Of course, the whole timed bit was a setup. Dan was already at first base. Everyone laughed until I began to catch up. Dan stumbled around third base when he saw me flying up behind him. He righted himself and decided to dive for home. I knew I was faster if I ran through the base, so I stayed on my feet. It was either a tie, or I’d edged him out. It was close. Moose pointed to Dan.
“Winner!”
There was no use fighting it. Moose was having too much fun.
“The next competition is gunning down a runner at home. You’ll line up in shallow center, and I’ll hit you a pop-up. The runner has to hold until you catch the ball before he can go home,” Coach Haskins said.
“I think we should be the runners against the other guy. I don’t need someone like Jim on the base path for me,” I said.
“But David’s faster than me,” Dan complained.
“Not according to Moose,” I pointed out.
“That sounds fair,” Moose said.
“I also want a complete infield,” I said.
Moose just rolled his eyes. I stepped up to Johan, who was our catcher.
“You better try, or you’ll be on my list, too,” I warned.
“Oh, believe me, I’ll knock you on your butt if you try to score on me,” he said.
That might’ve been a mistake.
Dan got to go first. He took his place in the outfield, and Moose hit him a high, lazy fly ball. The kid had played some baseball because he set himself up to catch on the run in. As soon as Dan caught the ball, I dug in and ran full-out. He came up throwing. The only problem was he overthrew it to get it there faster. When you did that, your ball tends to rise. Johan had to jump up to catch it. I was safe by a mile, so Moose couldn’t say otherwise.
It was my turn. I knew what was going to happen. As soon as I heard the ball come off the bat, I turned and sprinted to the fence. Coach Haskins had hit it over my head to give Dan a chance. I think everyone assumed I would try to use my big arm to gun it to home. But I knew that in a case like this, it was usually faster to hit the cutoff man. If I hadn’t had to run back, I might have tried a throw to home. Brock was at second base and had trotted out to shallow center like he was trained to do. He was just as surprised as everyone else was when I wheeled and fired the ball at him. I swear Brock caught it out of self-defense. He turned and fired it home on a rope. Johan was a man of his word. He got down and blocked the plate enough to force Dan to reach around to score. It was enough, and Dan was called out.
Coach Haskins was happy to see I’d made the right play. The rest of the team seemed a little deflated. I think they’d seen this before. Dan and I were tied, one to one.
“The last test will be hitting. You’ll each get ten pitches. The one who hits the longest home run wins,” Moose said.
I smelled a rat. Coach Herndon took the mound to warm up. In his prime, he’d been a pitcher in the minor leagues. While he didn’t have the heat anymore, he did have some nasty junk pitches. Dan got to go first. Coach Herndon grooved the first pitch, and Dan jerked it out of the park. The key was he jerked it, so it barely got out. He overswung on every pitch as he tried to kill it. With some work, Dan could be a decent batter. Playing on the JV team would help him for next year.
Dan had seen ten fastballs. My first pitch was a curve that actually hit me.
“Sorry,” Coach Herndon called out.
“Did that even count?” I asked.
“Yep,” Moose said.
Of course it did. The next pitch was also a curve, but Coach Herndon hung it out over the plate. I did as I had been taught and parked it for the win.
Coach Hope stepped up.
“Head to the track. We’re running stairs.”
And so, the first practice began, where they saw who was in shape. Personally, I think they wanted to kill us.
◊◊◊
I was in the shower, letting the hot water do its work on my tired muscles.
“What time are you going to be at the T-Bird?” Wolf asked.
I assumed Zoe had talked.
“7:30. You have to be there before eight, or you can’t get in,” I said.
I’d wanted a get-to-know-you date with Zoe, but she obviously had other plans. When Roc found out we were going on a date, he horned in. He was dating Piper, so it would be fine, or so I thought. Piper’s sister Emma also wanted to go with her boyfriend Neil. I’d taken Roc and Neil aside and explained that I would provide the ride, but they were not sitting with us. Roc almost was told he wasn’t getting a ride when he made a comment about not wanting to hang with old people anyway.
I came out of the locker room and saw that Fritz wasn’t driving.
“Aren’t you getting the door?” I asked.
“No, and you can ride in the front seat,” Paul said.
I was surprised Fritz would allow Paul to take me out after dark. He got into trouble when I got him laid in LA. It’s hard to watch your protection assignment when that’s going on.
“Did Fritz tell you the plans for tonight?” I asked.
“I can hardly wait. He said I was hauling a bunch of teens around. He did say that you had to buy me dinner.”
