A’ja offered her coach an appreciative smile even though internally, her heart was sinking. “Thank you, Coach James. I’m just doing my best.”
Coach James gave A’ja a head nod, and A’ja turned to walk out of the gym. It sucked that she was playing better than she’d ever played in her life, and it was all due to heartbreak. A’ja had been playing basketball with her father since she was five, and she started playing for the Rec Center in Raleigh, North Carolina when she was ten. A’ja made the team in middle school and played every year after. She got a full scholarship to NorthCarolina A&T University and after college, she was picked up by the London Lions. A’ja knew there was a possibility that she may have to move to another state if she got chosen to play in the league, but she never fathomed the team to choose her would be in London.
Having to live in London from the end of April until September wasn’t that bad, and London quickly grew on A’ja. She’d been playing overseas for the past eight years, and she was up to almost $200,000 a year which was great for a female athlete. It sucked that a male point guard that had the stats she did that had been playing for eight years could be earning damn near $200,000,000 a season. If she dwelled on it for too long, A’ja would become pissed, but she knew what it was when she got picked up. The pay scale simply wasn’t fair, but males dominated the sports world, and they were who people wanted to see play. The men.
Still, A’ja knew she was blessed, and she acted as such. She had endorsement deals with Adidas, Gatorade, Capital One, and CarMax. In the past year, she’d earned right at $1,000,000 with all of her endorsements combined, so she didn’t complain much. A’ja blinked back tears as she pushed the locker room door open. Every time she thought about the fact that when she went back home to North Carolina once this season was over, she’d be living in a new home, it made her chest tight. A’ja and her husband, Kenyatta, had been married for five years and had been having problems for the past year. She made the decision in April to file for divorce, and their $800,000 home was now on the market to be sold. Just because A’ja was the one that filed for divorce didn’t make it hurt any less. She was devastated. Broken. Kenyatta had been in her life for the past seven years. This was the longest period since knowing him that they went weeks without talking and when they spoke these days, it was about the house, or other matters that needed to be handled. Noencouraging words for the start of the season. No good morning text messages or random pictures and memes throughout the day. Those things had stopped a while ago, and A’ja’s heart hadn’t beat the same since.
It would have been very easy for her to crawl under the covers and let life pass her by. She could have let life beat her down to the point of being reckless with everything she cared about, but A’ja had come too far. Thirty wasn’t old, but it was damn near ancient for an athlete. Of course, there were players much older than her, but A’ja was on the court with women in their early twenties. She was talented for sure, but she had no desire to be playing ball at thirty-five. It had been in her plans to play one more season and have a baby. She would then stay home for a year play one more season maybe two, and then retire to have baby number two, start a business, and be a stay-at-home mom slash entrepreneur. That was now out of the question, however. It had been A’ja’s dream to have two kids by the age of thirty-five since she was seventeen. The day that she walked down the aisle and took Kenyatta’s last name, no one could have made her believe that she’d spend five years married to him and right before she wanted to start trying for a baby, they’d be breaking up. A’ja would have deemed that to be the most ridiculous thing she ever heard, but it seemed that the joke was on her.
Rather than letting a broken heart be her downfall, A’ja turned that pain into motivation. She allowed herself one week to cry, eat junk food, and replay every argument and fucked up word in her head like a movie. She threw a pity-party and asked God why a hundred times before she got on her best bullshit. A’ja spent five to six hours a day playing basketball, working out, and getting her body and mind right for the season. She would never allow a sports commentator to open his or her mouth and say her divorce was the reason she was playing terribly. Lastseason, A’ja was averaging fifteen points a game, and this season she wanted to bring that average up by at least five points. If she was going to be walking around with a broken heart, she’d do so while at the top of her game with eyes on her ready to negotiate the biggest contract of her career. Since she wouldn’t be sitting next season out to have a baby, she may as well be one of the highest paid WNBA players to ever grace a court and in order to do that, she had to be on her shit.
“You okay?” her friend Celine asked as A’ja opened her locker.
A’ja was the type that kept her head down and minded her business. She wasn’t cocky, arrogant, or rude, and she got along with everyone on the team, but Celine was the only one that she would call a friend. During the off season, the women parted ways and went back to wherever they lived, and Celine, who lived in Virginia, was the only one that A’ja kept in touch with during the off season. She was twenty-eight, had been married for ten years, and she had a nine-year-old son. Celine’s husband was a real estate broker that made big bank, so he could afford to come to London during the season. Celine had been playing for the Lions for five years, and he always came with her. No relationship was perfect, but A’ja could tell that Celine and Marlow were in love love. That old school, unbreakable bond love. No one outside of family and A’ja’s best friend, Simone knew about the divorce. A’ja wasn’t ready to open her mouth and speak the words yet, but anyone that cared about her could see that something had been off with her. No matter how hard she tried to hide it, A’ja was carrying around a heaviness that was dimming the sparkle in her eyes and omitting the positive vibes in her aura.
“Yeah, I’m good. She just told me that’d I’ve been playing well.”
Celine nodded in agreeance. “That you have. What are your plans for the evening? Marlow had to fly out this morning, but he’ll be back in two days. You want to go to our favorite spot for dinner?”
One of A’ja’s fears about London had been the food, but she’d been worried for nothing. Most of the restaurants that she’d eaten at had amazing food and her favorite spot, was a Turkish restaurant. London was actually a vibe. They had some of the most lit clubs and hookah lounges, and A’ja felt blessed to be able to experience the culture and the vibe.
“Sure, we can do that. I didn’t have anything planned. Want to meet there in an hour?”
The players had a housing allowance during the season, and A’ja chose to live in a one-bedroom flat at St. Katherine Docks while in London. It was less than a twenty-minute drive from practice and pretty close to the restaurant that the women wanted to eat at.
“Works for me,” Celine smiled.
Celine seemed to tower over A’ja a bit seeing as how she was 5’9, and Aja was 5’7. With cinnamon-colored skin and eyes the color of Hennessey, Celine was a gorgeous woman that had brightened her smile with veneers. Her locs were waist-length, and she had the longest eyelashes. A’ja with her mahogany-colored skin wore her hair curly. It was super-thick and always sweated out, so straightening it during the season was a waste of time. Curly, it touched A’ja’s shoulders but when it was straight, it touched the middle of her back. Before leaving for London, A’ja had gotten small box braids that were butt length. She was going to try and keep them in for a month, but if they started looking too rough, they were going to be taken out before the full month. A’ja could be a tomboy. In fact, she was a tomboy most days, but she absolutely cared about hair, clothes, and her appearance. When she wasn’t playing basketball, she lovedwearing make-up, and she loved getting her lashes done. She didn’t get her nails done during the season, but pedicures were a must.
A’ja said goodbye to the other players and headed outside to hail a cab. She had been coming to London long enough to learn the rules of the road and become accustomed to driving over there, but she never went through the hassle to get a license because she was only there a few months out of the year. A’ja’s soon to be ex-husband, was a music producer, so he made good money. He paid the mortgage and the utilities, while A’ja paid her car note, cell phone bill, and other personal bills like her credit cards. She bought groceries, paid for lawn maintenance, the weekly cleaning service and contributed to their home in those ways. Kenyatta still put more money into the house, however, so one thing A’ja wasn’t hurting for was money. She didn’t mind taking cabs everywhere.
A’ja settled into the back of the cab and smiled as she checked her phone. Wasting no time, she called her brother, Rod back, and he answered on the second ring.
“Heyyy bookie,” he sang into the phone, and she laughed.
“If there was ever a time that you weren’t dramatic, I’d be concerned. What you want crazy butt? I was in practice when you called.”
“I just want you to know that me and Simone will be there for your first game. I can’t wait. I’m gon’ be in the stands twerking this fat ass.”
A’ja laughed. It had been Rod and Simone that kept her half-way sane during her break-up. Rod was that person that was going to turn everything into a joke, and Simone was the intelligent, sensible one that stayed ready with some affirmations or something inspirational. From the day her mother brought Rod home from the hospital, A’ja knew she hada new best friend. She was three years older than him, and from the moment he started walking, they became inseparable.
A’ja didn’t know what gay was until she was in middle school, but from the moment Rod started elementary school, she’d hear some adults whisper and refer to him as feminine. There wasn’t a sport that their father, Gerald didn’t try to get Rod to play, but he wasn’t interested in any of them. It was A’ja that fell in love with the game of basketball and began to play. The older Rod got, the more flamboyant he became. He didn’t officially come out of the closet until he was twenty-three, but no one was shocked when he did. They already knew.
A’ja had never seen Rod as afraid as he was when he had to look his father in the face and admit to being gay, but Gerald just shrugged and said he already knew. A’ja had seen fathers disown their sons over being gay, and she could never, and would never understand it. There were actually people that would rather their child be a murderer or a rapist versus being gay, and that was sick to her.
“I can’t wait for y’all to come. Even with practice keeping me busy, I get lonely. It’ll be nice to have company for a few days.”
“You know we’re on the way and ready to turn up. If I could afford to miss work like that, I’d be on a flight once a month to come see you. Ughhhh I can’t wait until I get married and become a housewife. Having to work and take care of myself is beyond ghetto.”
“You are freakin’ nuts,” A’ja giggled.
Rod was a paralegal in a very prestigious law firm, and he made decent money. A’ja loved to spoil those closest to her, so she often gifted Rod with lavish trips or expensive gifts for Christmas and his birthday. His last birthday, he’d saved up $4,500 to put a down payment on his dream car, which was a cherry red Lexus IS, and A’ja gave him the money to make the first six payments. When he purchased a condo, she got him aliving room set as a housewarming gift and for Christmas, she gifted him several pairs of designer shoes and a Delta gift card, so he could book a flight anywhere that he wanted to go.
A’ja conversed with Rod until she reached her destination, and she ended the call and jumped in the shower. She didn’t have time to put on make-up, so after she put lotion on her body, A’ja brushed her teeth and dressed in camo print cargo pants, a white graphic tee, and orange platform, peep-toe heels. She let her braids hang down to her booty, and she sprayed perfume and swiped gloss across her lips. When A’ja checked her watch, she saw that she had fifteen minutes before she had to meet Celine. A’ja went outside and walked a few blocks before hailing a cab. She arrived at the restaurant at the same time that Celine’s cab pulled up. Celine and Marlow were staying in a flat about five minutes away from A’ja.
“Hey, boo,” A’ja greeted her like they hadn’t just seen each other.
The WNBA wasn’t as popular as the NBA, but a lot of people recognized A’ja when she went out in London. She was known way more in London than she was in the states. On the way inside the restaurant, a kid stopped them and asked if he could get a picture with them, and Celine and A’ja obliged. Once they were seated, Celine started with the small talk.
