Purpose // Jenlisa

20: Brownie Points

Lisa

The argument between Jennie and I had gotten out of hand pretty quickly. I think it's safe to say that we both said things that we shouldn't have said in the heat of the moment. We had different values but that didn't really matter at the moment. Jennie and I were young and something such as values should be one of the last things that we bicker about. It was an important topic, but only when we got older. If our relationship lasts so long that we get married and start a family, then the situation should be brought back up but for now it was irrelevant.

So instead of being angry and acting immature, I apologized to Jennie and decided to leave it all in the past. Rather than arguing, I put a smile on my face and went out to meet the rest of her family. Her grandmother and three of her cousins had come by. Jennie's grandmother was much like her own mother and for that reason the two couldn't stop yelling at each other. They both seemed to love to drink, and bring up things that were way too private for the family's ears. The night progressed with the two of them entertaining everyone with their arguing.

Jennie's cousin, who was eleven, was a big fan of mine so I gave him an autograph and a few pointers to help him during tryouts for his middle school basketball team. Jennie's other cousins consisted of an adorable little baby girl who was only a few months old, and another girl who was around our age. She was gorgeous, which was a trait that obviously ran in Jennie's family. The whole night she kept staring at me and if I wasn't mistaking she was openly trying to flirt with me. All I could do was smile awkwardly and then go back to talking to the eleven year old to make me seem occupied.

***

Even with all of the craziness that happened that night, and the rest of the weekend that we ended up spending at Jennie's place, I survived and tonight was the night of my first game. I stood there, zoned out as the coach gave his usual pep talk. I could feel the energy radiating off of each one of my teammates, but the energy didn't transfer to me. It was weird, almost like if I was just there. Usually, I'd be the main one pumped and leading chants for my teammates to get even more hype but not tonight. A hard shove knocked me out of my senses.

"Are you ready?", Jeongyeon asked me aggressively. It was a normal thing. We'd just keep pushing each other and saying 'Are you ready' until one of us cracked a smile, but tonight I wasn't into it. Instead of replying, I just looked at her. "I guess not," she muttered before turning to one of our other teammates. I covered my hands with my face and sighed. I had to get this right. If I sucked tonight then coach was going to put me on the bench. I didn't want to be on the bench. I wanted to be on the court where I belonged.

When we ran out of on the court, the stadium went wild. I looked up at the stands and my stomach turned. There were so many people out tonight, all dressed in our team colors. College students that pre-gamed and got drunk were about to jump out of the stands with excitement. I knew within that crowd was Jennie and her friends. They were somewhere in the student section cheering me on. I'm sure if I looked hard enough, I'd spot them but I decided not to. I didn't want to get distracted during the game if I kept looking over at them.

During the final huddle, Coach Smirnov listed off all of the plays we have been working on during practice. We were playing Stanford and they weren't our hardest opponent, but if we didn't play right then the game could easily go into their hands. I knew all of my teammates were praying that I had made a full comeback from my funk but just being on the court at the moment made me uneasy. I knew it was going to be a night where my game was going to nonexistent. Knowing that tonight wasn't going to be good, the best thing I could do was pray for the best and try my hardest on the court.

"Well, Brandon, here we are Stanford and UCLA are facing off for the first time this year. It's UCLA's first game and as you can see the crowd is going crazy. The last two seasons, Lisa Manoban has led her team to two titles! They've knocked UConn right off of their winning streak for the championship! They're a well-rounded team. With the duo, Yoo Jeongyeon and Lisa Manoban, it seems like nothing can go wrong for them. I've never seen one off game with them!"