Page 72 of The Tip-Off
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Zeke
“Who are you texting and is that a smile on your face?” My mom places the casserole dish in the middle of our kitchen table at precisely six o’clock. It’s been the same way my entire life. Always exactly at six.
“Just a friend from Valley.”
“You didn’t tell me you were dating anyone.” She takes a seat across from me with two plates and pushes one in front of me.
I spoon two large servings of her chicken surprise casserole onto my plate, thankful I don’t have to count calories anymore and pick up my fork before I answer her. “It’s not really like that.”
“Don’t tell me you’re stringing some girl around with that whole friends with benefits crap.”
“Mooom.”
“I’m serious. I raised you better than that.”
“It’s just complicated. She’s still at Valley and I don’t know where I’m going to end up yet.”
“So you and Gabby aren’t going to try long-distance?”
I choke around the mouthful of chicken and it’s the longest thirty seconds ever as I chug water and compose myself, my mother looking on with a smug smile. “How do you know about Gabby?”
“Instagram, of course.”
“You’reon Instagram?”
She rolls her eyes. “You say that like I’m a hundred years old. She seems sweet. How did you meet her?”
“She’s Wes’ girl’s best friend.”
“Ah, how is Wes? I always liked him.”
Thankful for the topic change, I smile. “He’s good. He’s going to be coaching at Valley next year and he seems excited about that.”
We eat in silence for several minutes before I drop my fork to my plate and prepare to ask my mother the question that’s been plaguing me for weeks. “Do you think Dad had it right that you can’t have a family and a successful career?”
“Whatever made you think he believed that?”
“I heard him. The day he left, you two were arguing and he said he needed to move closer to where the jobs were and that if he wanted to make it big, he couldn’t be worrying about getting home to have dinner with us at six every night.” I remember every detail of that night. The blue polo shirt he wore, the goatee he was sporting, and the devastated look on my mother’s face.
“I didn’t know you heard that. I’m sorry that you did. I can’t imagine what you must have thought all these years.”
“Well, he wasn’t wrong. Hedidbecome successful and if I’ve learned anything the past few years, it’s that it takes a lot of hours and sacrifices to have that kind of success. I know you managed it both, but you turned down better jobs so you could be here for me at night, drive me back and forth to practices and games.”
“And I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”
“So, you either sacrifice career or family?”
“It’s not a sacrifice, honey, it’s prioritizing what’s important to you.”
I mull that over wondering if it’s that simple. Did my dad just not give a shit? Was it so easy to put career first because he didn’t love me like my mom does?
“Do you think Dad would have been as successful if he’d stayed here with us and we’d been a real family?”
“I don’t know. It would have been harder, probably, but I don’t think your dad believed that it was a choice between career and family any more than I do.”
“Why do you say that?”
