Hook Shot (Hoops 3)

“Moni,” I mutter, paralyzed by my helplessness.

Lotus squeezes my hand, but doesn’t cease her persistent whisper. Psalm thirty-five, what she was repeating last night. Tears course over her cheeks, and she shakes her head.

“It wasn’t you,” she says, her voice thin and reedy. “It wasn’t you. It was . . .”

She doesn’t finish that thought. She doesn’t have to, but resumes her urgent whisper. I have no idea what to say or believe. What to think. Could Lotus have been right? Could last night, her premonition or whatever it was, have been about Simone?

As soon as we reach the hospital, they wheel Simone out of sight. She’s breathing, but still hasn’t regained consciousness. They have to pump her stomach.

A tube down her throat, her stomach being pumped. I’m caught in my worst nightmare, and I can’t wake up. Can’t even stir, but watch uselessly like some spectator trapped behind a glass partition separating reality from fiction.

“Bridget!” Lotus says, her tear-filled eyes wide. “You have to call her.”

“Shit.” I pass a shaking hand over my face. I dread having to break this to Bridget, but I’m also struggling to keep my temper under control. The lies she told, the scrutiny she exposed our family to again for her own gain—it’s all fresh in my mind. And the pills. Her name’s on the bottle of pills Simone took.

My conversation with Bridget is brief, terse, almost stoic in spite of her hysteria. It has to be. If I allow one emotion, compassion, through that wall of ice, they’ll all overtake me—trample my intention to save recriminations for later. For after Simone is out of the woods.

I’m seated in the waiting room, gripping Lotus’s hand like it’s a rope thrown over the side of a cliff, when Bridget arrives.

“Kenan, oh my God.” She’s dressed simply in jeans. No makeup. Tennis shoes. None of the camera-ready glamour I’ve gotten used to seeing since she’s been filming Baller Bae. Her face is streaked with tears.

I stand to greet her, and she flings herself into my arms. My teeth grind together, and I bite back all the questions, the accusations, and instead, awkwardly pat her back.

“Where is she?” she asks, pulling away to search my face.

“They’re working on her now. They were pumping her stomach.” I hesitate. “The pills she took—it was a bottle of yours. Did you notice it was gone?”

Her eyes transform from wide and teary to slitted and enraged.

“You can’t be blaming me,” she snaps. “If this is anyone’s fault, it’s yours.”

She glances down to Lotus still seated in the waiting room chair.

“And hers.” She points one long finger at Lotus, her voice rising. “This was Simone’s cry for help, for attention. When she needed her father most, you came and ruined everything.”

“That’s enough,” I snap. “If you’re gonna point fingers at anyone, it should be at yourself, Bridge. You think it’s coincidence that Simone tried this the night your train wreck of a show aired? The very night you dragged all the shit that drove us into counseling in the first place back out? Have you considered that?”

“No, I haven’t, because I wasn’t the one missing in action when she needed me most. Where were you when she needed you? With her.” She jerks her head toward Lotus. “So get off your high horse, Kenan. Maybe we’ve both failed her lately, but at least she didn’t have to wonder if she was first with me.”

“God, that’s so unfair,” I say. “We’ve been apart for almost three years between separation and divorce, and this is the first time I’ve dated anyone.”

“But Simone wants us back together,” Bridget says. “Maybe now you’ll believe her.”

“We can’t do that. We can’t tailor the world to her like that, and you know it, but we can help her deal with reality. And you’ve undermined that at every turn, encouraging this fantasy that we might get back together.”

“I wish both of you would just shut the hell up,” Lotus says tonelessly from her seat.

Bridget and I stare down at her, our mouths gaping open.

“Excuse me?” Bridget’s hands go to her hips, and indignation jerks her brows up.

“I know what it’s like to think the adults are all crazy,” Lotus says, shaking her head. “To feel like no one is considering what’s best for you. She doesn’t need the two of you at each other’s throats. She needs you both by her side.”

Lotus takes my hand and looks up, holding my stare. “This isn’t about you, Kenan. It can’t be. It has to be about Simone.”

Her eyes cool, harden like volcanic rock when they shift to Bridget. “It’s not about who is wrong or right, because if it was, believe me, Bridget, you’d be wrong.”

“Who do you think you are?” Bridget takes a step closer to Lotus. Before I can insert myself between them, Lotus stands and, even several inches shorter, manages to look Bridget right in the eyes.