his head shaved once a month. I want to go to Duke,
he flaunts Carolina Blue. If we didn’t love each other,
we’d HATE each other. He’s a shooting guard.
I play forward. JB’s the second
most phenomenal baller on our team.
He has the better jumper, but I’m the better
slasher. And much faster. We both
pass well. Especially to each other.
To get ready for the season, I went
to three summer camps. JB only went to
one. Said he didn’t want to miss Bible school.
What does he think, I’m stupid? Ever since
Kim Bazemore kissed him in Sunday school,
he’s been acting all religious,
thinking less and less about
basketball, and more and more about
GIRLS.
At the End of Warm-Ups, My Brother Tries to Dunk
Not even close, JB.
What’s the matter?
The hoop too high for you? I snicker
but it’s not funny to him,
especially when I take off from center court,
my hair like wings,
each lock lifting me higher and HIGHER
like a 747 ZOOM ZOOM!
I throw down so hard,
the fiberglass trembles.
BOO YAH, Dad screams
from the top row.
I’m the only kid
on the team
who can do that.
The gym is a loud, crowded circus.
My stomach is a roller coaster.
My head, a carousel.
The air, heavy with the smell
of sweat, popcorn,
and the sweet perfume
of mothers watching sons.
Our mom, a.k.a. Dr. Bell, a.k.a. The Assistant Principal,
is talking to some of the teachers
on the other side of the gym.
I’m feeling better already.
Coach calls us in,
does his Phil Jackson impersonation.
Love ignites the spirit, brings teams together, he says.
JB and I glance at each other,
ready to bust out laughing,
but Vondie, our best friend,
beats us to it.
The whistle goes off.
Players gather at center circle,
dap each other,
pound each other.
Referee tosses the jump ball.
Game on.
The Sportscaster
JB likes to taunt and
trash talk
during games
like Dad
used to do
when he played.
When I walk onto
the court
I prefer silence
so I can
Watch
React
Surprise.
I talk too,
but mostly
to myself,
like sometimes
when I do
my own
play-by-play
in my head.
Josh’s Play-by-Play
It’s game three for the two-and-oh Wildcats.
Number seventeen, Vondie Little, grabs it.
Nothing little about that kid.
The Wildcats have it,
first play of the game.
The hopes are high tonight at
Reggie Lewis Junior High.
We destroyed Hoover Middle
last week, thirty-two to four,
and we won’t stop,
can’t stop,
till we claim the championship trophy.
Vondie overhead passes me.
I fling a quick chest pass to my twin brother, JB,
number twenty-three, a.k.a. the Jumper.
I’ve seen him launch it from thirty feet before,
ALL NET.
That boy is special, and it doesn’t hurt
that Chuck “Da Man” Bell is his father.
And mine, too.
JB bounces the ball back to me.
JB’s a shooter, but I’m sneaky
and silky as a snake—
and you thought my hair was long.
I’m six feet, all legs.
OH, WOW—DID YOU SEE THAT NASTY CROSSOVER?
Now you see why they call me Filthy.
Folks, I hope you got your tickets,
because I’m about to put on a show.
cross·o·ver
[KRAWS-OH-VER] noun
A simple basketball move
in which a player dribbles
the ball quickly
from one hand
As in: When done right,
a crossover can break
an opponent’s ankles.
As in: Deron Williams’s crossover
is nice, but Allen Iverson’s crossover
was so deadly, he could’ve set up
his own podiatry practice.
As in: Dad taught me
how to give a soft cross first
to see if your opponent falls
for it,
then hit ’em
with the hard crossover.
The Show
A quick shoulder SHAKE,
a slick eye FAKE—
Number 28 is way past late.
He’s reading me like a
BOOK
but I turn the page
and watch him look,
which can only mean I got him
SHOOK.
His feet are the bank
and I’m the crook.
Breaking, Braking,
taking him to the left—
now he’s took.
Number 14 joins in . . .
Now he’s on the H
O
O
K
I got TWO in my kitchen
and I’m fixing to COOK.
Preppin’ my meal, ready for glass . . .
Nobody’s expecting Filthy to p a s s
I see Vondie under the hoop
so I serve him up my
Alley-oop.
The Bet, Part One
We’re down by seven
at halftime.
Trouble owns our faces
but Coach isn’t worried.
Says we haven’t found our rhythm yet.
Then, all of a sudden, out of nowhere
Vondie starts dancing the Snake,
only he looks like a seal.
Then Coach blasts his favorite dance music,
and before you know it
we’re all doing the Cha-Cha Slide:
To the left, take it back now, y’all.
One hop this time, right foot, let’s stomp.
JB high-fives me, with a familiar look.
You want to bet, don’t you? I ask.
Yep, he says,
then touches
my hair.
Ode to My Hair
If my hair were a tree
I’d climb it.
I’d kneel down beneath
and enshrine it.
I’d treat it like gold
and then mine it.
Each day before school
I unwind it.
And right before games
I entwine it.
These locks on my head,
I designed it.
And one last thing if
you don’t mind it:
That bet you just made?
I DECLINE IT.
The Bet, Part Two
IF. I. LOSE.
THE. BET.
YOU. WANT. TO.
WHAT?
If the score gets tied, he says, and
if it comes down to the last shot, he says, and
if I get the ball, he says, and
if I don’t miss, he says,
I get to cut off
your hair.
Sure, I say, a
s serious
as a heart attack.
You can cut my locks off,
but if I win the bet
you have to walk around
with no pants on
and no underwear
tomorrow
in school
during lunch.
Vondie
and the rest
of the fellas
laugh like hyenas.
Not to be outdone,
JB revises the bet:
Okay, he says.
How about if you lose
I cut one lock
and if you win
I will moon
that nerdy group
of sixth-graders
that sit
near our table
at lunch?
Even though I used to be one of those nerdy sixth-graders,
even though I love my hair the way Dad loves Krispy Kreme,
even though I don’t want us to lose the game,
odds are this is one of JB’s legendary bets I’ll win,
because
that’s a lot of ifs.
The game is tied
when JB’s soft jumper sails
tick
through the air.
tock
The crowd stills,
tick
mouths drop,
tock
and when his last-second shot
tick
hits net,
tock
the clock stops.
The gym explodes.
Its hard bleachers
empty
and my head
aches.
In the locker room
after the game,
JB cackles like a crow.
He walks up to me
grinning,
holds his hand out
so I can see
the red scissors from Coach’s desk
smiling at me, their
steel blades sharp
and ready.
I love this game
like the winter loves snow
even though I spent
the final quarter
in foul trouble
on the bench.
JB was on fire
and we won
and I lost
the bet.
Cut
Time to pay up, Filthy, JB says,
laughing
and waving
the scissors
in the air
like a flag.
My teammates gather around
to salute.
FILTHY, FILTHY, FILTHY, they chant.
He opens the scissors,
grabs my hair
to slash a strand.
I don’t hear
my golden lock
hit the floor,
but I do hear
the sound
of calamity
when Vondie
hollers,
OH, SNAP!
ca·lam·i·ty
[KUH-LAM-IH-TEE] noun
An unexpected,
undesirable event;
often physically injurious.
As in: If JB hadn’t been acting
so silly and
playing around,
he would have cut
one lock
instead of five
from my head
and avoided
this calamity.
As in: The HUGE bald patch
on the side
of my head
is a dreadful
calamity.
As in: After the game
Mom almost has a fit
When she sees my hair,
What a calamity, she says,
shaking her head
and telling Dad to take me
to the barber shop
on Saturday
to have the rest
cut off.
Mom doesn’t like us eating out
but once a month she lets
one of us choose a restaurant
and even though she won’t let him touch
half the things on the buffet,
it’s Dad’s turn
and he chooses Chinese.
I know what he really wants
is Pollard’s Chicken and BBQ,
but Mom has banned
us from that place.
In the Golden Dragon,
Mom is still frowning
at JB for messing up my hair.
But, Mom, it was an accident, he says.
Accident or not, you owe
your brother an apology, she tells him.
I’m sorry for cutting your filthy hair, Filthy, JB laughs.
Not so funny now, is it? I say, my knuckles
digging into his scalp
till Dad saves him from the noogie
with one of his lame jokes:
Why can’t you play sports in the jungle? he asks.
Mom repeats the question because
Dad won’t continue until someone does.
Because of the cheetahs, he snaps back,
so amused, he almost falls out of his chair,
which causes all of us to laugh, and
get past my hair issue
for now.
I fill my plate with egg rolls and dumplings.
JB asks Dad how we did.
Y’all did okay, Dad says, but, JB, why did you
let that kid post you up? And, Filthy,
what was up with that lazy crossover?
When I was playing, we never . . .
And while Dad is telling us another story
for the hundredth time, Mom removes the salt
from the table and JB goes to the buffet.
He brings back three packages
of duck sauce and a cup of wonton soup
and hands them all to me.
Dad pauses, and Mom looks at JB.
That was random, she says.
What, isn’t that what you wanted, Filthy? JB asks.
And even though I never opened my mouth,
I say, Thanks,
because
it is.
Missing
I am not
a mathematician—
a + b seldom
equals c.
Pluses and minuses,
we get along
but we are not close.
I am no Pythagoras.
And so each time
I count the locks
of hair
beneath my pillow
I end up with thirty-seven
plus one tear,
which never
adds up.
The inside of Mom and Dad’s bedroom closet
is off-limits,
so every time JB asks me
to go in there to look
through Dad’s stuff, I say no.
But today when I ask Mom
for a box to put my dreadlocks in,
she tells me to take
one of her Sunday hat boxes
from the top shelf
of her closet.
Next to her purple hat box is
Dad’s small silver safety box
with the key in the lock
and practically begging me
to open it,
so I do, when, unexpectedly:
What are you doing, Filthy?
Standing in the doorway
is JB with a look that says BUSTED!
Filthy, you still giving me the silent treatment?
. . .
I really am sorry about your hair, man.
I owe you, Filthy, so I’m gonna cut
the grass for the rest of the year and
pick up the leaves . . . and I’ll wash the cars
and I’ll even wash your hair.
Oh, you got jokes, huh? I say, then grab him
and give him another noogie.
So, what are you doing in here,
Filthy?
Nothing, Mom said I could use her hat box.
That doesn’t look like a hat box, Filthy.
Let me see that, he says.
And just like that
we’re rummaging through
a box filled with newspaper clippings
about Chuck “Da Man” Bell
and torn ticket stubs
and old flyers
and . . .
WHOA! There it is, Filthy, JB says.
And even though we’ve seen Dad
wear it many times, actually holding
his glossy championship ring
in our hands
is more than magical.
Let’s try it on, I whisper.
But JB is a step ahead, already sliding
it on each of his fingers
until he finds one it fits.
What else is in there, JB? I ask,
hoping he will realize it’s my turn
to wear Dad’s championship ring.
There’s a bunch of articles about
Dad’s triple-doubles, three-point records,
and the time he made fifty free throws
in a row at the Olympic finals, he says,
finally handing me the ring,
and an Italian article
about Dad’s bellissimo crossover
and his million-dollar multiyear contract
with the European league.
We already know all this stuff, JB.
Anything new, or secret-type stuff? I ask.
And then JB pulls out a manila envelope.