“I hear you were swinging your pole vault in the chapel,” said Ralph.
“Not really,” said Thomas. He felt that irritating mixture of anger over being the subject of gossip and pride that he’d impressed his friends. He was also ashamed of feeling proud; it was like he was hurting Hesta more. He had tried to call her again after classes today, but Susie Boardman had said she wasn’t on the dorm.
Coach McPhee motioned through the glass door of the locker room for them to hurry up.
Before they started, he had everybody on the team sit on the court while they talked about Staines’s death.
“I’ve experienced death up close,” said Coach McPhee. Thomas figured he was going to go into the story of his baby brother’s drowning in the bathtub again, but he kept his remarks generalized. “You never get used to it. You never stop being surprised by it. The important thing is to avoid it yourself. You guys need to make sure that it doesn’t do anything to you. You want to make sure that you don’t let somebody else’s death affect you.”
Everybody talked about Staines as if he were Mister Perfect.
“He was our leader, man.”
“The best damn quarterback in the league.”
“He would have gotten a scholarship for sure.”
“The guy was always making me laugh.”
“It’ll never be the same without him.”
Thomas couldn’t understand it. He had always thought Staines was a cockroach, and while he was sorry he got killed and all, it was hard to feel genuine remorse. But he joined in. He felt a little weird for pretending to mourn, but he felt even weirder for feeling sorrier for Angus than for Robert Staines. For Thomas, Angus was the loneliest person he could ever imagine.
Practice was bad. They had to rearrange the team to take Staines’s place, so nearly everybody was learning a new position. What made it even more complicated was that Coach McPhee had lost his whistle, so there was a lot of yelling whenever he wanted them to stop one drill and start another one.
“Some souvenir hunter picked it up over the weekend,” said Coach McPhee. “We had too much traffic through this building.”
After practice Thomas stayed behind to shoot free throws. Coach McPhee stayed with him and rebounded. He threw the ball back to Thomas with sharp bounce passes and an occasional chest pass that made Thomas feel like a pro.
“Same routine every time,” said Coach McPhee.
Thomas stepped up to the line, left foot first. He put the toe of his left shoe exactly one inch behind the free throw line. Then he positioned his right foot so that it was also one inch behind the line. He dribbled the ball exactly twice, placed it so that the lines on the ball were roughly perpendicular to the splayed fingers of his right hand, looked at the basket, and shot.
Swish through the net.
“Good shot,” said Coach McPhee. “Try it again.”
The ball bounced off the front of the rim.
“You didn’t follow through,” said Coach McPhee. “Wave the ball into the net. Extend your whole arm, and just wave that ball right into the basket.”
Thomas tried it again. Same routine. Looked at the basket. Shot. Swish.
“Good. Try it again.”
The ball bounced off the right of the rim.
“Don’t rush it. Take your time. Concentrate.”
Swish. Swish.
“Good,” said Coach McPhee. “Go for ten in a row.”
Three for three. Four for four.
“You’ll probably be playing more for us now,” said Coach McPhee.
“Yes sir.” Five for five.
“Anybody can have one bad game.”
“Yes sir. Thank you,” said Thomas. Six for six.
“You have a girl down this weekend?”
The ball bounced off the rim.
“Yes sir,” said Thomas.
“You lost your concentration,” said Coach McPhee. “In a game you’re going to have people screaming at you to miss it. You’re going to have some guy on the rebound line whispering crap at you. You’re going to have your parents or your girlfriend in the stands. You got to block all of them out and concentrate on your routine.”
Thomas started over. One for one. Two for two. Miss.
“Shake it off,” said Coach McPhee. “You can’t be perfect. See how well you can do.”
Three for four. Four for five. He finished at eight out of ten. The free throws toward the end felt really good.
“Eighty percent’s a winner in any league,” said Coach McPhee. “You’ll do well as soon as you learn to control your emotions.”
“You threw me off when you mentioned girls,” said Thomas.
“My point exactly,” said Mr. McPhee. “Let me tell you a true story. A very embarrassing story. When I was a kid, early teens, I used to watch a girl in the apartment across the alley get dressed. Every day at the same time she’d be in that room with the shades up, and she’d take off every bit of her clothes, and then she’d brush her hair by the window.”
It was funny to imagine Mr. McPhee as a peeper. “She’d brush it and brush it and brush it,” he said, “and I’d watch her the whole time. I got into so much trouble for that.” He paused.
“And?” said Thomas.
“And I got into trouble,” McPhee said. “That’s the moral of the story, Boatwright. If you fool with girls, you’re going to have trouble. Take my word for it.”
“How’d you get caught?” said Thomas.
Mr. McPhee laughed. “I’m the type who always gets caught,” he said. “Go get your shower and then I’ll walk you over to play practice.”
It was 5:35. Thomas showered and dressed in ten minutes while Coach McPhee put away the basketballs and turned out the lights. They stood together outside in the cold while Coach locked up the gym. He had his key to the gym on an old Boston College key ring.
“Supposed
