Her concern was different than mine. I was thinking about all the things that might be going on with Meredith. Kelly, as any coach would, was thinking about the game.
She un-puckered her lips and shrugged her shoulders. “Oh well. If she’s not here, she’s not here. Nothing we can do about it. Still gotta play the game.”
Again, she was smart. She wasn’t going to fret over something she couldn’t control and she certainly wouldn’t show any frustration over it to the other girls.
Stricker came in through the doors at the other end of the hall, his jaw tight and his cheeks sucked in.
“Recorded as absent,” he said. “Even if she shows, she can’t play.”
“Okay,” Kelly said.
“I’m sorry, Kelly,” Stricker said, shaking his head. “Nothing I can do.”
She set the bag of balls down. “Not your fault. She knows the rules. So do the other girls. We’ll be fine.”
But they weren’t.
The girls were rattled in the locker room as soon as Kelly mentioned that Meredith wouldn’t be playing. Eyes wide, they began to fidget and I could see the anxiety take hold.
Except for Megan. She just stared at her hands and shook her head
They carried the anxiety out on the floor with them. They were disoriented, out of sync, unable to do what they’d been prepared to do. They missed open shots, threw the ball away, missed defensive assignments. Kelly yelled, screamed, pleaded, all to no avail. I sat there, helpless and mute.
Episcopal, smelling blood early, went ahead and cut open a gaping wound in the Coronado team. They won by thirty two points.
Kelly kept her post game speech short, all of the girls hanging their heads, the collective disappointment clouding the room like the smoke after a brushfire. There was no point in getting on them. They knew they had come out and tanked. Their own knowledge of the failure was far more effective than anything she could’ve told them.
She turned to me in the hallway after we’d stepped out of the locker room. “You going to look for her?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Wouldn’t finding her help your case with Chuck?”
“I don’t know. She won’t talk to me so far. And it’s not like her father is a fan of mine. Not my business.”
She perched her hands on her hips, her elbows forming sharp angles at her sides. “I think you should look for her.”
“No offense, but I’m not here to save your program.”
She squinted at me for a moment, chewing on her bottom lip. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Yeah, it is,” I said, not believing her. “You didn’t ask me a single question about her well-being. After I told you about her absence, you went right into game mode. And you’re still in it. You want her back so that you don’t rack up any more thirty-point losses, not because she might be in any kind of trouble.”
She stared at me for a long time, then picked up the bag of balls and slung them over her shoulder. “Fuck you, Tyler. It’s my job to win games, but I care about those girls, too. My job tonight wasn’t to work them up into a frenzy over a missing friend, it was to get them to put that aside and play basketball. What should I have done?”
I didn't answer.
She raised both of her eyebrows. “Tell me. What should I have done? Had them hold hands in a circle and talk about how much they missed Meredith?” She let the eyebrows come down and shook her head. “Don’t act like you understand me. I don’t care if she ever plays again. I said you should find her because it’s the right thing to do and you would seem to know how to do it.”
She adjusted the bag on her shoulder. “That’s the only reason and fuck you for thinking otherwise.”
THIRTY-FIVE
I stood in the hallway for a few minutes, thinking over Kelly’s words.
Had I been unfair with her? She hadn’t asked if I thought Meredith was alright, hadn’t asked if I knew what might’ve happened to her and she didn’t ask any of the other girls if they knew anything.
She’d been focused on basketball.
But over the course of the week, I'd seen her demonstrate genuine concern and empathy for her players, not to mention the conversation we’d shared in the diner. She liked Meredith and not just for her playing ability. She hadn’t struck me as one of those win at all costs coaches. I hadn’t seen anything to indicate that her win-loss record superseded everything else.
Until she told me she thought I should look for Meredith.
Her timing stunk. It was hard for me to take it any other way when she walked out of a dead locker room after a crushing loss without their best player-and then asked me to go find that best player. I didn’t think she could switch gears that quickly, moving from defeated coach to concerned adult.
But maybe the truth was somewhere in between.
I walked outside and Gina Coleman was waiting for me.
“Tough loss,” she said, gesturing at the gym.
I nodded.
“You heard about Meredith, I assume?”
“Still missing?”
“Yeah. Didn’t come home from school yesterday afternoon, no one’s heard from her since.” She hesitated. “In fact, I think you were the last one to see her.”
“How’s that?”
“Couple of the girls said they saw you talking to her in the hall after practice.”
“I tried talking to her,” I said. “But she wouldn’t talk to me. Ran out of here and I didn’t follow her.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “You didn’t follow her?”
“Isn’t that what I just said?”
“Just checking.”
“Don’t do this, Gina.”
“Do what?”
“Stand here and jerk me around,” I said. “Show up outside the door to the gym and brace me. If you think I have anything to do with Meredith’s disappearance, you’re fucking nuts. I know Jordan sent his guys after me this morning. Those two are stupid. You aren’t.”
She rolled her shoulders forward and some of the tension in them disappeared. She uncrossed her arms and tilted her head toward the parking lot. “Come on.”
“No thanks,” I said. “I’ve got my own ride.”
She took a deep breath, let it out and looked at me. “Jordan wants to talk.”
“Tell him to call me and make an appointment.”
She blinked quickly several times. “You’re gonna wanna talk to him, Joe.”
“Doubt that.”
“I’m serious,” she said, leveling her eyes with mine. “And that’s not a threat. You should talk to him.”
“Really? Why’s that? He gonna make more wiseass remarks about my daughter?” I shook my head. “I’ll be fine.”
An empty smile settled on her face. “I know you’re pissed. You should be. I don’t blame you. Sending those two ass-clowns after you was a mistake. He knows it now.” She paused. “He wants to talk to you and it’s not what you think.”
I didn’t see anything that told me she was lying to me. She was serious and she wasn’t trying to strong arm me. And other than dumping me on my ass that first night, she’d been straight with me.
“Then tell me what it is,” I said.
“Just trust me.” She pointed her thumb over her shoulder. “He’s out here in the lot. He can tell you himself.”
THIRTY-SIX
Jordan was prowling next to a Black Cadillac Escalade, pacing back and forth, wired with nervous energy, his eyes on the ground.
He looked up as we approached. “What took so long?”
Gina held out her hands. “Relax, Jon.”
He glared at her for a moment before leveling his gaze on me. “You haven’t seen my daughter?”
“I saw her yesterday afternoon after school,” I said. “That’s it.”
He kept his eyes locked on me. They were bloodshot and tired. I doubted that he’d slept for even a moment the previous night. I remembered those nights.
He glanced at Gina. “You tell him?”
“Just that you wanted to talk to him,” she said, leaning against the back of the SUV.
“Tell me what?” I asked.