The Long Shot. Ellen Hartman

been forced into an austerity budget. The state sets spending levels.” She rattled off the facts, but her voice had lost its warmth. He imagined she was trying to hold back her opinion of this financial state of affairs.

       “Anyway, I don’t want to take up any more of your time. The reason I called is that even though I realize you don’t get back here very much, I’d hoped you might know someone who would be interested in helping out as coach, or maybe you wouldn’t mind sending a donation to help me pay someone.”

       Things must have changed in Milton since he’d been there, because no way the town he remembered would have let the team go. Man.

       His mouth went dry. Milton needed a volunteer coach.

       When he’d told Victor he didn’t want Wes to do easy community service, he’d meant it. He wanted Wes to see what his life could have been like and could still be if he didn’t start to focus. Where better to bring that lesson home than in Milton? He and Wes would both be there still if not for basketball.

       On a selfish level, if Wes worked out with the Tigers, that might give him an extra bump when it came time for the university to review his case. If he’d put the time in to stay in shape, would that show his coach he was serious about playing ball?

       “You need a coach now?”

       “Practice starts in two days.”

       “Say I can find someone. Would you be willing to write a letter of recommendation afterward?”

       “For a coaching job?”

       “For college.”

       “Guidance counselors love to write recommendations. If you know someone who’d be willing to help, I’d be more than happy to write a letter.”

       He didn’t need to tell anyone about the suspension right away. He’d be able to keep the details quiet while Wes did his work—he could tell Ms. Bradley what she needed to know when they were done.

       “Okay. I know someone.”

       “Thanks so much, Deacon. I mean, I’m phoning you out of the blue, and it’s just so generous of you to help me out. Would it be out of line for me to ask who you have in mind?”

       “Me. Well, me and my brother.”

       “You hate Milton.” He heard what sounded like a muffled curse, and she quickly added, “Well, not hate, but you don’t come home and I’ve heard—”

       “My business is flexible, so I can work from Milton.” He made the next part sound like an afterthought. “I’ll bring my brother. He’s the one who can use the college letter.”

       “So your brother is thinking about college? Good for him!”

       Her tone of voice set him on edge. It was that fake-supportive thing teachers always did when they were giving an order but wanted you to believe you were making a choice. Did she think that just because he didn’t go to college he wouldn’t send his brother?

       He’d worked hard to get where he was—no shiny green suits hanging in his closet now. He wasn’t that kid with no options anymore, and high school guidance counselors certainly didn’t intimidate him anymore. Not even if they were drop-dead sexy standing at the podium during assembly in a thong. He snapped out, “Of course he’s going to college. Why wouldn’t he?”

       “No reason,” she said. “I’ll look forward to meeting him.”

       “Why are you helping out the basketball team, anyway? You weren’t too supportive of the Tigers when I was playing.”

       “The details are different in this case,” she said. “You never answered why you said yes to this, either.”

       Her words held a challenge, but he didn’t owe her anything. He wasn’t about to be baited into spilling his guts about Wes.

       “Times change,” he said.

       “Well, even though it doesn’t seem like enough, you have my gratitude.”

       “Go, Tigers,” he said.

       “Go, Tigers,” she echoed.

      * * *

      HE FINALLY TRACKED Wes down in the gym. His brother was leaning against the wall, his eyes unfocused as he concentrated on the conversation he was having on the phone.

       “Call me as soon as you hear,” he said. “The minute you find out.” He listened for a few more seconds and then hung up.

       “Hey,” he said to Deacon.

       “You want to shoot around?”

       Wes shrugged. “I guess.”

       Deacon tossed a ball onto the floor. “Want the music on?”

       Wes caught the ball, but held it. “No.” He jogged a few feet toward the foul line, then turned and bounced the ball back to Deacon. “We’ll play to twenty. Win by two?”

       Deacon didn’t play against Wes. He used to when Wes was much younger. They’d played a lot. But Deacon had always held back, making sure his brother won. With ten years between them, there’d been no way to make the contest even close to fair. When Wes was about eight, he realized Deacon was letting him win. He’d pitched a fit, and when Deacon wouldn’t agree to play him “like a man” in Wes’s words, the boy had stormed off the court. After that, they’d shoot around, run drills, mess with tricks, but they didn’t play games.

       “I’m not playing you, Wes.”

       “Why not? I thought you’d be happy I’m trying to stay in shape so I’ll be fighting fit when they decide I’ve learned my lesson and can be allowed back on campus.”

       “Who was on the phone?”

       “Oliver.”

       He’d met Oliver during the move-in weekend. At first he’d assumed he was on the team because he was rooming with Wes, plus he was tall and well built. He looked like the other guys on the floor, but then the kid opened his mouth. Oliver was brilliant, no doubt about it, but he was pretty far off the beaten path, maybe far off the planet. At one point he’d spoken what Deacon assumed was Arabic because it sounded exactly that complicated and hard to learn, but Wes told him later it was Elvish.

       There’d been a mix-up in the housing office, and somehow Oliver had been assigned to Wes’s room even though he wasn’t on the team and shouldn’t have been on the basketball floor at the dorm.

       “He has to have a second hearing. They decided there’s enough evidence he was involved to suspend him, too.”

       “He cheated and he helped you steal a car.”

       “The cheating thing was a joke. Nobody would have cared about any of it if we hadn’t moved that car. Coach got pissed off because we embarrassed him. He’s been on me since— He’s just been on me. If we hadn’t touched his car, they’d have ignored everything, even the bar thing.”

       Deacon felt his skin go cold. Wes really didn’t see why people were mad about what he’d done.

       His brother went on. “Maybe I’ll just drop out. I don’t need college. You never went. I should skip the whole thing and get a job.”

       “Where? In the fast-food industry?”

       “Bill Gates dropped out. Mark Zuckerberg dropped out.”

       “So what? You invented some new Internet technology and you’ve been keeping it quiet until you can drop out of school and start minting money in the stock market?”

       “No, Deacon. You don’t have to be a jerk,” Wes said. “College is pointless. Like I said, you didn’t go.”

       He heard Victor’s voice in his mind. Tell him. Tell Wes. He’ll never know how much his education means if you don’t let him see all the problems you have