chapter twenty-two

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Saturday morning, Rashir was in his car driving home from Lourdes's apartment with a permanent smile etched onto his face. He and Lourdes had made up after a week of not talking and he was relieved. He hadn't expected to spend the night at her house, he had sped to her apartment immediately after the game ended Friday night and he didn't think he'd be there for long.

He pulled into his driveway and turned his car off, quickly grabbing his things and slamming his car door. He had practice at 12 and it was 10:45, so he had some time to shower and get ready. He had slept surprisingly well last night, when he tried to fall asleep on Lourdes's couch, he was tossing and turning for a while until he decided to take a chance and ask Lourdes if he could sleep in her bed. He was fully expecting her to say no and was shocked when she agreed. He was 100% sure only agreed because she just wanted him to shut up so she could get back to sleep though.

When he woke up alone in the bed, he remembered the events of the previous night and was immediately put into a good mood. He could hear Lourdes and her friends badgering her about why he had spent the night, but he said nothing, figuring he wouldn't embarrass her any more than she already was.

He unlocked the front door, tossing his keys on the little tray they had, and kicked his shoes off.

"Look who's finally home," Nico came around the corner from the kitchen with some sort of yellow substance all over the front of his shirt and his hands dirty as hell, "I thought you were gonna come home last night,"

"What the hell happened to you?" Rashir looked at him with disgust, ignoring his question.

"Mateo went out so I tried making eggs," Nico looked down at himself, "Don't change the subject, did you spend the night at Lourdes's apartment? Have a lil' makeup sex?"

"No, we talked and it was late so I spent the night," Rashir rolled his eyes, walking to the kitchen to see the damage Nico had done to it. He stopped at the entrance and grimaced, the island looked like something threw up on it and there were dirty pots stacked in the sink. "Why do you keep trying to cook? We all know you can't," He turned to Nico, "You better clean this up before Mateo comes home or else he gon' spazz on yo' ass," He advised him, "I'm gonna shower,"

He exited the kitchen and jogged up the stairs, heading for the guest bathroom. His shower still wasn't fixed and he was reminded to get Mateo to call the plumber. He closed the door behind him and began to peel his shirt off. He paused when he realized they were Lourdes's clothes, his mood dampening. He hadn't asked whose clothes they were when she gave them to him, as far as he knew, she wasn't talking to anyone so it couldn't have been a boyfriend. She hadn't made a move to explain who's clothes they were, so he just dropped it and decided to keep his questions to himself.

He threw the clothes in the hamper and turned on the hot water, stepping into the shower to wash the previous night off.

"Damn," Rashir stared at the recent picture Lourdes had posted on her Instagram.

He liked the picture and commented heart eyes, which he knew would get him in trouble with her later. Apparently, people thought that he and Lourdes were dating, they had been posted on The Shaderoom together and there were pictures of them hanging out circulating online, being taken out of context. When Lourdes had told him about this, she insisted they needed to be as platonic as possible to assure people that they were not dating. He knew people would take him commenting heart eyes on her post the wrong way, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

"Rashir, coach wants you on the court," He heard someone say from the door to the gym.

He was hiding out, sitting in the locker room on one of the benches, on his phone while they had a short break during practice. It was Monday and he was in a bad mood today, his calculus professor was being a bitch about his grade. He hadn't done well on a test and was threatening to tell his coach so he couldn't play in their next game. Coach had made it very clear from the beginning that the team couldn't have a single failing grade no matter the class or else they would be benched until they raised the grade. Rashir had to learn that the hard way during freshman year.

"Tell him I'll be out soon," He replied without looking back to see who was talking to him.

"He said he wants you now,"

Rashir turned to see who he was talking to and rolled his eyes when he saw it was Diallo. Diallo Johnson was a senior and a point guard on the team. Rashir disliked him, he was cocky and a ball hog. He was also a huge player, Rashir might have slept around, but all girls knew what they were getting into when they got with him. He never entertained the idea of a relationship and made it clear that wasn't what he was looking for whenever he met a girl.

Diallo liked to play with girls' feelings and lie to them, and basically just be a complete ass. He had cheated on almost all of his previous girlfriend's, some of them even interrupting practice to confront him. He continued to cause unnecessary drama on the team and Rashir couldn't stand him. He hadn't liked him since he transferred to UMD from Grambling State during sophomore year and joined the team.

"Aight, I'm coming," He stuffed his phone into his bag and stood up from the bench to walk out of the locker room. He brushed past Diallo who was still waiting at the door but caught up to him and fell in step with him. Rashir ignored his presence, not wanting to make any sort of conversation with him.

"You friends with Lourdes right?" Diallo asked and Rashir side-eyed him. He said nothing and Diallo took his silence as a yes, "I got her number the other day, you think you could put me on? I'm having a party after the game on Wednesday and I want her to come," Rashir stiffened at the thought of Diallo being interested in Lourdes. Diallo was a douchebag, Lourdes didn't need that in her life.

"You can't ask her yourself? I'm not finna talk to her for you just so you can fuck with her feelings," He snapped.

Instead of looking offended, Diallo just smirked at him and Rashir could already tell he was about to say something that would annoy him, "You jealous or something bro? Thought she was just yo' friend," Rashir ignored him, but Diallo kept pushing, "I mean I get it, she bad as hell. With an ass like that, I'd want her all to myself too,"

Rashir stopped in his tracks and turned to Diallo who had a smirk plastered all over his face. He seriously contemplated slapping the damn smirk off his face but chose to clench his fists at his sides angrily instead, his fists were itching to punch the jackass in front of him. "Don't get beat the fuck up Johnson," He growled, realizing they now had an audience. The rest of the team had looked up from their drills to see Diallo and Rashir arguing and Rashir was dangerously close to doing something he'd regret. Coach wasn't paying attention, he was too busy cussing out a waterboy for spilling something.

"What? I ain't say nothing," Diallo taunted, "I don't see why you so worked up, she not yo' bitch so what's the problem?"

Rashir raised his arm back to hit Diallo once he heard him refer to Lourdes as 'his bitch' but was stopped by someone catching his arm behind him.

"Aye! The fuck is you doing?" Nico asked and held him back from Diallo who was looking at him smugly like he had done something.

"Get off me," He shrugged Nico off. Mateo came jogging from getting water at one of the fountains outside of the, confused at the commotion.

"What's happening?"

"This dumbass about to punch that dumbass over there," Nico pointed to Diallo, "Can't leave yo' ass alone for 5 minutes huh? Already getting into fights and shit," He fake scolded him, just as coach came back from terrorizing the waterboy.

"What's going on? Why are we all in a crowd? Get into teams, we're playing a scrimmage today. We don't have all day," Coach Hill yelled, blowing his whistle loudly, making them all jump. Diallo walked away to the other side of the court as Rashir, forming his own team while Rashir stayed in his spot, still annoyed. "You gonna stand there all day Martin?" Coach asked him sarcastically. Rashir bit his tongue, resisting the urge to cuss him out. Anyone and everyone was getting on his absolute nerves today and he didn't have the energy to play a scrimmage.

"Come on bro," Nico ushered him over to a team with a couple of players. He grumbled under his breath and stalked over to them, ready to get practice over with and be home for the rest of the day.

Rashir was silent the entire way home, not wanting to join in on the conversation Nico and Mateo were having in the car. They knew not to bother Rashir when he got in his moods, they just let him have space and eventually he would get over whatever was bothering him.

The rest of practice went by as smoothly as it could have gone. Diallo didn't talk to him after the little altercation they had and Rashir had chosen to ignore his presence during the scrimmage even though there were a couple of fouls and aggressiveness. The girls were supposed to come over at 9 so they could discuss Lourdes's birthday trip and all of the details, so he had the rest of the day to improve his mood before he had to deal with company. Mateo pulled into their driveway, killing the engine and Rashir immediately exited the car, grabbing his duffel bag that was in the trunk of the G Wagon without a word. He walked to their porch and unlocked the door, kicking his shoes off, and jogging up the stairs to get to his room.

Once he got to his bedroom, he slammed the doors shut and locked it, he didn't want either of the boys to come in unannounced. He threw his bag down on the floor and flopped on his bed, pulling out his phone to try and distract himself. He went to reply to a text from Lourdes but was interrupted by an incoming call from his father. He declined, not in the mood to deal with a lecture about basketball from his father but his phone rang almost immediately after he declined the first call. He let out an annoyed sigh, clicking the answer button.

"What?" He snapped into the phone.

"Why are you using that tone with me boy? You better speak to me with some damn respect," His father barked into the receiver. Rashir pinched the bridge of his nose, already over this conversation and tempted to hang up on him.

"I'm busy,"

"You need to work on your shooting, I'm watching a clip from your last game and you keep hesitating, that can cost you a game if you don't get your shit together," His dad ignored his response and began criticizing him, "You don't even look like you want to fucking be there in some of these clips, what the hell is wrong with you,"

"Nothing,"

"Well obviously something is wrong with you, the news is saying you have a girlfriend, is that true? You better hope it's not. You need to focus on basketball and that's it Rashir, I've been telling you this since you were young, no distractions." Rashir opened his mouth to tell him he wasn't dating anyone but his father cut him off, "Whoever this whore is you need to cut her off, she's probably only after you because she wants to be a trophy wife," Rashir could feel himself getting even angrier at the fact that his dad was calling Lourdes a whore, he could handle his father tearing him down but he wasn't allowed to speak on Lourdes.

"She's not my fucking girlfriend, so stop talking about her," He hissed into the phone, "I have to go, bye, "He hung up before his father could protest. He turned on do not disturb so his father's calls wouldn't go through. He threw his phone down on his bed angrily, standing up and pacing around his room.

With the stress of keeping his grades up, playing on the team, worrying about getting drafted, and the media, he was starting to fall apart. He cursed and punched his wall, creating a dent. He didn't feel any better after the first hit, so he struck the wall again, fueling all of his anger and stress into the punch and successfully creating yet another hole in his wall. His knuckles were cracked open and bleeding, but he didn't feel anything as he shook his hand off and stared at the damage he had done. He heard someone jogging up the stairs and knock on his door but he ignored it, still zoned out and staring at the wall.

After a couple of seconds, his door opened and Nico stood there, looking at Rashir's hand with concern and then looking back up at his face.

"How did you get in here? I locked the door," Rashir grumbled, turning around to wash his hands off in his bathroom. He had his first aid kit under his sink for moments like this, so he pulled it out, searching for the alcohol and some bandaids. He washed up and wrapped his hands, used to the pain that came with putting alcohol on his cuts. Once he went back into his room, Nico standing in front of the wall he had just damaged. He looked up when he heard Rashir enter the room, giving him a look of concern which Rashir ignored.

"You really need to stop punching the wall, shit is expensive to fix," Nico said, turning to face him, "You good? I heard noises from downstairs and figured I'd see if you okay,"

"I'm fine," Rashir replied.

"Aight, if you wanna talk I'm here," Nico assured him, knowing not to push him.

"Thanks," Rashir gave him a small smile.

***
hey y'all! this chapter is kinda short but whateverrr. i've been meaning to ask y'all, who's your favorite character??? i see a lot of people hating on nala and sometimes even lourdes so i'm curious ๐Ÿ˜ญ don't forget to vote and comment!

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