The Desire

Tweet The ball was batted out towards the corner right towards the team bench, in seven seconds they would advance to the playoffs all the ball had to do was go out of bounds...


James woke up suddenly, he quickly hit the sleep button on his alarm something he got quite good at turning it off rapidly over the summer.  He sat up in bed and glanced at the clock display, in bright red letters it read 6:30.  He quickly jumped out knowing that if he lingered any longer he would lose valuable time.  Getting dressed with the clothes he prepared the night before he quietly opened his door and went to the kitchen.  When he opened the fridge he recalled the dream he had, or rather, the nightmare.

Number 17 of the other team runs down the ball, The coach is sure he stepped on the sideline but the refs are having none of it.  Even if they had blown the whistle no one would have heard it over the crowd noise.  17 whipped a pass to the top of the key to his point guard, James is looking at it all from the bench, no one is in position except Tommy who runs out to contest the open 3.  The point guard fakes out the whole gym by making one more pass to the other sideline, a spot occupied by number 3, there is no one within 10 feet of him, the clock reads 2 seconds.


James quickly shrugged it off, he hated thinking about something that had happened over 5 months ago but for some reason even when he avoided thinking about it he would dream about it.  He quickly tried to focus on what had to be done today, the dream only serving as motivation and nothing else.  He slammed the fridge door a bit harder than he would have liked, he wolfed down the meal he made for himself last night, over the summer he learned that these little things like picking out clothes and making a meal in advance would save him a lot of time.  Getting to his door he stepped out "Good" he thought, it had rained, running in cloudy cooler conditions gave him a sense of peace for reasons he did not quite understand, but to him it did not matter.  School was starting up again in twelve days and he was determined to make all of them count.

Number 3 catches the ball in stride and plants his feet.  The look on his face at realizing how much room he had told it all.  For a brief second James hoped he would step inside the 3 point line and tie the game, they deserved overtime at the very least.  They earned the right to make the playoffs with how they played their last 10 games.  Number 3 apparently did not feel the same way,  Launching a 3 in front of the loudest section of their home crowd.