By Ken Toghia
1. I need new shoes again
"I need another pair of shoes Mom!" Dru exclaimed as he and his mother, Mrs. Anders walked though the mall shopping for a birthday gift for his father.
"No you most certainly do not! I just got you those two weeks ago, they are barely worn and we are not made of money!" said an already exasperated Mrs. Anders. She was bracing for the inevitable. Dru may have been on the boarder of mental disability but
he was always extremely persistent in getting what he wanted and for the second year in a row had gone out for the high school basketball team, so basketball was his life right now.
"But Mom! Sean would think those were cool!" pronounced Dru.
"You already have gone through 6 pairs of EXPENSIVE basketball shoes this year!" she cried. "I just can't...", but then she saw his face drop. She hated basketball so much, but not because of the expensive shoes or because it was all Dru seemed to talk about,
but because she saw the looks of the people in the stands when he went out on the court for his "mandatory" play time, and the fact that for most of the time he sat on the far end of the bench either constantly talking to players who seemed more silently
engaged in the game than willing to talk back to him, or drawing something inside the newest pair of shoes she had purchased for him. "Alright." she sighed and walked with him towards the Foot Locker
2. Wednesday night game
Wednesday nights game was much like any other. Dru sat at the far end of the bench most of the game. Several times one of the forwards sat next to him staring at the action on the floor until the coach called him back into the game. Mrs. Anders never
missed a game, not because she liked basketball, or any other members of the team, but more because she was deathly afraid of anything happening to Dru.
She watched Dru alternate between talking to the player seemingly oblivious next to him, and once again scribbling something inside one of the newly purchased very expensive basketball shoes, he should have been wearing.
Silently she hoped through three quarters the game would be close enough that the coach would opt to keep him on the bench. She saw the less than serious looks that seemed to pervade the crowd when he took the floor, and she was always sure she heard faint
giggles and laughter just slightly above the noisy sounds of the game in progress, and nothing made her more furious. She knew her son was different, but people could be so cruel.
So she actually clenched her teeth when late in the fourth quarter, with an 8 point lead, the coach called Dru's number 55 and sent him in as a guard.
Tonight for a change, Dru's father managed to get there just in time, which she was thankful for, because his loud cheers for his son masked at least some of the snickering from the crowd.
As the seconds ticked down and the opposing team pulled within two points by driving past Dru repeatedly, her anxiety grew increasingly stronger, wondering what taunting Dru would get from his team if they lost the game because of him.
She actually whispered "Thank God" when the final buzzer rang and the final score reflected a four point lead for his team, largely on the shoulders of the team captain, Seth Peters, managing a steal and quick trip down the court for what appeared to be an
effortless layup.
Dru started running towards the bench and occasionally jumping with joy and Mrs. Anders stood up to head down from the stands when Dru collapsed.
3. The heart of a team
A couple of weeks later the devastated grieving parents were shocked to receive a call from the head basketball coach, James Trobin asking them to stop by the before the Wednesday game. Having just laid their son to rest Dru's father didn't think it was
a good idea, but the coach had been so insistent that finally he was persuaded to recommend the idea to his wife.
Mrs. Anders was understandably distant as her husband drove her back to the school. So many regrets of things undone and words unspoken when this kind of tragedy touches a life. And this was her boy, a special constant companion, who had fought so valiantly
for the shred of a normal life. She wondered how God could have taken her child so suddenly, and unexpectedly. She wished they would have spoken more about God, and she wasn't really too certain what her son's outlook on God was. His Grandmother had given
him an old Bible and she used to read Old Testament stories from it, and he had been to vacation bible study a few summers at the church near their home, but other than that the Anders were really not a church going family.
The couple was greeted at the locker room door by the very somber looking head coach. "Thank you both so much for coming" he said, "To tell you the truth, I'm not sure why this is so critical for the team, but they would not let it go."
Fully dressed in their uniforms, the team sat in front of their lockers and after a somewhat awkward silence, Seth Peters stood up to speak. "Mr. and Mrs. Anders, we, uh, just wanted a chance to let you, well tell you really, you know how much Dru, um how
he was the heart of this team."
Mrs. Anders lost it at that point. "How can you say that?! I saw him sitting there. You all ignored him on the end of the bench?! I heard people laughing every time he went in to play!"
Stunned Seth replied, "I, uh, guess we were all too occupied to hear any one laughing, but I can tell you, and um, I think I speak for all of us, Dru was our best team player.".
Mrs. Anders looked skeptical beyond words, and Mr. Anders could sense things were about to get more tense so he stepped in to move his wife towards the door. "Well thank you very much boys, I think we should..."
Michael Trann quickly stood up and said, "I guess I can see how confusing it would be from the stands. When anyone was having a bad game, or even a rough time off the court, he got the seat next to Dru. Dru knew the game. He was always watching us play,
and what he saw out there we listened too. And the shoes."
Seth chimed in, "Yes, you have to understand how much the shoes mean to us. You did know he gave us his shoes right?"
The couple stared blankly at the boys. Seth nodded as 7 of the team reached into their locker and pulled out shoe boxes, and two of the boys including Seth untied their sneakers and pulled them off their feet. Michael pulled back the tongue of his shoe,
"I was having a lot of trouble with Math and Chemistry. My parents wanted me to quit the team. It killed my game. The stress that is. Dru kept telling me how fast I was. How smart I was as a player. He didn't even know my problems but he was always
positive with us, encouraging us. He wouldn't stop. He wrote this in the shoe for me."
He handed the shoe to Mrs. Anders and she strained to make out the words, "My son, if your heart is wize(misspelled) then my heart will be glad". Mrs Anders smiled slightly recognizing her sons writing and somewhat poor spelling.
Michael continued, "I looked it up it's from the Bible; Proverbs 23:15."
Seth walked forward with his shoe, "Sorry mine actually smells a little, I actually could wear them. It says inside, Don't let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example...in speach, in life, in love, in faith. Timmy 4:12"
It was at this moment that the Anders both noticed each boy who had received shoes from Dru were wearing pairs of shoes that matched the ones in their shoe boxes. Seth watched their eyes trace the room and laughed slightly. "Um yeah, as great as Dru was
with encouragement. He didn't quite understand we didn't all wear the same size shoes. They were his gift to each of us, so if they weren't the right size, we had the pact."
Mrs. Anders eyes returned to need Seth's. "Pact? I don't understand."
Seth smiled, "If the shoes Dru gave a guy didn't fit we found one to match it. Sometimes we all had to chip in because some of the guys couldn't afford them, but we had to wear them for Dru."
One by one each boy brought forward his shoe, each with a different story, each with a Bible verse that somehow seemed encouraging to what they were facing. On the court, off the court, it didn't matter, Dru had somehow found the right words, the right
message from God to help them.
Mrs. Anders sank to the floor. Her husband and the boys quickly helped move her to one of the benches. When her breathing calmed and she seemed to recover a bit Michael spoke again, "There is something else you both should know. We kind of consider Dru
to have been our miracle. When we started talking, well sharing really the shoe messages, we realized there was more going on here. Most of us read the Bible now. Many of us have started going to Church. Only a few of us were what you might call Christians
before, all of this, you know?"
Then Seth brought a team captain "C" iron on patch and handed it to Dru's father. "You should know we had already voted to give him this, before anything, well before what happened. It's why we played so hard this season to to give him time out there,
he was our leader and our friend."
As the Anders prepared to leave one of the boys without shoes quietly approached and introduced himself as Sean. Mrs. Anders recognized him as the boy who sat on the bench next to Dru in his final game. He explained that he had not seen the message Dru
had put in the shoe for him, "I know it's a lot to ask Mr. and Mrs. Anders but if there was a message I would really like to know what it is. Nothing is going really well and I was kind of hoping to know what God wanted to say to me."
4. Afterward
Later that night Mrs. Anders walked into her sons room for the first time since the funeral. Found the final pair of sneakers and read the words on the inside "Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on etrnal(misspelled) life". She opened the bible that
she saw on the nightstand by his bed and started reading.
To this day ten pairs of basketball shoes reside next to a retired captains adorned, number 55 jersey in the school trophy case with a plaque that reads, "Andrew 'Dru' Anders, Basketball team captain. Life captain. Gift of God."
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