It was a Tuesday in April — too warm for spring, too cold for comfort. My twelve-year-old son, Caleb, came home from his best friend Louis’s funeral, and for the first time in his life, he didn’t speak. No backpack drop, no muttered “I’m starving,” no game clicks. He walked straight to his room, closing the door softly, as if sound itself could shatter him.
Hours later, I peeked inside. Caleb sat against the wall, clutching Louis’s old baseball glove to his chest, holding what felt like the weight of the world. Louis had been more than a friend — he was Caleb’s other half. They had been inseparable, Halloween partners, teammates, co-creators of impossible Minecraft worlds. After Louis died, silence consumed our home.
Therapy helped, slowly. But grief is unpredictable. One night in June, over a quiet dinner, Caleb said, “Louis deserves a headstone.” Not a store-bought one — something real, beautiful, a memorial he could earn. And earn it he did.
That summer, while other kids played, Caleb worked. Mowing lawns, walking dogs, washing cars, raking leaves — all for Louis. Every evening, he returned home, muddy and smiling, holding his Skechers shoebox full of coins. “Three seventy! Almost halfway!” he’d grin, never spending a cent on himself.
