My thirteen-year-old son took a weekend job washing dishes because he wanted to buy himself a new bicycle. Six months went by. The bicycle never appeared. Then one afternoon, his boss called me and asked a question that made my stomach tighten.
My thirteen-year-old son took a weekend job washing dishes because he wanted to buy himself a new bicycle. Six months went by. The bicycle never appeared. Then one afternoon, his boss called me and asked a question that made my stomach tighten.
“Do you know what Evan does with every paycheck?”
I told him my son was saving for a bike.
The man went silent.
Then he said,
“Ma’am, you may want to sit down. Because what your son has been telling you about that money isn’t true.”
For months, Evan had been completely fixated on the same bicycle.
Whenever we passed the sporting-goods store, his eyes went straight to the display window.
Matte black frame.
Orange lettering.
He knew everything about it.
The model.
The weight.
The gears.
Even the exact price down to the dollar.
But he never asked me to buy it.
That was the kind of child he had become.
His father died unexpectedly three years earlier.
After that, Evan seemed to grow up overnight.
He noticed when I sat at the kitchen table staring at bills.
He saw me cancel subscriptions and cut back on groceries.
He knew I had started saying no to things I once wouldn’t have thought twice about.
And somewhere along the way, he decided that asking me for anything expensive would only add to my problems.
So when he came home one evening and announced that he had found a Saturday job washing dishes at a small neighborhood diner, I wasn’t completely surprised.
“I’m buying the bike myself,” he told me proudly.
“You know you don’t have to do that.”
“I know.”
He smiled.
“But I want to.”
I gave in.
“All right. But your grades come first.”
“Deal.”
