Isaiah Thomas heard the doorbell ring. Even though he had been expecting that very sound, as his package had been listed as “out for delivery” for the past four hours, he still was startled. His nerves had been on edge the whole morning as he awaited the very important package.
Looking out on his porch, he saw the large cardboard box with a label that read, in big letters, “Equality Shoes”. Eagerly grabbing the box and taking it inside, he began to tear it apart not seconds after closing the door behind him.
In less than a minute, the box was in shreds, and before him on the table lay his prize: a pair of shoes which guaranteed that he would never again be the victim of height-based discrimination. A new Isaiah Thomas had just been born.
———————
“Yo, Isaiah, what’s that you got on your feet?” Miles Plumlee yelled as Isaiah stumbled into practice.
Isaiah looked down at his feet as if he didn’t understand what Miles was talking about. “Uh, just my normal shoes. Why?”
“Man, those aren’t your normal shoes. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
“Maybe you hadn’t noticed, but I’ve always been this tall,” Isaiah answered, his head now just four inches below Miles’ instead of a full foot. “I guess when you harbor undeserved hate and malice for anybody who meets your overbroad definition of ‘short’, you lose sight of how lots of those so-called ‘shorties’ are actually tall people.”
“Dude, you’re the one who’s walking around on eight-inch cardboard stilts.”
Isaiah laughed uneasily as other teammates came over to check out his new footwear. “I honestly have no idea what you’re talking about. You might want to check your height privilege, tall scum.”
“Nice shoes, Isaiah!” said PJ Tucker, who now had to look up at his newly-tall teammate. “It must be nice not being a manlet anymore!”
“I was never a manlet,” Isaiah corrected. “But I don’t need to take this abuse. I’m heading out to the club to pick up some honeys, and then we’ll see who’s the bigger man.” With that, Isaiah tripped and wobbled his way out of the gym.