jamie doom

The game was over. Our breaths slowed in unison. A basketball rested where it rolled by the fence. We had flung our bodies carelessly in a circle on the paved court. Smokes were offered in lunging movements resembling “Qi Gong” to teamates and foes and the Water Man, who was our most faithful spectator.

And the sun was balancing itself delicately on the South China Sea. Now it wobbled once or twice but stayed right there.

I sighed, shrugged off a cigarette, and made a makeshift pillow out of the free throw line behind me while listening to all that beautiful, soft, idle, Chinese chatter.

I looked over and nodded at the Water Man, all gold teeth and black eyes. We were good friends even though we had never said much to each other except about the water, which he delivered to me once a week. He was the strongest man in the world, pound for pound, so I was happy to know him.

Eight flights of stairs with three bottles of water went my friend, gold teeth and black eyes, without one drop of sweat falling or one complaint. We had some sort of inside joke going, though neither of us had a clue about the exact details of our running joke. We just looked at each other and rolled our eyes at the absurdity of the world. On the elevator, around everybody else, we would glance, smile, then both be shaking, stifling, trying not to laugh and scare all the “respectable people”.

But now, my friend the Water Man, was discussing the finer points of the UCLA double post offense or Dean’s Smith run and jump defense (at least I imagined he was).

I felt myself becoming part of the pavement, and I eavedropped into conversations in odd dialects on subjects I could only guess at. Nobody was talking to me, and I was happy.