Spinoff writer Madeleine Chapman has co-written Kiwi basketball star Steven Adams' autobiography, in shops next week. She tells how she wrote the book alongside an athlete she's known since they were both teenagers. Warning: Contains a lot of food.
He made me scull a pint of Guinness at 12pm on a Monday.
I'd never drunk a Guinness nor did I have any desire to on an empty stomach, but Steven said we were downing a pint and what Steven says goes.
It was June 2017. Steven was home for the off-season after the Oklahoma City Thunder finished a disappointing, yet somehow impressive season with a loss to the Houston Rockets in the first round of the playoffs.
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It was the Thunder's first season without Kevin Durant and Steven was suddenly the second-most valuable player on the Thunder roster behind Russell Westbrook, although if you told him that, he'd say something along the lines of "just doing my job, mate".
As I learned over the next year, Steven has always liked routine. Growing up, his least productive years were those spent without someone guiding him or giving him something to do.
In Wellington, as a teen, he had his weeks planned out in half-hour increments, with time split between school, training, gym, and games. Routine works for Steven and in the 2017 off-season, his routine included sculling a pint of Guinness before lunch.
I had flown to Wellington to spend a week shadowing Steven and learning about his early years growing up in Rotorua. The day I arrived, we had dinner at his favourite Wellington joint - R & S Satay Noodle House - with a few of his school friends.
I barely ate all day, having learned over the years that eating with Steven would require preparation. He ordered for the whole table, joking with the owner like old friends, and returned with giant bowls of chicken noodle soup.
I assessed the size and figured I could manage the whole thing. I wasn't about to bring shame upon my family name by not finishing a meal.
We sat and talked about the book, and what he wanted from it.
"I don't want any of that Disney inspirational shit," he said. "I just think maybe my story could be useful for some other kids out there."
I nodded - no inspirational shit. Got it.
We finished our noodle soup and I felt my stomach expand beyond what’s healthy.
"Alright," he said, scraping his chair back, "let's go get dinner."
I trudged after him up Cuba St to Cin Cin. He wore a camo jacket, camo hat, sweatpants, socks and slides.
It was pouring with rain. Everyone stared and a few men stopped Steven to say hello, before he politely, but deliberately moved them along.
Once in Cin Cin, he ordered a bottle of red wine and scanned the menu.
"What are you getting?" he asked.
I hesitated, wondering if it would be rude to order nothing and just watch him eat.
"What are you getting?" he asked again. I ordered a barrel of pasta.
As we ate, I imagined my stomach as a bottomless pit, able to hold vast quantities of food, despite never having done it before that night. Steven inhaled his second dinner and jokingly assessed his glass of wine.
He talked about how Spurs coach Gregg Popovich loves his wine and how one day they were going to bond over a full-bodied red. I listened and wondered why my pile of pasta didn’t seem to be getting any smaller.
An hour later, the bottle of red was empty and my soul was full of the pasta that had nowhere else to go after my stomach said 'no more'. Steven went up to pay and I didn’t dare suggest we go 'dutch', because it was the night before payday and who knows what that bottle of wine cost.
On our way out, a family of diners asked Steven for a photo. While he obliged, I stood in the rain, taking deep breaths and wondering if my stomach muscles would ever be the same.
"Let’s go to Floridita's."
I turned to meet my maker.
"They do good desserts."
Floridita's was packed out and Steven decided against waiting for a table. I offered up a prayer of thanks to whoever was listening, as we walked to the car.
On the way home, I asked him about his voice, how much of his humour he wanted included (in the book).
"After all," I concluded, "it’s your name on the cover."
"What about your name?"
"It’ll be inside somewhere."
"That’s bullshit."
I argued that it wasn't and he relented.
That was Sunday night. On Monday morning, we went to the gym.
Steven went to the gym every day at 10am, because 10am on a weekday is a gym's quietest period. His trainer, Gavin Cross, looked up from a massage he was giving a client to greet us affectionately.
They chatted for a while, seemingly in their own language, before heading out to the gym floor for a workout. I took a notebook with me, intending to take notes and quickly remembered how boring it is to watch someone train.
But I hadn't worn workout gear, much to Steven's disapproval, and so spent 45 minutes watching other gym goers watch Steven. One fairly prominent wellness influencer took a sneaky Snapchat video of Steven, thinking nobody would notice.
But I noticed and I remembered.
At the end of his session, Steven asked Gav if he was ready for his Guinness.
"Guinness?" I asked.
"Oh yeah, it's a great source of iron," Gav explained. "You having one?"
Iron shmiron, sitting down for a Guinness would be perfect for asking about Steven’s childhood, I figured.
"Maybe," I said, wanting to be on my A game for the drunken interview.
When we parked up outside Four Kings at 12pm, I opened the car door.
"You having a Guinness?" Steven asked again.
I said it was probably too early for me.
"Well you can’t come in unless you’re having a Guinness."
I went in.
Turns out "having a Guinness" meant literally standing at the bar, ordering a pint, sculling the pint and leaving. Gav, Steven and I clinked glasses, and before I could blink, they'd plonked their empty pints on the bar.
Thankfully, I hadn't eaten or drunken anything all day, and was simply thirsty, so was only a couple seconds behind them. Gav nodded approvingly and we walked back out to the car.
I hadn't asked a single question. The next stop was Prefab for lunch.
