She thinks about it for a moment, the way she seems to do for everything. Maybe that’s why I feel such a kinship with her. “A little. I’m more scared of not being good and everyone laughing.”
“Yeah.” I want to hug her because she looks so distraught, but I know that’s not my place. “I get it.”
And I mean it in a way I can’t fully explain to a seven-year-old—that the fear of failing in public doesn’t diminish as you get older. The stadium just gets bigger.
She seems surprised, as if she expected me to tell her it would all work out, and she doesn’t need to worry. It’s clear that this is important to her.
Penelope stops Monroe, and they talk for a moment before Monroe runs back to us with a hula hoop in her hands.
I take the hula hoop from Monroe and hand it to Hazel. “Okay, show me what you’ve got.”
She steps into the hula hoop, and I try to concentrate on her and not on Penelope crossing the distance toward us in my peripheral vision. Hazel sets the hoop at her waist with the focused expression of a kid who’s been at this for a while with disappointing results. She starts the spin, sways her hips, and the hoop wobbles and drops to her feet.
Her shoulders fall.
Monroe’s lips press together, and she stares at me with an expression that says, you gotta fix this.
“That’s a start.” I squat down.
Penelope stops short of us, and something catches in my chest that I wasn’t prepared for, because she’s standing back and letting me do this. It might be nothing to her, but it feels like everything to me.
Hazel sighs and doesn’t reach for the hula hoop on the ground.
“I mean it. Your timing is there. You just need to keep your weight further back and move from your hips instead of your whole body.” I take hold of the hoop, and she steps out of it. “Watch.”
I run through it slowly, exaggerating the movement so she can see the mechanics. Then I do it at normal speed and keep it going.
“I told you he was the one!” Monroe jumps and claps.
I hand back the hoop.
“From your hips,” I tell Hazel. “Not your waist. Start it at the back.”
She tries again. The hoop makes it four full seconds this time before it drops. She raises her eyes to meet mine, and her expression nearly wrecks me. She’s starting to believe it might be possible.
“Better,” I say. “A lot better.”
Penelope remains a few feet away, her fingers over her mouth as though she’s trying not to show how much she needed that.
“Keep practicing, and it’ll come.” I start to walk away, not wanting to push things too far, but Monroe steps into my path.
“Wait! She has to do a whole routine. You have to help her with it.”
Hazel nods, picking up the hula hoop from the ground.
“Let me talk to your mom,” I say to Hazel, patting Monroe on the head. “The two of you go have fun. There’ll be time to master the hula hoop.”
Hazel drops the hula hoop, and before they run off, Hazel stops in front of Penelope. “Did you see?”
Penelope smooths a hand over Hazel’s hair with a big smile on her face. “I did. Great job, honey.”
Both of the girls cheer and run off.
I stuff my hands in my pockets and close the small distance to Penelope.
“I’ve tried everything.” Her voice is quiet. “Videos, practice. I bought a second hoop thinking if she watched me struggle enough, she’d feel better about her own attempts.” Our eyes lock for a beat. “It’s incredibly unnerving. She’s going to be up on that stage in front of her whole school, and I can’t fix this for her.”
Throughout my life, I’ve known many versions of this woman. The twelve-year-old fielding balls and telling me to widen my stance. The girl who saw when I was stuck in my own head—whether it was about baseball, my family, or school.
