Taj Gibson walked up to his locker and quickly noticed that it wasn’t set up quite how he expected it. His jersey was hanging in its place, and the customary bottle of Gatorade (orange flavor – his favorite) had been put in its spot on the shelf, but there was something unexpected there next to the sports drink.
It looked like a box of chocolates. On top of it was a small envelope, the kind that would enclose a simple note of thanks or some other well-wishes. Taj took both of these things and gave the box a small shake. There did seem to be small bits of something inside, probably a confection of some sort.
Feeling his heart rate quicken slightly, he noticed that the envelope had been sealed with the symbol of a tulip. Tulips were Brianna’s favorite flower. The writing on the front of the envelope was also in a distinctly feminine script, so perfectly curved, floral to the point where no man could have ever emulated it. “To Taj,” it read.
So this was finally it. After a year of writing thoughtful, loving poems to his beloved dance team member, she had finally reciprocated. He felt slightly lightheaded at the thought of opening the envelope to find a poem of her own composition, written in response to his own amorous prose. Sometimes, in life, it was hard to find the words to convey your emotions, but through the poetic arts, a new range of emotional expression could be achieved, and Taj dearly wanted to be with someone who he shared that intimate connection with. He knew now that Brianna was the one.
The envelope could wait, however. Taj was hungry and was looking forward to a chocolate, especially a chocolate that had certainly been hand-chosen by Brianna at one of the Twin Cities’ multiple fine chocolatiers. Setting down the envelope, he sat in his locker and opened the box expectantly.
“Yeah Karl! Yeah Karl! Uh! Uh! Do me harder! Uh!” screamed an extremely loud, extremely Brianna voice from an unknown source inside the box. As his Timberwolves teammates looked over in confusion at the unexpected noise, Taj barely heard it; his gaze was transfixed by the tablet screen inside the box, which was playing a very graphic scene of his very own Brianna in the throes of carnal relations with none other than Karl-Anthony Towns.
His face turning a deep red as he witnessed the lewd video, he didn’t even notice as Karl-Anthony himself rolled into the locker room in a wheelchair. “Enjoying the gift, Taj?” he asked sweetly.
Taj looked up, startled from his transfixion on the pornographic display inside the box. When he saw it was Karl-Anthony, he couldn’t answer. He replaced the cover on the box (which didn’t stop the audio from playing) and stared at his feet.
Karl-Anthony reached over and snatched the envelope from Taj, who didn’t protest. Rudely ripping it open with no heed to the precious contents inside, he unfolded the card and began to read from it. “Dear Taj, please stop sending me your creepy poems. You will never know my body so intimately as Karl does on a nightly basis. -Brianna.”
While teammates uncomfortably tried to ignore what was going on, Karl-Anthony threw the card at Taj, where it hit him in the face. He still couldn’t say anything in response to this ultimate humiliation. However, the tears which dripped from his eyes said everything that words could not.