"I can't cancel. Watanabe needs the briefing before Monday." His father's voice sounded apologetic, coming from the hallway outside his parents' room. Kagoa stared at the ceiling. The Lakers poster above his desk, it was of Shaq mid-dunk with his mouth open.
His father knocked twice on his door before opening it, in his dress clothes and briefcase in hand.
"Sorry, kiddo."
Kagao sat up. "You're going in?"
"Shouldn't be the whole day."
"Okay."
"Be good for your mother," Yuichiro said, then he left and got out of the house.
Kagao lay back down, thinking about the tryouts. He thought about how he played all day yesterday. He still needed to practice.
'I need a ball and a hoop.'
He was downstairs before his mother had finished making breakfast. She agreed after the third ask.
"It's not a phase," Kagao said.
"Alright," she said. "Finish your rice."
Tamayo came with them to Sports Authority. She always asked questions about everything visible from the window during their car rides.
"Stay close," their mother called after her.
The basketball section had the balls arranged by size, dark orange, brown, and black, lined up on a display rack. Kagao pressed his palm against each basketball, feeling the grip and weight of it.
He picked up a size 7 and bounced it against the floor, rotating against his hands. "This one," he told his mother.
She was already talking to the store employee about portable hoops - a young guy who looked uncertain about the technical specifications until she mentioned adjustable height, at which point he led them to the back of the section.
There were three models, and Kagao picked the one in the middle. It had a solid base, and you could adjust it from six feet to ten.
She paid, and Kagoa carried the box to the car himself. It was heavier than he expected, but he didn't ask for help. They arrived home and set up the hoop together in the backyard, his mother reading instructions while Kagao tried to fit pieces together, without really knowing what he was doing.
Tamayo circled them both, accidentally handing them the wrong bolt twice, then a piece she'd apparently been sitting on. It took forty minutes, and when the pole finally stood upright at ten feet, Kagoa patted himself on the back.
---
Kagoa bounced the ball on the concrete. The ball came back lower than he expected, and he adjusted his release and shot. The ball hit the front of the rim and bounced back hard.
He retrieved it and shot again, but it hit the rim again. His mother sat on the back stairs with her tea. Tamayo sat beside her, watching.
"You keep missing," Tamayo said, pouting.
"I know." He shot again.
The first hour was dribbling. He'd learned something during the week- the fundamentals came faster when he found the rhythm first. The concrete meant adjusting: lower dribble and harder push.
He worked left-hand, right-hand, switching. He did low crossovers, never letting the ball rise above his knee. His dad had mentioned once, watching a game, that you could tell a serious player by how low they kept the ball during crossovers - less time in the air meant less chance for a steal.
After dribbling was shooting. The concrete affected his launch point; he had to plant slightly differently. He made his shot two times in a row, and when the ball dropped through the net, just something about hearing that swish sound made him want to hear it again.
Tamayo eventually wandered inside around noon, "Mom, I'm hungry, and Kagao isn't doing anything interesting anymore, he's just doing the same thing over and over."
"He's practicing," his mother said.
"Boriinggg."
The door closed, and his mother stayed. Kagao didn't notice her staying as he was too engrossed in practicing, until she appeared beside him with a glass of water. He drank the glass of water while still watching the basket.
"Thank you," he said.
"Are you hungry?"
"In a minute."
He started working on post moves around one o'clock. He thought of Shaq in the post doing a half-turn and making the shot. He tried it, but the timing was wrong; he tried again, but closer this time, but the ball arched too far left.
He moved to the other side and tried the drop step. He did it against an imaginary defender, focusing on the right, then back to the hook, but it was still wrong.
'I can feel it's not right.'
That was the difference he was learning today: the things his body already knew versus the things he had to teach it. Dribbling, shooting, those had come naturally to him somehow. The specific footwork of a post hook, he had to build those.
He didn't mind building; he just needed to know they were built correctly before he moved on. On the ninth, he felt the elbow position shift into something more natural, the wrist rolling differently at the release.
The ball hit the glass and dropped through. He stood still for a moment, then set up and did it again. By mid-afternoon, the ache in his arms had gotten worse; he'd noticed it but kept going. He was now working on the fadeaway.
The fadeaway from the right side: catch, pivot, two dribbles into the post, push off the left foot, lean back, shot at the peak, that's what he saw from Kobe. His first attempt, he put too much lean and missed, the second he shot badly and hit the front of the rim hard, the third was better, but his left foot didn't push off fully. He went again and again.
"Kagao, sweetheart. Take a break. You've been out here for hours." His mother said worried.
'One more time. Just get it right once, and then I'll take a break.'
When he got to the seventh - something in the footwork clicked, the timing aligned for half a second, and the ball arced on a better trajectory - but hit the side of the rim. He stood there exhausted, his arms aching even more now, and his shoulders were burning slightly, but it didn't matter to him, he picked up the ball and went again.
On his eighth try, the lean work and the foot push work, but on the release, he hit off the rim again.
"Kagao."
"I'm almost done."
On his tenth attempt, the ball left his hands perfectly, and he did everything right; it arched and dropped through the net. He set up and did it again and again and again, each time making it.
At four o'clock, the back gate opened. His father paused in the gate, looking at the hoop and Kagao mid-motion, running a drop step that ended in a short hook. Kagao didn't notice him until the shot was through the net.
"Watch this," Kagao said.
He set up at the right block, post position, the fadeaway he'd spent three hours on. The push-off was clean, same with the lean, and he released at the pea,k hitting the shot.
Swish.
Kagao picked up the ball, and his mother appeared in the back doorway.
"Yoichiro," Sachiko said in relief, gesturing for him to come towards her.
His father walked to the stairs and sat down, and they started talking. She glanced at Kagao and went back inside. His father watched him run the fadeaway twice more.
"You've worked hard today," Yoichiro said. "But the greats know when to rest, rest is a part of practicing, and the most important aspect."
Kagoa paused with the ball in both hands, looking at the rim. "My hook isn't consistent yet."
"You have all the time in the world, Kagoa; there's no need to rush greatness."
Kagao held the ball for another moment, then carried it to the base of the hoop and set it down. Inside, dinner was already almost ready. Tamayo sat at the table, drawing something on a piece of paper, narrating it to nobody in particular.
The television was on in the other room, some Sunday evening program his mother watched while cooking. The kitchen smelled like miso. Kagao washed his hands at the kitchen sink.
"The fadeaway looked clean," his father said.
"The footwork is still rough on the left side," Kagoa replied, looking disappointed.
"You'll fix it."
Kagao dried his hands and walked to the table. "Nii-chan," Tamayo said without looking up from her drawing. "I made you something."
He came around the table to look. A crayon drawing of two stick figures: one very tall, one small. The tall one had a round orange circle - a basketball. The small one had yellow hair, which Tamayo had, so that was her.
"You're watching me practice," he said.
"I gave you the basketball in the drawing," she said. "Because you like it."
"Thanks," he said, smiling.