Curtis stood in center court taking a mental count of all of the players who were on time and present for this practice. Everyone but June Bug Washington and DeMarcus Brown was here and ready to do what had to be done to get ready for Tuesday’s game. It was clear just by his looking at the young men standing before him that they were going to put a hurting on Bouclair College and earn their rightful place in the play-offs at the SNAC Basketball Conference during March Madness. They had not forgotten the brutal beatdown they’d suffered at the hands of Bouclair when they played them earlier in the season. And now, after weeks of hard-core preparation, the Fighting Panthers of Evangeline T. Marshall University were ready to go out on that court and turn Bouclair College every which way but loose.
Both Curtis and Maurice were confident that the Lord was going to bless them with victory and that they were going to win this game. How it happened, how close or how wide the score would be, was something they couldn’t and didn’t care to know. But what they did know was that victory was imminent. It couldn’t be any other way. As Trina had written in her e-mail to both him and Maurice this morning—how could God get the glory if they were defeated by Bouclair College?
They were on the side of the Lord and Sonny Todd was of the world. How could it possibly be any other way? No matter what it may have looked like to the natural eye and as a result of natural circumstances, it could not and would not be any other way. This was supported by the Word of God. And it wasn’t any secret that God’s Word did not return void. God was not going to let the enemy win and get up in Eva T. to run a reign of terror and ultimately destroy the basketball program Curtis and Maurice were working so hard to rebuild.
Coach Sonny Todd Kilpatrick may have won every game he played. But he destroyed every program he ran. His players rarely received their degrees. The incarceration rates for the teams he coached were way too high for college students. He did not put any significant amounts of money back into the programs he worked for. And in all of the years that Sonny Todd had coached, he had only two NBA draft picks under his belt—one of the two was dead as a result of a shootout in the player’s old neighborhood with a rival gang member.
And as Charles Robinson and Bay Bowzer had recently discovered, many of Sonny Todd’s wins were actually losses. Bay Bowzer had gone down in the back alleyways of black college basketball. He discovered that Sonny Todd had a very elaborate system of picking and buying off the referees for each game he was concerned about losing. Consequently, Bay and Charles managed to get a jump on old boy when they bought back the refs for Tuesday’s game—paying them double to be honest over what Sonny Todd had paid them to cheat, and therefore tripling their take at this next game.
Charles and Bay had Pierre cracking up when they told him what they’d done. Then Charles said, “I cannot wait to see old boy’s face go old-school-white-boy red when those referees get to making the right calls during the game. You know the red-face flush I’m talking about when a white boy like Sonny Todd gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar.”
Pierre pulled out a C-note. “My bet is that he’ll lose at the end of the third quarter.”
“I’ll raise you a hundred. Because it’ll happen somewhere during the second quarter,” Charles said and laid two hundred-dollar bills on his desk.
“You both are going to lose your money,” Bay told them and laid five hundred dollars on the table. “He is going to bust a gasket towards the end of the first quarter. Y’all in or are you too punked out to go there with me?”
“Oh … Hell naw …” Charles said and laid another four hundred dollars on the table. “I ain’t nevah skeered. What about you, Pierre? You want to teach this youngblood a lesson or two about doing business with us?”
“I’m in, Boss,” Pierre said, and put down five hundred dollars.
“All I can say,” Bay told them as he put down his extra hundred dollars, “is that I am going to have a very very merry merry Christmas on da house.”
The team was hyped about this game and had done and was doing everything that Coach told them to do. There was too much to lose if they didn’t win this game—and so much to gain from a win over Bouclair College. First, due to Bouclair’s high ranking in the league, the team who beat them automatically won that spot in the Conference play-off games. And second, the team knew that such a win would raise their status in their league—which translated into attracting NBA scouts from across the country.
Because what a lot of folks didn’t know about Curtis’s best players was that they all had NBA potential. His top draft picks were Apostle Grady Grey’s son, Sherron, who although only six feet six was the top center in the state. Then point guard Kaylo Bailey, at five foot ten, would bring back fond memories of the days when Spud Webb set the courts on fire.
Curtis and Maurice glanced up at the clock. It was eight-thirty, the team had just completed their warm-up routine, and Coach Bivens and Coach Palmer had yet to arrive. Maurice pulled out his cell phone but Curtis shook his head. He needed them to be more than an hour late to make his next move.
It was the oddest feeling to experience God moving in his life in such a powerful and provocative manner through a basketball game. Curtis would have thought that “a mighty move of God” such as the gospel artist Norman Hutchins sang about with such fervor would come about through something dealing with traditional church life. But as Gran Gran had to tell him, this was not about “church” but the Kingdom of God. And since the Kingdom could not be confined to a building, no matter how sacred the edifice, it shouldn’t have surprised him that the Lord wanted to play this one out on center court.
The side door of the gymnasium opened. June Bug and DeMarcus strolled in, dressed to the nines in full-cut baggy designer jeans, their leather team jackets, and throw-back jerseys. Two of the cheerleaders that Maurice swore were the long-lost descendants of the biblical Jezebel were hanging on their arms. The squad captain, ShayeShaye Boswell, and her best friend, Larqueesha Watts, gave the other players a y’all are so lame sneer, and then went to sit on the benches even though this was a closed practice.
As Curtis made his way over to where they were sitting, he thought that those two had to be some serious skoochies. Because only overheated hoochie mamas could wear those tight lowrider jeans with identical black sweaters that came off the shoulder and stopped right under the curve of their breasts, revealing some buffed and cut abs and waistlines. As much as he couldn’t stand those little heifers, he had to admit they did look hot and good—and it was cold outside.
“You and your skoochies are excused,” Curtis told the four of them in an icy voice that made the brisk winds outside feel like a warm Caribbean breeze.
DeMarcus, who looked so much like his father, Reverend Marcel Brown, it was uncanny, stood up and stepped up to Curtis. “We have practice, Coach.”
“No, you don’t have practice, son. But we do,” Curtis told him firmly as he got up in DeMarcus’s face. He didn’t know who this little boy, with milk still on his breath, thought he was. But he was getting ready to find out who he wasn’t.
DeMarcus backed down and moved away from Curtis.
“My grandfather is not going to be happy,” June Bug said, trying to pick up where he felt DeMarcus should not have left off.
When he stepped up, Curtis put the palm of his hand on June Bug’s chest and shoved him back onto the bench with so little effort it scared the other players. They knew you didn’t mess with Coach Parker. But they didn’t know he had it like that.
Curtis pulled out his cell phone and flipped it open. He stared down at June Bug, who was trying desperately to collect himself and act as if that shove hadn’t hurt.
“Now you really have something to tell the bishop.” Curtis held the phone out toward June Bug. “Here, call him. It’s on me, son.”
June Bug didn’t say a word, just glared at Curtis with pure venom in his face. He hated Coach Parker and would have done anything, including throwing that game, to get back at him. He got up and said, “Let’s go. We don’t need to practice for the game ’cause we got plenty of game.”
“The only way any of you will be at that game is if you buy a ticket. You are no longer benched. You”—Curtis pointed to June Bug—“and you,” he continued, and pointed at DeMarcus, “are permanently dismissed from my team. So take your little hoochies and get out of my gym.”
Curtis walked off without so much as a thought to giving them a backward glance. The team had been glued to the middle of the gym, watching all of this play out. When Coach kicked them out, Sherron Grey said, “For the Lord Most High is awesome. He is the great King of all the earth. He subdues the nations before us, putting our enemies beneath our feet.”
“Amen,” Maurice shouted out, to be followed by several more “Amens” from the team. He loved it that the team captain was so filled up with the Word that he could pull those verses from Psalm 47 at the most perfect time.
Curtis waited until the side door slammed shut and then blew his whistle to get the team ready for the real practice. Quiet as it was kept, he was glad those two little negroes had shown their butts like they did. He hadn’t just wanted to bench them. He didn’t want them anywhere near this practice session because he did not want June Bug and DeMarcus watching their moves and strategies. He knew they couldn’t stand the ground he walked on, and they would sell out their entire team if it meant getting back at him.
He was about to do a practice run with half of the team pretending to be the most intimidating players on the Bouclair side, but was stopped dead in his tracks by Maurice. Kordell and Castilleo had just walked in through that same side door, and Curtis and Maurice didn’t want those two to watch this practice, either.
Maurice leaned over to Curtis and whispered, “Is that particular door some kind of portal to the Devil’s family room?”
Kordell walked over to Curtis and Maurice, adjusting his coach’s whistle as if he were really getting ready to do something. He said, “Why are your grandmother and her girls walking around the grounds of the Athletic Center with huge bottles of oil in their hands, praying and speaking in tongues?”
“If you want to know the answer to that question, I suggest you get on your knees and take it up with the Lord,” was all Curtis said.
“He can’t do that, dawg. Because he don’t know God’s number,” Maurice said.
“Oh, you got jokes, huh?” Kordell said.
Maurice didn’t answer him. He didn’t want this next level of business to take any more time than necessary.
Curtis started over to where Castilleo was still standing. He turned back and beckoned for Maurice and Kordell to follow him.
“We have some quick administration business to take care of before we get into the practice.”
Castilleo sat down on the bench and stirred his coffee.
“So, what is so important that we can’t get practice going in a timely manner?” Kordell said, as if he were the one running the show.
Curtis could not believe the presumption of this negro. He had planned to handle this matter in a professional manner but thought, Bump that, and said, “You and your boy here are fired.”
“You can’t fire us,” Castilleo protested. “We have contracts.”
“Not anymore” was all Curtis said.
Kordell’s eyes narrowed. He was playing it cool but he was panicking inside. He knew that if Curtis fired them like this, he had done his homework and his decision was based on an airtight contingency clause. He just wanted to know what it was.
“Castilleo’s right,” Kordell said calmly. “You can’t just up and fire a man with a contract without due cause. We can sue you and this entire university.”
Curtis glanced over at Maurice, who retrieved two envelopes from his coach’s playbook. He handed one envelope to Kordell and another one to Castilleo, and then waited for them to open them and study the photos.
“I see you went out to Sock It to Me last night.”
“And what if we did,” Castilleo spat out at him. He couldn’t see what pictures of them getting lap dances had anything to do with their jobs.
“Well, what if I told you that those girls on your laps are only fifteen years old? And then, what if I told you that the next set of photos shows you, Kordell, and your boy Rico pouring liquor for these little teenyboppers? And what if I told you that a sting is going down right now as I speak, out at Sock It to Me?”
“And what if I told you that if we were in trouble, we’d be in handcuffs about now,” Kordell shot back at Curtis, who just started laughing and then said:
“Okay, so what if I told you that the only reason you have on a black coach’s warm-up suit instead of an orange jumpsuit is because Yarborough Flowers is running the sting and will leave you alone if you and your boy pack up your mess and get to stepping to wherever it is that chumps like y’all go to?”
“He can’t do that without any real evidence.”
“So you think a fifteen-year-old giving you a lap dance and drinking liquor out of your pimp glass isn’t any real evidence in the eyes of the law?”
“Why don’t we start with statutory rape,” Maurice said.
“We didn’t sleep with those hos,” Kordell said smoothly.
“You didn’t but he did,” Curtis said, wondering why Castilleo couldn’t tell that little girl was underage. Everything about her screamed jailbait.
Castilleo’s eyes got real big and that fool blurted out, “But I paid her, man. I thought—”
Before Castilleo could finish, Kordell hopped up and knocked him to the floor. Hot coffee went everywhere.
“I told you,” Kordell said in between a series of blows. “I told you not to pay that girl and to wait …”
By now the team had gathered around to watch this fight. They were athletes and a good coach-to-coach fight didn’t upset them much. They’d seen a few good ones between Coach and one or two coaches Curtis didn’t like. But a fight between coaches on the same team? And over some underage booty? That was a fight worth seeing.
As far as those young men were concerned, both Coach Bivens and Coach Palmer deserved to be fired and have a foot crammed up their butts. They were all under the age of twenty-three, and they knew better than to pay for anything other than admission, a dance, and for those twenty-one and over, something to drink at a strip club. And they also knew that underage girls slipped in, and they had learned to spot them out.
Plus, Sherron Grey’s daddy had told him which clubs were breeding grounds for legal trouble. Sherron was saved and didn’t go to the strip clubs but he made sure that his teammates knew where to go, and which clubs to stay clear of. And Sherron knew, just from talking to his daddy and godfather, Big Dotsy, that if there was one place no decent, self-respecting, and thinking brother should go to, it was Sock It to Me—everybody on the club scene knew that. It was a miracle that Coach Palmer wasn’t lying up in the morgue with his throat slit after laying up with one of the women at that place.
When Castilleo’s voice reached a feminine pitch, Curtis and Maurice pulled Kordell up off of him. Maurice helped Castilleo to his feet, and then smacked him upside the head.
“That was for the baby girl you should have kept your hands off of.”
“She was a ho,” Castilleo said.
“She was somebody’s lost child,” Curtis snapped. “And I guess you were dead intent on taking the baby straight to Hell. I feel sorry for you. Because you have a lot to answer for.”
“I would, if I believed that hype about God and retribution. I’ve seen too many people do what they please and not have one thing happen to them.”
“Keep living, son” was all Curtis said. “But in the meantime, you and your boy get out and don’t come back.”
Castilleo staggered out of the gym smelling like stale, dried-up coffee. Kordell made an attempt to walk out like all that had gone down wasn’t about nothing he needed to be concerned about. But as soon as he got to his car, he put in a call to his boys—Rico, Paulo, and Larry. Those pictures Curtis and Maurice had were just the tip of the iceberg. He grabbed a tissue and wiped at the sweat that was dripping off his head.
As soon as the door closed, Curtis turned to the team in a feeble effort to try and get something accomplished at this practice. They had a game to play and win, and had not gone over one decent play. He took a deep breath and sighed, wondering how they were going to work this out in the time they had left.
The door opened on the opposite side of the gym and Gran Gran, Miss Queen Esther, Miss Baby Doll, and several other members of The Prayer Warriors came in carrying those big Sam’s Club–size bottles of oil. It wasn’t olive oil, either. They had real anointing oil that could only have been special-ordered from Theresa Green’s store.
Doreatha Parker had been so busy interceding in prayer for her grandbaby that she hadn’t seen the boy in weeks. And that was odd because they hated not seeing each other for too long. But the Lord had her sequestered in prayer, and didn’t release her to see Curtis until this morning. Doreatha was a seasoned soldier of the Cross. And when the Lord gave her instructions, she obeyed. Years ago she would have asked the Lord some questions. But now, when God told her to do something, she did it—no questions asked.
“Gran Gran,” Curtis said and went over to hug her. He wanted to run but that was so uncool. Right now she was definitely a sight for sore eyes. And she couldn’t have come at a better time.
Doreatha, who was tall for a woman her age, and a feminine version of her grandson, wrapped him up in her arms. Her baby had been going through. But it had to be that way to get him to where he needed to be. And if he had to suffer, then so be it. If that was the only thing to get his attention, then that is what he had to go through. But standing here, looking the baby in his eyes, Doreatha realized that all of that had not been for naught. This Curtis was a new creature in Christ, and the anointing was all over him.
“Baby, the Lord touched Baby Doll’s heart and led her to call us here to anoint the grounds around the Athletic Center, to anoint this gym, and to pray over you, Maurice, and the team.”
“And,” Miss Baby Doll added, “the Lord has a Word for you and this team. It’s ‘chill.’”
“Chill?” Curtis asked. “The Lord told us to chill? Chill?”
“Uh, yeah,” Baby Doll said, looking perplexed. “If the Lord said ‘Chill,’ why you questioning that, boy?”
“It just don’t sound like a Word that God would use.”
“So God has sent you a Word list that He uses when giving a Word?”
Curtis sighed. He should have known better than to try and argue with Miss Baby Doll. She used to be homeless and knew how to handle herself. She also used to be crazy and was now healed, delivered, and completely in her right mind. You didn’t mess with people like that.
“Look, I didn’t question the Lord when He told me to tell you to chill. I just obeyed and brought you this Word. Now, do you want to know the rest, or are you going to have a debate with me on the validness of chill?”
Curtis didn’t open his mouth.
“Umm, hmm, didn’t think so. Boy, the Lord wants you and these children to go and get some breakfast, then go home and get some rest. Then, He wants y’all in church tomorrow, and after that to rest and stay in prayer and the Word. He wants y’all to just chill. Trust Him because He has already given you this win. Now go and chill out so you will have the mental and physical energy to really play that game. You all have been working hard for weeks. And now it’s time to chill.”
The Prayer Warriors gathered around Curtis, Maurice, and the team, and indicated that they were to get on their knees. They poured oil in their hands and anointed everybody. Then Gran Gran started praying.
“Lord, in the name of Jesus, we thank You for bringing us this far. My grandbaby is now saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost.”
“Hallelujah” came from The Prayer Warriors.
“And, Lord, these children kneeled before You, the ones who are now saved and the ones who are hesitating on getting saved, have hearts that keep turning, turning, turning, towards You.”
“Praise You,” Miss Queen Esther said.
“So, Lord, we thank You, we praise You, and we bless You in the name of Jesus. And, Lord, we praise and claim the victory over Tuesday’s game. Give this team a sweet victory. Place Your angels all in the parking lot, at every door and window, and all over this building to protect this team and these coaches. Lord, anoint them with abilities from Heaven to play like they ain’t never played before. Lord, keep them safe, and we bind up all injuries in Jesus’s name.”
“In Jesus’s name, Lord,” Sherron said.
“And Lord, let folks see Your glory at this game. Let folks know that the Kingdom is far greater than a church building. Your Kingdom is everywhere and extends to everything. For Your Word states that everything on the Earth belongs to You, and the Earth is Yours. Lord, this game and this win is Yours. We dedicate this game to You and give praises to Your name for the victory in Jesus’s name, amen.”
“Amen, amen, and amen,” Sherron said, followed by a series of amens from the coaches and the team.
They all got up and Kaylo said, “So, what do we do now, Coach?”
“Go over to Cashmere Estates and eat breakfast at the Senior Center. They prepared a meal for you all as a treat,” said Miss Baby Doll, who headed Janitorial Services and Grounds Maintenance Services at Cashmere Estates.
“And don’t worry about transportation,” said an older man with a white cane with a red tip, through one of the side doors. “We have the Senior Center vans outside for you young men.”
“Oooh, Lacy,” Miss Baby Doll said, grinning like she was a co-ed. “You so sweet, baby.”
“Heh, heh, heh” was all Mr. Lacy said as he got the team loaded up in the vans.
“How long is that honeymoon gone last, Doreatha?” Miss Queen Esther asked her best friend.
“Probably until Jesus cracks the sky,” was all Doreatha said, and then started laughing as they started blessing the gym and finished anointing it with oil.