Part 2: A 13-Year-Old in a Wheelchair Asked Me What It Felt Like to Fly — I Welded Him a Sidecar to Find Out. The Father Who Walked Out 11 Years Ago Saw the Video on the Internet
I want to tell you about Caleb’s father.
His name is Kevin Reyna. He is forty-one years old. He grew up in Tulsa. He met Andrea at a community college in 2009. They got married in May of 2010. Caleb was born in August of 2011 — three weeks early, with myelomeningocele, the most severe form of spina bifida. The lesion was at the L3-L4 level. Caleb was operated on within the first 24 hours of life.
The newborn intensive care unit course was, by Andrea’s account to me later, eighty-one days.
Kevin Reyna stayed for the first sixteen of those days.
On day seventeen, he told Andrea he could not handle it.
He told her — in the family lounge of the NICU at Saint Francis Hospital in Tulsa, on a Tuesday morning in late August of 2011 — that he had not signed up for “this kind of life.”
He told her he was sorry.
He left.
He did not come back to the NICU.
He did not come to any of Caleb’s eleven surgeries over the next twelve years.
He paid court-ordered child support — $312 a month — for thirteen years. He never missed a payment. He never made an additional one.
He did not come to Caleb’s first birthday. Or his fifth. Or his tenth.
He sent a card on Caleb’s eighth birthday with a $20 bill in it. The card said, “Happy birthday, son. — Dad.”
Caleb, at eight, had asked Andrea to throw the card and the twenty into the trash. Andrea had done it.
That was, until March 8th, 2024, the most contact Kevin Reyna had had with his son in eleven and a half years.
I know all of this because Andrea told me, sitting on the small wooden front porch of her rental house on a Wednesday evening in September of 2023, while I was over to drop off a set of measurements I had taken of Caleb’s wheelchair. She had made coffee. She had, very carefully, told me the story.
I had not asked. She had decided to tell me.
She had told me, “Marcus. You are about to spend hundreds of hours in your garage building something for my son. I want you to know what kind of family he comes from before you start. So you can decide if it’s worth your time.”
I had said, “Andrea. It’s worth my time.”
She had said, “Why.”
I had said, “Andrea. Because Kevin Reyna left, and somebody has to be in that garage. The brothers and I have decided to be in that garage. That’s the deal.”
She had cried for a few minutes on the porch.
She had said, “Marcus. Don’t make me a project. Don’t make him a project. We’re not a project.”
I had said, “Andrea. I am not making you a project. I told your boy I would help him fly. I am going to keep my word.”
She had nodded.
She had said, “Okay, Marcus. Okay.”
She had drunk her coffee.
I had gone home.
I will not bore you with the welding details. I will tell you the highlights.
Over the next eight months, with the help of three brothers from the Cherokee Hills Iron Brotherhood MC and a sidecar engineering consultant in Bartlesville named Glen who had retired from a custom rig fabrication business, I designed and built a sidecar that:
— accommodated Caleb’s pediatric wheelchair locked into a custom welded floor frame, eliminating the need to transfer him in and out of his chair;
— had a five-point harness anchored into the steel chassis, sized and padded for a thirteen-year-old’s body proportions, with a pediatric medical advisor’s sign-off on the geometry;
— had a custom-padded headrest at the exact height to support his head if he could not hold it up;
— had a custom roll bar above the chair with a crash pad;
— had a clear acrylic windshield that could be locked in three positions: fully up to deflect the wind, halfway open, or fully down so the wind hit Caleb directly in the face;
— had a small reinforced compartment for his medical bag — catheterization supplies, emergency seizure medication, two bottles of water, a small towel, a communication tablet;
— had a custom-painted cobalt blue tank to match my Heritage Softail;
— had, hand-painted in white script on the rear quarter panel of the sidecar, the single word FLY.
The whole project took 412 hours.
Three brothers from the club helped me weld. Two more sewed upholstery with me. One of our prospects — a twenty-three-year-old named Ryan — drove out to Bartlesville every Saturday for six weeks to work with Glen on the engineering specs.
The sidecar was finished on Friday February 9th, 2024.
We did not tell Caleb.
Andrea brought him to my shop the next day for what she had told him was “a visit to see the new bike Mr. Marcus is working on.”
It was Saturday, February 10th, 2024.
The shop bay door was rolled up. The Heritage was parked in the center of the floor with the new sidecar attached on the right side.
Andrea pushed Caleb in.
He saw the rig.
He stopped.
His small face went through about six different expressions in three seconds.
He said, “Mr. Marcus. Who is that for.”
I said, “Buddy. That’s for you.”
He looked at me.
He looked at the sidecar.
He looked at his mother.
He looked back at me.
He said, “Mr. Marcus. Are you sure.”
I said, “Buddy. I have been sure for eight months.”
His eyes filled with tears.
He did not cry.
He just looked at the sidecar.
Then he said, “Mr. Marcus. May I please touch it.”
I said, “Buddy. Of course you can.”
His mother wheeled him over.
He put his small hand on the cobalt blue gas tank.
He said, “This is the same color as the Heritage.”
I said, “Yeah, buddy. They match.”
He said, “Mr. Marcus. They match.”
He did not say anything else for a long time.
We rolled the rig out of the shop.
We loaded Caleb into the sidecar.
We buckled him in.
We strapped his wheelchair into the floor frame.
I had Andrea sit on the back of a brother’s bike following us. Three other brothers came along in formation.
We rode out to a quiet country road off East 91st Street, south of Tulsa, where the Sheriff’s Department had given us informal permission to do a low-speed first run.
I locked the windshield in the fully open position so the wind would hit Caleb’s face.
I started the engine.
I looked over at him.
I said, “Buddy. You ready to fly?”
He looked at me.
He nodded once. Hard.
I rolled out.
First gear. Maybe twelve miles per hour. Slow.
For about twenty seconds Caleb just sat there with his eyes closed and the wind on his face.
Then his small hands came up.
He raised both arms straight out from his sides like he was an airplane.
He tilted his face up toward the sky.
And he yelled — at the top of his thirteen-year-old lungs, into the cold February Oklahoma morning, with the wind in his hair — “I’M FLYING. MR. MARCUS, I’M FLYING. DON’T STOP. DON’T STOP. I’M FLYING.”
I did not stop.
We rode for about four miles down that country road, twelve miles per hour, with Caleb’s arms out and his face turned up.
When I finally pulled over, his face was wet with tears and his small body was shaking with what I realized after a few seconds was not crying — it was laughter.
He could not stop laughing.
He laughed for four straight minutes.
Andrea was off the back of the brother’s bike by then, kneeling next to the sidecar, with her own face wet. The brothers who had ridden with us — three middle-aged tattooed men in their cuts — were standing at the edge of the road silently with their helmets in their hands.
One of them, a fifty-eight-year-old retired deputy named Howard, said, very quietly, “Marcus. That’s what we built her for, brother.”
I said, “Yeah. That’s what we built her for.”
Caleb finally caught his breath.
He looked at me.
He said, “Mr. Marcus. Can we go again.”
I said, “Yes, buddy. We can go again.”
We went again.
Andrea, watching from the side of the road, had her phone out.
She filmed forty-seven seconds of the second pass.
In the clip, you can see Caleb in the sidecar with his arms out and his face up.
You can hear him yelling, “I’M FLYING, MR. MARCUS. I’M FLYING.”
You can hear me laughing — a deep, surprised, watery laugh — over the engine.
The clip ends with the two of us going down the road and Andrea’s voice, off-camera, saying very quietly, “My God. My God. He’s flying.”
She did not mean to post it.
She uploaded it to her personal Instagram on Saturday afternoon for about forty followers — mostly family in Mexico City and a few coworkers from the pediatric clinic.
By Monday morning, somebody had cross-posted it to TikTok.
By Tuesday, it had a million views.
By Friday, it had three million.
By the following Friday — March 8th, 2024 — it had over twelve million views and had been shared by, among others, two news anchors, a Major League Baseball player, two Christopher Nolan film crew members on Twitter, and a country music singer.
Kevin Reyna, somewhere, had also seen it.
Because at 8:47 a.m. on Friday March 8th, 2024, Andrea’s cell phone rang.
She was at work at the pediatric clinic.
The number was a Tulsa area code she did not recognize.
She picked up.
A man’s voice on the other end said, “Andrea. It’s Kevin. I just saw the video. I want to talk to him.”
Andrea did not say anything for a long time.
Then she hung up.
She did not pick up when he called twice more that morning.
She called me on her lunch break.
She told me what had happened.
She said, “Marcus. He’s going to keep calling. I don’t know what to do.”
I said, “Andrea. Do you want me to handle it.”
She did not answer for a long moment.
Then she said, “Yes.”
I said, “Okay. Forward his next call to my phone.”
She said, “Okay.”
He called her again at 11:14 a.m.
She forwarded it to me.
I picked up.
The phone rang.
I was sitting at my workbench in my shop. I had just finished a lunch sandwich.
I picked up.
A man’s voice said, “Andrea?”
I said, “This is Marcus Drewry. Andrea forwarded your call.”
There was a long silence.
Then the man’s voice said, “Marcus. I’m Caleb’s father. I’m Kevin. I saw the video. I — I want to talk to my son.”
I did not say anything for a moment.
Then I said the seven words I had been preparing in my head for two weeks since the video had started going viral and I had figured out, correctly, that it was only a matter of time before this phone call.
I said, “You want to talk to your son? You come here. In person. Not on a phone.”
There was a silence.
Then Kevin Reyna said, “Marcus. I — I don’t know if I can do that. I don’t know what to say to him.”
I said, “Then don’t say anything. Just come.”
He said, “Marcus. I have been gone for eleven years.”
I said, “I know. That’s why this needs to be in person.”
He said, “Marcus — “
I said, “Sir. With respect. Your boy is sitting in a wheelchair tonight. He has been doing it for eleven years without you. You don’t get to call him on the phone after a video goes viral. You don’t get to be a phone-call dad. If you want to be his dad — actually his dad — you come here. You sit at his kitchen table. You look him in the face. You let him say what he wants to say. You take whatever he says. That is the deal. I am not negotiating it. I am the man who built him a sidecar. I am the man who heard him say I’M FLYING for the first time in his life. I am not letting you do this on a phone.”
There was a long, long silence.
Kevin Reyna said, “Marcus. I — I need to think about it.”
I said, “Sir. Take all the time you need. The address is on Andrea’s mail. You have it. The boy’s not going anywhere. He’ll be in that house when you’re ready.”
I hung up.
I sat at my workbench for a long time.
I called Andrea.
I told her what I had said.
She was quiet for a moment.
Then she said, “Marcus. Thank you.”
I said, “Andrea. Don’t thank me. Let’s see if he comes.”
She said, “He won’t come.”
I said, “Andrea. I think you’re right. But that’s gonna be his decision, not yours. And not Caleb’s. Caleb has been asking ‘why didn’t he come’ for eleven years. Now he gets to ask ‘why didn’t he come back when he had the door open.’ Different question.”
She said, “Yeah. Different question.”
She hung up.
Kevin Reyna did not come.
I want to tell you exactly what he did instead, because Caleb deserves to have this part of his story written down honestly.
Kevin called Andrea three more times in the next eleven days. Each call, he said different versions of the same thing — “I’d like to talk to him. I think a phone call would be easier on him. I’ve been thinking, and I think a phone call is best.”
Andrea did not pick up.
She forwarded each call to me.
I picked up each one.
I said, each time, the same thing: “Sir. The address is on her mail. You come here. We sit down. That’s the deal.”
On the fourth call, Kevin Reyna said, “Marcus. You’re not Caleb’s father. I am his father. You don’t get to set the terms.”
I said, “Sir. With respect. I am not setting terms. I am holding a door open. The door is at Andrea’s house. You can walk through it. You have not walked through it for eleven years. The door has not moved. It is still there. The terms are: you walk through it in person. That is not me setting terms. That is what being a dad to a kid in a wheelchair requires.”
He hung up.
He did not call again for two months.
In May of 2024, Kevin Reyna called Andrea one more time.
She picked up.
She told me later what he said.
He said, “Andrea. I am not going to be able to come. I think it’s better for everybody if I don’t.”
He paused.
He said, “I just — I just want him to know I saw the video. I want him to know I’m proud of him.”
Andrea said, “Kevin. Tell him yourself. Come here.”
He said, “Andrea. I can’t.”
She said, “Then don’t tell him anything. He doesn’t need a message from you. He needs a father. If you can’t be a father, just stay gone.”
He said, “Andrea — “
She hung up.
He has not called since.
That was nineteen months ago.
I want to tell you what we did with Caleb when the calls were happening.
We told him the truth.
Andrea sat him down at the kitchen table on the night I had taken the first call. She told him that his father had seen the video. That his father had called. That she had not picked up and that I had answered the second call.
Caleb listened.
He thought about it.
He said, “Mom. What did Mr. Marcus say.”
Andrea told him.
Caleb thought about that for a long minute.
Then he said, “Mom. Did Mr. Marcus tell him to come in person.”
Andrea said, “Yes, sweetheart.”
Caleb said, “Mom. Will he come.”
Andrea said, “Sweetheart. I don’t know.”
Caleb said, “Mom. I think Mr. Marcus is right. I don’t want a phone call. I don’t want a person who left when I was three weeks old to be a phone-call dad. I want a person who is willing to sit at our kitchen table. If he’s not willing to come, I don’t want him.”
He paused.
He said, “Mom. I have Mr. Marcus. I have the brothers. I have you. I have grandma. I have Yo-yo. I have my notebook. I have the sidecar. I have all of it. He doesn’t have to be a part of it. I am not less because he isn’t here. I have figured that out. I figured it out in fourth grade.”
He took a sip of water.
He said, “Mom. If he ever decides to come, I will sit at the table with him. I will hear him out. But he doesn’t get to come into my life through a phone. I deserve more than that.”
Andrea cried for a little while.
Caleb did not cry.
He had figured this out, on his own, somewhere in the year between the last birthday card with the $20 in it and the day a 290-pound biker started a Heritage in front of him in a clinic parking lot.
He had figured it out without any of us.
He was, at thirteen years old, the steadiest person at the table.
There is one more detail I want to tell you about the sidecar, because Caleb has asked me to make sure I tell it.
There is a small steel plate welded to the inside wall of the sidecar, just above the headrest, where Caleb can see it every time he looks up.
The plate is six inches by two inches.
It is welded to the structural steel of the chassis with a single TIG bead.
It says, in small precise hand-engraved letters that I did myself with a Dremel rotary tool:
BUILT FOR CALEB PATRICK REYNA
FEBRUARY 2024
BY THE BROTHERS WHO STAYED
Caleb saw the plate the first time we rolled the rig out of the shop.
He read it.
He looked at me.
He said, “Mr. Marcus. The brothers who stayed.”
I said, “Yeah, buddy. The brothers who stayed.”
He said, “Mr. Marcus. That’s perfect.”
He did not say anything else.
He has never said anything else about it.
He looks at it every ride.
I do not need him to say anything about it.
The plate is the part of the story that does not need words.
Caleb is fourteen now.
He is starting eighth grade in August.
We ride every Saturday morning, weather permitting. We have ridden him to physical therapy. We have ridden him to a Christopher Nolan film crew screening of Interstellar at a small private theater in Oklahoma City that one of the prospects had a contact at. We have ridden him to the Tulsa Air and Space Museum. We have ridden him to a Boy Scouts adapted-camping weekend.
The sidecar has accumulated, in eighteen months, exactly fourteen thousand four hundred and thirty miles.
Caleb has flown in it for every one of them.
He is taller now. He has grown three inches since February of 2024. He is going to outgrow the sidecar in another year and a half.
I have already started designing the next one.
The next one will be larger. It will accommodate a young teenager’s body proportions. The next one will have a slightly more upright child-seat angle to support his lengthening torso. The next one will have a new harness sized for a fifteen-year-old. The next one will have a new headrest. The next one will have a new roll bar. The next one will have, hand-painted in white script on the rear quarter panel, the same word.
FLY
I am going to keep welding sidecars for Caleb until he is twenty-one.
I have decided this.
He has decided this.
His mother has decided this.
The brothers have decided this.
The man who left in 2011 does not get a vote.
I want to close with one thing.
I do not hate Kevin Reyna.
I do not even know him.
I have a guess about him. My guess is that he is a thirty-eight-year-old man who looked at his newborn son in the NICU in August of 2011 and decided he could not handle it, and who has been carrying that decision in his chest for thirteen and a half years, and who saw a video of the boy he had abandoned with his arms in the air screaming “I’M FLYING” and decided, for the first time in over a decade, to pick up a phone.
I do not know if he has the courage to pick up the phone again.
I do not know if he ever will.
What I know is that the door is still open.
The address is still on Andrea’s mail.
The kitchen table is still in the kitchen.
Caleb is still here.
If Kevin Reyna ever decides to walk through that door — in person, like a man, like a father, like the dad Caleb deserved at eleven months old and at three years old and at five and at seven and at nine and at twelve — Caleb has told us he will sit down.
He will hear him out.
He will take whatever Kevin Reyna brings.
He will be the steadiest person at the table.
That is what Caleb is.
That is what flying is, I think.
It is being lifted by people who showed up. It is being held by a frame that was welded by the brothers who stayed. It is putting your arms out in the wind and trusting the men who built the rig.
It is figuring out, at thirteen years old, that you do not need the people who left.
Caleb knows.
He has been flying for two years.
He is not coming down.
If this story moved you — follow the page. There are more boys like Caleb. More fathers who left. More brothers who stayed. More sidecars in more garages being welded by men who told a kid in a wheelchair, once, that they would help him fly. There are more stories the world doesn’t see — and I will keep telling them as long as someone keeps reading.
