Heart of Gold (Anthony Rizzo)

Thirty Five

Anthony

It's been over one year since I've met Isabella and Nicholas and one year since Isabella and I went on our first date.

For the past year my life has completely changed and in the best ways possible. I've changed. I've found a purpose that's bigger than baseball. It was family and helping each other and fighting for a heart. And it's been such an amazing year so far, there's nothing I could do that can capture what the last 365 days have meant to me but I'm going to try my best.

We spend the morning getting Nicholas to school and doing what we usually do. I bought her a bouquet of flowers and a card and she got me a bag with "Anthony Rizzo Family Foundation" engraved in it and a picture of all three of us with the kids at a hospital visit not too long ago. The foundation was pretty young but it was serving its purpose in getting kids treatments and helping pay off bills and that's more than I will ever ask for. It's the best gift anyone has ever gotten for me.

After getting Nicholas to school she goes to the spare room to do some home work. While she was in there it was time for me to work my magic.

I go to the store and pick up the little cake I had made. It was a gold heart with the words "happy anniversary Bella" on the front in silver. It was small enough that it'll feed three people happily and it won't go to waste later. Next I pick up some sparkling juice so we can celebrate with Nicky and he won't feel left out. After I purchase all of that I pick up the pictures and was on my way home.

I get there and Isabella was still studying so I took the time to get my project done. Since I moved in I always asked why she kept her room so simple and she said she never had time to decorate it. I mean Nicky's room was Cub themed and even the spare has a design on the wall but her room was always simple. There was a wall that was completely bare and I decided that I should fix that.

I sneak into our room and pull out the 300 pictures from the past year I got printed off and I throw them on the bed. One by one I tack them to the wall until it was completely covered. A hour later I was done and I was sweating but it was complete. I step back and smile. A hundred memories fill the wall and the best part was a lot of them weren't captured on camera. But here is three hundred reminders of how great this last year has been and how much we've experienced together.

There's a knock on the door and I stop.

"Hey Anthony, I might have already eaten a piece of the cake... please don't be mad at me" she begs and I laugh.

"The cake was for you" I remind her going to the door. I open it and I see she's almost crying.

"I know. But I know you probably wanted us to enjoy it together" she insists. Man she was really upset about this.

"It's fine, really. Did you like it" I ask.

"Yeah, it just looked so good. A little too good if you ask me" she mumbles and I smile.

"I'm not upset, I promise" I say and she smiles.

"Good, so what are you doing" she asks.

"Why don't you follow me mad find out for yourself" I say grabbing her hand and pulling her behind me. We walk into our room and she gasps when she sees the wall. Usually it looks like nothing is going on in this room and now it looks like everything is.

"What did you do" she asks.

"I've taken every picture of us, or at least you, I've had from the past year and I printed them out and put them up. There's some pictures from Nicky's birthday even though he wasn't feeling too well and some from when went to Boston for your birthday and Jon showed us around."

She walks over to the one that I put in the center for a reason, it was my favorite picture. She traces her finger along it and smiles big.

"I love this picture, so much" she claims.

"Me too" I admit standing behind her.

It was from one day when the organization had a family day at the park. My parents and Isabella and Nick joined me as we got to take pictures on the field. My dad spent a hour explaining why the ivy was such a crucial reason to how we play here. Nicholas ate it up like it was ice cream, he loved it. In the picture my dad was holding Nick up so he can grab a ball out of the ivy, he was so happy he found it. Isabella and I were smiling big as he showed us the ball obviously proud of his accomplishment. He was really sick at the time but you could never tell, most of the time you couldn't. We were this little family who supported each other. Sure it wasn't a big moment in our life but sometimes the smallest things take up the most space in someone's heart.

Next to it was a picture from the pumpkin patch. Nick was on my shoulders and he had his scare crow by his side. He was smiling down at me as I smiled up at him, another great moment to go along with every other good moment we've shared.

"I remember this" she says. "This was the happiest that little boy had been in years" she admits.

"It was my favorite day last year. I was kinda bummed there was no baseball and we hadn't received any news on a good heart donor and we made that trip to kind of get away from life for a while. And we did, when I look at this picture I don't remember a life changing event or a that we were there to have a break. I remember being a family, just picking pumpkins and eating junk food. I wasn't a baseball player and I wasn't a cancer survivor. I was Nicholas's best friend, I was your boyfriend and that was more than enough to keep me satisfied" I admit.

"We are something pretty special, huh" she asks.

"We are. And these pictures only begin to explain the amazing times we've had over the past year" I explain.

"This is so incredibly sweet Anthony. Thank you. Not for just this, but the past year. It's been so amazing and I can't see how many more pictures we can try to put up here" she smiles.

"Here's to one year out of forever" I say.

"Forever" she repeats.