The next Friday night, Juniper’s sister, Rose, came home from college again. Her entire family was excited to see her. They couldn’t wait to hear all about her adventures at school. As they ate dinner, Rose told stories about her college basketball team.
Rose scooped piles of mashed potatoes on her plate as she talked. “So, every player on the team was the best player from her own hometown,” she said. “One day, we decided to have a contest to see who could make the most three-pointers in a row.”
Juniper watched Rose grab another chicken leg and pile more broccoli on her plate. Rose had told them earlier that the dorm food was terrible.
“So, we all took a turn,” she continued. “Shot after shot, until there was only me and two other girls left who hadn’t missed. We were at five in a row each.”
The entire Jackson family leaned forward. They were eager to hear how her story would end.
“I shot first,” Rose said, taking a huge bite of peas. “Swish. It went in as smooth as butter.”
Juniper’s dad beamed, “That’s my girl. It’s all that extra practice I made you do.”
Rose rolled her eyes at her dad.
Juniper laughed.
“Sure, Dad,” Rose said. “You are the best coach and father, yada, yada.”
He chuckled at Rose poking fun. He seemed more relaxed when Rose was around.
“Anyway, I made my shot,” Rose continued. “Then the next girl went. The ball hit the rim and bounced out.”
“Then came Jasmine. She is not friendly,” said Rose. “She’s one of those girls who can’t ever be happy for someone else.” Rose looked over at Juniper and asked, “You know that type of girl?”
“Do I ever,” Juniper said. She looked down at her plate, thinking of Veronica and her minions.
“So Jasmine lines up her arm and is about to let go,” Rose said, pausing for effect. “And just at that moment, a huge poster fell from the side of the gym! It clattered to the ground right beside us. We all jumped and screamed.”
Juniper watched Rose tear off another hunk of chicken with her teeth.
“Jasmine was startled, and the ball went wonky in the air,” Rose said, her mouth full of food. “It was like even the universe didn’t want her to win.”
The entire family laughed.
“Well, that wasn’t the weirdest thing,” Rose said. “The weirdest thing was that I actually felt bad about laughing at Jasmine.”
Juniper stopped mid-bite. Now she felt bad for laughing.
“So I let her shoot again,” Rose said, looking specifically at Juniper.
“What happened?” Juniper asked.
“She won,” Rose said simply, chewing. “She made two more in a row. I only made one. But then she congratulated me and, actually, she’s one of my closest friends now. Girls are strange.”
“That’s great, honey,” her mother said. She looked proudly at her oldest daughter.
Juniper was amazed. She thought about what it might be like to try to be nice to Veronica. It would be hard.
Juniper gazed around at her family.
Her dad was laughing at something Rose had said. Her mom grinned at the both of them. Juniper loved it when her family was together like that. She wished Rose still lived at home.
After the girls cleaned up the dishes, Rose snapped a wet towel at Juniper’s leg. She barely missed. “Wanna go shoot some hoops little sister?” Rose asked.
“Sure,” Juniper said. “But I’m taller than you. So, really, who’s the little sister?”
* * *
Juniper passed Rose the basketball. It was twilight, and the sun had slid behind a cloud. The sky was a mixture of pink and purple streaks. A mourning dove cooed. The world felt peaceful to Juniper.
Except that she was losing at H-O-R-S-E.
Juniper had an R. Rose had only an H.
Juniper sunk one in from all the way across the driveway.
“Nice shot, little sister,” Rose taunted and bounced the ball on the asphalt. “You’ve improved these last few months.”
Juniper scowled. “Tell Dad that,” she said.
“Uh-oh. Is he still getting on you a lot?” Rose asked. She lined up where Juniper had made her shot. She aimed and let go. The ball arced through the air, circled the rim, and finally went in. “Yes!” Rose shouted. She pumped her fist.
“Lucky shot,” said Juniper. “And yeah, you could say dad is getting on me a lot,” Juniper said.
“Oh man,” Rose said. “Seventh grade was the toughest year,” She dribbled behind her back and then passed the ball to Juniper. “He was so nice to everyone else and so hard on me.”
Facing away from the rim, Juniper threw the ball into a backward arc toward the basket.
The ball bounced out.
“It’s like I can barely ever do anything right for him,” Juniper said. “And he puts so much pressure on me because I’m tall. Or because I’m his daughter, I suppose.”
It was Rose’s turn. She lobbed up a perfect hook shot through the air. It swished in like magic.
Juniper groaned. That was going to be a hard one to replicate.
Rose said, “You know he was a short kid, right?” She passed to Juniper.
“Yeah, I knew that,” Juniper said. She caught the flying ball as it whizzed toward her.
“But did you know that in seventh grade,” Rose said, “he was a benchwarmer? It wasn’t like it is now, where everybody gets in. He spent a whole season on the bench.”
“Really?” Juniper said. She paused to look at her sister.
“Can you imagine?” Rose said. “Sitting on the bench all year? Working your tail off in practice and never once getting to go into the game?”
“He did tell me he almost quit playing after that year,” Juniper said.
“Yeah,” Rose said. “I thought about that a lot when he was being extra bossy.” She grinned up at her little sister.
Their shadows spread out beneath them on the sidewalk. Juniper’s shadow was lean and long and inches taller than Rose’s.
“You’ve grown a lot this year,” Rose said. “You’ve got to be, what, eight feet tall by now?”
“Probably,” Juniper said. “Look, even my shadow is as skinny and tall as a flagpole.”
“I grew a lot in seventh grade, too,” Rose said. “It was awesome.”
“Awesome?” Juniper said. “You mean that you actually liked being tall when you were younger? For real?”
“Of course! Back then, even the boys wanted me on their basketball team. I was way taller than any of them.”
Juniper thought about her sister playing on a seventh grade boys team and laughed. She then thought about how she was wasting her height by being ashamed of it. She thought about what the science teacher saying about her being able to command attention. Her height made her different. But maybe different could come in handy.
Juniper threw the hook shot over her head to try and match Rose’s shot.
Swish!
“Woo-hoo!” Juniper shouted.
Rose gave her a high five. They continued to play their game, giggling and teasing each other. Juniper thought about how much fun it was when she didn’t think about having to be the best. She wondered if it had been her dad making her feel that pressure. Or maybe she’d been doing it to herself all along.
Rose missed an easy layup and fell to the ground in mock agony. Juniper cracked up until she had to clutch her sides in pain. The sisters howled and rolled until tears came to their eyes. The neighbor dogs started barking at the ruckus.
When they recovered, they got up and put in shot after shot. Juniper thought all the while about physics theories and angles. About rotation theories and the wonderful symmetry of it all. She ended up losing to her sister by one letter. She didn’t care, though.
For the first time in a while, basketball felt beautiful. It was like a symphony, with all the instruments lined up. The ball. Her giraffe legs. The basket. Her sister’s flawlessly arced shots. It was perfect in its own unruly way.
Juniper couldn’t remember the last time she’d had that much fun playing basketball. Neither girl noticed their dad watching them closely from an open window.
Neither girl noticed the gloomy look on his face.
Later that night, Juniper got up to get a glass of water. She overheard Rose and her dad talking in the living room. Juniper crept closer and stayed as quiet as possible.
“I think you’ve got to take it a little easier on her,” Rose said.
“What do you mean?” their dad said.
“I mean, it’s really hard being your kid on your team,” said Rose.
Juniper could feel her heart hammering in her chest. She couldn’t believe Rose was confronting him. She also didn’t want to get caught eavesdropping.
“Was I really too hard on you?” their dad said.
“Let’s just say I was glad you were only my coach for one year,” Rose said.
There was a long pause.
“She did say something strange to me the other day,” he said finally. “She said we used to have fun playing basketball.”
“Basketball has got to be fun at least some of the time,” Rose said. “Right?”
I was watching you two out in the driveway tonight,” their dad said. “I haven’t seen Junebug look that happy playing ball in awhile.”
Juniper had heard enough. She tiptoed back up the stairs as quietly as she could on her big feet.