Page 118 of Chosen By a Baller 3: Playin’ For Keeps

I sucked my teeth as everybody around us laughed. A few seconds later, someone behind the camera counted us down.

“Alright, we’re rolling.”

The interviewer smiled at us.

“First, thank you both for sitting down with me today. There’s obviously been a lot of conversation surrounding the two of you lately, but before we get into any of that, I want to go back a little. From what I understand, you two have known each other for a long time.”

“Yeah,” Sianni answered.

“So, high school sweethearts?” the interviewer asked.

“Something like that,” I answered.

Sianni slowly turned her head toward me. “Something like that?”

“What?”

“Now it’s something like that?”

I fought back a smile. “You know what I mean, ma.”

“No, I don’t.” she looked toward the interviewer. “See how he tries to act?”

“Act?”

“Like he wasn’t bothering me.”

“Bothering you?” My face twisted. “You liked my ass.”

“Eventually.”

“Eventually my ass.”

She laughed, and then I shook my head.

The interviewer smiled. “So, Kyrie made the first move?”

“Definitely,” Sianni answered.

“Because I knew what the fuck I wanted.”

“See?” Sianni pointed at me. “This is exactly how he was.”

“Was?” I looked at her. “Shit, I’m still like that.”

“I know. Trust me.”

Everybody laughed. I reached over and grabbed her hand, letting my fingers slide between hers. The crazy part was, none of that shit actually happened.

There hadn’t been no teenage Kyrie chasing Sianni around, trying to make her my girl. No high school relationship. No heartbreaking goodbye before I went off, chasing football.

That was the story. But sitting here holding her hand, watching that smile spread across her face while she played along with me, that shit didn’t feel as fake as it used to.

“So, what happened?” the interviewer asked. “How did two high school sweethearts end up going their separate ways?”

“Life,” Sianni answered with a small shrug. “We were young. Kyrie had football, and eventually his career started taking him places. We both had things we needed to figure out for ourselves.”

I nodded.