Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The gym always smelled the same in the morning—cleaned hardwood, a trace of sweat that never fully left and that faint rubber bite from old basketballs.
It was a scent Mac trusted. She’d been here early enough that the building was still waking up.
The hallway lights were brighter than they needed to be, and the air carried that cool, conditioned hush before bodies warmed it.
The girls started drifting in sneakers squeaking, the low chatter of high school life trailing with them.
Mac stood at midcourt with a ball tucked at her hip and watched them loosen up, some on the baseline with band work, some shooting half speed, one girl sitting on the floor to tape an ankle as if it was a ritual she’d done a hundred times. It had probably become one.
Connor’s sister wasn’t loud, exactly. She just moved with certainty, like she knew where she belonged.
Mac had noticed Addie last week. Not because she was the best player in the gym—she wasn’t. Not yet. But because she played with her eyes up. Because she didn’t panic when the floor shifted. Because she adjusted.
“Okay,” Mac called, clapping once. The sound snapped the room into place. “Circle up.”
They gathered, a little sloppy, a little eager.
“You’re scrimmaging today,” she said. “Full speed. I want you to treat it like it matters without acting like it’s life-or-death. You can do both.”
A few girls nodded like they understood. Mac rolled the ball lightly under her foot and scanned faces. “We’re going to run a simple set. Nothing fancy. But you’re going to run it right.”
She pointed to a girl with a tight braid and sharp shoulders. “You’re point. You’ll call it.”
To Addie, she said, “You’re on the wing. You’re going to feel like you’re invisible for the first thirty seconds. You won’t be.”
Addie’s mouth twitched as if she didn’t know whether to smile or take that as a warning.
Mac tossed the ball to the point guard. “Let’s go.”
The first few possessions were what Mac expected—fast, noisy, full of extra movement. Too much dribbling. Eyes dropping. Girls trying to prove something every time they touched the ball.
Mac stopped them twice. Corrected footwork. Reminded them to talk. Made them run it again.
By the third run-through, they started to settle. The gym sounds shifted. Less chaos. More rhythm.
Mac jogged along the sideline, tracking spacing, calling out names, offering quick cues.
“Cut through, don’t drift.”
“Talk early.”
“Two feet. Two feet.”
She wasn’t playing. Not officially. But she’d been drawn into these scrimmages before, stepping in for a possession when she needed to demonstrate timing or to show what reading the floor actually looked like. The girls listened differently when she moved.
Today, she felt…open. Not loose. Not sloppy. Just less braced than she usually was.
That should have been a good thing.
The point guard called the set again, and Mac stepped in at the top for one possession, mostly to give the girls a clean read.
The ball swung to the wing, and Addie came up like she was supposed to.
Mac signaled with her eyes—just a flick.
The kind of communication that wasn’t learned by reading a playbook.
Addie caught it, squared and hesitated half a beat. Mac saw the defense shift and made the cut she’d made a thousand times.
Only this time, she went a fraction too early.
Not much. Not enough for anyone else to notice as a mistake.
Enough for the lane to close.
Enough for Addie’s pass to arrive in a space that wasn’t there anymore.
Mac’s hand met air.
The ball slapped the floor behind her and rolled toward the baseline, bouncing once, twice, then settling near the wall like it had decided to stay out of it.
For a second, the gym went quiet in the way that happened when teenagers were startled by adult imperfection.
Mac straightened, breathing steady. She didn’t look at the ball. She didn’t look at Addie. She looked at the defense, at the spacing, at the angle of the cut.
Then she nodded, once.
“Freeze,” she said.
The girls stopped in midmotion, sneakers squeaking, bodies caught in awkward stances.
Mac walked to the spot where she’d cut and pointed at the defender’s hip. “Right here. See this?”
A few heads tilted.
“You’re reading the ball,” she said, voice calm. “But you have to read bodies. If she’s already cheating to the lane, you don’t win that cut by going faster. You win it by going later. Make her commit.”
She glanced at Addie. “You weren’t wrong to hesitate.”
Addie blinked. “I—”
“You felt it,” Mac said. “Trust that feeling. Most of you are trying to convince yourselves you’re wrong before you’ve even tested the feeling.”
She turned back to the group. “Run it again. Same set. But this time, you’re going to wait until you know the lane is yours.”
No one argued. No one laughed.
They moved back into position, and the gym’s rhythm restarted.
Mac jogged to the sideline, but something tight and private pressed against her ribs. She kept her face neutral, her tone even, her hands steady.
She’d made it a teaching moment.
It hadn’t been staged.
And she knew—she’d been a beat behind her own instincts—and she knew exactly why it bothered her.
The scrimmage kept going. The girls adjusted. They started to see it—how the floor opened when they didn’t rush it, how a cut wasn’t just effort but timing. Addie hit a clean corner three that made the whole group whoop, and Mac couldn’t help the smile that tugged at her mouth.
She clapped once. “Yes. That.”
By the time she blew the whistle to end it, everyone was sweaty and flushed and laughing in that relieved way that meant they’d worked hard and survived it.
“Water,” Mac called. “Two minutes. Then we’ll cool down.”
The girls scattered.
Addie stayed close, hovering near the scorer’s table as if she had something to say but didn’t want to say it in front of everyone.
Mac grabbed her own water bottle and leaned against the wall, watching the girls talk over one another.
She felt the mistake still in her body—tiny, almost weightless, but there. Like a thread snagged on the edge of her awareness.
Addie stepped closer. “Hey, Mac?”
Mac turned. “Yeah.”
Addie’s cheeks were pink from exertion, hair coming loose from its tie. She looked younger right now than she had while playing.
“Um.” Addie pulled at the edge of her shirt. “I was wondering. Are you coming to the fish fry on Friday?”
Mac’s stomach did something small and immediate, like it recognized a pressure before her mind did.
“Fish fry,” she repeated, buying a second.
“Yeah,” Addie said. “At our house. I just assumed you and my brother—” She stopped. “He didn’t say. I just assumed.”
Mac kept her expression light. She’d spent years learning how to keep her reaction from showing on her face.
“I don’t usually plan that far ahead,” she said. “I’m not sure yet.”
Addie nodded, too quickly. “Oh. Okay.”
Mac wanted to soften her response, to make it seem less like a no.
“I’ll let you know,” she said—and meant it.
She didn’t need to answer yet, and for once, she trusted that.
Addie brightened a fraction. “Yeah. Okay. Cool.”
She backed away, already turning toward her friends, the question dropped as if it hadn’t mattered. But Mac could see the slight hitch in her shoulders, the way she tucked it away.
Mac watched her go, and the old reflex woke up—the one that wanted to make sure she hadn’t disappointed anyone. The one that wanted to run after a kid and fix a feeling before it settled into something heavier.
She didn’t move.
She let the discomfort exist—and noticed how much of it came from wanting this to matter without letting it decide her.
That was the new thing.
Across the gym, Clay Chapin appeared in the door, coffee in one hand, phone in the other, scanning the gym like a school principal who lived in a constant low-grade schedule.
He lifted the coffee cup in greeting. “That looked good.”
Mac nodded. “They’re working.”
He walked closer, stopping beside her. His eyes flicked to the girls, to Addie laughing now, to the way the group had stayed engaged even after the scrimmage ended.
“I appreciate you doing this,” he said, quieter. “I know it’s…above and beyond.”
Mac swallowed. The phrase touched something in her that had been used against her before, even when it was meant kindly.
“It’s fine,” she said.
Clay angled his body slightly toward her, lowering his voice the way people did when they thought they were being respectful. “I’m still hoping you’ll consider the offer to teach and coach this fall.”
Mac kept her gaze on the gym. “It’s on my radar.”
“The deadline’s end of July,” he added, as if she might have forgotten. As if dates weren’t the easiest thing to turn into weights.
“I know,” she said.
Clay hesitated, then nodded once. “All right. I won’t bug you about it. Just…think about it.”
Mac didn’t answer. Not because she was being rude, but because she’d learned that every extra word invited negotiation.
Clay walked away.
Mac stared at the far wall for a second, letting the layers of pressure settle. Paula’s call. Clay’s deadline. Addie’s casual assumption about Friday.
It wasn’t big. None of it was big.
That was almost the hardest part.
Connor walked in ten minutes later.
He came through the side door like he belonged there now—keys in hand, hoodie on, hair still damp from a shower. He paused just inside, scanning the court.
Mac’s body reacted before her mind did. A loosening. A recognition. Not excitement, exactly. Something steadier.
Connor spotted her and smiled, the same unrehearsed one from his porch.
“Hey,” he called.
A couple of the girls looked up. A few giggled. Addie rolled her eyes at the girls like they were embarrassing.
Mac’s chest tightened.
Connor crossed the gym, stopping in front of her. He glanced at the girls. “How’d it go?”
Mac kept her tone even. “Good.”
He nodded. “You look like you worked.”
“Yeah.”
Connor’s eyes searched hers for a second, then he softened his voice. “Everything okay?”
Mac could have said yes.
She could have said nothing.
Instead, she said, “Your sister asked if I’m coming to a fish fry on Friday.”
Connor blinked, surprise flickering across his face, followed by something warmer that didn’t quite make it to his mouth before he caught it.
“She did?” he said.
Mac watched him closely. “At your parents’ house.”
Connor huffed a small laugh. “We have lots of fish. My dad took Parker fishing, and now it’s time to fry those walleyes.”
There it was again, that sense of something almost said, then held.
“She asked if I was coming,” Mac said.
“I’d like you to come,” Connor said. “I was planning to ask you tonight. Addie beat me to it.”
Mac held his gaze. “Okay.”
“Okay?” He leaned a shoulder against the wall beside her, not touching her, but close enough for her to register. Present without claiming space.
“I’d love to go to the fish fry,” she said. Then, after a breath, she added, “With you.”
He grinned. “It’s a date.”
Mac watched the girls grab their bags and start filtering out, still talking about plays, about shots, about who had gotten crossed up and who had redeemed themselves. Addie hung back for a second, then jogged toward Connor.
Addie glanced at Mac. “Sorry if I made it weird.”
“You didn’t,” Mac said.
“Hey,” she said to Connor. “Why hadn’t you asked her yet?”
Connor gave his sister’s ponytail a tug. “Someone didn’t give me a chance.”
“Sorry.” Her gaze shifted to Mac. “So, are you coming?”
Mac saw Connor close his eyes.
She smiled. “I’ll see you there.”
As Addie jogged off, Connor exhaled slowly, then looked back at Mac.
“I’m glad you said yes,” he said.
“I’m glad you asked.” Mac smiled. “I love walleye.”
When he smiled back, the pressure in her chest shifted—not gone, but manageable.
“Me, too.”