Chapter Three
Jaxon
I tug on my tie as I wait for my dad at the restaurant. It’s really constricting; I feel like it’s strangling me, which is an interesting metaphor considering how constricting my life has been the last few years, but I try not to focus on that. I try to concentrate on the fact that my dad insists on having a fancy dinner with me whenever he’s in town, which is the reason why I haven’t completely given up on our relationship yet. Besides, who am I to argue when there is free food involved? So, I suffer through and wear the damn tie.
I don’t know when our relationship changed. Somewhere around the time my little brother Matty became a superstar on the football field, I suppose. Up until that point, my dad was my hero. He was everything I always wanted to be—big, strong, kind, and funny. And he looked at me like I was his whole world.
Then something shifted. It wasn’t a big moment that caused the tension in our relationship. It was gradual. Slowly but surely, my teammates were bigger and faster than I was. Slowly but surely, Matty was bigger and faster than everyone on his team. That’s when Dad stopped looking at me like I was his buddy and started looking at me like I was tagging along for the ride. It hurt. A lot. But I tried to make it right. Holy fuck, I tried.
I made sure to walk-on the football team here at school, even though I knew it wasn’t going to lead to anything except lots of time and exercise. I signed up to major in business, with the idea that eventually I would manage a couple of athletes and work at the foundation my dad set up all those years ago. I did my part, and I still do, hoping something will change and I’ll stop feeling like his “extra” kid, and he’ll be proud of me again. But I also have to live for me.
It’s a weird contradiction and one that makes my head spin sometimes—do what makes Dad proud or be myself. These days, it feels like those are two very different things.
Staring at the lobsters in the lobby, I concentrate on memories of my childhood. When I was a kid, my dad used to set me free at fancy places like this, knowing I would never run away as long as there was a tankful of lobsters to mesmerize me.
I would stand and look at the tank and wonder how the lobsters felt. Were they aware of their pending death? Were they oblivious to their fate? It seemed weird to me that people would watch them walk around, living their little lives, and then eat them. Until I had my first taste. Now, I’m the one observing them because I’m trying to decide which one I’m going to pick for my meal. The meal I’m having with my dad when I drop the bomb about choosing the major I want, not the one he wants me to have.
I still think it’s morbid, picking out your dinner while it’s still alive, but I justify it by assuming that having a quick death in a pot of boiling water is better than spending your days running from your fellow lobster as he tries to snap your face off with his claw. Yes, these are the random thoughts I have the hungrier I get, which is a hell of a lot better than plummeting into my pity party while I wait.
Suddenly the door opens and a massive figure walks in—my dad, larger than life. He smiles at the couple leaving and holds the door open for them to pass. They have to scoot around him because he’s so big, he takes up the entire doorway. Even in his forties, my dad still forgets he’s a giant compared to the majority of the rest of the world.
Once they pass, he turns and catches my eye. If it’s possible, his smile gets even brighter. “There’s my boy!” Two steps later he’s got me wrapped in a huge bear hug.
My dad has always been a hugger. I may be an adult now, but that doesn’t stop him from showing his affection, publicly or not. I humor him because it has been a couple months since we’ve seen each other, and as much as he can be overbearing to the point of annoyance at times, he’s still my dad.
He finally pulls away to give me the once-over, and I find myself bracing for what’s next.
“You’re looking tired. Are you feeling okay? Are you practicing too hard? Getting enough sleep?”
“I’m fine, Dad,” I say with a roll of my eyes. “I just had a long practice today.”
His eyebrows furrow with concern. “Are you pushing yourself too hard?” he continues to question. “Do you need to cut back? Maybe you shouldn’t be working at night—”
“Dad,” I interrupt. “I’m fine. They drew my labs a couple months ago when I did my annual physical. Everything came back perfectly normal. There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m just tired.”
“Okay,” he says, but I know he’s not fully convinced. Not that he’ll ever be fully convinced. It doesn’t matter that I’ve got the highly coveted “cured” label that came after five years in remission. It doesn’t matter that I’ve been considered cured for more than ten years now. He doesn’t hesitate with the questions whenever we meet up. I’ve learned how to deflect.
“Come on, Dad, don’t you have an eight o’clock reservation? I don’t want to be late.”
He flashes me a knowing grin. “You’ve been eyeing those lobsters, I see.”
“Damn straight. I’m a growing boy. You need to feed me.”
We walk up to the hostess stand. “Name?” the very blonde, very buxom hostess asks in an equally very bitchy tone.
“Hart,” I reply. “Again.” She cocks an eyebrow at me and scowls, still treating me like gum on her shoe, just like she did when I first got here, and she wouldn’t seat me because I was by myself.
Of course, when she turns to my dad, she has a flirty smile. “I see your entire party has finally arrived, Mr. Hart. I’ll be happy to seat you now.”
I roll my eyes and huff as she grabs two menus and leads us into the seating area.
My dad leans into me as we walk. “What did you do to piss her off?” he asks quietly. It irritates me that he assumes I did something.
“Oh, you know—I didn’t bring your wallet with me,” I snark.
“What?”
“A girl in my statistics class works here. She says they’re very good at pinpointing who the one with the money is. That’s the person they’re nice to because that’s the person who tips them. The rest of us are an inconvenience and are in the way.”
Dad chuckles. “That doesn’t happen.”
I shake my head. No matter how many times I try to explain that people treat him differently because of who he is, he never gets it. “Ask Mom about it again. She’ll tell you.”
He just laughs as we sit down, probably still not believing me.
As we settle in, the hostess leans closer to my dad, and puts a hand on his arm. “If you need anything, Mr. Hart, anything at all, just ask. My name is Mindy, and I’ll be right there at the front.”
“Okay.” A strange look crosses his face as he finally realizes my assessment of her behavior was probably right. It still shocks him when people treat him special because of who he is, no matter how many times the rest of us complain about it. My dad has never met a stranger. Unfortunately, I’ve met many.
As she walks away, a waiter takes her place. Thankfully, he’s a guy. In my experience, they’re easier to deal with in situations like these.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” he begins, placing small white napkins on the table in front of us. “My name is Luke, and I’ll be your server this evening. May I start you with a beverage? Perhaps something from the bar?”
“I’ll take two fingers of Johnny Walker Black,” my dad says, surprising me. “Jax, do you want something?”
I shake my head. “No, I have to work tonight. I’m going to stick with water.”
Dad flashes me that concerned look again, but he’s distracted quickly by Luke. “Very good, sirs. Feel free to browse the menu. I’ll be back with your drinks and to answer any questions you may have.”
He walks off, and I look over at my dad. “Since when do you drink whiskey?”
“Since Henry Davidson introduced me to it.”
“Henry who?”
He looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. “Henry Davidson? Only the best tight end in the history of the NFL.”
I stare at him blankly.
“Seriously, Jaxon? With all of that football trivia in your brain, you don’t remember Henry Davidson?”
I continue to stare at him before finally asking, “When did he play?”
Dad peruses the menu absentmindedly as he answers me. “He played for the Browns all throughout the 80s.”
A laugh bursts out of me. “He played for the worst team in the league like twenty years before I was born, and you think I’m going to remember him?”
His jaw drops open and he looks like I kicked his puppy. I actually have to stifle a laugh because of how disappointed he looks. Only this time, I know it’s light-hearted, which gives me a boost.
“What part of best tight end in the history of football are you not hearing, son?”
“The part about his glory days being over before I was even born, Dad.”
“You’re such a little punk,” he says playfully and looks down at his menu. “Anyway, he’s working for the foundation now, and we were having a dinner meeting not too long ago when he introduced me to it. Turns out, I’m a whiskey man.”
Again, I have to try not to laugh. “What you’re saying is you have a man crush.”
“All right, smart ass. You’re not even looking at the menu. What do you want for dinner anyway?”
I look at him and wait for him to answer his own question. Finally, he looks up.
“You and that lobster,” he says when it hits him. “You’re going to eat me out of house and home.”
“Hey, it was your idea to eat fancy. I could have gone for a pizza.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
I lean back in my chair, relaxing into the conversation. So far, I feel like it’s going well. He’s in a good mood and looks happy to be hanging out with me. This is good. It’s really good.
“How is everyone doing?” I ask as he puts his menu down. “How’s Matty? Mom says you’ve been going to his middle school football games.”
Dad’s eyes light up at the mention of my younger brother and his natural talent on the football field. Yet, they dim just as quickly as he sensors himself. The relaxed feeling I had fades as his demeanor changes.
“Good. He’s doing good. They moved him up to the eighth-grade team. He and Trace are playing together.” He pretends to look at his menu again when we both know he’s really avoiding eye contact.
This is the reason I went to school so far away from home. When Matty started playing on the pee-wee league, it was fun for all of us. Watching those little bitty kids play was funny, especially when they’d get nailed in their oversized helmets with the football and fall over.
But as Matty got older, and it became obvious how much talent he has, my dad got more and more tight-lipped. At first, I thought it was because he didn’t want to put pressure on my little brother. Then one day, I walked in on him talking about Matty’s game with my mom. He was animated and excited, waving his hands around with a big smile on his face.
Until he saw me. His face dropped, and he stopped talking. I tried to re-engage the conversation, even throwing in a little extra excitement into my own voice, but he just downplayed everything. Knowing my dad as well as I do, I knew then and there he was trying to protect me from feeling like a disappointment to him. Which only made me realize exactly how much of a disappointment I was to him. And it hurt.
And yet, I still try to engage him in talk about Matty. Partially because I’m interested. Partially because it’s turned into this weird twisted game for me as I struggle to keep my sanity with this situation. When will my dad realize that not everyone is going to be a football icon, and some of us are fine with that?
“But he’s in the sixth grade.” Watching him closely, I try to see any flicker of excitement from him. Any at all. But he continues to be stoic.
“Well, he’s pretty big compared to the other kids.”
I lean my elbows on the table, frustrated with this shit. I’m practically challenging him to show me some sort of real emotion about this. “Really? That’s not how mom explains it. She says he’s the biggest kid out there. He barrels over everyone else, and he’s really good. He’s on track to accomplish some great things on the field.”
“Maybe. He’s still young, you know. And everyone’s path is different.”
And there it is. The obligatory “everyone’s path is different” bullshit he spouts whenever he wants to shut down a conversation. Once again, he reminds me what an utter failure I am because I’m not going down the same path he did. This conversation is about to get worse once I drop the college bomb on him tonight.
“Why can’t you just tell me how excited you are?” I ask quietly, surprising even myself. He finally tears his eyes away from his menu to give me a surprised look. “Mom tells me how funny it is that you pace up and down the field during every game. That you can’t hardly watch because you’re just as nervous as the players.”
“She told you that?”
“Of course she did. She says it’s hilarious to see everyone’s reaction to the big guy barreling up and down the field, trying to keep his cool and not stalk onto the field and get in the ref’s face if he doesn’t agree with a play.”
“It’s not that. It’s…um…my back hurts from sitting on the benches for a long time.”
He’s lying to me. I know he’s lying. Yes, a career ending back injury forced him into early retirement. And yes, it hurts sometimes. But we both know he’s once again trying to cover up his own excitement.
“Whatever,” I grumble and snap open my menu, pretending I don’t already know what I want.
“What does that mean—?”
Fortunately, Luke shows up at that exact moment, interrupting what could have easily turned into a really nasty fight. I’m so frustrated I want to pull my hair out or scream or maybe both. Something—anything—to get him to see me, really see me for the first time in years. Instead, we take a moment to cool off as Luke places my water and Dad’s whiskey on the table.
Before he can leave, we place our order. Lobster, double the seasoned vegetables, hold the rice for me. Filet mignon, double the seasoned vegetables, hold the potatoes for him.
Same meal, same downplayed conversation. Nothing ever changes with my dad. Not even his workout schedule. In spite of his retirement, he still meets up with Deuce, his longtime friend and teammate, several times a week for a couple hours. And now that they’re old enough, Matty and Deuce’s son, Trace, go with them. I’m sure that’s information I’m not supposed to know in case it “hurts my sensitive little feelings.” I’m curious to know how it’s going, but I’ll save those questions for Matty. He’s much more open with me. Plus, the hurt I’m feeling is quickly morphing into anger. It’s best not to push it. There are other important issues we have to discuss tonight.
Eventually, Luke leaves to put our order in, and I venture into more neutral topics of conversation.
“What are you doing in town anyway?”
“You know that project we’ve been working on?” I nod. “We need to acquire some land for it, but the land owner actually lives down here. I came to do some schmoozing to see if they’re in the market to sell and if I can take some acres off their hands.”
Once football was no longer an option, Dad threw all his energy into Hart to Heart, the foundation he established after I was diagnosed with leukemia as a kid. The mission of the foundation is to raise awareness about bone marrow donations and building the national registry. Hart to Heart’s growth coincided with Dad’s retirement and allowed him to focus his passion and energy away from playing the game to growing the organization.
The success of Hart to Heart has been amazing, and over the last ten years, the number of lives saved as a result has been tremendous. We’ve always loved hearing from the families who have benefited from the work my dad and his foundation have done. I think it helps him feel like he’s accomplished something much more important than what he did on the football field.
Since its inception, the foundation has expanded to include several other umbrellas to help with research and medical bills. Now, they’re looking to expand again to an even bigger project—opening a resort.
It’s been niggling in the back of my dad’s brain for a few years. One of the things he noticed and said for years was there were lots of pediatric oncology camps for the kids to go to, but there was nowhere for the parents to decompress. Even when their kids were away, the bills kept rolling in, the phone kept ringing, there were still jobs and responsibilities pulling them in every direction. He felt like the parents needed a place where they could go to recharge as well.
Now, the Hart to Heart board is in the process of acquiring some land to open up a spa/resort for parents of pediatric oncology patients. The concept is for parents to stay at a five-star resort for free while their children are only about ten miles away at their own camp. The spa would allow the parents to decompress, indulge in some pampering, and meet and spend time with other parents who are going through the same experience. The concept itself has a lot of merit and donors have been really interested. But, regardless of how interested the donors are, the process is slow. I think my dad first mentioned the resort about three years ago.
“That’s really cool dad. How did the meeting go?”
“I think we’ve got a shot,” he says excitedly, finally expressing a real emotion in front of me. “There are a couple of other areas we’re considering, but this is our favorite at this point. It’s only five miles from the kid’s camp, which is great. And there are already several buildings that will only require renovations. Plus, there is a large building that would be perfect for events and conferences, which is a great alternative for renting the facility for corporate retreats. And, if all goes as planned, we may be up and running in the next couple of years.”
“That’s awesome. This is going to really go over well with the parents.”
His eyes soften as the memories come back to him. It’s been ten years since my last hospital stay, but he’ll never forget how close I came to death. None of us will. If it weren’t for my brother being born early and the hospital getting medical clearance to transplant his cord blood into me, I probably wouldn’t be here today.
“Yeah. Your mom and I could’ve used a place like this. We were lucky to have a huge support system, but most parents don’t have that. It’ll be nice to give parents some rest and pampering to help them through the hardest time of their lives. Plus,” his smile perks up, “in a couple years you’ll be joining the board, just in time for us to open.”
I stiffen as I prepare myself for the next part of this conversation. I hoped to avoid it until after I’d at least eaten my hand-picked lobster. It doesn’t look like that’s going to work out.
Sucking it up, I finally confess. “Well, Dad, I wanted to talk to you about that.”
“What’s up, son?”
“See, um,” I clear my throat to buy myself a second to calm my nerves. “I changed my major.”
He gets a stunned look on his face. “What do you mean? You don’t want to major in business anymore? I thought you wanted to work for the foundation and manage a couple athletes on the side?”
I tilt my head to the side and back. “I never really wanted to manage anyone, Dad. It was an idea I threw out there once, but I never really latched on to that.”
He continues to look shocked, like this is coming out of left field. Which I guess to him it is. “But you’re good with all that statistical data and crunching the numbers. The football trivia. We’ve talked about this for years.”
“No, you’ve talked about it for years,” I disagree. “I’ve kind of gone along with it because anytime we talk about football, you clam up and pretend to not be disappointed by my lack of skills.”
I shake my head, angry with myself for going there. I’m not trying to pick a fight, but I think I just did. Sure enough, when I look up, his eyes are wide. “What are you talking about? I’m not disappointed in your lack of skills.”
“We’re gonna have to agree to disagree on that one,” I say with a sigh. “My point is, I’m not getting a business degree anymore. I don’t want to work for the foundation. I changed to pre-med.”
He shakes his head in confusion. “Okay, we’re going to get back to your last comment about me being disappointed in you—”
“No, we’re not.”
He shoots me a glare for interrupting him. “We are. But first, what do you mean you don’t want to work for the foundation? It’s our foundation.”
“No, it’s your foundation, Dad.” I huff in frustration. “Do you even look at the posters hanging up anymore? The ones of you and me? I’m not nine years old anymore. I’m almost twenty-one; I have hair. I’m cured. I don’t want to be the poster boy for Hart to Heart anymore.”
“So we’ll change the posters,” he says like that fixes everything.
“Dad. Listen to me. I don’t want to work for the foundation.”
He looks at me like I’ve lost my damn mind. “Okay, if that’s what you want. I don’t understand what brought on this change. I’ve never once heard you mention medicine. I’m trying to figure out what’s happening here.”
“It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while. You know I’m really good at math and science, and I can remember just about anything related to it.” He nods. “I was thinking how much Dr. Bates helped me and how my ability might work to my advantage if I were ever to be a doctor. The idea sort of grew.”
He sits back, getting more comfortable. “Wow. That’s a really lofty goal.”
“You don’t think I can do it?”
“I didn’t say that. It’s just a big commitment.”
“That’s why I didn’t tell you before. I wanted to make sure I could hack it before I ditched the business degree. But I took a couple upper level science classes over the summer to try it out.”
“And?”
“Straight A’s,” I answer.
He smiles at me. I have no idea why he’s smiling. I hope that means I have his approval, but at this point, I don’t really need it. It’s already a done deal. “That random statistical stuff really came in handy, huh?”
“Sure did,” I say, running my finger around the rim of my water glass to keep my hands busy. “I’m going for it. I’ll be in school for an extra year, which means I’ll need to work a little more, maybe a few more hours. I’ll probably have to get student loans to get through med school…”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, Jax, stop.” He raises his hands up, palms out. “If med school is what you want to do, don’t worry about the cost. We can cover it.”
“Yeah, I know, but Matty and Lucy are going to need it too.”
“Matty’s probably going to get a full ride. Don’t even worry about that.” As soon as the words are out of his mouth, I see it on his face. He thinks he threw my brother’s accomplishments in my face, so he clams up again.
I look to the ceiling and clench my fists in anger. He doesn’t get it. I’m allowed to be proud of him too. He’s my brother for fuck’s sake.
“You have got to stop doing that shit,” I practically growl at him.
“What are you talking about, Jax?”
“I know Matty is a fucking super star,” I practically yell, slamming my fist on the table. He sits back, bewilderment crossing his face. Lowering my voice, I lean forward to speak again. “Matty has always been good at football. And why wouldn’t he be? He’s your son. It’s a fucking given. But I’m Austin’s son,” I spout, surprising myself as much as the words obviously just shocked him. “I’m good at math and science and am interested in learning more about medicine. I come from a football family, but I’m not destined to be a football great. Never have been, and I’m okay with that. I wish you were okay with it too.” Suddenly, I need to get away from him. I can’t be a letdown to him anymore. “You know what? Forget it.”
I push away from the table and stand up, throwing my napkin down. He stands up right along with me.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m leaving. I have to work tonight. Thanks for the…water,” I say, realizing our food hasn’t even come yet.
Turning away from him, I storm out the door. I may have the Hart last name, but I have the Bryant genes. And if he can’t accept and appreciate that part of me, fuck him.