Vibiana in the Half-court Set

Coach Jenkins shielded his eyes from the bright California sun. “This right here costs more than a house in Texas.”
Callie peered through the tinted windows. “Magic drives a Maserati.”
The Maserati was low to the ground, looking like a wild animal.
Our team had ten players but Saint Paul’s had sixteen. Sixteen mostly tall girls, blonde hair tightly pulled back from their faces, wearing baby-blue warm-ups, now and then giggling during their lazy shoot around. About ten minutes before tip-off, on a silent signal from their coach, they bent low, snapping free the warm-ups to reveal baby-blue uniforms, with their names on the back spelled out in satiny gold. I had never seen that before. Warm-ups or names on the back. Our jerseys had been handed down from generations of sweaty girls, the blocky white numbers crackling with age.
Coach saw me staring. “Think they play better because they have warm-ups?” he asked.
Both teams gathered at midcourt to recite the Our Father. Afterwards, Saint Vibiana stood in a circle, arms resting on each other’s shoulders. “Play as a team, win as a team,” I said, and the girls all said, “Team!” Callie said, “Box out,” and we all said, “Box out!” Our hands stacked in a tower, we shouted, “1,2,3 Vibiana!”
Just as we were breaking up, Junie leaned close and asked, softly, but not that softly, “Why ain’t you with your whites?”
I felt like slugging her. Callie was there, too. Pretending she didn’t hear.
“Cause you would lose,” I said. “If I did that.”
She rolled her eyes. I wanted to trip her so she would fall face first to the court, break all her teeth. How would she like that?
Saint Paul’s won the tip-off. Their point, the shortest girl on the court, baby-blue Cons laced with sparkly laces, advanced the ball, me shadowing, bumping, trying to disrupt the play. When her blue eyes darted wide, searching for a pair of open hands, I reached in. Quickly she turned, and shoved her elbow into my neck.
I couldn’t breathe. The refs stopped the game. For a second or two I thought that gym floor would be the last thing I ever saw. Callie came over and rubbed my back, until, at last, in one long, ugly gasp, the air choked back into my lungs. The point behaved as though I was being overdramatic.
I missed both foul shots and went to the bench. My throat felt bruised, a bruise leaking to the base of my neck. Delmy took over but got upset by the trap, the four grabby hands attacking the ball, so Coach switched Callie to point but that meant that when Callie passed the ball, there was no Callie to catch the ball. We couldn’t score.
The blonde girls snuck each other little looks, confident. They grinned.
I felt something then, a warm breath at the back of my neck. My dad, leaning close.
“You’re all right,” he said. I shook my head. We needed to go to Kaiser after the game so the doctors could rebuild my trachea. Meanwhile, Scholastica dawdled, safe at midcourt, with Callie tripled-teamed, and Junie unable to slow, not even for a second, those tall girls from scoring.
The Saint Paul team enjoyed the game, skipping up and down on their way to an easy two, smiles tucked in tight.
A hot tear splashed onto my knee.
“Play,” my father said. “There’s nothing wrong with ye.”
He hated watching us lose. He wanted me to pretend, make things fun again.
Coach Jenkins glanced my way, nodded. He meant, Ready?
Both of them wanted me to pretend.