I Need You to Pay Me Back for Those Trading Cards

I don’t really have many memories of my dad’s parents.
They lived in Houston, and I don’t think they were too far away from us.
We just didn’t see them much.

We spent a lot more time with Mom’s parents—Granny and Boompa.

The couple times I remember going to their house,
I just remember it being kind of dark.
Grandpa smelled weird,
and Grandma’s voice sounded fake,
like she was trying too hard.

I couldn’t really look at her face.
Mom said Grandma had a couple of face lifts—
and that’s why she looked the way she did.

Grandpa didn’t drink.

He’d had a liver transplant.
Twice.

The first time, he didn’t stop drinking.
He ruined the first replacement liver.

That was why he didn’t drink anymore.

He was really tall, way taller than Dad,
and Dad was about six foot one, Mom had told me once.

I don’t recall how old I was,
but sometime after moving to Charlottesville,
we went back to Houston to visit.
We stayed with Grandma and Grandpa for a couple of days.

One of those days,
they took me grocery shopping with them.

We went to one of those warehouse stores, like a Sam’s or Costco,
but I don’t remember which.
I had never been to one before.
It was way bigger than a regular grocery store.

So much bigger, in fact,
that they sold things that weren’t even groceries.

When I went shopping with Mom,
it was just to Food Lion or Kroger.

On one of the aisles was a huge display of football cards.
I wasn’t really into sports,
but I had gotten into football cards.

Boompa had told me once that I should collect sports cards—
that sometimes you’d get a rare one and it’d be worth a lot of money.

That, plus the new friends I’d made at school
who were really into football cards,
started to solidify it as a hobby.

I had sometimes pocketed a couple of the foil packs at the grocery store.
Sometimes I’d slip them into the cart if Mom wasn’t looking.

So naturally,
with a huge display of trading cards in front of me, I asked my Grandpa if he’d buy me a pack.

He looked at them and said,
“They’re sold by the box here, not the pack.”

Oh! A whole box of the foil-wrapped cards? Yes, please. Can I have one?

He put it in the basket.

“Can I have the collector’s magazine too?”
I asked, pointing to a book that showed the values of the cards and print counts.
(Beckett’s, maybe. I’m not sure.)

That went into the cart, too.

Time passed. We checked out.
The box of cards went on the conveyor belt and into a bag.
Out the door we went.

When we got back to their place,
I started tearing into my new treasure trove of football cards.

Oh wow.
I’d have collateral to trade around at school.

I spent the rest of the day sorting them,
checking off the list in the magazine,
and putting them into the binder I brought with me.

The next day, Grandpa came over to me holding the receipt.

“You owe me such-and-such dollars and so-and-so cents,” he said.

His voice was deep and booming.
His breath filled the air around him.

I looked up, absorbed in my game of Tetris on the Game Boy I brought for the trip.

“I assume you have that on you?”

“Huh?” I asked, confused. “What do I owe you money for?”

“The football cards. That’s how much they were.”

“What? I don’t have that kind of money.
I thought they were a gift.”

“No, they weren’t.”

“But…”

“You asked me to buy them.
I assumed you could pay me back.”

“I thought they were a gift.”

“No. The collector’s guide can be a gift, if you like.”

He looked back at the receipt.

“It was only a few dollars. I’m okay with that.”

Then he looked back at me.
His gaze landed on me.
This wasn’t a joke.
This wasn’t like when Boompa was pulling my leg.

This man was dead fucking serious.
He wanted that money.

“If you don’t have it today, that’s fine,” he said.
“I charge daily interest, though.
I’m going to need it before your family leaves.”

I never spoke to him again.