The Best Buy Parking Lot

I walked out of Best Buy and heard a question that made me pause.

It was a Wednesday afternoon and I had an errand to run. I just picked up my son and his friend from their last day of school.

We stopped at Best Buy where I chose a refurbished iPhone to replace my son’s old one. It had several cracks on the screen and hadn’t worked in over a week.

The teens passed the time walking around the store, eating snacks, and enjoying each other’s company.

I handed my son the bag containing his new cell phone on our way out of the store. His face lit up with a calm excitement that said a thousand words to me. I knew he was happy, grateful, and felt lucky to have it.

He told me many times over the past week that he would start saving his own money for a new phone and not to buy him one.

But summer was here. 

It seemed like he was getting more independent with every day that passed. The cell phone was for my peace of mind more than anything else.

The sun shone on the fairly empty parking lot as the teens continued talking and laughing.

“Aren’t you going to say thank you?” my son’s friend said.

I was a couple of feet in front of them when I heard this. This one sentence almost made me stop in my tracks.

I already knew they were good kids. That wasn’t it. This time something felt different.

It was the timing.

I continued walking to the car with the teens close behind.

That question was unexpected, and it made me smile the biggest smile. I felt like I just got to know my son’s friend a little better.

Saying thank you in the middle of laughing, talking, and goofing around like the teenagers they were on the last day of school meant so much more to me.

No prompts, no reminders to say those words, just a simple, genuine question. It was one of those moments that I know will stay with me for a long time.

On our drive home, I continued to hear that one sentence.

I wasn’t looking for a thank you. I went into the store that day to replace something that was old and broken.  

I had no idea that this ordinary errand would leave me thinking “How lucky is my son to have a friend like that?”