Unwritten Rule

Few people are trustworthy to have as friends. The state of humanity is really sad in that regard. In one moment you're breaking bread with a longtime friend, then the next thing you know he's stealing hundreds of dollars from you. That actually happened to me. I wasn't all that surprised when it occurred because this same person stood before God and took vows as a husband then cheated on his wife. My mom taught me to look at people and situations like algebraic equations: If your friend is willing to betray another friend, it's very likely he'll do the same thing to you.

Swag spent most of the season creating situations to draw attention to himself. In order to start practicing, my guards and forwards were required to run eleven fullcourt sprints in a minute. A few days before the run, Swag suffered a mysterious back injury while playing pick-up. He couldn't run the sprints as a result when everybody else did. Once he realized there were other players capable of taking his minutes days into practice, the back injury went away.

The other stunt he'd pull for attention was walking onto the court with his glasses on during our team meetings before practice. Each time, I'd have to tell him to take off the glasses. When we finally got past that issue, he started taking way more time than was allotted to get dressed in the locker room. I flipped out one morning and suspended him for nine games. I had enough of paying special attention to a grown man.

One of his closest friends on the team, Hickory, always played the role of mediator between Swag and I. Hickory and Swag had met that Fall and became really tight. Whenever Swag messed up, Hickory attempted to pick up the pieces. In a sense, he was Swag's personal handler. They lived together off campus in an apartment and really bonded. When it was time to move out at the end of the school year, they both cried.

Ultimately they decided to attend the same 4-year college together and be roommates again. They even shared women at school. Their friendship grew even stronger until Swag took a blow-torch to the bromance.

Hickory: Did you hear about what happened between me and Swag?
Me: I heard y'all aren't that tight anymore. Something about a girl but I didn't care to find out more.
Hickory: So remember how Swag used to do all that stuff here and you'd say he was a Diva and stuff?
Me: Yeh.
Hickory: I thought you were just being hard on him until he did some ole foul shit to me.
Me: What happened?
Hickory: After he left school he heard that I was messin with this girl he liked on campus. Instead of just talkin to me about it, he messaged my girl on Facebook and told her about everything I was doing on campus.