A Father First: How My Life Became Bigger Than Basketball (28 page)

Both the drive to do that and the need not to get too far ahead of myself came from being me, Dwyane Wade Jr.—the son of the man who had to convince my high school coach that maybe I’d be as good or better than my brother Demetrius. What did Dad really think of my chances of going further than college? When I asked him in later years how he felt at the time, he confessed, “I was too stubborn to think you could or that you would have the opportunity to make it at the next level. Not that you couldn’t or wouldn’t find your way. But that was me and my thinking. My focus was never about getting to the next level, you know? It was just about teaching you guys the game of basketball.”

Tragil was there on that same page, no doubt, thankful for the educational opportunities and for doors in business and even public service that could open after a successful college showing. The marriage complicated everything, in any case, so she asked me again, “Why the rush?”

Well, I reminded her, I had a son and Von and I were starting a family and committed to the right things. If a wedding was what the Funches women cared about, and they were in a hurry, there was no reason to postpone making the marriage official. Deep down I had misgivings; I’d been hearing a lot of worry and pressure about all of the added responsibilities and I kept up with “I’ma find a way.”

What that could mean in reality was far beyond me. The concept of getting a prenup would have made me laugh. Siohvaughn and I were two kids from Robbins, Illinois, unsophisticated, clueless, unprepared for the complications of wealth and fame. Especially at a time when we had nothing. Other than that, if you asked me whether I was in love, enough for a lasting marriage, I wouldn’t have known how to answer. I knew that Siohvaughn and I, ages twenty-one and twenty, were head over heels in love with our baby boy. That said, the tension between her and me, on top of the pressures of this period, was a nagging concern.

But being stubborn, once I’d made a decision that was it. So I put a positive spin on my choice, and told Tragil that getting started young was a good thing—that I wanted to have my kids young, while I still had lots of energy to be engaged with them on their level. That meant the kids and I could play together, grow together, and wasn’t this how to keep the promise that I had made to be different?

Tragil understood that I’d made up my mind and went forward to help us plan the day. There wasn’t enough room for our various relatives at our little half-storefront church but we were able to hold the ceremony at the church right across the street. The first date they had available for us was May 18, 2002.

If memory serves, Dad was the first one to realize the significance of that date. Dad had a thing about reoccurring numbers and dates. His birthday, March 17, St. Patrick’s Day, was always a source of pride for Dwyane Tyrone Wade Sr. He would boast that the city of Chicago turned the river green just for him. Of course, my being born on January 17 had made the birth of his only biological son that much more special. So what was it about May 18? By coincidence, that happened to be my parents’ wedding anniversary.

We were all mystified but felt honored to be sharing the date with my parents. The thought that their marriage hadn’t lasted more than five years wouldn’t have occurred to me if Dad hadn’t later mentioned his own skepticism about our marriage. I know he wanted the best for us and he thought highly of Siohvaughn and her mom. He also didn’t want to tell me what to do. Looking back, he said, “You were growing into a man and I wanted to see what kind of decisions you were going to make.” He also remembered telling me some months after the wedding that so much of life was in front of me that he doubted the marriage would last more than five years. Well, if he did say that, I blocked the comment out. Maybe because it touched a nerve.

I also blocked out the fight that happened on the eve of the wedding when Von went off because I’d decided to go spend the night hanging out with the fellas. This wasn’t one of those bachelor parties with strippers or crazy drunken wildness. We were just going to hang out at Marcus’s and then I’d come to the church in the morning. What was the big deal?

This was an early indication of Von possibly feeling threatened by my closeness to the guys or just her needing to be in charge. It was also an early indication of me pushing back against that control. In the end, I went to Marcus’s anyway. He, Vinny, Wug, Donny, and I sat around telling stories about how fast the years had gone by.

Vinny was good at putting everything into context, just saying how it was hard to believe, “You getting married, being a dad, growing up so fast. Seems like yesterday was the fourth grade.”

Nobody would have tried to talk me out of getting married. They knew me. Once I’d made up my mind, even with misgivings, I believed my will would be strong enough to make our marriage work.

The wedding day showed Siohvaughn and me how many people cared for us and wanted to celebrate the important step we had taken. The choice before me was either to linger on potential problems or focus on the good and on everything that was wonderful about my wife, and the ways in which we were blessed. True, we were struggling—so much so that we definitely couldn’t afford a catered event for the wedding. But we did serve Popeye’s fried chicken, my favorite! And we had a support system. My mother-in-law was a devoted and involved grandmother to Zaire, helping out, babysitting, whatever she could do, especially when Siohvaughn and I were studying for finals. We could also look forward to Mom’s release once she returned to us and to her becoming Grandmama, too. We had loving friends and relatives on both sides of our family who were cheering us on. The last thing I wanted to do was let any of them down. Scratch that. The last thing I wanted to do was let Zaire down.

After the celebration was over, however, other realities set in once again. One of the issues is faced by many college athletes or students on scholarship who have to make do on the financial aid supplied by the institution. Room and board is great during the school year. But on holidays and off-seasons, you’re left to your own devices. That’s hard enough when you’re single but for married students with children, the struggle can be very rough. Whether it was a cause or an effect, by summer, Siohvaughn and I were arguing more than ever, and once again the pettiest stuff became heated debates. If not for the joy of playing with Zaire, my best friend in the world, and seeing his rapid development, I would have probably started to question more seriously the decision to get married.

Maybe I was old school about how life was supposed to work. In the story about how boy meets girl and boy gets girl pregnant, wasn’t the traditional ending that boy does the right thing, marries girl, and eventually they learn to care for each other and get past the rough patches?

More than that, in my mind the real problem was money. Once we didn’t have to worry so much, I was sure, we’d all be happy together. And so I pinned my hope and belief on that motivation, soon transforming that need for better days and the hunger (literal and otherwise) into the pressure cooker at the core of my being.

This was the recipe that stoked the fire to win big that 2002–2003 season. That fire, combined with Coach C’s guidance and strategic brilliance, not only roused us to want to go all the way but, more important, it made us believe we could. The belief that you can win is everything.

From the moment we walked onto the floor of the first preseason game, our Marquette colors of gold and blue draping Bradley Arena and making everyone in the stands look like royalty, you could feel that the season ahead was going to be a story to tell.

The word most often used to describe it by others was
magical.
On November 15 in New York City, we put up a W against Villanova and never looked back, cruising to victory through the next three games. Our fifth game was at Notre Dame, and though we played like winners, it was our first loss of the season. Looking to erase that memory, we played our next four games, all of them at home, at a playoff level of passion, handily beating Appalachian State, Wisconsin, Elon, and Grambling State. By early 2003, we had fallen twice, first to East Carolina and then to Dayton, but then roared back in a hard-fought win against St. Louis and a smackdown against South Florida on our home court. The rest of January was glory time, giving us four wins: Tulane, Charlotte, DePaul (always a pleasure to compete against the school that didn’t recruit me hard enough!), and East Carolina (returning the favor from our previous loss).

There is a saying that the better it gets, the better it gets.

Such was the case for most of the rest of the season. We went from a win at Cincinnati to a nail-biter of a victory at home against St. Louis on February 5 (the same week that Zaire had his first birthday), and then to earning a win against Wake Forest on the ninth. The icing on that cake was another victory on the twelfth, against DePaul.

Our next game, at home against Louisville, was nonstop ballin’ all the way to the end, when the basketball gods smiled down on our opponents, giving them a 73–70 victory over us. But we shook that off and won the remaining five games, which included a rematch on Louisville’s home court that gave us a 78–73 win.

The last game of the season, slotted to be against Cincinnati on our home court, held special significance. This was beyond the fact that it would pave the way for our record for the year, to soon stand at 27–6, the second best winning record in school history, and Marquette’s first ever Conference USA Regular Season Championship—with the 2003 Conference USA Player of the Year award given to me.

As fate would have it, the date of the last regular season game, March 8, fell three days after Mom’s scheduled release from prison. We were ecstatic about the timing that would let her attend her first and only college game of mine. But after everything we had been through that day when she went to court for sentencing fourteen months earlier, we knew that getting her to the game would be iffy. What was the problem? As we learned, the provisions of Mom’s probation stipulated that under no circumstances could she be allowed to leave the state—especially with her history as a fugitive.

My sister and I, along with members of our extended family, enlisted everyone we knew to plead her case and make an exception, with our guarantee, special escorts, extra security. We were desperate. Finally, we made contact with her probation officer. In another surprising coincidence, his last name so happened to be Wade. No relation. After much deliberation, Mr. Wade granted Jolinda Morris Wade special permission to attend that last game.

Excited and still somewhat in a state of disbelief, I was almost nervous. This was at a much different level from high school, for one thing. Not to mention that Mom was no longer in her madness and could savor the seeds she had planted, the result of her belief in me and her having once told me, “Go get you a game.”

Mom was even more excited and nervous. When she departed the penitentiary early on March 5, they gave her money and she took the train into Chicago by herself. Tragil went to pick her up and was shocked by what she saw. Mom had hips! Being clean and having three square meals had made her thicker and rounder, more womanly and motherly—and had given her face back the beauty that drugs had stolen from her. But because of the solitary confinement and lack of sunlight, Mom had come out with dark circles under her eyes. And her hair, which had grown thick and bushy, had not been given the benefits of salon styling.

The first thing my sister did was to set up appointments to get Mom’s hair and makeup done. During our brief reunion held privately before the game that night, when Siohvaughn, Zaire, and I were able to see Mom, I had to say that the woman I saw before me was more beautiful and put-together than in all my memories of her.

We cried. We hugged. Siohvaughn and Mom hugged. And thirteen-month-old Zaire, already talking and trying to get in on adult conversations even then, added humor to our brief though emotional reunion.

My mother thanked me again for the letters. She reminded me that I had called her my hero. “Do you know how that made me feel? The woman who dropped the ball, me?” she asked. “Me your hero? I was not only able to do my time but I was ready for anything—like, how much time y’all got?”

Words will never do justice to the experience of coming out onto the floor later that night and looking up to see my mother’s face. She was in awe. Tragil warned her, just so she would know, “We’re not his only crazy fans.”

Mom kept looking at Tragil in amazement. Around her were the banners painted for me, the people chanting my name. Let me rephrase that. It wasn’t my name. It was the name of her son. Even if no one knew that she was my mother, Mom later said that she felt like a celebrity—and was extra happy that she’d had her hair fixed so pretty.

The win against Cincinnati at home was the fairy-tale ending for the season.

Whatever my stats were for the night, I haven’t gone back to check. But I know that I played well. That was out-of-body surrender, me suspending the laws of gravity and taking flight. In that game, I felt that Dad’s nickname for me had proven true. After everything, after where I came from, I had to be Lucky.

More than lucky, I was blessed—the most blessed and the happiest son alive.

As the final buzzer sounded and the crowds rushed the floor to surround the team, I looked up in the stands and Mom was on her feet, like Rocky, tears running down her face, nodding her head in triumph. I catapulted over whoever was standing between me and her, ran up, and hugged her so tightly and so long, time stood still. Fans and teammates were gathered nearby and pressed in, surrounding me, Mom, and Tragil. I had to yell above their voices and the lingering cheers from the game, telling her, “I love you!” And then I hugged her again.

In remembering that triumphant moment, Mom would remind me, “After I had my hair fixed so pretty, when you grabbed me and swept me up like that, my hair went all crazy and then the photographers starting snapping away!”

I forgot that part. We both would be able to laugh, reliving a highlight together that would shine forever in our lives. As Mom puts it, “We were just so into the moment. And it was the most exciting moment of my life.”