Page 29 of Tommy Gabrini: All Fall Down
“You must have gotten a good night’s rest because you look really refreshed.”
Tommy and Grace glanced at each other again. They both knew what refreshed him that morning, and it wasn’t sleep.
“You’re still coming to my game, though, right, Daddy?”
It’s still at three?”
“Yes sir. You’re still coming then?”
“Has he missed one yet, Thomas?” Grace asked their son.
“No ma’am. But I wanna be sure.”
“Why?” asked GG.
“Because.”
“Because why?” Grace asked TJ too.
TJ was embarrassed, but he was no liar either. “Because I get more girls when Daddy’s around.”
Grace and Tommy laughed. But GG was appalled. “Girls? Is that all you ever think about?”
TJ looked at her as if she was insane. “What else is there to think about?” he asked.
And although GG shook her head, Tommy and Grace glanced at each other. They were a little concerned that he was following a bit too closely in one of his father’s bad steps: his prior life as an unrepentant ladies’ man. And TJ had the looks to be that guy. It wasn’t until Tommy met Grace did he give up that life.
“I have a meeting this morning,” Tommy said to his son, “but I plan to pick up your mother later today and we’ll be there by three.”
“I’m going to Nira’s birthday party,” said GG happily. “I won’t have to suffer through your boring soccer game.”
“And I don’t have to suffer through your boring face,” said TJ.
They were about to go back and forth again, but Tommy stopped it. “That’s enough,” he said. They reminded him of when Reno and Sal were together. He was always their referee too.
Grace put Tommy’s plate on the table along with her own, went and prepared coffee, and then they all sat down together for the first time that week.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
After dropping off Gianna at her friend’s birthday party and talking with the birthday girl’s mother, Grace was running late getting TJ to Redmond where his team was the visiting team for the soccer game that day. Redmond was only thirty miles outside of Seattle, but they didn’t make it all the way through Tatem, a small town in between Seattle and Redmond, when police sirens were heard. When Grace looked through the rearview and when TJ turned around to look, they saw the policeman pointing for Grace to pull over to the side of the road.
TJ looked at his mother in disbelief. His Uncle Sal always joked that whenever Grace was behind the wheel it was as if she was driving Miss Daisy she drove so slow. “You were speeding, Ma?” a surprised TJ asked her.
“No,” Grace said as she nervously pulled over. “I mean I was maybe a couple miles over, if that. They can’t write a ticket unless it’s at least five miles over the limit, and I know I wasn’t going that fast.”
“Then why are they stopping us?”
Grace was concerned too. “I don’t know.” Then she looked through the rearview again and realized that two patrol cars had pulled over behind her. A white cop got out of each one of the patrol cars as if it was some drug bust or something equally major crime that needed assistance. She looked at her son as her stress began to build. “Do whatever they tell you to do, you hear me, Thomas?”
“Me? I’m not even driving.”
“You’ve seen those videos on social media. Has that stopped them before?”
TJ exhaled. “No ma’am.”
“Do exactly what me and your father told you to do in these situations. You look white, but they shoot white boys too.”
“I’m black,” said TJ proudly.
