Gavin rolled his eyes, a chunk of his strawberry-blond hair sticking up from his forehead like he’d been shoving his hands in it. “It’s ajersey, Mom, not a ‘football thing.’”
I did not need him reminding me what it was, because the cost of that jersey had tied my stomach into a ruthless knot for a solid week. It was a few chunks of material, for crying out loud. I could’ve made one for less than half the price.
But the look on his face when he’d opened his tenth-birthday present was worth it. Wide-eyed awe, the kind that couldn’t be faked and appeared less and less as he got older. I’d bought it a little big because at the rate he was growing, he’d be out of that thing in six months, and that was not the most economical use of a ridiculously expensive gift.
For the first three months, he wore it to bed every single night, desperately waiting until he’d grown a little to wear it in public and the pride on his face when he wore his Archer Evans jersey to school was one of those mom moments that shouldn’t make you cry but totally does. He didn’t want toys anymore for birthdays and Christmas. It was getting harder and harder for him to make a list that didn’t consist of video games or jerseys or ... video games. And the day he was able to wear it in front of his friends reminded me why it was important for me to try my best to understand this shift in the tides as he grew older.My kid was on top of the world—absolutely nothing could take him down when he was wearing that thing.
I tied a knot in the stitch, then another, and snipped off the end of the thread. “What about it?” I asked.
Gavin chewed on his bottom lip, then walked the rest of the way into my room, his hands behind his back and a sheepish look on his face. There wasn’t really anywhere for him to sit. The bed was covered with laundry, which I usually shoved to the empty half before I face-planted on my hand-me-down mattress that sagged in the middle.
He sucked in a deep breath and thrust his hand out, the jersey balled up in his grip. “I don’t want it anymore.”
When you’ve lived your life in a near-constant state of chaos, something fascinating happens. Nothing—and I mean nothing—shocked me. Not even when a stranger shoved his hand down my pants in a weaker moment. I’d rolled with that little bombshell very quickly, banishing the entire evening to the dark, cobwebby parts of my brain.
Honest to God, it was my best personality trait (compartmentalization was right up there too), allowing me to show up whenever and wherever someone needed me, and somehow, I hadn’t lost my mind yet.
A litter of eight puppies from out of state needs emergency foster placement because they still have to be bottle-fed? On it.
My kid comes in the door at seven p.m. and informs me that we need a scale model of the planets for school tomorrow? No problem. Happened way more frequently than I cared to admit.
The school secretary calls right in the middle of a big donor meeting and tells me that Gavin puked in math class and I need to run over to pick him up? On my way. I had a strong suspicion he was faking half the time, but honestly, I’d puke, too, if I needed to do that pointless shit on a daily basis.
(I’d gone twenty-seven-and-a-half years and notoncehad I done algebra outside of school, but please, I’d love to have them tell me again how useful it is.)
Don’t even get me started on Pops and his absolute refusal to do anything to keep himself healthy becauselife tastes better when your foodis deep-fried. I’d fielded no fewer than five calls that month from his nurse, reminding me that he needed better eating habits.
Yeah, no shit, he did. But the man was as stubborn as a mule, and I’d learned years ago that I couldn’t make him do anything he didn’t want to do.
Seriously ... before Gavin had walked into my bedroom way too late on a school night—both of us still awake past ten because his soccer practice went long and he had homework to finish—I would’ve sworn on a giant stack of Bibles that nothing he said could genuinely surprise me.
But this had me sitting up straighter.
“Why don’t you want it anymore?”
The rest of my question stayed locked in my throat, but it was something along the lines ofDo you have any idea how much that thing cost? You’re going to wear it until it falls apart.
It took everything in me to leave it unsaid, because four months of use was not what I’d had in mind when I dropped a hundred and forty freaking dollars on that thing.
Was I sweating? I was sweating.
But then Gavin’s chin trembled, and his eyes immediately filled with tears.
“Oh, bud,” I whispered, gently taking the jersey from his hands. “Talk to me.”
He dashed a hand under his eyes when a few stray tears escaped. “You know that quote Pops always tell us?”
I pushed some laundry aside, making room for him. “Which one? Pops loves his inspirational quotes, doesn’t he?”
More tears slipped down his cheeks, and seeing him so genuinely upset made it feel like I had concrete blocks stuck in my gut. “A-about respect. That the right to be respected is won by respecting others.”
I couldn’t remember exactly where it came from, but he did repeat it often, and my tenderhearted kid, who didn’t have a father to teach him lessons, absorbed everything his great-grandfather said like a dried-up little sponge.
“Yeah, I remember that one.” I ran my hand through his hair. “What about it?”
Gavin stared down at the jersey in my hands, looking unbearably sad.
“Remember last year, when Coach King benched Archer at the end of the season because he wasn’t playing as well as he could and he wasn’t ... he wasn’t being, um, a good leader in the locker room?”