“Mom! LOOK!”
Ethan nearly spilled his drink pointing toward the giant screen above the football field.
I looked up.
There we were.
My husband, Chris, sat on one side of Ethan. I was on the other. Ethan wore his favorite blue jersey and was grinning so widely that, for a moment, he looked like every other happy 10-year-old at the stadium.
He waved at the camera.
Chris threw both hands into the air.
Ethan shouted, “WE’RE FAMOUS!”
People around us laughed.
I reached for my phone.
Then the stadium announcer spoke.
“Ethan, we’re very happy you’re here with us today.”
My son stopped bouncing.
His face filled the enormous screen.
“But there’s something you don’t know about this trip.”
I looked at Chris.
He looked just as confused as I felt.
“All three of you,” the announcer continued, “please turn around and look behind you.”
Ethan grabbed my hand.
“What is it, Mom?”
“I don’t know, Captain.”
We turned.
A man was walking down the stadium steps.
Chris stared at him.
All the color seemed to disappear from his face.
“Leo?”
Behind Leo came Ray, a familiar face from the hospital, carrying Ethan’s battered plastic tabletop football game.
A nurse from Ethan’s floor followed.
Then Cody, another young patient, and his mother.
Ethan’s mouth fell open.
“No way.”
Ray lifted the little game.
Ethan started laughing.
And suddenly, the football game we’d thought was just a family outing became something none of us would ever forget.
Three Months Earlier, Football Was Just Football
Before cancer changed our lives, Sundays in our house were ordinary.
Chris yelled at the television.
Ethan corrected him.
I pretended I wasn’t invested while complaining about the referees louder than either of them.
“Mom,” Ethan once told me, “you don’t even know the rules.”
“I know cheating when I see it.”
Chris nearly choked on his chips.
Those silly arguments became some of my favorite memories.
Then Ethan’s cancer stopped responding to treatment.
One afternoon, his doctor asked Chris and me to step outside his hospital room.
I remember staring at a tiny cartoon football taped to the door while the doctor explained that the treatment wasn’t working as hoped.
Chris asked questions.
What else could they try?
Was there another treatment?
Another clinical trial?
Another hospital?
I couldn’t get past one sentence.
We might have much less time than we’d hoped.
When we returned to Ethan’s room, a football game was playing on television.
Chris sat beside him.
Their team scored.
“YES!”
Chris jumped from his chair.
Ethan burst out laughing.
Chris immediately leaned toward him.
“You okay, Captain?”
Ethan smiled.
“Dad, I laughed.”
“I know.”
“I’m allowed.”
Chris sat back.
“Of course you are.”
I lifted my phone.
Click.
From that day forward, I started documenting everything.
Ethan eating cereal.
Ethan sleeping with one sock on.
Ethan making a terrible face at hospital food.
Ethan arguing with Chris about football statistics.
Pictures.
Videos.
Voice recordings.
I told myself I was simply preserving our life.
I didn’t realize how much those ordinary moments would come to mean.
Then Someone Asked Ethan About His Final Wish
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