“How deep you plan on getting into the game?” he said.

“I’d like to know that myself.”

“It’s a tough business in those streets when you get past eighteen,” he said. “You see things you were dreaming about start to curl up and die, and you want to curl up and die with them.”

“I’m out there on the streets every day, man,” I said. I threw a jumper from the corner, and it went in clean.

“You got to learn to use your talent,” he said, “really use your talent, and you got to cover yourself.”

“What’s your cover, coach?”

“You are, Lonnie. You’re my cover.”

I really couldn’t get next to that. I waited for him to go on, but instead, he grabbed the ball and started towards the hoop. He took off from the foul line, bringing the ball up from the dribble with one hand and hooking it in. It was a smooth move.

“That’s pretty nice,” I said.

“That was my shot when I was a kid,” he said. “Used to drive suckers wild with that shot. I was playing in this big game one time when I came down the court and all of a sudden I was just doing it. I tried to figure out later where it had come from. And the only thing I could figure was that it was what I needed when I used it. I needed it, and it came.”

He tried to show me the shot, how he controlled the ball from the dribble. His hands were bigger than mine, and half the time I tried it, the ball just went up in the air. But I could feel it. The way he explained the shot I could feel it. For the first time I felt that I had something that nobody else had. That maybe, just maybe, my game was a little deeper than a lot of other guys’ games. It felt good.

Paul was never alone anymore. I went by the center, and he was there with one of his la-di-da friends. We didn’t take people to the center unless they were okay. This cat had a big button on his jacket that said something about Justice for Native Americans. I didn’t dig cats that wore signs on themselves.

“Hey, Paul, where you been?” I asked.

“Oh, I’ve been working with my friend, trying to get a book drive together,” he said.

“Lenny,” the cat said. “Lenny Travis.”

He stuck out his hand, and I shook it. He had soft hands, and I wondered if he was funny or something. I didn’t want to say nothing about his hands, so I asked him where he lived.

“Riverdale,” he said. “Not far from the Russian embassy.”

“Riverdale? Ain’t that where the rich people live?”

He nodded.

“Lenny, this is Lonnie Jackson,” Paul said.

“What’s the button for?” I asked.

“It’s in support of the American Indian,” he said.

“What you doing for the Indians?” I asked.