EPILOGUE
INDY
Four Years Later
Iverson lifts his sweaty little head from my shoulder. An imprint of my shirt creases his cheek as he stirs awake from his afternoon nap. His sister, Navy, has been up for over an hour, running around our family box at the United Center.
It doesn’t happen too often, but at least once a season, both Ryan and Zanders will play at home on the same day. I intended to spend the afternoon at home while they transformed the arena from a hockey rink into a basketball court, but the kids fell asleep after their uncle’s game, and I wouldn’t dare mess with nap time.
“How’s my favorite niece?” Zanders asks, barging into the room as he carries my favorite niece.
Taylor Shay Zanders is my only niece, the same way Navy is his.
“She’s a little fussy.” My little girl’s hair is a mess from her nap and her eyes are still swollen from crying. “Navy, we’ll go see Daddy before his game starts, I promise.”
My daddy’s girl hates when Ryan has to go to work. Even though he’s only in the locker room downstairs and spent the entire morning with her watching her uncle’s game, it’s never enough time for her.
It’s not enough time for him either.
Iverson is my laid-back guy and Navy is my emotional girl. They’re both just over two years old with completely defined yet opposite personalities.
Zanders hands his daughter, Taylor, off to me so he can console mine.
“Hi, Tay Tay.”
“Goldfish?” she asks, holding her hand out to Iverson.
He smiles and takes one from her palm.
“Baby Iverson sleeping?” she asks me.
“He was. He just woke up.”
Tay pets his head as if she were putting him back to sleep. The girl absolutely adores both her cousins.
She calls him baby Iverson, but he’s only the baby of the family by three months. Ryan and I began trying to conceive as soon as we moved into the house, but not so surprisingly, it didn’t work. When I did my first egg retrieval, we came away from the entire process with only one embryo, so I did a second egg retrieval later that year. Again, after all was said and done, we only got one more viable embryo.
We transferred one immediately, and unfortunately, our first attempt was unsuccessful.
I took it hard. Those months were rough. I felt like I was letting myself down, letting Ryan down, but he couldn’t have been more supportive. He didn’t even bat an eye as he began looking into foster and adoption options. We wanted nothing more than to provide a safe and loving home to someone who needed it. Even if we were simply a stop for them until their biological parents were back on their feet. We never saw a difference between biological or un-biological. We’d love them with everything we had.
The entire process was lengthy and time-consuming, and while we were going through it, I came to a point where I finally felt mentally prepared to attempt transferring our last embryo.
It worked. I was finally pregnant with our son, and I had never felt the kind of joy and excitement as I had that day when we were told we were going to be parents.
That is, until about two weeks later when we got the call that an expecting mother wanted to meet us. After endless conversations and exploring every option, making sure we were not only the best choice for the baby but for the mother as well, that same unexplainable love overwhelmed me once again.
Navy Renee came into the world just three months before her brother. The new Shay siblings might not be biological twins, but they’ll be raised as if they are. They’ll share the same class in school and hopefully the same friend group. And if we’re lucky, they’ll stay as close as Ryan and Stevie have.
Just then, as I’m thinking of my best friend, she and Rio join us in our box.
All season long, this is the Zanders and Shay family box at the United Center. It doesn’t matter which of Chicago’s teams is playing that night, it’s ours.
On her way in, Stevie pops a kiss on my daughter’s cheek who is now giggling and happy with her uncle as they dance around the room.
“One win down. One to go.” She takes a seat next to me. “Tay Tay, how many is Uncle Ry going to score tonight?”
She throws her hands up. “A hundred!”
“A hundred? So confident.”
Understatement of the year. Taylor Zanders is as confident as they come, but also sweet in equal measure.
“Yeah, and they win like Daddy win.”
“And like how Uncle Rio won,” Rio cuts in, taking the chair on the other side of me. “Don’t forget about me, Tay.”
“Uncle Rio didn’t score.”
The family’s newest comedian does a great job at keeping us all humble, and I can’t help but laugh at my friend’s expense. Rio rarely scores. He shares the blue line with Zanders. It’s not typical for a defenseman to be a high scorer on the team, but Taylor rarely reminds her dad he didn’t score after a game the way she does Rio.
“Yeah, well, Tay, Uncle Rio hasn’t scored in quite a while.”
He shoots me a look to remind me that he’s not only referring to the ice.
Rio DeLuca is one of my very best friends. Our bond has only gotten stronger since we met five years ago, but the guy is a giant kid. He’s twenty-seven years old, playing in his sixth year in the NHL, and his place is still the team’s party house.
He’s got a heart of gold and absolutely no idea how to talk to women.
Hopefully, someday, someone will see past the goofy exterior to realize his potential, but at the same time, he might need to grow up a bit for that to happen.
“How’s this year’s flight crew?” I ask.
He pops his shoulders. “They’re not you two.”
“Honey, we quit years ago. You’re going to have to move on.”
His green eyes concentrate on the court in front of him. “I refuse to accept that you both quit.”
“Three years ago,” I add for him.
“Yeah. Yeah.”
As much as I miss seeing the team on every road trip, I’m glad I left when I did. I flew for one more hockey season before calling it quits. Ryan and I were trying to get pregnant, and by the end of that year, we were. Plus, The Ryan Shay Foundation was taking off, and I was running the business end of it all.
By the time Navy and Iverson were here, my job was a full-time gig that needed my attention. I’ve loved every second of working for Ryan’s foundation. What used to be a summer camp, turned into a year-round passion project. We’ve been able to keep Chicago’s outdoor courts clean and usable, Ryan’s sneaker donation has tripled since we started, and what was once a provided lunch during the summer, has turned into daily after-school meals to those who need it.
Our latest project was one of my favorites. We’ve been able to upgrade thirty percent of Chicago’s public school libraries with new textbooks and tools for research. There’s also plenty of new books for those kids who want to read for fun, and we’re hoping to reach at least the next thirty percent this year.
Reading is something that Ryan and I first bonded over, and though we don’t have the same taste in books, being able to step into someone else’s shoes and read a story from their perspective, not only helps with learning and literacy, but also cultivates empathy.