Page 204 of Disarm
“Will do.”
Coach’s officealways smells like coffee and sweat and some kind of lemony cleaner he uses to wipe down his whiteboard. There’s a framed photo of the team from last season on the wall, slightly crooked. Behind his desk, a bulletin board is cluttered with schedules, camp flyers, and a couple of faded newspaper clippings.
He’s in his usual UCSC hoodie, glasses perched on his nose as he stares at his laptop. When I knock on the doorframe, he glances up and gestures me in with a flick of his fingers.
“Burton,” he says, motioning to the chair in front of the desk. “Sit.”
My stomach does a stupid little roller coaster dip.
I obey.
“How’d that stats exam go?” he asks, surprising me. I didn’t think he actually paid attention to when the team talks amongst ourselves. Especially when it comes to things that don’t involve an orange ball.
I scrub the back of my neck. “Uh… not catastrophic,” I say. “I didn’t black out or start crying, so that’s a step up from last semester.”
He huffs out something that’s almost a laugh. “I’ll take that as a win.” Then he leans back, folding his arms, eyes sharpening. “Listen. I wanted to talk to you about something before it starts coming at you from other angles.”
That sounds… ominous.
“Okay…” I say carefully.
“You remember the scout from Oregon, obviously,” he goes on, and I nod. “The same org reached out again. They liked what they saw at that game. And they’ve been looking at your tape since.”
My heart starts pounding in my ears. “Okay,” I say again, because that’s the only word in my brain.
“They want you at a summer camp thing,” he says, reaching over to tap a printed email on his desk. “High-intensity, invite-only, a lot of drills, scrimmages, and skill work. Other scouts will be there, not just them. It’s kind of a pipeline. You do well there, more doors open.”
My brain is doing that thing where it tries to detach from my skull and float to the ceiling.
“Wow,” I manage. “Okay.”
Get another word in your vocabulary, Caleb.
He gives me a look. “You don’t have to give me an answer right now,” he says. “I’m just putting it on your radar. We’ll talk about logistics. Money, travel, how it fits with your summer, all that. But I want you to understand something.”
I sit up straighter without meaning to.
“You’re on people’s radar now,” he says, voice firm. “You’re not just some undersized guard anymore. You’ve put together a string of really solid games. Scouts talk. They share notes. The guy from Oregon isn’t the only one who’s asked about you.”
The room tilts and I grip the edge of the chair.
“Whoa,” I say, even quieter.
Coach studies me. “How does that land?” he asks. “Give it to me straight.”
I laugh, a short, breathless sound, almost like I’m forcing it.Okay… I’m totally forcing it.“Like someone just cracked my skull open and poured possibility in,” I say. “Which is… cool. And also… terrifying. Like… like I’m being asked to pick a future off a shelf and I’m still trying to figure out how to pass stats.”
His mouth twitches. “Fair,” he says. “Look, Burton. I’m not here to shove you toward the draft tomorrow. You’re not declaring this year. We both know that. But after next season…” He shrugs. “If you keep working, keep putting up numbers, and keep improving on defense the way you have been? It’s not crazy to talk about you declaring.”
The sentence hits somewhere deep in my chest and then explodes outward: declare for the draft.
Sixteen-year-old me would’ve sold a kidney for him to say that. Twenty-two-year-old me wants to throw up.
“I… don’t know what to do with that,” I admit. “Part of me wants to scream and run laps around the gym. And another part is like—” I snap my fingers. “Nope. Too much. Shut it down. You’re not allowed to be excited because then it’ll hurt more if it doesn’t happen.”
He nods like this is exactly what he expected me to say. Which is both annoying and… grounding.
“That’s your job, right now,” he says. “Notice both parts. Let them both exist. Then show up to lifts and practices and class on time. You don’t have to decide your whole life today. You just have to keep doing the work that has already got you here.”
