“You better not let him hear you say that or you’re gonna get coal in your stocking.”
She shook her head at that, but sighed, accepting her fate. She lived in a Christmas house. There was no use fighting it.
“What kind are you making?” I asked Steph, walking up behind her to wrap my arms around her waist as she mixed dough in a bowl.
“Oatmeal. But the chocolate chip is almost gone.”
“Almost gone?” I asked. “There were three full plastic bags of them.”
“Talk to your sons and those hollow legs they apparently need to keep filling up. They actually helped make more, though, so I can’t be too mad. That’s all already in the freezer. How did it go?” she asked.
I’d worried a lot when I first got Made that I wouldn’t know what to do with myself with too much free time.
When the kids were small, it was easy to fill my time with them.
As they started getting older, though, and wanted to be with their friends more than us, the days started to stretch long.
Until Stephanie approached me with an idea.
Start my own charity.
Not for Christmas presents for kids in shelters. That was still, and would always be, Steph’s thing.
But to help kids like the ones I used to be. To go back to my old neighborhood and set up some resources for at-risk kids and teens.
Eventually, that idea became a youth center. A place for kids to hang out for free to get away from their shitty households that didn’t involve being on the streets where they would be prey for all the local crews.
They could just chill, decompress, watch TV, play video games, listen to music. But they could also get some food, wash clothes, work with tutors, pick up hobbies, or learn skills that they could eventually use to get into trades or even college.
It was a place to break cycles.
It was somewhere I really could have used at that age.
Even if my life did turn out pretty fucking great, I was able to see—looking back—how easily it could have gone badly, how close I’d been too many times to dying young.
The chances of any of these other kids catching the eye of organizations that would love and support them were slim. They were much more likely to end up in prison or in a coffin.
But maybe not, if the youth center gave them the support they so desperately needed.
And if nothing else, even if they were still headed down that road, at least they would have clean clothes and full bellies—some dignity—along the way.
“Place was packed today,” I told her.
It had been slow the first few weeks. Neighborhood kids didn’t want to be seen going into a youth center.
“Free pizza and homemade cookies will do that,” Steph agreed.
“Heard some of them saying they were excited to decorate ornaments and put ‘em on the tree.”
“Love that. You’re doing such great things there.”
“All thanks to you,” I said, turning her around and kissing her long and hard.
“Gross,” our second son grumbled as he went to the fridge to grab a drink.
“Someday, you’ll get it,” I assured him.
“When you know, you know,” our eldest agreed.
