Sex, Love, and Basketball *Books 1 and 2* (Slowly Editing)

7. "Are You A Boy Or A Girl?"

*Bubbline is real, bishes!! That's not relevant to the chapter, but hey. It's a score for lesbians in my book. 🌈🌈 #20gayteen*

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Excuse any mistakes or grammatical errors.

Jayla

Coach was still keeping Parker and me away from the team, so we decided to start working out together, so we'd still be good when we finally got to join them again. That was also our only choice since coach said if we wanted to get in the gym it had to be together.

Three weeks have gone by and coach hasn't budged. We're still being punished, but I sort of got used to it. Parker is actually really cool, so I didn't mind much. I just missed my other teammates.

I've been helping her a lot with her weaknesses. That was once I finally got her to admit that she had weaknesses. Pride was her worse enemy. Aside from Parker's ass defense, she was a great player and that's why we mainly worked on defensive drills.

Parker told me she plays lazy defense because she has bad knees, but I told her that wasn't a good excuse. She just needed to get treatment for her knees and to make it a habit to ice her knees after every practice. I also suggested using Flexall before games and practices. It's sort of like Icy Hot. And the main thing was playing through pain. My knees weren't the greatest, but I would never let that hold me back.

I helped Parker a lot with her defense and she was getting way better. I was actually proud of her. The main key to defense was staying low. You can't play defense standing straight up. That's how people get their ankles broken (figuratively speaking). It's easier to change direction quicker when you stay low. It's also helpful to stay low because it makes it easier to make your self wider and it's more difficult for the person with the ball to go past you if you're wide.

Parker already knew this stuff though. Her issue was just her bad knees, but since she's doing what I told her and getting treatment in the training room like she needs to. She'll be fine.

I get that helping Parker could possibly mean not starting, but I don't care. She's my teammate and I'm just a sophomore. If I don't start this year, I will next year and the year after that. My time will come.

"I really appreciate you helping me, Jayla." Parker said as we were sitting in the locker room after our one on one practice.

"You know it's no problem. At the end of the day, we're on the same team. If you do well then that benefits the whole team. It's not about us as individuals." I shrugged.

"I was worried about a sophomore starting over me at first, but I don't care now. I'm gonna be honored subbing in for you. And it'll be great because I'll be able to keep that same intensity going since you turned me into a defensive beast." Parker half joked. Like I said her defense has gotten way better. Now that I think about it, it's never been bad. She was just holding back because of how much pain she was in because of her knees.

"Let's just both work our asses off and whatever happens happens. I don't really care about starting. I never did and that's why I was so confused on why you wanted beef with me." I spoke.

"It's not that I wanted beef. It's just that they say 'If you want to be the best, you have to beat the best and in order to beat the best, you have to play the best.' You're my biggest competition as far as this position goes, so I always challenged you because I wanted to get better. I guess I just got frustrated along the way because it was hard to accept the fact that you're better than me." Parker confessed.

"Even in high school I had to work harder than everyone else because this doesn't come easy to me like it does to you. It's like you were born for this and I have to put in twice as much work just to be able to do half of what you do naturally. In other words, I was being a hating ass bitch and I apologize for the way I treated you."