Free Million-Dollar Throw by Mike Lupica

game today,” Nate said. “Dad, I’ve lost games before, but I’ve never felt as much like I’d let everybody down.”
    “You’ll get up, though. You always do.”
    “What are you doing here, by the way?”
    “Your mom informed me that you needed company even though she said you didn’t think you needed company.”
    “Maybe she was right.”
    “Oh no, big boy. Not maybe. Our story is going to be that she was definitely right, that you were thrilled to see your old man, and that she still knows you better than anybody. It’ll make her whole week.”
    He put out his fist and Nate gave him some back. “I’m totally down with that,” he said.
    “Trouble is, you still look down.”
    Maybe it was everything that had happened, because of the game and Abby. Or maybe it was just because it was him and his dad on a field alone and it never seemed to happen that way anymore, at least not as much as Nate wanted it to happen.
    But it just came out of him, like a genie jumping out of a bottle.
    “Why’d they have to pick me to make this stupid throw?”
    His dad didn’t act surprised, or startled, just made a casual motion for Nate to toss him the ball. Nate did. And then, barely looking at the target, his dad whipped a throw at the tire from the Million-Dollar Throw distance, nearly putting it through on the first try, hitting the side of the tire so hard it spun the thing around.
    “Is that what all this moping is about?” his dad asked.
    “I didn’t think I was moping.”
    “Looks like it to me.”
    Nate didn’t know what to say to that, so he ran after the ball and brought it back. “I mean, I’m excited about doing it, at least some of the time, when I’m not geeked out of my head about it,” Nate said. “But most of the time, it’s like it’s one more thing I don’t need right now. Like one more guy piling on when I’m already down.”
    In a voice that wasn’t much louder than the wind at the tops of the trees, his dad said, “When you’re down.”
    “Yeah,” Nate said.
    “So the thing that’s bringing you down,” his dad said, “is the chance to do something you’d rather do than eat: throw a football. Live out every kid’s dream and maybe win a million dollars doing it. You’re telling me that’s what has your insides tied up in a sailor’s knot?”
    “No,” Nate said, not liking his dad’s tone now, not liking the way this was going, wondering how things could get sideways between them this quickly. “No,” Nate said. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant that it’s like more pressure than I need right now, that’s all.”
    “Pressure?” his dad said.
    And in that moment, it sounded like Iverson talking about “practice.” As if Nate had not just said a bad word, he’d let one slip out in front of a parent.
    “ You’re under too much pressure?” his dad said.
    His voice sounding completely different from when he’d first shown up at Coppo.
    Like it belonged to somebody else.
    Nate just stood there, not knowing how to talk to this dad.
    “You know what pressure is?” Chris Brodie said. “Pressure is not even getting the chance to do anything you love anymore. Or even like.”
    “Dad, I get that, I really do.”
    Nate felt like he was standing there against a blitz he hadn’t seen coming.
    “Do you get it?” his dad said. “Because I’m not sure you do. I’m not sure anybody does. Pressure? ” he said again. “Pressure is doing a job you hate, that even makes you hate sports sometimes, so you can hold on to what’s supposed to be your real job, except you can’t make a living at that job anymore.”
    Nate looked down and saw him clenching his fists now, unclenching them, over and over, those big hands of his, ones Nate always thought could grip a football as easily as if it were a baseball.
    “Dad, I didn’t mean to make you mad,” Nate said. “I don’t even know how we got to talking about this.” Just wanting the conversation to be over,