“Maybe.” Gabriela looked over at her mom. “Can I see Daddy soon?”
There it was again. That icy pit, the hollow ache.
Rebecca was off the phone, but she stood leaning against the wall, her eyes closed and her lips moving in a silent plea.
What if that was me?
It felt like someone shoved a wooly sock down my throat as I glanced back and forth between them. I remembered when Malcolm told us Rebecca was pregnant, just as we started our rookie season together. They’d been dating for almost a year when he was drafted to Ft. Lauderdale. I was their first-round pick, and he was the second. I bolstered the offense, and he was the stalwart in the defense. I attended their wedding a month later, where he told me I had no business being on the dance floor.
Attempting to swallow that wedge in my throat, I gave Gabriela a smile. “I don’t know, G. Wanna see what your mom put in that backpack?”
The distraction worked well enough. She dropped to the floor and tugged the zipper open on her purple backpack. Inside were some coloring books, a tablet, a doll with terrifyingly big eyes, and a container of Legos.
“I don’t want to play with any of this, E,” she grumbled. “There’s nothing fun.”
“Oh man, sure there is.” Tugging open the front of the bag, I pulled out the container of the Legos, peering at the contents carefully. “We can make something really cool.”
“We can?”
Skepticism was stamped all over her little face, and she reminded me so much of Malcolm that I grinned. “Oh, yeah. You think I’m good at throwing a football? I’m even better at building really cool houses with stuff like this.”
“Can you make a castle?” she asked.
I blew a raspberry. “I have a degree in architecture from Stanford. A castle is nothing.”
She giggled.
I stood, glancing around the waiting room. A family in the corner watched us, the little boy giving me a wide-eyed stare. He wore a Ft. Lauderdale shirt, so I walked over and knelt next to his chair. “Hey, bud, do you mind if I borrow this little table next to your chair?”
He nodded rapidly, eyes massive in his face. “You’re … you’re Emmett Ward, aren’t you?” he asked in a hushed, incredulous whisper.
“I am. What’s your name?”
He managed it, only stammering a few times.
I held out my hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Cory.”
“Will you sign my shirt?” he said in a nervous rush.
“Of course. I don’t have a marker on me, though,” I told him.
His mom held up a hand, digging into her massive purse until she pulled out a Sharpie. He leaned back so I could scrawl my name on the left side of his chest over the logo I’d worn for the past five years.
She gave me a thankful smile as I returned her Sharpie, then wrapped her arm around her son’s shoulder. “We saw the replay on ESPN. I hope your teammate will be okay.”
“Thank you. We do too.” I stood, picking up the small table. “I’ll bring it back when I’m done, I promise.”
After I set the table in front of Gabriela, she excitedly dumped out the varying shapes and sizes of Legos in pinks and purples and teals. One Batman figure was mixed in, and she picked it up, zooming him around in the air while I sifted through the offerings. I scratched my head. A castle might be tough, but I always loved a challenge.
I gave her a serious look. “You have an important job, okay?”
She nodded.
I held up one of the larger bricks. “You need to find me all the blocks in this size.”