Fadeaway by E. Vickers (ebook smartphone TXT) 📗

him to text anyway. It’s certainly no way to write poetry.

He’s about to go ask Luke if he needs a drink yet when the phone rings on the table.

“Hello?” he answers.

“Coach” comes the voice.

Coach B swallows. Blinks back the tears that have sprung so suddenly.

“Jake.”

“I probably shouldn’t have called,” Jake says, but Coach B protests.

“You call me anytime.”

“Well, not anytime. They’re kind of strict about that here.” He clears his throat. “I stole from you.”

“I wondered about that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I know, son.”

There’s a long pause, and the boy’s next words are choked. “What do you think of me now?”

“Now?” Coach B stops to consider this. “I think, or I suppose I hope, that you’re starting to see the worth I saw in you all along. Not on the court but the real worth of your soul.” He closes his eyes. “I think you’re facing an opponent as tough as any I ever did, and you’re conquering it, day by day.”

Jake starts to protest, but Coach B won’t have it.

“It’s true,” he says. “How many soldiers face the enemy on the battlefield with great courage, only to fall to the very same foe you’re facing now?

“And why?” he asks. “Because we treat it like a shameful, secret battle. We make each other face it alone.” He thinks of all the friends he has lost, in one way or another, to this same shadowy opponent. “Please know you’re not alone, son. That you’re never alone. And please know how proud I am of you.”

They both have a hard time saying anything after that. Coach B clears his throat and looks out the window to where Luke still toils away at the tilling.

“This brother of yours,” Coach says. “He writes poetry. Did you know that?”

“Some of my favorite people do,” Jake says. “I’m starting to write some too.”

“I know. I read one today. It’s a fine poem, son. Have you called your mother?”

“I can’t.”

“I know. But you’d better do it anyway.”

Jake only hesitates a moment. “Okay.”

“You don’t have to talk about the hard things yet, if that helps.”

Another pause. “There’s a cooking group here. I could ask her how to make pad thai.”

“I think that would be an excellent idea. I might ask her that myself. I’ll get off the line so you can give her a call now. But you take care, son. And if you happen to hear from Kade again, tell him I said hello.”

“I will.”

Coach B waits for Jake to end the call, then tucks the phone into the pocket of his sweater. He looks out the window and sees the tiller lying across the loose earth, the task completed and its master gone. Then a smile breaks across his face as he hears a familiar rhythm: three dribbles, pause, then the clang of the ball off the rim. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear it was Jake out there shooting foul shots.

He opens the screen door and watches.

Three dribbles, pause, and this time, only the chunk of the ball through the net.

All at once, Coach B is transported back to the first time he watched Jake shoot at this very same hoop.

“That’s nice,” he says. “Foul shots are important. Fundamental. I can see somebody’s been working with you on those.”

Luke nods. Dribbles three times, exhales, shoots again.

Makes it again.

“Has anybody ever taught you the fadeaway?” he asks.

Luke nods again. Dribbles once, pulls up to shoot, fades it away.

Misses badly.

But the form is there. His head is in it, hands are soft. No doubt the heart is there too.

“Good, good,” Coach B says. “Should we work on that for a bit?”

And they do.

Once upon a time there was

Nothing

and then there was

Something.

No brother,

then

Brother.

But before that

galaxies

planets

oceans

mountains

grass and trees

seasons

whales

birds

cows

spiders

people.

And it was good.

Mostly.

Because as soon as there were people,

they could hurt each other,

but they could help each other too.

And they did.

And it hasn’t stopped.

The opposite of a big bang

is a fadeaway,

but the opposite of a fadeaway

is something else,

I think.

Something that disappears

and you wait

and you wait

and you hope

and you wait

and just when you’re about to give up

it comes back again.

Like leaves on bare branches.

Like spring.

Even though the events of this story are fictional, they are far too real for so many in America. In 2019, overdose deaths in the United States surpassed 700,000, with over 50,000 of those deaths involving opioids. Tragically, these numbers will likely continue to rise along with the usage of other drugs, such as methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin, and a drastic increase in illicitly manufactured fentanyl analogs—all of which has been complicated and exacerbated by the COVID pandemic. Although a lot of smart and dedicated people are fighting the problem from a lot of angles, it isn’t going away anytime soon, and our tendency as a society to shame and other those who suffer from addiction only makes the problem worse.

The national addiction crisis is as devastating as it is far-reaching, and whether the struggle is our own or that of a friend or loved one, it affects us all, regardless of age or ethnicity or socioeconomic status. It affects our communities, urban and rural, regardless of geography.

It has certainly affected my own hometown. The first seed of this story came from a youth night in response to this problem that I attended years ago with my son. The scheduled speaker had nearly lost everything—including his life—to painkillers. I knew he would be a powerful speaker, but I naively assumed his message might not be directly relevant for me and my family. My son has a supportive network of friends, teachers, coaches, church leaders, and immediate and extended family. He’s a great student who excels at a lot of things. He has grown up with three pharmacists in the family, including his father, and a grandfather who was a judge for thirty-two years. As a result, he’s been made very aware throughout his life of the heartbreaking and dangerous impact of drugs. He knows