The Tour

twenty two / home movies

The car door slammed behind me as I walked up the porch and into my house. I had just gotten home from dropping Will off at his house after therapy. The role of the glorified taxi driver had fallen to me while everyone else was at work, but it wasn't the worst thing in the world.

    Today, Will had claimed rights to the aux and had spent the twenty minute ride playing as much music as he could that he knew I would hate. By the time we finally pulled up to his driveway, I was wondering if I would ever be able to understand another word that a singer would say.

    Jumping onto the couch I pulled up Instagram on my phone. I had posted the picture of Evan and Will from the plane the other day, and a lot of people had responded to it. It was crazy how many people had heard about Will, but on the other hand, word spreads fast among island communities. A clip of him announcing my award had also gone viral within the surfing community, so that explained a few things. Among the comments on my post was Noah, who felt free to express his distaste with my caption, which read "My favorite boys."

    I clicked on the Hawaii baseball program's story and watched a clip of Evan throwing in the bullpen the other day. His curveball was already looking nasty this season, and I was looking forward to seeing how he would do. Once I finished watching their most recent stories I went to the profile and continued to scroll through their recent posts. I was familiar with a good number of the boys, but I had only talked to a few that Evan had brought home with him for weekends and things like that.

    Somehow I soon ended up all the way back to a post from last year. I knew where I was as soon as I saw the photo from their last win that pushed them over their rivals in extra innings to earn a spot to the national tournament. Evan and Will were both piled on top of their teammate, Cade, who had just hit a walkoff home run. All the boys had massive grins on their faces and were excitedly jumping all over each other. They were eliminated after that, but it was still a great memory. 

    I smiled and scrolled down to see the next post. It was a video of Will during a game against UCLA. He started playing a few steps off third base, and the camera followed him as he moved towards the foul line to field a ball that was hit hard down the line. The slow motion film captured him extending his arm to field the ball backhand before he took two more steps into foul territory. He jumped and turned in the air, throwing the ball over his shoulder to first. The camera angle jumped to the first base side where the first baseman extended to make the catch and the umpire signaled out in the background. The clip ended by showing Will casually walking back to his spot and smoothing the dirt out. The caption read "Nolan Arenado who?" and the comments were filled with fans theorizing about when Will would get picked in the draft.

    I sat frozen on the couch, watching him leap through the air over and over. It was impossible for me to wrap my mind around the fact that he would probably never do that again. I honestly didn't even think much about how good he was until now. Of course, I texted him and complimented him when I saw the clip, but I had no idea if he was actually good enough to get drafted ever. Will didn't talk about it much, and I didn't really ask.

    Our family kept our collection of family films on DVDs below the television, and I looked through them quickly before putting one in the player.

    The video started out with clips that my mom had filmed from our back porch. I was around five and my dad was pushing me through the waves on my kid-sized surfboard. He and I spent countless hours out there when I was young, him towing me through the whitewater and pushing me into bigger and bigger waves before I paddled well. The film moved on to Evan's kindergarten graduation, and Will was shown waving next to him in his blue robe and cap.

    The next segment was probably from some Sunday afternoon when our families had been hanging out. Noah had just started running on the kid's track team, which was probably just a tactic that Rachel and Koa had thought of so that he could get some energy out. On that particular day Noah had decided to go on the run that his seven year old self needed to be the best, and Evan and Will dutifully put on their running shoes to follow along. I, on the other hand, had not been invited and was clearly upset about it. The camera panned to the three boys running down the road, and I came into the frame a couple of seconds later, dutifully running after them in a dress and bare feet.

    I huddled in the corner of the couch, chewing on my lip while my eyes brimmed with tears. I probably sat there for hours, and eventually a pair of arms wrapped around me from behind.

    "Oh, honey," my mom whispered as she walked around to sit next to me on the couch.

    The tears trickled down my cheeks, but I tried to wipe them away. She handed me a tissue and I blew my nose before leaning against her. We sat and watched the videos for a few minutes, looking on as the boys played in their first coach pitch games.

    "Was he going to go for the draft?" I said, still watching them on the screen.

    My mom ran her fingers through my hair. "Rachel told me that he brought it up for the first time when he came home for a break after their fall season. I don't think that Will had ever thought about it before he went to school, but apparently the coaching staff was talking about it with him and told him that he had a decent shot. As far as I know he never made a decision though. It's a big choice either way."

    I nodded. Eventually, most of my tears came out and by the time my dad got home I hopefully looked pretty normal. We ate dinner together and I listened to him and my mom tell their stories from work.

    "How was your day, River?" My dad asked.

    I shrugged and pushed my peas around on my plate. "Fine."

    "You brought Will to and from therapy?" He confirmed.

    "Mhmm."

    "We were watching some of the home movies before you got home," my mom said, giving my dad a look. He nodded and a look of understanding crossed his face.

    "I know how hard everything seems now. All I can say is that I think things will get a whole lot better than you think they will."

    "He could have gone pro, dad!" I was exasperated, and I wasn't feeling too optimistic about anything today.

    "And that either wasn't the best plan for his life, or he still will. Sometimes we just have to trust, even when it is hard. This is hard for everyone involved, River. But we can have hope, and things will get better. They already are."

I was running around campus the other day and saw this little girl chasing after her older brothers in their neighborhood and I imagined her being just like River hahaha

This may not have been the most exciting chapter, but I do think that it is important to show how one person's suffering impacts those around them, and I hope that I did it in a mildly interesting and realistic way. Thanks so much for reading, I love y'all : )