Too Many Secrets

Chapter 17

The buzzer beeps causing my heartbeat to quicken. No matter how many years I play this game, the buzzer always scares me. It's halftime. We are down by 10 points, which is not a lot. The score is 40 to 30. It's a close game and they are pretty good. My whole body is already so sweaty. I have played almost the entire game so far. The moment when the coach called my name to be on the starting lineup was one of the best moments I've had in a long time.

The coach is going over the game plan for the next two quarters. After fifteen minutes the buzzer rings again, causing a bunch of the girls to flinch. Sometimes loud noises like that make me think of those nights. With all the yelling and screaming. The nights with Nick.

"Skylar, you're up again," the coach says to me.

My bad mood immediately leaves and I'm just excited to get more playing time. We can't lose. I just need to focus. We got this.

"Hey, Sky!" Sienna screams from the center of the gym.

"Coming," I say jogging up to her.

"You are doing great. Keep it up. We just need six more baskets to get ahead," she whispers. "You got us 10 points already, you can do it again."

I think I get a little red from her compliment, but it could just be the heat. It's our ball. I take the ball up the court. The thing about basketball is that you need to be aggressive. You need to get all up in the other team's face without getting a foul. When I play I take all my anger out on the court. My mind goes into a trance and I can't hear or see anything that is not related to what I need to do. Within twenty seconds into the second half, I already scored.

I jog back on defense with the other four girls and they give me small high-fives. I glance at the bleachers for a second and see the huge smile on my brothers' faces. I can't help but smile too.

The third quarter also goes by fast. We are still down but only by two points. There is no way we are not winning. We go back onto the court and start playing again. Their ball this time. After five minutes of running back and forth, I get really tired. I feel a little dizzy and lightheaded. I raise my hand to the coach and he quickly substitutes another player.

I look back at the bleachers and see the worried look on Jake and Dylan's faces. Ben is focused on the game and Zach and Cole and talking to each other. I try to pace my breathing but I can't. I jog over to the locker room and splash some water on my face. My heart isn't beating as fast and my breathing is almost back to normal. I look at myself in the mirror and I look disgusting.

"You're okay," I whisper to myself.

I walk back out of the locker room and sit on the chairs next to the rest of my team. I look back at the bleachers again and the boys are gone. They are nowhere to be seen. Maybe they had to go home or something for work. I'm used to it. My mom never had time to come to my games because she was always at work. I suddenly feel like I've been stabbed in the chest. I never cared about this kind of stuff, so why do I know?

"Sky you ready to go back in?" the coach asks me.

"Yeah of course," I respond immediately.

"No, Sky. Don't." a voice says from behind me.

I turn around and my brothers are there. Where on earth did you come from?

"What do you mean?"

"You just had an asthma attack or something," Dylan says.

"No, I didn't. I was just a little tired. I'm good now."

"I think you should sit this one out, kid," Cole says while patting my shoulder.