“You only have a few chances in life to be great. And it’s something you learn. If you step away from this now…Why would you want to practice avoiding greatness?”

Ben picked up his backpack and moved toward the door. Price didn’t stop him.

“You don’t want me at the courts if I don’t want to be there. You’ve chased other kids away.” Ben looked full into Price’s startled face. He walked back into the hallway.

*  *  *

And then, almost blessedly, every wrestling practice was a humiliation, a confusion of limbs and a string of unknowable forces that left him on his back unable to move again and again and again and again. Of course Ben was frustrated, but there was also a relief that no one really cared how he did; no one could expect him to be good. The other newbs on the team—Dave, Eben, Anoop, and Matt—tried to help him along but had their own struggles to worry about. Ben flung himself into every practice. He dove after exhaustion, both absorbed in and detached from his effort. Simon started hassling him about his weight; he was no good to the team if he couldn’t make weight. Coach Weber worked one-on-one with him. Ben could sense that he missed having Ennis on the team.

Ahmed turned out to be upsettingly decent at squash. He was calm and diligent, hitting ball after ball against the wall of Court 12 after practice, never expecting too much from himself. Even though he was a little heavy, he had a good sense of where the ball was going to be, and he was very flexible and able to take longish strides, and so, to the despair of the players around him, he started beating guys with ambitions of playing varsity. When he lost a point he just moved on to the next one, always just making sure he got the ball back and reasonably close to the wall, and sooner or later his opponent would mishit the ball or try too complex a shot and hit the tin. Eventually his opponent would lose himself in a rage and hardly be able to see. People began to fear playing Ahmed, not because he himself was fearsome, but because the prospect of losing to him was so humiliating. They would freeze up and Ahmed would win.

Every time Ben passed the Dragon now he seemed to see it anew. It wasn’t aggressive or abusive or mean. It just seemed to see underneath Ben’s new wrestling persona. And maybe so did everyone else: Hutch and Evan, Alice, Markson, everyone.