Chapter 48: The Waiting Game

Inside the Forum, the concrete corridors ran in tight, echoing loops, every surface painted an institutional off-white that years of traffic had worn toward gray.

The air was cool and carried the chemical bite of floor cleaner mixed with something deeper, an old, earthy smell Kobe remembered from arenas all over the league.

Exposed pipes crossed the ceiling.

Rolling crates and laundry bins sat half out of doorways, forcing anyone passing through to weave around them.

He followed the arrows for EVENT LEVEL — TEAM ENTRANCE at first, but it didn’t take long before the map in his head started moving faster than the signs.

Left at the first cinderblock hallway, right at the utility closet, then straight until the ice machine came into view.

When it appeared exactly where he expected it, Kobe almost laughed.

His feet picked up speed as he rounded the next corner.

Somewhere behind him, Fisher called, “You in a hurry?” Kobe kept walking.

“Just trying to get there.” Fisher jogged a few steps to catch up.

They passed two workers unspooling a long run of cable across the floor.

Neither looked up, though one lifted a hand as Kobe and Fisher squeezed past.

Fisher fell into step beside him.

“You ever been here before?” “Just for trials.” Fisher looked around.

“Didn’t think they let high schoolers into these halls.” Kobe shrugged.

“I got lost and wandered.” Fisher gave him a sideways look but let it go.

The corridor opened into a larger staging area where arena staff moved between carts of folding chairs, cases of Gatorade, and equipment waiting to be hauled somewhere else.

The lights were brighter here, and voices bounced off the concrete from every direction.

Kobe barely noticed any of it.

There was a door to the left, unmarked and slightly ajar.

Something in his memory pulled him toward it.

This way.

He nudged it open.

Plastic bins were stacked almost to the ceiling.

Mops leaned against one wall, cleaning supplies covered metal shelves, and black marker identified several containers in block letters.

MOP HEADS.

ZAMBONI PARTS.

ICE PAINT.

Kobe stared.

Fisher stopped behind him and looked over his shoulder.

“That your secret training facility?” Kobe shook his head and backed out.

“Wrong door.” He let the door close and looked down the intersecting hallway.

A larger corridor opened to his right, the sign above it reading TEAMS — HOME.

Kobe stared at it for a second, then smiled to himself.

It had been a long time.

He remembered the Forum, but not every turn beneath it.

He adjusted the bag on his shoulder and headed down the correct hallway, Fisher falling into step beside him.

The next turn came easier.

As they moved deeper beneath the arena, the clatter of carts and equipment faded behind them and music began bleeding faintly through the concrete.

The sound crew was testing the arena speakers.

A song played for several seconds, cut off in the middle, and was replaced by something completely different.

Somewhere beyond the walls, the Forum was beginning to come alive.

At the far end of the hallway, a security guard sat behind a small desk with a black-and-white television angled toward him.

He checked their badges, waved them through, and returned his attention to the screen before either of them had passed his desk.

Beyond the checkpoint, the corridor narrowed again.

The lights were colder here, the walls broken only by a series of steel doors.

A familiar smell drifted through the hallway before Kobe could figure out where it was coming from.

Popcorn.

Fisher slowed and lifted his head slightly.

“You think they got that ready already?” “Maybe for the crew.” “Wouldn’t mind a bag.” Kobe looked at him.

“We just got here.” “And?” Kobe shook his head.

A heavy utility cart came rattling around the corner before Fisher could say anything else.

Yellow bags were piled high on top, and the woman pushing it didn’t slow as Kobe and Fisher moved aside.

“Watch it, hon.” She passed them, then glanced back.

“You boys know where you’re going?” “Locker room,” Fisher said.

She jerked her chin down the hall.

“That’s the one.” “Thanks.” Two more turns brought them to a purple wall with the Lakers logo painted across its center.

Kobe’s pace slowed before he meant it to.

The door beside it was metal, scuffed around the edges and worn dull around the handle from years of use.

Fisher reached it first and pulled it open.

He disappeared inside.

Kobe stopped at the doorway.

This time there was no uncertainty.

He knew this door.

His hand settled against the cool metal, and for a moment the hallway around him seemed to fall away.

The storage room had been wrong.

A few of the turns had been different from the ones in his head.

Time had blurred pieces of the building together.

Not this.

Kobe pushed the door open.

Voices reached him first.

A locker slammed somewhere inside.

Someone laughed from deeper in the room.

Then came the purple and gold.

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He found his jersey waiting for him, folded on the bench like a bat signal calling him forward.

The 8 was face up, no fraying, the fabric so bright it almost glared against the metal.

A few lockers down, someone had set the music too low to actually be heard, so it filtered into the room as a pulse with no melody.

The hour before a game was its own animal, all memory and muscle and barely contained energy.

Kobe slung his bag into the cubby, sat, and took stock.

Nick Van Exel was already stripped to his shorts, legs crossed, looking half-asleep while a trainer wrapped his ankle in deliberate, almost lazy circles.

Nick kept up a running commentary, sometimes with the trainer, sometimes to the guy taping his own wrist beside him, sometimes just to himself.

“You ever notice,” Nick said, “they make us come in two hours early, but you only need about fifteen minutes to actually get ready?” He didn’t wait for an answer, just sighed and flicked a ballpoint pen against his thigh.

Eddie Jones was all economy.

His movements were spare shoulders loose, arms rolling out in small circles, and feet tracing patterns on the mat without ever breaking the line of his posture.

When he laced his shoes, it was one motion, smooth, left then right, no check, no fuss.

He looked up once, caught Kobe’s eye, and nodded.

“How you feeling?” Eddie said, quiet but direct.

“At a 100 percent,” Kobe replied.

Eddie grinned.

“Bet you slept three hours.” Kobe said, “Three and a half.” Eddie’s smile widened, but he didn’t push.

Instead, he rolled his ankles, stood, and moved to the trainer’s table, where he rotated his hips while the staffer double-checked the tape job on his foot.

There was nothing about the routine that looked accidental.

Fisher came in next, clutching his own Gatorade and a folded stat sheet.

He dropped the bottle, which rolled under the bench, and spent ten seconds scanning the floor before realizing it had settled behind Nick’s heel.

“You seen my bottle?” Fisher asked.

Nick lifted his foot and the bottle appeared.

“Lost and found,” Nick said.

Fisher snatched it up, nodded thanks, then joined a conversation already in progress on the other side of the room.

He kept checking the clock, then the locker list, then the clock again.

Each time, his eyes darted back to the jerseys lined up on their racks, as if half expecting his to vanish between glances.

Bruce Bowen was nearly invisible.

He wore over-ear headphones, battered and kept his head down, working resistance bands in precise, mathematical reps.

At some point, a trainer tapped his shoulder to ask if he needed new tape; Bruce just shook his head, not breaking rhythm, then adjusted his grip and started the set over.

Shaq didn’t so much arrive as happen.

His voice cut through three different conversations before he even entered, first as a low, muffled rumble, then as a full-throated “Yo!” that vibrated the bench under Kobe’s thighs.

Shaq was dressed in full warmup, sleeves pushed up past the elbow, hair freshly buzzed, and he had a towel slung over his shoulder like he expected to use it as a prop.

He surveyed the room, caught the scent of food from somewhere, and said, “Why we never get real breakfast in here?

How you gonna ask a man to block shots on half a bagel?” Nobody answered right away.

Nick just called out, “Complain to the union,” and Shaq smiled like he already had.

Ben Wallace was last in.

He wore the same plain t-shirt as always, but the sleeves looked tighter each week.

He sat a few lockers down from Kobe, opened his bag, and began a process that was clearly ritual: right shoe out, check the laces, tie once, pull, untie, tie again.

He did the same with the left, then again with the right.

By the third pass, he had to have known it was tight enough, but he kept going, fingers working the knots with the intensity of someone trying to strangle a problem instead of solve it.

Around them, everything else kept moving: trainers rolling carts of tape and towels, the hum of the ice machine, and a staffer walking through with an armful of clipboards.

Every few minutes, somebody called out for a missing sock or a lost band, and someone else answered without even looking up.

At some point, Ben caught Kobe watching him tie his shoes for the fourth time.

“What?” Ben said, not defensive but as if he’d caught himself mid-action and now had to justify it.

Kobe glanced over.

“What’s wrong with it?” Ben looked up.

“What?” “Your shoe.” Ben looked down.

“Nothing.” “You’ve tied it like four times.” Kobe flexed his own foot, testing the tape, then pointed at Ben’s wrist.

“You ever going to try playing without that?” Ben shrugged.

“Not today.” Kobe nodded, understanding perfectly.

For a second, they sat in silence, then Ben started untying again.

The room felt loose but with tension.

Every few seconds, the background volume dipped, someone checking a clock, glancing at the list, making a private tally of what came next.

The TV above the lockers cycled through highlights: a dunk montage and a top ten that had already looped twice since Kobe walked in.

Somewhere behind him, Nick said, “You think they ever get tired of showing the same damn dunk?” Shaq answered from across the room, “Nope.

Not as long as it’s me doing it.” Nick said, “Wow, aren’t you humble.” The trainer taping Nick’s ankle grinned but kept wrapping.

Fisher answered, “I just want to see if we can actually get through a quarter without twenty whistles.” Kobe nodded.

“You think they’ll call it tight?” Eddie said, “Preseason always is.

Nobody wants a fight on opening night.” Shaq, overhearing, called out, “That’s a lie.

I want a fight every night.” A minute later, Del Harris entered.

He didn’t wait for silence; the silence just happened.

He had a stack of papers and a look like he’d spent all morning in fluorescent light, which was probably true.

He scanned the room, nodded at the group, and set his materials on the table.

“Alright,” Harris said.

“Let’s get to it.” .

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Harris started with the basics: who was starting, who was matching up, and how the early subs would run.

The names came out in a steady rhythm: Van Exel at the point, Eddie at the two, the old frontcourt with Ceballos and Campbell, and then Shaq in the middle.

“Fisher, you’re first in.

Bowen, you’ll see time on both ends.

Ben, we want you anchoring the second group.

Kobe—” Harris paused, just long enough for Kobe to know he’d considered a longer word but left it out.

“You’ll run the two and slide to three if needed.

Watch their rotations.

They’ll try to speed you up.” Kobe nodded, already mapping the permutations in his head.

Harris shifted, eyes tracking the room.

“We’re not going to out-talent anybody on the first day.

You want to impress, do it on defense.

No easy cuts, no lazy closeouts.

And if their second unit starts to run, make them earn every inch.” He glanced at Ben.

“Don’t let them walk the ball up.

Pressure from the first step.” Ben nodded, face expressionless.

Harris looked at Kobe.

“That goes for you, too.” Kobe said, “You want a switch on the first action, or stay straight?” “Straight,” said Harris, “unless they bring in that big guard, then call it.” He looked like he might say more, but instead tapped the play chart and moved on.

As Harris finished, the room held its breath for the beat that followed.

Then he said, “Questions?” Nobody answered.

“Good.

Finish getting ready.” The coaches backed out, one by one, leaving the room in the lingering aftershock.

For a moment, nobody spoke.

The music on the TV had switched to a commercial, just canned horns and a woman’s voice selling something Kobe wasn’t listening to.

Across the room, Shaq clapped hard, a thundercrack that snapped every head up.

“Aight y’all, let’s go bust their ass,” he boomed, grinning big enough to fill the wall behind him.

Nick, already on his feet, yelled, “Don’t break the door,” and Shaq pointed at him like he’d just scored a point.

The room came alive, fast.

Warmup tops zipped, shoes hit tile, and bags shuffled and closed.

He laced his shoes, tight but not overdone.

Stood, bounced once on his toes, and felt the entire nervous charge settle into muscle memory.

As the team filed toward the tunnel, the noise outside the locker room grew louder, the hum of the arena swelling to a real, living thing.

Kobe followed, eyes ahead, ready for whatever came next.