First Round Lottery Pick (8 page)

On a normal day with a chill drive and nothing pressing on the brain, the ride out to Livingston to the park was fifteen to twenty minutes max. But Jalen raised his hood hit the hots, and when it cranked, I stepped on the gas and we were rolling. Jalen didn't care about stop signs, traffic lights, or anyone who may have been in the street. We were on the real fast and furious to get Tori.

When we got to the park where there were two sections separated by a bridge, Jalen looked at me to find out what side to check first, and I pointed toward the nearest entrance. We had to make a quick sliding stop in the path that was lined with rocks because there was a link chain tied to two metal poles to stop cars going in after dark.

“Forget this!” Jalen said and smashed right through it.

The next thing I knew, we were on the other side of it and going down a winding, dusty road looking for Tori. We saw a car up ahead with headlights on and stopped behind it. We ran up to the car and looked in and saw a body laying face down. Then, all of a sudden, there was a scream, and we jumped back.

Up underneath the girl, a guy showed his face. “Yo', man what you guys doing out here?” He reached under his seat and pulled his pistol.

“Look, man, we ain't mean no harm, okay. I'm looking for somebody, and I thought she might be up in this car.”

His eyes were squinted because Jalen's lights were burning the hell out of them. He went back and forth, pointing the gun at us. “You sure that's all this is?”

“Yeah, man, we're sure,” Jalen assured him.

He looked at us again. “You see anything?”

“Like what?” Jalen wanted to know.

“What you looking for?” He looked at us again and put his pistol down.

We moved away from the car.

“There's nothing else around here, Jalen.”

“Let's go over to the other side.”

We ran to the car, and Jalen smashed on the gas and peeled out to the other side of the park, where we sat for a few minutes. Then, at the very end of the park, we noticed a car parked with the back end toward us.

“That's got to be Tori in there, Jalen.”

“Yup.”

“Pull all the way up, man, all the way up.”

Driving up to the car was creepy. Jalen was driving slowly, and the rocks under the tires made the whole situation more intense. When Jalen stopped the car, we walked up to it and looked in. Tori was in the backseat with her eyes closed.

I opened the door. “Tori? Tori?”

“Is she dead,
L
?”

“Tori?” I called out like three times. I was scared to touch her, but I did anyway. Touched her face then put my hand on her chest to see if she was breathing. “Tori? Tori? Tori, are you okay? Tori, answer me, damn it!”

She finally responded. “
L
, is that you?
L . . .
”

“She's alive,
L
! She's alive! C'mon, man, pick her up and get her in the car!” Jalen shouted.

We were not wasting anytime trying to call an ambulance to take her to the hospital. She looked weak and was barely breathing and crying out for her mother and sisters.

She had her head on my lap in the backseat as Jalen pushed it hard to the hospital. I could barely hear Tori, but what I did hear, I didn't like at all. She kept saying they wouldn't stop, and when I looked down toward her legs, she had marks on the inside of her thighs that looked like razor cuts.

The hospital took her away from us right away.

When we went outside to move the car, there were close to thirty policemen pointing their guns at us, telling us to kiss the pavement. We did exactly what they told us.

By the time the police stopped asking us questions about how we found Tori, it was way over an hour later. We got back into the hospital and saw Tori's mom there, all of her sisters, my mother, and, of all people, Toy.

My mother stood up and gave me a hug when we walked into the waiting room. “Boy, are you all right?”

“Yeah, Ma, I'm cool.”

“Langston, why didn't you call us to let us know where you were going? You could have been hurt out there.”

“We didn't have the time,” Jalen let her know. “All we wanted to do was get Tori back.”

“Boys ain't never listened to me, since you walked all the way to Carl Brown IGA together when you were five years old to get them damn cream pies.”

Tori's mother stood up and gave us a hug. She was so happy that Tori was still alive. When I asked how Tori was doing, she didn't tell me more than I already knew. Tori was weak and barely breathing, but the doctors said that she would make it and put her in intensive care, just in case.

I moved over into the corner with Jalen. “Yo', we not letting this slide,” I told him.

“Oh, hell to the naah. I'm already on it,
L
. Ain't no way we letting Tori get played like this.”

“Did you see all those cuts on her?”

“Somebody took a razor to her. She's in pain.”

“Well, when I find out who did it, they ain't going to know what pain is.”

“
L
, we going to find out, okay, but when we do, you need to step back on it. You don't need to know what happens or when it happens 'cause it's going to be on the gruesome tip.”

I didn't want to hear what Jalen was saying, but I knew he was only watching out for me and my future, like he'd always done.

“Yeah, yeah, okay.”

Toy decided to interrupt us. “What I tell you,” he said. “My word is bond.”

“What you want, Toy?” I asked him.

“I'm your agent, so I don't need to want a gotdamn thing to come talk to you. You are my responsibility, but at the moment, I have something for you. Here is your copy of your contract. Keep it in a safe place.”

I snatched it out of his hand and gave it to Jalen to hold for me.

“Look, if I find out you had anything to do with Tori getting hurt, I'm going to—”

“Listen, your young ass is starting off on the wrong foot,” Toy said, cutting me off. “You know I don't get down like that. And please don't ask me to reveal who told me where you could find her. You know the code in the street, and that's the code we living by on this one.”

“Yeah, I got your code,” I told him.

“Mmm-hmm. That's what I thought,” he snarled. “Now, listen, the overseas draft is little less than two weeks away. I need to sit down and talk to you about some things before that time.”

I just gave him a blank stare.

“Look, I know we got started off on the wrong foot but, young buck, believe me—You done signed, and your ass need to go pro now. There is no turning back. You got that?”

I didn't like it, but Toy was right. My plans to keep college an option were gone. I had signed with an agent and I had to play overseas. I had to do me in a big way now, and I had to play the game. “Yeah, I got it,” I said back.

Toy looked over at Jalen. “What about you?”

“Just do your job and get out of my face.”

“But I'm still calling the shots, Toy. You understand that? Any and everything that goes down is my call,” I let him know.

“No doubt,” Toy said.

“So, Toy, what brings you over? I didn't know you were so into things happening in the family.”

I guess our little meeting in the waiting room was way too much for my mother not to be included.

“Reecy, now you know I'm always concerned when your boy needs some support. Besides, didn't
L
tell you the good news?”

My mother looked up at me and Jalen turned his back as if looking in another direction. “What news?”

“He signed with me today,” Toy said. “I'm your son's new agent.”

I spent as much time as I could in the waiting room hoping Tori would get enough strength to really talk to me. I was only getting about four hours of sleep each night. Because nothing is ever written in stone until the final contract is signed, Toy set up workouts for several other overseas teams just in case something went wrong with Barcelona.

On the day of another workout, I woke up smelling breakfast.

“Ma, thanks for the food.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

I looked over at her. She was sitting watching television on the couch, but the kitchen was so close, I could see her just fine.

“You want to come out to my workout today? I'm 'bout to bust that ass today.”

“No, thank you.”

“What? Why not?”

“I didn't think you wanted me around in your business dealings anymore.”

“What do you mean?”

“How could you sign with that fool, Toy?”

“It was just something I had to do.”

It was the very first time I hadn't been honest to my mother about my basketball career, and I didn't feel good about it. I didn't want to get her involved, though, because getting Tori back was the reason I signed the agreement, nothing more. If my mother had found out that Toy blackmailed me, she would have gone to see him with that little pistol she kept in her nightstand. I didn't think it was worth getting her in trouble, so I just decided to keep why I signed with Toy on the hush.

“Had to do? What do you mean by that?”

“It was just something I decided to do. Ma, look, Toy's been around. He knows a few people in the league. Plus, the pressure was starting to get to me. It's only a three-year deal.”

“But I don't like him, Langston. Toy has been in some scandalous mess around here, and by the way, I see it. He hasn't changed that much.”

By the time I finished talking to my mother, she eased a bit. I promised her I wouldn't let him ruin my career, and that things would be okay, but she still didn't like that I'd signed with Toy.

Jalen came over to take me out to the gym, and my mother put a smile on her face, and decided to come along. She hated riding in Jalen's car. She kept asking him, “If you have to start the car like that, how do you turn it off?”

It was good to hear her giving Jalen attitude. Things were getting back to normal.

I wanted to see Tori for a quick second before I went into the gym, so Jalen swung around to the hospital first.

 

 

“What do you mean, she doesn't want to see him?” Jalen asked the nurse after they wouldn't let me back to Tori's room.

“She has a list of people she doesn't want to see at the moment, and Langston Holiday is on the list.”

My mother asked to see the list, and the nurse gave it to her. “Well, my name isn't on it. Let me go see her. I'll be right back.”

About twenty minutes later, she came back.

I could tell she had been crying. “Ma, what's up?”

“She just needs some time,
L
.”

“She doesn't want to see me?” I started to move toward her room.

My mother grabbed my arm. “Baby, she can't right now.”

“Why not?”

“She was raped.”

I almost fainted. “Raped?”

“Yes, she's not well, and she doesn't want to see any men right now.”

I felt a tear fall down my face. “Not even me? She don't want to see me?”

After my mother explained to me what happened to Tori, there was no way I was going to work out for the scout. All my energy was sucked out of me, and I felt paralyzed and unable to think about anything I needed to be doing. All that rah-rah, go-get-them bull the scouts used to pump me up wasn't going to work.

I needed to get away, and that's exactly what we did.

 

 

“Man, she said it was at least ten of them, Jalen.”

“
L
, I can't even imagine that happening to Tori. No wonder she don't want to see us.”

We were sitting in Jalen's car. He had just scored some brew, and there was no way he was going to keep me away from drinking with him.

“It ain't right, man,” I told him.

“As long as I have known Tori, the only person she has ever fucked with is me. ‘Jalen, yo' car a mess. Jalen, leave those tricks alone. Jalen, where is your homework. My sister, man.”

“Bad things always seem to happen to good people.”

“I could care less about graduating now. I mean, she won't even be there.”

“All those big plans,” Jalen said with a faraway look. Then he drank down some brew.

“All Tori talked about was strutting across the stage like a model.”

“You know she was going to do it,
L
. She was goin' to kill 'em. Hell, she ain't dead, but I'm pouring out for her. This her taste. This going to lift her up for real.” Jalen took his beer and pointed it toward the sky then let a drop fall to the ground. “That's for you, girl!”

Out of nowhere Toy appeared and looked into the window of my side of the car. “You mind telling me what you two retards are doin'?”

“What it look like? We don't answer to you; you answer to us,” I let him know.

“Roll up on us again like that, and I'm telling you, you're not going to like what happens,” Jalen told him. “I think he need to get that straight,
L
, or nothing ever going to get done in this camp.”

Toy began to laugh, but his smile was fake, and then it turned into a snarl. “You muthafuckas don't know anything, do you? If you haven't realized, no matter how you want to slice and dice it, I'm the leader of this bitch. I am the one making the deal for your contracts. I'm the one talking on your behalf for endorsements. Fools, never bite the hand that feeds you. You got that?”

“Toy, I think you been drinking, man. I mean, I know I can't fire you for the next three years, but I tell you this—You can go get a deal with IBM, Gatorade, or Ford, and I don't have to sign a damn thing.”

“True that,
L
,” Jalen said, “but add Cadillac on his ass too, since he like to ride so nice.” Jalen began to laugh. “So who really running things now, with your corny ass?” Then he took a sip of his beer, making an irritating slurping sound.

“Look, y'all young bucks think you something 'cause you got a few rappers and players in the league phone numbers on speed dial. But let me tell you something. Everybody know Toy. They know me 'cause I should have played in the league and gotten what I just got your ripe, young ass, Langston.”

“Man, what are you talking about?” Jalen wanted to know.

“I'm talking about the seventeen-million-dollar shoe contract that's being faxed to my office as we speak.”

Jalen sat up and burped after another sip of brew. “Seventeen million?”

I couldn't even talk. My tongue would not move. Toy looked at me. “Now, mister man, be your ass funny and don't sign that.”

Come to find out, Toy had made the deal with a bigwig up at New Funk Apparel who he'd roomed with in his college days. They were kicking off their new line and told him the only way they were going to reach the young urban market was to sign a baller who knew the streets and could relate to their brand. When I asked Toy why he didn't let me know about the deal in the works, he said he wasn't going to tell me about it when I wasn't signed to him, then give me the opportunity to go behind his back and broker a deal myself. And that's exactly what I would have done.

I just didn't trust Toy, but his deal was sweet, and it was a good first step to, at least, start giving him a little bit of credit.

We went home to tell my mother the news.

 

 

“Why y'all smiling so much?”

We were standing in the living room, and she was still working on some knitting or something she said she was going to sell on the streets.

“
L
and Jalen, if you don't tell me why those grins are on your faces, I'm goin' to—”

“Ma, you ain't going to believe this.”

“No. What you two ain't going to believe if you don't get from in front of my TV is how much I can still spank that ass.”

Jalen looked at me and started to laugh.

“Now what is it?”

“Ma, I just got offered a seventeen-million-dollar shoe contract!”

If I only had a camera to capture the look on her face.