To Die For Read Free

appointment at the clinic. Decided then and there to have my baby. And that was my son Jimmy.
    But here’s the trick life hands you. You get this kid all right. You love him to death. And just like you figured, he loves you too. You weren’t wrong when you figured this child was going to be the most precious thing you’d ever be handed in your life.
    But the joke’s on you. Because once you get this child, what can you do about it but wake up every morning, waiting to see what dreams won’t come true today? Before long, you stop having the dreams altogether. If you’re smart you do.
    Jimmy was three weeks old before I could bring him home from the hospital on account of how little he was. Four pounds, two ounces, when he was born. They had him in an incubator.
    I’d stand there in the nursery, holding him in my hands, him with this little shirt on that came off my old Tiny Tears doll. His skin was almost transparent, with these blue veins showing through. Legs like chicken wings. No hair, no eyelashes. Fingernails barely sprouted. He was so little he couldn’t even cry. Just made these little squeaking sounds, more like a puppy than a kid.
    It was no picnic. My folks wouldn’t let me come back home, so I moved in at Patty’s, put Jimmy in day care when he was five weeks old, got my job at Wendy’s, the three-to-eleven shift.
    You think about all this stuff you’ll do when you have a kid. Taking them to the carnival to ride in those little boats. Get their picture taken with Santa, make sand castles at the beach. You picture yourself being one of those mothers pushing the stroller down the street, pushing your kid on the swings. Passing out the Hi-C at baseball games. It never works out like how you pictured. You only have enough tickets for him to ride the little boats four times, and then you got to take him home only he’s crying for another turn. He’s scared of Santa. Your one afternoon off all week to take him to the beach it rains. Or you’re just so tired by the time you get home, you got barely enough energy to stick the frozen pizza in the microwave and turn on the TV.
    He was always a good boy, Jimmy. Nights I’d be at work, he’d fix himself supper, get himself to bed even. He learned pretty young not to ask for much, so I hardly ever had to say no. I mean he always loved dogs, but he always knew we couldn’t have a puppy.
    Third grade, he wanted to join Little League. Not that he knew the first thing about baseball. It’s not like this was a boy that got to play catch with his dad every night after supper. He just watched games on TV and got the idea in his head that this was his sport. What could be so tricky about running around the bases, you know?
    So we signed up for the league. I paid my registration money. We bought him a glove and a bat and I even took him down to this field near our apartment to throw him some balls. Not that I could throw worth beans. But you did the best you could.
    Comes the Saturday morning of the tryouts, he takes a bath, wets his hair down, changes his T-shirt three times, he’s so excited. Down at the field, when I fill out the papers on him, and they ask who he played for last year, I write down “Never been on a team before.” The guy in charge looks surprised. “Most boys his age already have some experience,” he says.
    “Well this one doesn’t,” I say. You got to start somewhere.
    I see a couple of the mothers rolling their eyes, like “What kind of people are these?” and you know they take one look at me and figure out my whole story: She got knocked up when she was a teenager. No dad in the picture. Kid’s a loser.
    When Jimmy’s turn comes to bat, they throw him all these pitches, and he never manages to hit one. Finally they set up the T for him, and he kind of taps it. They tag him out. One of the mothers on the bench that doesn’t know this is my son says, “Jesus, let’s hope the Orioles don’t get that one.”
    Jimmy stuck it out