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they’d put down in the Springs gym had suddenly turned lumpier than a bowl of Quaker oatmeal, and they were talking about tearing it up and starting all over again. And the high school gym was booked and there was an art fair at the Y.
    And St. Pat’s was always looking for any new ways to raise money and now they had this exciting moneymaking opportunity from the Middletown Basketball Travel Team.
    Starting today.
    â€œFigured you ought to hear it from me, sport,” she said.
    â€œThey’re coming to my school?” he said. “ My gym? What’s the next thing I’m going to find out, they expect me to ball boy for them?”
    â€œWhy don’t you go with Will after school today instead of playing ball?” she said. “Or take the bus and I’ll meet you at home?”
    His mom usually had teacher conferences after school on Friday, and Danny would get the gym to himself.
    He shook his head no, closing his eyes good and tight.
    No crying in basketball.
    â€œI’m staying until they come,” he said.
    â€œBut I’m going to be late today.”
    Danny said, “I’m staying.”

    Will tried to get Danny to take the town bus with him after school. Or take the bus he took to the Flats, on the north side of town where he lived, a few blocks from Danny, and play his new NCAA Football 2005 video game.
    â€œMy dad played college football,” Will said. “He says NCAA 2005 is better.”
    Will Stoddard basically said Danny should do anything except be anywhere near the St. Pat’s gym when the “Springers”—it’s what he called Springs School kids, in honor of The Jerry Springer Show —showed up for their first practice.
    But Danny kept shaking his head every time Will came at him with a new alternative plan, even after they’d started playing one-on-one in the gym, and all the St. Pat’s buses, including Tess’s, were long gone.
    Occasionally Will would whip out his cell phone, which he kept in his baggy white North Carolina shorts even when playing basketball. There was a part of Will, Danny knew, that believed that cell phones could even make sick people better.
    â€œI’ll call my brother,” he said. “He got his license yesterday. He’s looking for reasons to ride around. He wants to come get us, and he usually doesn’t want anything to do with either one of us.”
    Danny shook his head from side to side, more slowly than before, trying to get through to him. “This is my day to have the gym to myself,” he said. “I’m not going to go hide in my locker.”
    They had finished their first game of one-on-one, Danny winning, 10–7. The game was only that close because Danny had given Will his usual spot of five baskets. Sometimes he’d given him seven baskets in a game of ten and still beat him.
    Will always took the points and always acted as if he was the one doing Danny the favor.
    But then Danny would watch with great admiration sometimes as Will would borrow money off one of their other classmates and make the other kid feel as if this was his lucky day, that handing over five bucks to Will Stoddard was somehow exactly the same as the other kid winning the lottery.
    Danny had just scored the winning basket by pushing the ball between Will’s legs, flashing around him to collect it, and banking a combination hook-layup high off the backboard.
    â€œWhere’d you get that one?” Will said.
    â€œMy dad showed me.”
    â€œI’ve been meaning to ask you all day—is he still in town?”
    They had finished playing now, were sitting on the stage, still sweaty, legs dangling over the side. Danny bounced the ball on St. Pat’s floor. “Unless he left while I was in school today.”
    â€œYou haven’t seen him since…?”
    â€œNo,” Danny said. “But no biggie. You know how my dad is.” He turned to look at Will