Excerpt from The Falconer by Dana Czapnik, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

The ball drops through the net behind me, and Percy jogs to grab it. I put my hands on my hips and look up to the sky while I catch my breath. "You're an asshole, you know that?"

"Please. You love it. You lurve it." He bounces the ball softly off my back, in the tough spot between the shoulder blades.

I wish it weren't so true.

The game unravels fast for me. Two all quickly turns into 4–2, then 6–2. We're playing first to seven, and whatever shot I had to show him I'm still a worthy opponent, still close to being equal with him, is vanishing.

He's got a cushiony lead, so the smug asshole tries his hand at a huge three-pointer from so far downtown he's practically at the Bowery. It clangs off the rim like a church bell, sending sinusoidal reverberations throughout the court.

We race to chase it down, but he's got the adrenaline of a winner. He grabs the ball, pivots, and faces me and the basket.

Here it is, kids. A defining moment. I dig in and get low. Scrunch up my Champion mesh shorts. Get ready for what's coming.

He palms the ball with his giant left hand and just holds it out behind him, like he's Jordan, tapping the toe of his pivot foot in front of me. Taunting me. Begging me to try to steal it. I'm no fool on the basketball court. Maybe I'm a fool in other parts of my life, but not here. He's pulled this sick move on me before, so I know to just stay poised on D and wait this motherfucker out. But then the kid starts staring at me. Right in the eye. Challenging me to a fourth-grade staring contest in the middle of a one-on-one battle royal. I'm not afraid of a little eye contact. I hold his gaze and I don't blink. He's got green eyes, rimmed with deep, dark blue on the outer edge of his pupils, and a freckle in his left iris that looks like a moon in orbit across the face of Jupiter. It couldn't be more beautiful if it was painted in by hand. What an imperfection. Girls have fallen in love with boys for less. A miniature river of sweat swims down the middle of his brow and drops off his nose. I'd suck the sweat off his face if I could. What would it taste like? Orange Crush? He makes a move, finally. Puts the ball down and starts dribbling toward the basket. Then he palms it again and gets all the way around me by wrapping his right arm behind his back and around my waist. I feel the size of his hand on my body. My pupils dilate. My capillaries pop. He jumps up and rolls the ball in from the front of the rim.

Game. Over.

I should be pissed. He removed his handicap and drove the lane. But I stay quiet about it. Warrior Goddess has left the court. I'm back to being what I always am. My heart melts right out of my rib cage, oozes out of my skin, and splats on the hot blacktop court.

Percy can feel my disappointment. "Sorry, Loose. It was right there. I couldn't help myself." As though the thing I'm upset about is losing.

"It's cool." I shrug and laugh it off. It's always cool. It's never a big deal. It's just a game.

I jog to get the basketball, which has wandered onto the court next door. I pause for a moment to watch the sun. Not the ball, the real sun. The star that gives us life. It's setting behind the New Jersey piers, taking all the color in the world with it. I recently found out that the sunset today is not like the sunset in prehistoric or pre-industrial times. It's a man-made thing. It's the pollution that gives it its colors, because of all the aerosols in the air. My cousin Violet, who is twenty-five and an artist, told me that was the inspiration for The Scream. A huge volcano erupted in Indonesia and made sunsets around the world a deep, searing red. If you'd never seen a red sunset before, it would be easy to imagine it was a signifier of the end of days. But we see red sunsets all the time now, especially this time of year, when the air is somehow thicker. I look up at the prewar buildings flanking Riverside Park and admire the way the light reflects off the stone and glass.

Excerpted from The Falconer by Dana Czapnik . Copyright © 2019 by Dana Czapnik . Excerpted by permission of Atria Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.