Vickie's footsteps echo in staccato rhythm in the gray light of early morning. She drew the short straw for a grocery run, so she comes laden with their necessities, vegetables damp with dawn dew and bread still oven-warm. All items are checked off on the grocery list, and this makes her happy. She kicks the door, unable to free up a hand for keys or a polite knock. The answer is immediate; this bothers her, because Crystal's no early bird and Linda's too young to enjoy a sunrise.

Her teammates- both of them always her teammates, in green, blue, or black- await her. Auburn hair mussed, jade eyes bleary, pale skin blotchy, Linda looks like a sleepwalker. Crystal's dark eyes hold no spark of her usual mischief, and her quiet smile is replaced by a single grim, angry thin line of lips. Silently they take the groceries from her, leaving her emptied and bereft of purpose. She comes in, closing the door quietly, a ghost in the unlit room.

Crystal reenters, head slightly bowed. She doesn't look at the computer, the electronic traitor sitting in the corner so innocently. "First free agent signin' came, back home," she says.

Vickie nods. "That set your price yet?" she asks. Gentle features and a sweet smile hide a practical mind; she knows that most of her Liberty teammates are free agents, including the two with whom she toils during the winter.

Crystal shakes her head. "Point guard. Sparks didn't think seven All-Stars were 'nough, they had to get themselves one more to back up Teasley."

Inside Vickie's mind, a list of WNBA point guards immediately comes up, most names discarded in a second as non-All-Stars or players too young to be free agents. A frown crosses her face. "Pee-Wee got dealt, and why trade the fourth pick for somethin' that's gonna be nothin'? Ticha got cored up, Bird's too young to walk, Jen Azzi retired and never got her due in the W anyway. The Williams kid in Seattle might be a nice fit for the Sparks."

"Not her," Crystal says.

Vickie thinks harder. "Staley wouldn't leave Charlotte 'less a team moved to Philly or Charlotte didn't offer." A quick smile flashes across her face like spring. "It's Black, isn't it? Wouldn't that be a kick, Spoon in New York, the Pest in LA, makin' it all even more interestin'?"

"Not her either, she wasn't an All-Star in this league," Crystal reminds her.

Vickie runs through the catalogue of point guards one more time, and as she realizes that there's one unaccounted for who has been an All-Star, Crystal quietly opens her arms and lets Vickie sag against her. Vickie looks up, eyes burning. "This is some sick joke, right? I know you'd do that to some rook, never thought you'd try it with me, but there's a first time-"

"I wish I was jokin', VJ. Wish I could tell you that it was gonna be alright. But she's gone ring-crazy. She's a Spark now." Crystal strokes Vickie's hair, supporting her as best as she can. Tears aren't falling, and she's not sobbing, but Vickie's pain is all too evident to those who have come to know her.

"It's all my fault," Vickie mumbles into Crystal's shoulder. "Shouldn't've told her Blaze cored me. Shouldn't've let Blaze do it. She wouldn't've gone if-"

"She's a grown woman, an' what she does is her own business." Crystal spits the last word out like poison. "She wanted time, she wasn't gon' git it with K.B. comin' on up. She thought she could do more in L.A. Look, what's done is done. She made her choice, and now she's gonna live with the consequences. An' it ain't right for you, an' it ain't fair, an' that's the way it is, ain't it?"

"Easy for you to say," Vickie says. "You ain't sleepin' 'lone this summer." She pulls away from Crystal, sitting down on the couch as if it's the last solid thing in the world. Maybe for her it is. Fingers run uncertainly through braided hair as if she's never seen it before. "I did this for her. I prayed to be with her. Cherished every second. And now she's gone. It don't seem to make sense." She looks up. She looks like she expects to wake from a dream at any second. A team without Teresa, a summer without her beloved, doesn't seem like anything that should actually should exist.

Crystal doesn't have the words for her. Linda, hovering in the doorway, doesn't have them either. Vickie finally looks at them, catching each of them with her intent gaze. "Don't go," she whispers to them.

Neither makes any promises.