The other night I took Jake to his soccer practice...by myself. No other kids. I love when that happens. Jake and I both know what it means. We get to stay after practice a little bit and practice our soccer moves on each other.
The other night the sun was definitely gone. The moon was slowly descending. It was more dark than light. I thought we would just go home.
Jake made us stay.
Can't we just practice "just a little bit?"
How could I say no?
Jake jumped in the goal box. His favorite position.
I got to shoot goals on him.
My favorite position.
We played longer and longer.
I could barely see the ball. But he wanted to keep playing.
I was shooting goals between the fine line of shooting hard enough that he had to work hard, but soft enough that I didn't score every time.
We were both loving it.
I could tell by the smile on my face, and his jumping up and down and clapping his hands together whenever he made a great catch.
I heard myself yell out from across the field when I could barely see the lines of his small body.
Guess what, Jake?
What?
You are making my dreams come true!
What?
When I was younger, I used to dream about having kids who would play soccer with me on a beautiful green soccer field. All by ourselves. And now my dream has actually come true.
I could see the outline of a smile swipe across his delicate face.
Thanks for making my dreams come true, I yelled.
We stopped playing shortly after that. We simply couldn't see the ball anymore.
I grabbed the ball, his water bottle, and of course, his right hand in the palm of my left.
I shuffled his hair, bent over and kissed his head.
I whispered, I love you, buddy.
He didn't respond...with his words.
He immediately took both of his arms, wrapped them both around my right arm and squeezed as tightly as he could.
We walked off the field walking as close to each other as possible.
The beautiful huge, green soccer complex that was completely empty...
except for me and my son.
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