In My Skin (6 page)

My senior year at Baylor, and especially my rookie year in the WNBA, is when I started paying closer attention to fashion and how I wanted to represent myself away from the court. After trying different styles over the years, I finally realized I could blend them together to create a look unique to me, putting my own spin on the trends. And a key part of my style now has nothing to do with clothes. Since my senior year of high school, I've added one or two tattoos a year. I'm working toward full sleeves on both arms, and I'll probably get more ink on my back. I understand there are people out there who are put off by tattoos. Ink isn't for everyone. There are many different ways to express yourself; it just so happens a lot of people enjoy doing that with tats. We see it as a kind of art, and I don't think we should be judged for it, as if we're doing something rebellious and don't want to follow the rules.

MY FIRST WEEK
of ninth grade, I saw that girl Kim in the hallway, the one who had asked me if I was gay, when we were in seventh grade. She looked me up and down—I was wearing a big hoodie, sagging my jeans—and said, “Oh, okay.” She wasn't mean about it; her tone was more like, “I knew it.” I'm pretty sure she was thinking back to that moment at volleyball tryouts two years earlier, when I went out of my way to deny who I was. So standing there in the hallway, I just looked her in the eyes and said, “Yeah, you know, shit happens.” That's exactly what I said. Then I shrugged and kept walking.

I laugh when I think about it now, because “shit happens” sounds like a terrible way to acknowledge your sexual identity. But I was actually feeling pretty good about myself. It was obvious by the way I was dressing that I was trying to make a statement. And when kids asked me if I was gay, I would say, “Yup.” Word spread pretty quickly in high school, so I didn't really have to tell a lot of people myself. It just became common knowledge. The fact that I was six feet tall by then and playing volleyball helped me avoid some of the name-calling I had endured in middle school. Not all of it—sometimes when I walked into the gym, guys would say stuff like, “Yo, you can untuck now!”—but as I would quickly discover, being an athlete carried some status with the cool crowd. And the more my self-confidence grew, the less I worried about what other people were saying.

Don't get me wrong: it's not like all the lights switched on for me at once, magically, with a choir singing in the background and everyone in my life embracing me for who I was trying to become. It was a big, long process, and I had my share of missteps and detours. Telling my father I was gay just wasn't an option at that point. But telling my mother felt like a necessity, an instinctive urge to share my truth, because I trusted her so much, and I think I knew, deep down, I would need her love and support for the journey ahead. So one afternoon during my freshman year, I came right out and told her. I was leaning against the wall in our kitchen, and I just said the words, “Mom, I'm gay.” I hadn't even planned the moment; it just felt right. She smiled, hugged me, and told me she loved me. That was it.

I know now that a lot of kids aren't as fortunate as I was, to have a moment like that, to have at least one parent they can confide in and lean on when they're trying to figure out who they are. And believe me, I still had a lot to figure out. When I look back at my fifteen-year-old self, I can't help but shake my head. I remember walking down the hallways at school, with my jeans sagging, my boxer shorts showing, using really hard-core hand gestures, my voice all rough and edgy. I was going overboard with my new look, which tends to happen when you've felt restrained for so long: you end up snapping to the other end of the spectrum, like an elastic being released. But when I came home from school, and I was walking those final steps before I got to the back door of our house, I would yank up my jeans and tighten my belt, reminding myself to tone down my mannerisms.

Being true to myself has often been at odds with my desire to please others. I've spent years trying so hard to be the version of myself that would make the most people happy. Over time, though, I've come to realize that no matter how much I compromise, some people will never understand me. And accepting this truth has given me a new level of comfort and freedom.

O
n game days, I like getting to the arena early, so I have plenty of time to go through my pregame routine and get focused, settle down, clear my head of everything else. I sit and listen to music for a while; then I go around and say hi to my teammates as they start to roll in. Whenever I can, I try to hit the court and work on my post moves before practice or pregame warm-ups. I got a late start with basketball, so I feel like I'm always learning. People say, “You can't teach height,” and obviously my height gives me some advantages as a player. But height only takes you so far, especially in the WNBA, where I'm routinely going up against big, strong, powerful women with more experience as pros. I got into foul trouble early during my first game in the league, when we got blown out by Chicago. I kept leaving my feet and trying to block every shot in sight, even though I know better than that. I'm already six foot eight, so there's no need to make myself taller. I played smarter in the second half, once I had a chance to collect myself, but I was so amped up in that first half, it was like I was back in ninth grade, running up and down the court without a clue.

I started playing soccer and volleyball when I was in seventh grade. I tried out for the school teams with some of my friends, mostly because sports were the only activity my dad allowed me to do—the only time I could hang out with other kids and feel like I was part of the group. I had always been full of energy when I was little, constantly in motion, and I quickly came to love the competitiveness and intensity of sports. Volleyball was fun because I got to spike and block; hitting that ball, or rising up to deny someone, felt so good. I played goalkeeper in soccer because I liked to use my hands (and because I didn't want to run around much). Everybody focuses on scoring in sports—that's where most of the glory is—but I liked being the one to stop people from scoring.

Starting in seventh grade, I would hang out with kids in the gym sometimes before school and mess around with the basketball, but I didn't know what I was doing and I never practiced on my own. It wasn't until eighth grade, when some of my friends tried out for the team, that I decided to give it a shot. But the start of my hoops career was delayed because of the big fight I got into with Messy Girl in the bathroom. When I told myself everything would be different in ninth grade, that I would stop pretending and start with a clean slate, I had given myself hope, a lifeline to get through middle school. The problem was, I still had to show up every day, see all the same faces, swallow my emotions. I was scared, and I had no idea yet how much basketball would later sustain me. It wasn't until high school that I realized the opportunity I had lost when I got kicked off the team in eighth grade.

By the time I entered ninth grade at Nimitz High School, I was a solid six feet and eager to write a new story for myself, a real story that I could live in public instead of crumpling up the paper and hiding it somewhere in my bedroom. I played volleyball again that fall, and I caught the eye of the varsity basketball coach, Debbie Jackson, who asked me to try out. My hoop skills were trash. I was clumsy and fumbled the ball a lot—I couldn't dribble more than once or twice without losing it—and I wasn't very strong. But I had decent footwork from playing soccer, and volleyball helped me with my timing, so I was good at blocking shots. Basically, Coach Jackson thought I had a lot of potential. I didn't have much else at that point, just size, potential, and the desire to get better, a good enough combination for me to make the junior varsity, then move up to the varsity after a half-dozen or so games. I averaged around 10 points a game that season, mostly coming off the bench, and I blocked a lot of shots.

I also kept growing. I was about six foot three by the summer after my freshman year, tall enough to attract attention from recruiters. Up until then, the idea of going to college had never really crossed my mind. Whenever I imagined my future, I always saw myself graduating from high school and becoming a cop. Neither of my parents had attended college—my dad joined the military, and my mom took some secretarial classes at a small business school—so it wasn't something on my radar. That summer, though, I started getting letters from colleges, which is when I finally realized what Coach Jackson and other people meant when they told me I had potential. It wasn't just about how good I could be at basketball; it was about the doors that basketball could open for me. I was playing AAU (Amateur Athletic Union) ball for the Houston Hotshots, which exposed me to a lot of good local competition, and all I had to do was look around me to see examples of how I could improve my game.

The growing confidence I felt off the court carried over to basketball. And the more I improved as a player, the better I felt about the person I was becoming. It all just fed on itself. After fighting and struggling my way through middle school, I now had a new sense of purpose. Basketball became another form of expression for me, and when my sophomore season rolled around, I was ready to express myself loudly. My skills were still raw, but the game was starting to click for me, and the competitive outlet became even more important because I had given up volleyball after ninth grade. I wish I could say I quit volleyball to focus my energy on hoops, but the truth is, my decision was mainly a fashion choice. I just couldn't wear those tight shorts anymore. I had asked the coach if I could wear basketball shorts, and she said no. So then I suggested track shorts, which were closer in length to our volleyball shorts but looser and less constricting—you know, not all up on my ass. Coach said no again. So that was the end of my volleyball career. I spent all of middle school feeling uncomfortable in my own skin; there was no way I was going to spend another minute wearing anything I didn't want to wear.

The funny thing is, the first time I ever dunked was during volleyball practice. It was my freshman year, and there was a guy who worked with us sometimes, a school employee, and one day he tossed me a volleyball and said, “Brittney, go dunk that.” I hesitated and gave him a look that said, “Do what?” So he said it again. “Go dunk that ball. I want to see if you can do it.” I had watched guys throw down in the gym before, but it wasn't something I had thought about trying myself. I could barely dribble at the time. I walked to the top of the key, took a few running steps, raised the volleyball over my head, and plunked it through the net as my fingers grazed off the rim. It wasn't much of a dunk, but I got it down. And just like that, I was hooked. I became as obsessed with dunking as everyone else. I wanted to get better at it, and I practiced with the guys during open gym sessions that winter, trying to get the timing and coordination right. I also became serious about working out, which helped my jumping ability.

The first time I dunked a basketball was during my sophomore season with the girls' varsity. We were scrimmaging one day, and somebody got a steal and threw the ball ahead to me. I had some space, so I took a couple of steps, jumped up, and dunked it one-handed, like it was no big deal. Everyone was like, “Girl, you just dunked that!” And then they wanted me do it again, just to be sure. So I did. You could feel the energy level rise in the gym. That's what I love about dunking: it's like turning the volume way up on a good song. It's a powerful thing. In fact, the first time I dunked in a game, later that season, it felt like the whole gym was on full blast. We were winning big, and I got the ball on a fast break, so I put an exclamation point on things and slammed it home. Everybody went nuts. My teammates were jumping on me, the fans were falling all over themselves in the stands. Coach Jackson had to call a time-out just to settle us down.

It's not every day you see a sixteen-year-old girl dunk. And I could dunk easily. In January 2007, during my sophomore season, somebody made a video of me—
High School Girl Dunker
—and uploaded it on YouTube. It went viral, and that's when the media really started paying attention. Obviously, it helped that I could do more than just dunk. I averaged 22 points and almost 11 rebounds and 6 blocks a game that season. And by the end of the spring, I had grown to six foot six.

I was feeling pretty good about my body. I was getting stronger, and being an athlete gave me a sense of focus. It's crazy: the same thing that got me picked on in middle school—my body—was now a plus for me, just because I played basketball. So I wasn't, like, “Oh my God, I wish I would stop growing!” I was okay with it, especially because I wasn't in physical pain anymore. All throughout the seventh and eighth grades, I had tremendous pains. My knees ached so badly I would cry. Even if I just lightly bumped something, I would feel a sharp jolt that put me in tears. Meanwhile, I had no idea it was growing pains. Pretty ironic, right? With all the other crap that was happening in middle school, all the emotional agony, here I was in physical pain, too. My dad actually took me to the doctor in eighth grade to have everything checked out, to see why I was growing so quickly and make sure I didn't have any kind of disease or a tumor pressing on my pituitary gland. They did all sorts of tests, and everything was fine. My growth plates were just wide open. The doctor said, “Yeah, she's going to grow a lot.” My dad is six two and my mom is five eight, and the doctor predicted I'd be around six three. (Wrong!) The funny thing is, the pain in my knees stopped when I got to ninth grade, but that's when I really shot up fast.

THE SUMMER AFTER
my sophomore year, I switched AAU teams and played for DFW Elite in Dallas. The Hotshots didn't really travel outside Houston, and I wanted tougher competition. DFW Elite was sponsored by Nike and was one of the top AAU teams in the country, so we went to all the major events, like the Nike National Invitational Tournament in Chicago. A bunch of my future Baylor teammates played on that squad: Odyssey Sims, Brooklyn Pope, Jordan Madden, Kimetria Hayden, and Makenzie Robertson. Anyone who knows anything about women's college hoops knows that Makenzie is Kim Mulkey's daughter. So you can imagine all the buzz that created, with people saying Kim had an unfair recruiting advantage. I didn't know much about the recruiting process and how it all worked, but I had seen and heard enough to know I wanted to avoid all the craziness you read about—the phone calls and texts from lots of schools, the pressure of weighing the pros and cons of different programs, the campus visits, the media speculation. I had enough drama in my life already. The last thing I needed was a parade of coaches in my head.