Thanks, Dad

I dropped another box on the table sitting in the driveway. It was the last box of Dad’s old stuff. I didn’t want to get rid of it, but I couldn’t stand to keep the house and there was no way all of this would fit in my apartment. I was keeping two boxes. The rest had to go.

I started unpacking the box I’d just brought down. I pulled out several jars of nails, an assortment of tchotchkes, and an old baseball. My fingers felt along the seam, searching for where I’d tried to cut it open when I was six.

Dad had caught me going at it with scissors, and he’d just about had a conniption.

“Jared! What are you doing?” he’d yelled. “Stop!”

When I kept trying to cut into it, he’d snatched the baseball out of my hands. I’d started to cry.

“Hey, buddy,” he’d said, his voice softer. He’d sat down next to me and pried the scissors from my tiny fingers. “You can have it back.”

It was my turn to snatch the baseball from him. I went for the scissors next.

“Ah, ah, ah,” Dad had said, holding the scissors well out of reach. “How about we go play catch with it instead?”

That was the first time we’d played catch together and the day I decided I wanted to play baseball. I told him then and there that one day I’d be playing in the Majors.

He’d laughed and said, “You just make sure you never play for the White Sox.”

Someone walked up then, pulling me back to the present. I stared down at the baseball and hesitated before I set it on the table.

“Daddy, look!” a little boy squealed. “It’s Jared Sykes!”

I knelt down in front of the little boy. His eyes went wide.

“You play for the Yankees,” he breathed, his lips forming a tiny o. “You’re my hero.”

Taking in his awed expression, I smiled. “Hold out your hand.”

The little boy offered me one of his tiny palms. I set the old, fraying baseball in it.

“When I was your age, my dad taught me to play with that ball.” I tapped the baseball in the boy’s hand. “That’s the ball that started my career. Now it’s gonna be the ball that starts yours.”

The little boy stared down at the baseball, his eyes still as wide as saucers.

I straightened and met his dad’s eyes. He reached for his wallet, but I shook my head.

“Thank you,” the boy’s dad mouthed.

I nodded. He led his son away as he started babbling about baseball and how he wanted to play for the Cubs and maybe the Yankees one day, like I did.

I smiled to myself, looking up at the sky. “Thanks, Dad. For everything.”