air.

  “Why did you move in a hurry?”

  “My father would kill me if I told you.” Kerri paused, considering. “Okay, you promise not to tell?”

  “Promise.”

  “He had a minor heart attack. That’s why he retired, and why I
moved here so quickly. You’ve seen the way he takes care of himself?”

  “The cigar-and-beer diet?”

  “Right. So when he got out of the VA hospital, I talked it over with my mother and decided that he’s the only father I’m ever going to have. If I’m going to try to have more of a relationship with him, it’s got to be now.”

  “That’s good of you.”

  “You know that he likes you, don’t you?”

  Elijah jerked his head in surprise. “I think you might be talking about a different person.”

  “It’s true. Breaking up concrete, plates on the lawn mower, and all the other ridiculous chores. They’re not really chores; he was testing you, trying to see what it would take to get you to quit.”

  Elijah extended his arm out the open roof. Despite his cramped position, it felt good to be driving with the top down, listening to this strange, frenetic girl. He felt as though he could listen to her talk forever. “How is that a sign of fondness? I was trying to help him out, not get into the Navy SEALs.”

  “Because that’s the kind of person he is. It’s also what he did for the army.”

  “So you’re officially admitting he’s not an accountant?”

  Kerri smiled and rolled her eyes. “Not even close. His job was to train Special Forces guys for what’s called ‘unconventional warfare.’ He had to test them and push them to their absolute limits to find their breaking point.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yes. And do you know what he did when he found their breaking point? He pushed them even farther. Most of the guys would break, of course.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “The breaking part? Means they’d give up, quit, or go crazy. But the few who made it…those were the men he’d assign to his team. And they’d go on special missions all over the world. Sometimes they’d go in so deep that they wouldn’t even have support.”

  “Jesus! How do you know all this stuff?”

  They arrived at a small coffee shop with plenty of outdoor tables. Inside, she stepped to the counter and ordered two cappuccinos with hardly a pause in their conversation. “Look, some girls are into shopping and makeup and catching the most popular guy; this is what I’m into. Though more specifically the criminology side of things. Is that too weird for you?”

  “No, but you telling me that your father was trying to find my breaking point, that’s weird. Speaking of which, what is that?” He pointed to her cup.

  “It’s just coffee and steamed milk. Try it.”

  They chose an outside table under the glow of a streetlamp. Elijah noticed Kerri’s hands, which were especially slender and elegant; her nails were done in a two-tone of pink and off-white. He wondered if she’d painted them for him. He hoped so.

  She scattered a handful of white plastic squares on the table. “Anyway, the whole point of coming here was so I could tell you about my plan.”

  “Right,” said Elijah. “Your plan to take down the gang. But what are these?”

  “GPS trackers that I stole from my father. The cheapest, most elegant solution to your problem. I found this whole box of surveillance stuff he had from work. We’re going to use them as a counterinsurgency measure.”

  “I have no idea what that means.” Elijah was getting the hang of drinking his cappuccino; he sipped so that he got three parts coffee to one part froth. “I’m pretty sure no one knows what that means.”

  “Then I shall explain,” she said.

  “Okay,” said Elijah. “But my phone is buzzing like crazy. I need to answer it.”

  Elijah swiped his phone just as a second voice mail showed up on his screen, this one from Dylan’s mother. Quickly he played Michael’s message. His voice sounded wrong, too high-pitched, and panicked. “Elijah! Something’s happened. You gotta call me right away.”

  The one from Dylan’s mother was incomprehensible, borderline hysterical. At some point, a man took the phone from Dylan’s mother and introduced himself as Detective Tillman. In a slow, deliberate voice, he asked Elijah to call the Baltimore Police Department as soon as possible.

  Elijah’s fingers shook as he pulled up Michael’s number on his favorites tab.

  “Elijah? Is that you?”

  “It’s me. What’s going on?”

  A pause. The drawing in of air. “Dylan’s dead, man.”

  Elijah stopped breathing and counted off seconds.

  One.

  Two.

  Three.

  Four.

  He knew what the words meant logically, but there was no way to accept it. How could Dylan be dead? They’d been playing ball together just a few hours before. It was impossible.

  “Elijah, man, you there?”

  “Yeah, I’m here.” That’s not my voice, he thought. I don’t sound like this. So who’s talking? “What are you telling me?”

  “He’s dead. Dylan’s dead. We were walking home with the trophy, right?” Michael’s words came slowly, haltingly.

  Elijah tried to picture the two of them, one broad, with a swaggering gait, the other thin, bounding ahead on the balls of his feet.

  Michael continued, sobbing freely, no longer trying to hold back. “We stopped outside my house and talked about what we were going to do with our share of the money. Dylan said he’d changed his mind about the Mustang 5.0 and wanted to buy a complete set of them X-Men comics. Like a first edition thing or something.” He blew his nose. “And I was giving him crap about it, you know, because they’re just, like, comic books.”

  “Tell me the rest.” Again, with the voice that wasn’t his.

  “He got all hurt and offended and called me Fat Boy.” A choking laugh laced with the edge of hysteria. “I felt bad, so I said I was sorry and hugged him. I told him he was my white brother and he could spend his money however he wanted. After that, man…I don’t know.”

  “Tell me,” said Elijah. “Exactly what happened. Come on.”

  “I went up the walkway to my house, and Dylan kept going. We were gonna get cleaned up and change, and then wait to hear from you. You know, to hear what the Syracuse guy had to say.”

  “And…”

  “Somebody—somebody shot him,” stammered Michael. “I was in my kitchen getting a bowl of cereal, and I heard a loud pop, but I figured it was just fireworks. You know, some kids setting off M-80s or something. I didn’t think anything of it. But Dylan’s neighbors found him lying on the sidewalk. Somebody shot him in his back, Elijah.”

  OF ALL THE possible responses to his friend’s death, Elijah wouldn’t have guessed silence. He sat rigid in the Fiat’s passenger seat, gripping his phone tightly, as though he could squeeze the bad messages right out of it. When Kerri pulled up at his house, he tried to speak, but no words came to him.

  “Can’t you tell me what’s wrong?” she asked.

  He shook his head and staggered to his house.

  Later, at the police station, Elijah’s mother, Mrs. Henderson, and Mrs. Buchanan sat in the waiting room while the remaining sons met with Detectives Tillman and Stacey. Detective Tillman was bald and paunchy, wearing an ill-fitting suit, while Stacey was short and clean-shaven and had dark bags under his eyes. The boys sat next to each other in a small, private office containing a desk and four gray steel chairs.

  “We’d like to ask you some questions about your friend Dylan,” said Detective Tillman.

  “You’re going to find who did this?” asked Michael.

  “Yes, but right now we’re the ones who ask the questions. When was the last time you two saw Dylan?”

  “At the end of the tournament,” said Elijah. “I stayed, and he and Michael went home.”

  “In a car?” asked Detective Tillman.

  “We walked,” said Michael.

  After they went through the details and specifics of the walk home, the detectives ran through a litany of other questions.

  “Did Dylan have any known enemies?”

  “No,” said Michael.

  “
Was he in a gang?”

  “No.”

  “Did he deal or use drugs?”

  “No.”

  Michael started to get a dangerous look in his eyes, so Elijah took over and spoke for both of them. He answered every question and told them about Money and the Blood Street Nation. He answered honestly, describing his encounters in the black Mercedes word for word. Encounters that he hadn’t shared with Michael before. Yet every question he answered prompted three more. It didn’t take long for him to see that the detectives didn’t believe him.

  Tillman: How did you meet this guy, Money, and what’s his real name?

  Elijah: I don’t know his real name. He was watching me play a pickup game at the Battlegrounds. He called me over to his car.

  Stacey: What do you mean you don’t know his real name? He bought you four-hundred-dollar sneakers and sponsored your team, and you’re telling me you didn’t get his name?

  Tillman: That’s strange. Does that sound strange to you, Ken?

  Stacey: A little, Bob. What did he look like, Elijah?

  Elijah: Shaved head, brown eyes, maybe five-feet-eight. He wore a black hoodie and jeans.

  Tillman: Skin color?

  Elijah: Like mine. [Holds out his forearm for them to see.]

  Stacey: And you said he had a gun? Know what kind of a gun?

  Elijah: I don’t know. It was silver. [Holds his fingers apart eight inches.] This big.

  Tillman: And tell us again why you didn’t report that encounter?

  Elijah: Because he had a picture of my mother. He had the addresses of where she works. He told me to keep my mouth shut and not tell anyone about him. He said if I was smart and followed directions, no one would get hurt. I believed him.

  Stacey: Did he directly threaten you or your mother? You say he’s dangerous, but I’m not getting it, so help me understand.