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Instead, Nelson launched into his favorite subject, football. His friend, Jets fullback Tony Richardson, plays against Cincinnati on Thursday, and Nelson wondered how Bengals receiver Terrell Owens would react to cornerback Darrelle Revis labeling him a “slouch” last season.
The Jets captured each of their last three games in the final seconds, but while Richardson is employed by the N.F.L.’s most dramatic team, he understands the gulf between the game and real life. Nelson affirmed that recently, as he waits for the transplants he would eventually die without.
“This is real serious,” Richardson said this week at his locker. “Tyler is my little brother. We’re that close.”
They met through the Make-a-Wish Foundation at an event in Tampa, Fla., before the Super Bowl in February 2009. Of the dozen children there, Richardson met Nelson first, and he was struck by Nelson’s vast knowledge of football strategy and statistics, by Nelson’s boisterous laugh and wide smile.
Richardson called their connection instant. He knew he was supposed to work the room, but he struggled to pull himself away from Nelson.
Nelson lives in the Dallas suburb of Grand Prairie, and since Richardson had N.F.L. Players Association business there, he took Nelson out to dinner soon after their initial meeting. Thus began their friendship.
Richardson knew little of Nelson’s suffering, mainly because Nelson never complained or wallowed. His mother, Cynthia Nevels, a financial and business consultant, said doctors diagnosed cystic fibrosis two days after her son’s birth.
At age 13, Nelson’s condition worsened. Forced from competitive sports, he developed diabetes and weighed less than 100 pounds. Doctors said Nelson’s liver was cirrhotic, his lungs damaged, his spleen the size of a football. His nose bled constantly. He coughed blood. He spent weeks in the hospital. He took 17 medications daily.
Nelson answered pain with a smile on his face and laughter in his belly, and an outlook that remained positive. Only once in 16 years did his mother see frustration fill his face.
Richardson sent text messages or called every other day. On Nelson’s last two birthdays, Richardson visited. Two years ago, that meant spending the day with Nelson in the hospital, where they ate cake and talked about girls and played video games. Nelson explained his preferred profession: pilot.
Mostly, football was their bond. Nelson loves the Dallas Cowboys, and he rattled off the statistics of his favorite players, like Emmitt Smith and Terence Newman, and now Dez Bryant. Nelson taught Richardson to play the video game Madden NFL, where Nelson destroyed him.
“He needed tips,” Nelson said. “When he came down here, I kind of blew him out. He’s not the only one.”
In October, concerned with Nelson’s internal bleeding, doctors sent the family to the transplant hospital in Houston. Nevels leased her home near Dallas and sold most of her possessions to help cover medical costs. When she did not feel overwhelmed or scared, she felt numb.
From Oct. 22 to Nov. 15, the family waited, uncertain of the status of transplants for Nelson, uncertain of his future. Nevels projected calm that masked her inner turbulence.
“On the inside, I’m thinking, how is he going to make it?” she said. “There are no guarantees here. I was afraid. I still am.”
She taught Tyler yoga to help with breathing. She flew one brother, Jeremy, a senior football standout at South Grand Prairie High School, to Houston, and that alone improved Tyler’s condition. On Nov. 15, the family learned that the hospital’s medical board had approved his transplants, which he will receive at the same time, from the same donor.
The hospital gave him a pager. He sent a photo of him holding it, smiling, to Richardson.
Even with Dr. Marc Schecter, the hospital’s medical director of the pediatric lung transplant program, Nelson remained all football, all the time. In fact, after the Jets’ comeback victory last Sunday against Schecter’s favorite team, the Houston Texans, Nelson entered the hospital in Jets gear.
On average, Schecter said, patients wait 81 days for transplants. Because Nelson needs two organs, his wait could be longer.
In the interim, Nelson and his family stay at the Ronald McDonald House in Houston, where he attends a nearby school and tries to maintain as normal a life as possible.
“The hardest part is the waiting,” Schecter said. “We could call him tonight. We could call him in six weeks.”
Through his contacts with the Jets and Nike, Richardson sent three boxes of hats, shirts, jackets and shorts to Nelson. He also reached out to the N.F.L. and the players union and asked teammates Dustin Keller, Mark Sanchez and Nick Mangold to spread the word via their Twitter accounts.
Next week, Nelson will undergo an operation designed to divert the heavy bleeding from his intestines, stomach and esophagus around his damaged liver, toward the heart. He hopes his story will inspire more to donate organs (find out at giftstotyler.org). He also hopes the Cowboys will hire Bill Cowher or Tony Dungy as coach next season.
“Tony will never know how much inspiration he provided,” Nevels said. “Human beings don’t do something like he did. He makes Tyler happy. He gives Tyler hope.”
Richardson would like to hold a mirror to that notion. Because he sees the same thing, the other way around.
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