David Greene stared at himself in the mirror and saw his father. Not just the facial features and mannerisms they shared, but the memory of watching him in this same mirror on a day like this one, thirty years ago. The shirt he wore was his father’s. It was starched to a crisp, the sleeves too long, and smelled faintly of Old Spice and time.

A small sheet of paper shook slightly between his fingers.

He cleared his throat.

“My father was not a man of many words...”

As he said it, his mind traveled to his father, Leonard, sitting in his chair after work, reading the newspaper silently, while his wife cooked dinner. David sat at the table doing homework, headphones on, “Protect Ya Neck” blasting through them. His head bopped as we worked through math problems, but when he looked up, his father was staring at him, with a tired smile on his face.

He turned the volume way down and finished his homework.

“He wasn’t one of those people who talked to hear himself speak. When he spoke, it meant something.”

David stopped. He felt his chest tighten. He wiped the tear threatening to fall from his right eye.

“He showed up. Parent-teacher night, talent shows, church, even when he was tired from working a double.”

David decided to play the trumpet in middle school, hoping to impress a girl who played the clarinet. He missed two notes in his solo, started too late, and ended too early, but still, his father sat in the front row, eyes closed, as if he were listening to Miles Davis. He didn’t scream his name or anything, but he was the first person on his feet.

“He was a man of routine. Saturday mornings were for chores. Sunday for the Lord. You did both. Even if you played sick.”

He noticed movement behind him in the mirror.

His son, Isiah, had his eyes trained on his reflection. The boy was twelve, but reminded him of his father. He was quiet, observant, and didn’t waste movement or words.

“I remember being out in the yard with him one fall, it had to be late November, and we were raking the leaves, treating the lawn that disappeared the month before. I complained about being cold and about the dead grass. He looked me in the eye and said, ‘If you want life in the spring, you take care of what’s dead in the fall.’ It took me a lot of years to understand. I get it now.”

David looked up from the paper. Isiah hadn’t moved.

The boy had never seen his father like this. Emotional. Nervous. He struggled with his feelings watching his father talk about his father. At his age, your father has all the answers, but in this moment, his dad was reaching for something he couldn’t see.

He thought about the way his grandpa would greet him with a firm handshake and pat on the back, like he was already a man. The way the man would sit silently, never smile, but always say things like, “Be a man of your word,” and “A man is only worth as much as those who love him.”

Now, his dad was trying to find the words to say goodbye.

David folded the paper and put it in his pocket, then sat on the edge of the bed.

“Miss him?”

David nodded his head.

“More than I can explain.”

Isiah came and sat beside him. He noticed the way the cuffs of the sleeves rode down his father’s hands.

“Is that his shirt?”

“Yes. He called it his “good shirt”. Wore it to church, weddings, and funerals. I was going to have him buried in it, but I needed a piece of him with me today.”

“You look just like him.”

David laughed a little.

“You do, too. He used to say I got my smarts from my mother, but I got his face, and that would take me further in life.”

He stood and went back to the mirror, tie in hand.

“Wanna hear the rest?”

He watched Isiah nod in the mirror.

He removed and unfolded the paper. Took a deep breath.

“He didn’t say ‘I love you,’ he showed you. He showed me by waiting up for me to get home until I was 23. Teaching me how to change my oil. The way he called me each morning when I moved into my own place. The way he looked at my son.”

The tears started, but he didn’t wipe them.

“He was everyone’s go-to guy. If something broke, his phone rang. If they were short on a bill, they knocked on the door. I always wondered who he turned to when he was in need.”

He turned the paper over.

“My mother knew his love best. He didn’t buy her roses or anything like that. He washed the dishes after she cooked. Made her breakfast so she could rest a little longer. He never left the house without kissing her goodbye. Never took his wedding ring off.”

He paused.

“When she passed, he never talked about it. But every Sunday, he sat in the same pew, sixth row on the left, an empty seat for her Bible. Whenever the choir sang ‘Blessed Assurance’, he was on his feet, mouthing every word. I think he felt closer to her on those days.”

David turned to Isiah.

“He taught me how to hold on to what I love without breaking it.”

The boy turned his face quickly, not wanting his father to see the tears in his eyes.

"I see my father everywhere. He’s in those azaleas we planted that cold winter. He’s on that crosswalk over on Carver. The one he petitioned for after that little James Morgan was hit by a car back in ‘87. I see him in the way Mr. Hodges calls me ‘Little Lenny’, even though I’m a grown man. I see him in the mirror. Especially today.”

He stopped. Folded the paper carefully, held it close to his heart.

The shirt didn’t fit. But it held him just right that moment.