Miles Carter knew what was inside the box before he lifted the lid.
Or at least he desperately hoped he did.
The rectangular package sat in front of him on the kitchen table, wrapped in white paper covered with tiny multicolored birthday candles. A stack of pancakes with twelve candles waited beside it, already cooling because his mother had insisted they open one present before eating. Red, yellow, and blue balloons floated behind his chair, their strings tied to the back of the old wooden dining chair that had belonged to his grandmother.
Across the table, sixteen-year-old Darius leaned forward.
“Open it already.”
Miles grinned.
“I am.”
“You've been touching the paper for thirty seconds.”
“I’m appreciating it.”
Darius laughed.
“You are weird.”
Their mother, Renee Carter, stood behind Miles with one hand resting against the back of his chair. She had spent most of the morning rushing between the kitchen and laundry room while reminding everyone that Darius had basketball practice at eleven.
“Come on, birthday boy,” she said. “We don't have all morning.”
Miles tore through the wrapping.
The white Nike box underneath made his heart jump.
He looked up.
“No way.”
Darius immediately leaned closer.
Miles pulled off the lid.
White tissue paper.
Then red.
Then black.
He folded the paper back.
The shoes were exactly the pair he had been staring at online for months.
White leather.
Black swoosh.
Red panels along the sole and heel.
The Nike Air Flight Legacy sneakers he had tried on once at the mall and then quietly put back after seeing the price.
Miles lifted one shoe with both hands.
His entire face changed.
“Mom.”
Renee smiled faintly.
He looked from the shoe to her.
“You got these?”
She did not answer immediately.
Miles did not notice.
He was already turning the sneaker in his hands.
“These are the exact ones.”
Darius reached across the table.
“Let me see.”
Miles held one out.
Darius took it.
He whistled.
“These are nice.”
“I know.”
Darius checked the size.
His eyebrows rose.
“Ten?”
Miles nodded proudly.
“My feet grew.”
Darius looked down at his own shoes.
He wore a ten and a half.
He pressed his thumb into the toe of the new sneaker.
“Might fit me.”
Miles laughed.
“They’re mine.”
“I know.”
Darius smiled.
“I’m just saying.”
Miles pulled the second shoe from the box.
For perhaps fifteen seconds, he forgot every disappointing birthday he had ever had.
He forgot the basketball tournament that took over his tenth birthday weekend.
He forgot his mother spending half his eleventh birthday dinner on the phone with Darius’s coach.
He forgot that the last expensive thing bought specifically for him had been a science kit two Christmases earlier.
The sneakers were stupidly important.
Miles knew that.
They were shoes.
Nothing more.
But he had wanted something that belonged to him before somebody else needed something more.
Renee reached over his shoulder.
“Let me see.”
Miles handed her the right shoe.
She turned it over.
Checked the size.
Then looked toward Darius.
“Try it.”
Miles blinked.
“What?”
Darius frowned too.
“Mom.”
“Try it.”
She handed the shoe to him.
Darius laughed awkwardly.
“It’s Miles’s.”
“I know whose birthday it is.”
Renee looked toward her older son.
“Just see if it fits.”