Todd Bloom drove like a jackass down the Dallas North Tollway making stupid jokes about Cady and Dan feeling each other up in the darkness of the backseat of his Jeep Wrangler, which had no shocks and a canvas top that turned highway driving into the Iditarod. He even listened to music like a dick—knuckling the preset stations on his Pioneer stereo while mocking every song he heard as for fags. The upside was the more her brother embarrassed Cady, the better Dan seemed in contrast. They made their way downtown until hitting a traffic jam two blocks from Reunion Arena. The game was about to start, and Todd should have let them hop out, but instead he honked and screamed at his fellow late-arriving assholes. Finally the Jeep lurched into the Escher ramps of the parking garage and they found a spot with five minutes before tip. The four of them were rushing across Reunion Boulevard when Todd shot back onto the curb. Dan caught this in the corner of his eye and grabbed Cady by the arm, sure they were about to be hit by oncoming traffic.

The light was a stale yellow turning red with nothing crossing. Todd had done it just to fake them out. Lang cackled like a hyena.

“Made you look!”

Todd Bloom, ladies and gentlemen.

Running to the gate and tickets stubbed, they thankfully split up—Todd and his butthead buddy Lang took two in the section behind the Mavs’ bench, and Cady and Dan had the mezzanine seats at half court. Both were primo spots in the arena—Cady’s dad was on retainer for Trammell Crow—right in the fat-cat sections. They skipped up the escalator grille as a soprano sax player asphyxiated on Francis Scott Key for three eternal minutes, and scooched into row fifteen just as James Donaldson stepped in elbow to elbow against Hakeem Olajuwon. Cady and Dan looked at each other like they had just made the last train out of Paris, and it was whirlwind and romantic, and Dan almost kissed her there, but then Hakeem swatted the ball to Sleepy Floyd and the crowd settled down in mild disappointment, the game begun, the moment of anticipation gone with it.