Page 142 of Unexpected Forever
I lookout the small side window in the backseat and stare at the moon. It’s a big white ball in the sky that moves along with us.
It’s because those space men are inside and moving it so they can follow us.
I wonder if their controllers look like the ones that Wes and I use when we play video games.
How cool would it be to control the moon? Maybe I’ll be a space man so I could see how they do it.
“Daddy, where are we going?” I ask, the moon completely forgotten.
“The hospital. We need to pick up your mom and your new little sister.”
I frown. I didn’t want a little sister. Wes had one, and she did nothing but bother us while we tried to play Mario Brothers.
Dad cheers at something said on the radio.
“Yes! Won the first game of the season. Nate, my boy, I think the Braves have a good chance at the series this year.”
I don’t know what any of it means, but it makes Dad happy and that makes me happy too.
He continues. “You know, I used to play baseball in high school. I was pretty good too. My coach said I was the one to watch in college. But it wasn’t meant to be for me.”
“Is that when you started playing gee-tar, Daddy?”
“Yeah.” He pauses and turns the steering wheel. “It was always my dream to play at Fenway.”
“What’s a Fenway?”
He laughs. “It’s not a thing, buddy. It’s the oldest baseball stadium in America.” He looks over his shoulder with a smile. “Would you like to join little league next season, bud? I could coach you.”
“Yes!” I raise my fist in the air, bouncing in my seat. Wes plays ball, and this way we could play together longer. Plus it means I’ll get to spend more time with Daddy and less time with the stinky baby.
Wes had told me about how babies stink when they poop.
“Daddy, if I play, will I get that big thing for my hand?”
“A glove?”
“Yes! I want one like Wes has. Can we get one like his?”
“Sure, buddy. Whatever you want.”
I blinkand a wave of dizziness hits me.
Holy shit.
How had I forgotten that my dad played baseball and never got to live out his dream?
Or that my mom never left the bed, crying all the time after Megan was born?
The years up until they died were a blur of yelling and crying, plus a parade of babysitters for us and musicians, singers, and drug dealers for my parents.
More snatches of time play in my head. This time after we’d moved in with Cathy and Jim.
“There are only three ways an addict ends up, Cathy. Clean, in prison, or dead. I’m sorry your brother chose the latter, but we both know it was only a matter of time before he relapsed.”
She sniffles. “I knew what would happen as soon as she ended up with those painkillers after the baby. They’ve been his vice ever since he blew out his knee playing baseball. And they always led him down the slippery slope to the hard stuff.”
I didn’t hear anything more after that, and until this moment, I had forgotten hearing the conversation at all.
