In a place like Shermantown, New York, fall felt like winter, cold enough for Jessie to wear her father’s big, baggy yellow sweatshirt for gym class.

The phys ed teacher, Mrs. Gordy, let the girls choose between playing half-court basketball and lining up to take ten free throws in a row and see how many they could make on the other side of the gym. The latter was the more popular option, because of course hardly any of the girls wanted to get sweaty.

Mrs. Gordy, planted herself at the free-throw basket to collect rebounds and bounce-passed the ball back gently to the shooter. Most of the girls were terrible, a few throwing the kind of underhanded lobs from between their legs that Jessie’s older brother Ben called granny shots. The best of them, a blond-haired, fair-skinned girl named Katie whom a lot of boys their year had crushes on, made four out of ten foul shots, earning enthusiastic applause from Mrs. Gordy when she made her last two in a row. “Keep shooting until you miss!”

Katie air-balled the next shot. No telling if she’d missed intentionally so Mrs. Gordy would stop cheering.

Jessie had learned to shoot from Ben, but they hadn’t played in years.

When Jessie’s turn came up, she made her first shot, an ugly clanger that rattled from one side of the metal rim to the other before finding its way through the hoop. The shots to follow were smoother. Ben called it getting in the zone when they’d played past dark those summer nights, when they were old enough Mom and Dad didn’t feel a need to hover, young enough Jessie didn’t have anything better to do than hang out with her brother. Jessie didn’t think of the zone as anything more mystical than muscle memory. Once she found the rhythm of shooting the ball from the same spot, it was like walking at a steady clip or feeding herself handful after handful of popcorn in a dark movie theater. Repeat the same motions. Achieve the same results.

The baskets to follow all passed straight through the net, hardly grazing the rim at all. Mrs. Gordy had stopped cheering by the tenth one, and only said, hushed, “Keep going, Jessie.”

Jessie kept going. Around her twentieth straight basket, her arms fatigued. She adjusted, a deeper bend in the knees, then a slight jump. There were two shots that went in, but rattled the rim, one that almost spiraled out before she got her rhythm back.

A few girls behind Jessie started paying attention, asking how many shots she’d made or how she was doing it, as if there were some sleight of hand that only made it appear she made basket after basket.

Mrs. Gordy held the ball after another made shot and looked to the analog clock hung high on the cinderblock wall, protected by a crisscross of wire. It was 11:07. She ordinarily sent the girls back to the locker room to change at 11:05, before the class period ended at 11:20. Jessie hadn’t realized how long she’d stood at the foul line.

“There’s only time for one more shot.” Mrs. Gordy blew her whistle and hollered for the girls playing on the other end to gather around.

In the time it took for them to stop playing and make their way over, Jessie probably could have shot three or four more times.

“Jessie’s going to take one more free throw,” Mrs. Gordy said. “If she makes it, it will be sixty straight.”

An audience assembled, Jessie felt certain she’d blow it. But she didn’t think about it anymore. Only took her shot. Trusted the muscle memory.

The free throw hit the front rim, then tumbled gently through the net, another successful shot.

***

Things moved quickly. Mrs. Gordy told the girls’ basketball coach how well Jessie could shoot. Coach Holmes pulled her out of English. She was a tall woman who taught Health classes for juniors and seniors. Coach ran through of the logistics of being part of the team, from when and where to meet for practice after school, to needing to have her parents sign a form (Coach Holmes handed it to her—a mostly blank sheet of copy paper, with two lines of sans-serif font, faded because the toner cartridge must’ve run low, a blank line to write in Jessie’s name, another blank line under PARENT/GUARDIAN SIGNATURE. At no point did Coach ask Jessie if she wanted to play basketball.

But when Jessie showed her father the form, he beamed. He’d always been a sports fan, his home office less and less a workspace as the years went by, more and more storage for boxes full of baseball cards and autographed eight-by-tens. He professed that he never got why his son had chosen amateur wrestling over basketball, but embraced it when Ben was good enough to qualify for out-of-town tournaments and never missed one of his matches. The idea of a daughter on the basketball team?

“This is too good to be true.” Dad tipped back his Coors Lite from the head of the table. He coaxed the story of the sixty straight free throws out of Jessie by excruciating degrees and clapped. “Not one, but two athletes in the family.”

Mom was still letting their individual plates of tuna casserole cool on the kitchen counter while she tossed iceberg lettuce and tomato wedges in Italian dressing.

Jessie pointed at the line on the permission form. “They just need someone to sign.”

Dad held up the form as if it were an expansive legal document. “We’ll see what happens this season. If things are really cooking, maybe we look at a transfer to Sacred Cross.”

“I don’t think we can afford private school.” Mom grated cheddar into the big wooden salad bowl.

“It could be an investment,” Dad said “We put her in a position to succeed, it pays off later. That WNBA is just getting going now, but five, six years from now when Jessie’s done with her college career, maybe the ladies are making the same kind of money the men are. You know, the men’s minimum salaries are two-hundred-K. Say the women make even half that. You invest that kind of money and you can be set for life.”

“You think Jessie’s going pro?” Ben said. “She’s never even played in a game before.”

“It’ll make for a hell of a story that way.” Dad leaned back, hands folded behind his head. “Everyone wants a story. A diamond in the rough. The girl who never knew about her own gift until one fateful day in gym class. It could be a movie.”

Ben took a big bite out of a dinner roll. He always seemed to wait until he had food in his mouth to speak. “I don’t remember you being good at basketball.”

It was true, when last they’d played it had been her and Ben against his friend Jim, just after Jim had had a growth spurt and emerged a much better player than Ben. Still, playing two-on-one, Ben had quickly realized he was better off not passing so she couldn’t turn over the ball.

Basketball wasn’t the only sport they’d played. She used to grapple with Ben in the living room before he was very serious about it, in those minutes before Mom or Dad or a babysitter could catch on to what they were doing. Someplace between the amateur technique Ben now excelled at and WWF theatrics. He was stronger, but she didn’t hesitate to bite his hand, jam her tongue in his ear, or if all else failed knee him in the balls, while he protested about her breaking rules they’d never agreed upon in the first place.

Jessie sat up a little straighter at the dinner table. “I don’t remember you being good at wrestling.”

“You’ll have your first game Saturday.” It was hard to tell if Dad’s interjection were oblivious or intended to defuse tension. “I’m sorry to miss it, but I’ve got Ben’s tournament in Rochester.” He turned to Mom as she set down the first plate in front of him. “Meg, you’ve gotta bring the camcorder.”

“She’ll probably play five seconds before they realize she’s clueless,” Ben said.

Dad finally pulled a ballpoint pen from his trousers. “That team needs shooting.” He signed. “Their percentages are terrible, especially from the line. Jessie’s exactly what they need.”

Jessie didn’t know the girls’ basketball schedule or the team’s weaknesses, but Dad read the sports section of the paper religiously over breakfast.

“Free throws tell you what you need to know about a player. Especially in a game, when the pressure’s on and everyone’s watching. Nothing but them, the ball, the hoop.” Dad looked downright starry-eyed and it occurred to Jessie how uninterested he’d been in anything else she’d done—her pre-pubescent dance recitals, her time in the middle school chorus. Reading between the lines, she intuited he’d rather be at Jessie’s game than Ben’s wrestling tournament, but knew he couldn’t abandon his son on such short notice. “When every eye in the gym is on a player, it speaks to who he—or she—is. It speaks to character.”

“Won’t you need the camcorder for Ben’s match?” Mom doubled back to kitchen.

“My matches, Mom.” Ben plugged the rest of the roll in his mouth. “It’s a tournament. After I win a match, I wrestle another.”

“And another after that,” Dad said. “The coaches get better video than I do anyway. You go on and take the camera to Jessie’s game.”

Mom mumbled something about how she was supposed to go shopping, and Jessie said it was fine if she didn’t come. Mom and Dad suddenly unified, though, in not quite shouting her down, but certainly speaking more loudly as they articulated that of course her mother would be there and Jessie’d do great and Dad would watch the game as soon as he got home.

“Two athletes under the same roof.” An elbow noodle tumbled loose from Dad’s fork and fell on the permission form, a speck of tuna and string of melted cheddar quickly imprinting themselves on a blank space. “Incredible.”

***

Mom did bring the camcorder in its bulky carrying case, a copy of Tuesdays with Morrie sticking out of a side pocket.

Coach handed Jessie her white jersey in the locker room. There was little pomp or circumstance as they entered the gymnasium to warm up. Thirty, maybe forty people dotted the bleachers. Jessie scanned them to spot her mother, all the way at the back, reading her book. She hoped she wouldn’t take the camera out, remembering those times Mom or Dad insisted on filming them blow out birthday candles or shoot hoops in front of the house. Jessie was self-conscious whenever she had a camera on her, never natural, never her best self.

The team huddled on the sideline before the game. A girl named Renee, a junior and the team captain called out Win on three! and counted off one-two-three! The rest of the team shouted win! in response, but Jessie was a beat late understanding what was going on and grateful for the chance to retreat to the bench.

The game was quieter than she’d expected, every squeak of sneakers on hardwood audible, every bounce of the ball thunderous. Things moved quickly, all fluid execution when it came to girls getting to their spots, all of it expert until the shots took flight and, true to what Dad said, hardly anyone could shoot. After a minute and a half of play, one of the girls from Shermantown High got fouled driving to the basket and made one of two free throws.

The first quarter ended with Shermantown High leading West Falls, eighteen to ten. Jessie’s team fell into a rhythm with Renee driving to the basket more aggressively and pulling up to hit her jump shot when the defense gave her room. From what Jessie could tell, they ran fewer plays at that point, aside from setting screens for Renee, or someone occasionally taking a pass after she got swarmed by multiple defenders. By half time, they were up thirty-three to eleven.

Jessie thought this was a good thing, not only to be part of a winning team, but to be able to report back to her father about how good Renee was. He always enjoyed hearing about an outlier, an athlete whose progress he could track, even if it weren’t his daughter.

The downside of what became a thirty-point lead and the best player from the opposing team fouling out was that there was no reason to keep Shermantown High’s best players on the court. Jessie found herself checking in at shooting guard. The backup point guard, a runt of a girl who couldn’t possibly have stood five-feet, pushed the ball up the court, two fingers in the air, calling a play Jessie didn’t know.

Jessie didn’t know where she was supposed to be, but remembered advice Ben had given her when they were on the same team against Jim in their driveway. Keep moving. It’s too easy for him to cover you if you stand in place.

Jessie zigzagged, pivoted, and cut, only to find herself out in the open. She registered a moment too late that being open meant the ball might come to her.

Jessie felt the ball collide with her shoulder. Tears welled in her eyes and the girl guarding her had caught up enough to grab the loose ball. Jessie chased after her down court, but the girl passed ahead to a teammate in a baby blue West Falls jersey, who converted the layup.

“Head up! Eyes open!” Coach may have been calling to all the girls on the floor, but Jessie felt the point acutely.

She glanced up in the stands, hoping to find Mom reading her book.

The camera was rolling.

***

Jessie wasn’t sure what Mom had told Dad about her first game went, but she did know how Ben’s tournament had gone. He won his way to the final match, the championship round for the 106-pound weight class, only to compete against a girl. Mom quoted to Jessie from her late-night phone call with Dad that Ben got in his own head about the unusual matchup and wasn’t himself. He’d gotten pinned at the end of the first round.

Jessie felt relief. The fact that he had been good at his sport made his failings more monumental, would surely be the point of focus for the family, while Jessie quietly decided if she’d quit the basketball team outright or give it another game.

But they didn’t talk about Ben’s tournament after he and Dad got back. They ate the pizza Dad had delivered, not taking the care to customize or diversify the order to suit everyone, but simply getting two of the pepperoni and green olive pies he preferred, Mom tolerated, that Ben picked the olives from. Jessie removed the olives and the pepperoni from her slices and blotted grease from the surface of the cheese. Truth be told, she didn’t like pizza.

They ate in silence. Dad and Ben each got up at intervals for more pizza, because the little saucers Mom put out only fit one slice at a time. Jessie alternately refilled her glass with water, then Cherry Coke. Mom poured her second, then third glasses of chardonnay.

Ben asked if he could be excused after his fifth or sixth slice and Dad said no, they were all going to watch Jessie’s game as a family after dinner.

Jessie made a half-hearted effort—projecting modesty—when she said they didn’t have to watch the tape of her game. Even if Mom hadn’t told Dad anything, he’d have already read the box score and observed she’d played for a few minutes, without registering a single point, rebound, or assist. He wrangled the wires to hook up the camcorder to the AV ports in the back of the tube television.

Mom had only started recording when Jessie went in the game, but didn’t miss a second of her time on the court. Jessie watched herself rub her hands against her shorts to get some of the sweat off, look all around, then start to run.

Dad maintained the same stoic expression he’d worn since he got home from Ben’s tournament. He sat alone in his recliner.

“It’s not good.” Jessie watched from the middle couch cushion, between Mom and Ben. She could recognize her movements on screen, knew the pass was coming. “I’m not good.”

“We know,” Ben said.

As the point guard released the ball in Jessie’s direction, Jessie let the words out of her mouth, too. “Why don’t we watch the tape of you wrestling that girl while we’re at it?”

Ben was on her. He pressed her face down into a couch cushion until she managed to turn her head. Her neck hurt. He was stronger than he’d been before, fingers clasped, knuckles digging into her back, his inner elbows hooking her upper arms. It was a lopsided wrestling hold that held her right arm in place while he wrenched her left shoulder, threatening to tear it from its socket. Dad barked, for chrissake!

It wasn’t Dad who got Ben to stop—grabbing them by the back of their necks like cats like he would in the old days—but rather Mom’s voice, not as loud, but tired, and serrated. “Get off her, Ben.”

The pain in Jessie’s shoulder stopped, then she felt brother’s grip slacken by degrees until he had stepped away. Jessie stayed down, but turned her head to face her mother. She tipped her wine glass back, then got up and returned to the kitchen.

***

Dad insisted Ben invite Jim over to coach Jessie. He showed up in a baggy muscle tee. She’d nursed a crush on him for years and suspected that had something to do with Ben’s choice to hang out with them in the driveway for their practice session.

Jim wasn’t that much better at shooting by percentages than either of them, but he unmistakably had more confidence in how he handled the ball, dribbling between his legs, pivoting and faking before he rose straight up for his jump shot.

Jim coached Jessie to keep her head up while she dribbled and guided her to keep her chest tight to his back when he posted up. “You’ve got to limit my options.” He dribbled as he spoke, at a crouch, his butt out, into Jessie’s stomach. He smelled of driveway dirt and sweat. Smells of summers past when there was time to play games outside. It was cold now.

“I think that’s enough,” Ben said.

Jessie eased off on defense.

Jim ignored him, backing up, body firm against her. If he pressed, he could probably bowl her over, but he stopped short. “Give me room and I know there’s space to drive. Or if I go straight up, you’ll never be there in time to block the shot.”

Ben cut in, giving Jessie the ball and guarding her. “This is girls’ basketball. Offense is more important than defense.” He put his hands up. “Get by me if you can.”

Her fingers were going numb in the November chill.

“Take advantage of the space,” Jim said. “Make him pay.”

Ben had given her room. She popped her hips, bumping against his groin so he staggered. She might have shot then but was slow on the draw.

“Take it to the hole!”

Jessie wove to the right, clear around and a full step ahead of Ben. She was still getting the hang of layup form but had space to sink a short jumper off the backboard.

Ben picked up the ball and fumed when Jim clapped from the sidelines. “Whose friend are you anyway?”

Jessie thought Ben might chuck the ball at him and got in between them. “I thought you were both out here to help me.”

Ben moved the ball from one hand to the other as though he was weighing options like the risk of revealing himself to be the worst basketball player of the three, or what it would mean if a girl—his own little sister—surpassed him at hoops after another girl had pinned him over the weekend. On the other hand, there was going into the house, and in so doing leaving his sister alone with his friend, bodies close, where what happened happened.

He stayed. He lobbed the ball over Jessie’s head, into Jim’s waiting hands. “Did she tell you about what happened when one of the girls passed to her?”

Jessie grew warm at the retelling, and she was glad her face had probably already turned red from the cold.

When Ben finished, Jim seemed to consider the story. “She should’ve been watching for the ball, it’s true.” He dribbled, standing up straight, taking a step back from both of them before he focused his attention on Jessie. “But your teammate shouldn’t have passed you the ball if you weren’t looking, either.”

Jim wound up stepping back, coaching both of them from the side, as if he were there to help them equally as they played one-on-one, not keeping score, inconsistent about possession rules after one made a shot or the ball went out of bounds.

Ben posted up on her with a high, slow dribble, the opposite of how Jim coached them. Jessie picked off the ball, swung around him and motored to the basket as fast as she could. Ben wasn’t going to let her drive on him again. He couldn’t stop her cleanly, but did block the shot, his sternum colliding with her left shoulder as she went up for the layup. In a game, she’d get two free throws.

Jessie doubled over, cradling her arm.

“You OK?” Jim put a hand to the same shoulder Ben had hurt a couple days before.

“She’s fine,” Ben said.

“Come on, dude,” Jim’s breath took shape against the chill air. “She’s your sister.”

“Yeah, she is. So, I know her better than you do.”

Jim left soon, the end of his first and last time helping Jessie with her game. Jessie and Ben played on. The fouls didn’t get harder, but they didn’t stop coming from either one of them. They played until a streetlight a few yards from their driveway was all the light they had to see by, and then played some more. They played until Dad got home from work and nodded approvingly, watching until he’d observed Jessie shoot numb-handed, missing badly, having lost any feel for the ball.

***

Jessie felt a little more confident heading into her second game. Going to practice had given her a general idea of the plays. There was also some reassurance in knowing Coach wouldn’t play her unless it were another blowout.

Jessie hadn’t anticipated that the starting shooting guard would commit four fouls early. Carly, who split time as the backup shooting guard and small forward, was out with a sprained ankle. So it was that only a few minutes into the third quarter when Coach called on Jessie.

The opposing team—Lincoln High—wore bright red jerseys that Jessie thought looked more professional than Shermantown High’s or West Hills’. They were a better team, too, having rushed to an eight-zero lead to open the game, passing a lot and alternately having their center—who must have stood close to six and a half feet—score inside, or the point guard or shooting guard drill jumpers from outside. Shermantown rallied, but never cut their deficit to fewer than twelve points.

But things went fine, Shermantown not noticeably worse for Jessie’s time on the court, if only because, in not getting the ball, the Lincoln players didn’t know her to be incompetent.

There were more onlookers in the gym than the previous game—Lincoln High fans. Still, Jessie could hear her father clap, hear his voice calling for her to Get open!

Jessie did wind up open as the defense collapsed on Renee on a drive to the basket. Renee looked out and made what coach would call the right basketball play—the technically sound choice if all things were equal on a basketball court—and fired the ball out to Jessie. She fumbled with the ball, but managed to corral it and line up, a defender rushed back out—a taller, thicker girl. Jessie succeeded in drawing her into the air on a pump fake, creating contact when the defender’s ribs crashed into Jessie’s bad shoulder and sent Jessie tumbling to the hardwood. The girl on defense offered her a hand to help her up and mouthed, Sorry.

Jessie said, too loud, out of breath, “It’s all right.” She made her way to the foul line and heard her father again. Show ‘em, Jessie! Show ‘em!  

Jessie didn’t stop to think about the free throw, didn’t bounce the ball to get a rhythm. She took her shot and fought back a grimace as her shoulder throbbed on the release. It wasn’t a bad shot. Correct form, a decent spin. The ball caught the front of the rim and bounced out.

That easily could have been the story of the first, second, or third free throws she’d shot in gym class, before she fell into a rhythm and made shot after shot. If she’d gone eight or nine for ten, would Mrs. Gordy have kept her shooting? Would she have suggested her for the basketball team, rather than simply offering her a high five for an above-average performance?

Jessie got the ball again. She knew her father was watching and remembered when she was a girl and her father might as well’ve been the king of the world to her, his every dream of her every success an inevitability because he believed. He’d dragged along Ben to the game, too. She remembered when being brother and sister meant being constant companions. But now, despite still sleeping in rooms on the same hallway, still going to the same school, they’d never been further apart. Dad had marveled at the prospect of having two athletes under the same roof. Maybe if she made this free throw, she could stick out the season. If she could stick out the season, maybe that would make up for Ben’s failings. Maybe, somehow, Ben wouldn’t see her success as an affront to everything he’d accomplished up to that point. Forget competition and sibling rivalry. Maybe he’d be happy for her.

She did bounce the ball once this time, lined up, and released. The rotation was better, the arc of the ball higher.

Squint her eyes and she might mistake the gymnasium glow for the streetlight that shone just past her driveway at home. Squint her eyes and she might think the ball had passed seamlessly through the net—a perfect shot—when, in reality, it had just grazed the outside of the net, missing badly as the ball fell short of rim.

A Lincoln High player snatched the ball and started dribbling before the referee whistled. He conferred with the other officials, who agreed it was a dead ball and Lincoln would have to inbound from the sidelines.

As everyone rearranged, Jessie thought there’d have to be another pause. Surely Coach would call a time out and get her off the court. But everything kept going. Jessie was out of position running back, so the girl she was supposed to guard was open for a layup. Jessie was step behind getting back into position on offense, too. Everything stayed in motion, never ever slowing down.

***

Michael Chin was born and raised in Utica, New York and currently lives in Las Vegas with his wife and son. He’s the author of seven full-length books, including his novel, My Grandfather’s an Immigrant, and So is Yours (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2021) and his latest short story collection This Year’s Ghost (JackLeg Press, 2025). His short work has previously appeared in journals including Bat City Review, Prairie Schooner, The Pinch, Passages North, and The Normal School. Find him online at: micketchin.com.