"Benjamin Franklin Rodriguez! Get your ass back here this instant!" Screaming and things could be heard being thrown from the kitchen to the family room. Pots were heard hitting the walls and bouncing off the furniture as plastic plates hitting the soft carpet and then more screaming. "BENNY!" A girl's voice - - more less that would be MY voice going up to my high soprano singing voice screaming my best friend's name.

I should probably explain the situation, but before that I should introduce myself. Name's Kimberly Diamond Alma; yes interesting name I know, not. I like to go by Kitty though, because I like wearing a cat collar on my right ankle, love sea food, especially fish, and at times fast reflexes. But that's always a rare occasion. I guess you can say that's only when it's called for, like baseball for instances. Can run and catch a ball quicker than anyone else. But anyways, moving on I'm 13 years old and my hair is dark brown; which ends up getting people mixed up for it being black, with natural red highlights that can be seen in the sun that goes to my waist while having hazel eyes. I'm a bit under the weight size for my age, but blame my family life. Despite that I have good friends that make me living and breathing still. Besides for baseball being my passion, I also love to bake and sing.

But moving on from me, the situation at hand is that my best friend: Benny; took my favorite hat. And not just any ordinary hat that all the guys think. The reason it's my favorite hat, because Benny gave it to me when I first moved to the town. See being the new girl in town I came across all the guys when I was exploring around.

I had just escaped my house from the usual fighting caused by my mom and the step dad, and I had taken my baseball mitt when leaving. It was about mid-afternoon on a warm sunny day and me just wearing baggy jeans, big t-shirt and a tank top with my lovely black converse shoes. It was then that I had come across the "Sandlot" where I would be spending all my summer days there along with them. I had walked into the outfield when all of a sudden I had heard a voice scream out. "Hey! Watch out!"

Looking up fast I saw a baseball coming towards me, without really moving from where I was, took my stance and my mitt and reached up catching the fly ball with ease. I heard pounding feet running towards me and saw who I would be calling all my good and best friends for my life of living there. Their mouths hanging open except one guy; who would be my best friend of all time: Benny Rodriguez. One of the boys, who I had learned that day was Hamilton Porter or be known as Ham stepped up looking like a smudge jerk. "Pretty good catch… considering you're a girl." Snickering could be heard from the seven other guys, except Benny who was glaring a bit at him.

I shrugged my shoulders while tossing the ball up in the air. It defiantly was NOT the first time I heard that remark made to me. Even though I was a girl, had the curves of the body figure, had boys following me, knew how to talk and handle them. I was NOT a girl, I was a tomboy. That's what I thought of myself anyways. My mother was not happy about that and tried making me wear dresses and act like a lady, but I rebelled and she hated me and hated that fact a lot.

As I stopped tossing the ball up I smiled at the guy who had freckles all over his face and was a bit on the heavy side, but I never tried to judge before knowing someone. "Well, if I am a girl, how about this girl shows you she can play." I smirked seeing his face scrunch up with a bit of disgust, possibly thinking that the female gender could even play baseball. I threw the ball at the kid whose name I later found out was Kenny since I saw that he threw the pitches.

Making my way towards home base I picked up the bat swinging it a few times getting use to the weight and feel of it. I saw the guy who did not join in the laughter stay on the sidelines watching me with curious eyes. I smiled inwardly and kept my eye on the pitcher. The freckled kid kept trying to distract me from my concentration but I kicked it to the back of my mind, it was the least of my worries for now. Keeping my eyes just on the pitcher, he pitched it, I swung, feeling the vibrations through the bat as I made contact with the ball and seeing it fly up but short in distance. I knew I had too much of an up angle on the swing, but I threw the bat behind me and ran like no ones ever seen before to first, then to second and then diving to home plate making the dirt fly up.

As it finally cleared away the guy who did not laugh at what was said earlier was there at home plate and raised his hand. "Safe!" The ball was close, maybe about three inches from second base, but I just ran the bases like it was a home run. The, err… freckled face boy huffed crossing his arms as I stood up smiling proudly at him, dirt caked my long t-shirt and a few smudges of dirt on my face, my hair was not that bad, just here and there could be seen of different colors from dirt and the sun hitting it. The faces on the other boys were completely PRICELESS! They just gawked with their mouths open; apparently they have never seen a girl like me before. The guy wearing the blue baseball cap was grinning and came over holding his hand out. "Hey, names Benny Rodriguez. Pretty nice hit out there." He flashed a smile as his eyes lit up with happiness knowing there was another kid around who enjoyed baseball.

Smiling like an idiot hearing his words, I took his hand and shook it while pulling it back brushing off some of the dirt. "Thanks, but I hit the ball a bit at a wrong angle with the bat, that's why it went up to high and distance not far." I will admit, I can tell what I did wrong when hitting the ball. It's a bit of a special trait of mine that my father told me, he thought it was really interesting and loved it when I was younger and would babble on and on about what was wrong with my hit. Just thinking on that memory of him made me daze out for a quick minute but then came back to my senses while smiling at Benny and laughed at his facial expression. "Well, pleasure ta meet'cha Benny. You can call me Kitty." I grinned stupidly at him.

Hearing a snicker from the freckled face boy I saw Benny nudge him. "Well, anyways I think introductions are in need." Benny stood by the freckled face boy and turned to face me. "So, this guy right here." He pointed at him "His names Hamilton Porter but we call him Ham." Then he pointed to an African American kid "The pitcher is Kenny DeNunez." Next up was a pair of twins. "Next are the twins; the oldest is Tommy and his younger brother Timmy, but we just call him Repeat". He then pointed to a tall skinny guy "His name is Bertram Grover Weeks." Second to last he pointed to a kid who was short and had black rimmed glasses "This is Mike Palledorous, but we call him Squints."And the last kid who had the front of his bangs gelled and skinny "And lastly, Alan McClellan, but we call him Yeah – Yeah." He pointed to each of them as he said their names.

As I looked around at all of them I saw it was a variety of guys, it was pretty interesting since it was not just one of the same race. Made me feel happy to know race, color and size did not matter so I guess I smiled which caught the attention of Ham. "What you smiling about." I could tell he was still sore about me showing that a girl could actually play, but I brushed it off turning my attention to him crossing my arms and shifting my weight to my left leg.

"If you must know your team is what's making me smile." All of their faces; including Benny's looked confused. I just rolled my eyes at them. Guys... if it was one thing they were a bit slow and dense at points, and this just proves one of those moments. So I continued. "Your team has various different types of players. Makes me happy to know that it doesn't matter what they look like. You know how some those uptight rich people need it to be one specific kind of race and all? Yeah, annoys me." After that I still had my arms crossed and my face looking a bit sour.

Ham looked impressed and stuck his hand out. In which I looked at him tilting my head to the side in a confused manner. Guess it made him a bit embarrassed as he turned his head away coughing before talking. "I guess you're good by my standards. Sorry for that uhh, talk down. For a girl you can play." He had a look of sincere on his face and he did mean what he said. I could hear it in his voice.

Smiling I took his hand and shook it. "No harm done really, you are not the first person to say that to me, heh." I looked at the sun and realized it was a bit late, and I should be heading back even though I was dreading it. "Well anyways, pretty awesome to meet you all, but I gotta get goin. See ya tomorrow?" I asked in the form of a question, because even though they had accepted my talent of being able to play I was still not sure they even wanted me back, but when I saw nods of their heads I smiled and ran off waving.

Halfway home, I heard Benny's voice calling me. "Hey Kit! Wait up!" Stopping I turned around to face him as he ran up to me holding something. "Here, you wear the clothes; I thought you would need, you know, a hat to finish your look." He smirked as he finished holding out an old worn black baseball hat that had holes here and there.

Blinking a few times I stared at it, but felt a smile creeping on my lips as I took it from him. "Thanks Benny means a lot." Putting it on I looked back at him doing a peace sign. "So, how does it look?" I felt him adjust the hat a bit so it was not covering my eyes a lot and it still blocked out the sun. After he was finished I found a new formed smile on his lips, as his eyes shone with happiness yet again.

"Ha, looks good on ya. Anyways, tomorrow meet at the "Sandlot" at 8 A.M. sharp." With that I would soon realize and find out that he was my next door neighbor. Because he ran off down the street I was on and saw he had walked right into the house next to mine.

Well, to the point now and enough of the flashback. We were at my house since the parental units were not home - - and thank god they weren't, they would shoot me if they saw the house now. And stated before, I had tons of fun throwing things his way trying for him to return the hat. "BENNY! Come on!" I was now standing in the middle of the family room huffing as he was leaning against the door frame twirling the hat on his finger smiling at me. I hated when he did that, because it got me so damn frustrated. He had a good height on me, and he knew while I knew he would just hold it above his head so I could not reach it. Damn for being short. So I just plopped down on the carpet floor staring at him and pouting. "I hate you for being taller! Just so you know!"

Laughing he came over and put the hat on my head and pulled it down to cover my eyes. I could tell he sat down since I could hear and feel the vibrations of him hitting the floor. "Aw, come on Kit. You know you can't hate me worth squat." His voice held a slight humor tone to it as he stared at me with his intense eyes. It irked me about that with him when he started at me; he knew mostly EVERYTHING about me as I did about him. And he KNEW I could NEVER hate him. But when he looked at me it was like he could read my mind, my every emotion just from looking at my eyes. And it bothered me greatly.

Hate is a really powerful, strong word that can sting the heart when used in the worst correct context. Fixing the hat so it covered my eyes I got my thoughts in order. Even though Benny was my best friend there were a FEW things he did not know, and was never going to know… I could never have the heart to tell him. I was scared on the outcome if I did, and besides he did not need to be dragged into my life like that. Finally lifting the hat I saw that he was looking at me with concern. Damn. I thought in my head. He knew something was wrong, I could tell just by the way he was looking at me. I put on a smile at him and chucked a nearby pillow at him. "Ugh, stop reminding me that I can NEVER hate you Benny." I laughed this time to throw off any suspicion he had of anything being wrong at that moment.

Looking around the family room I clicked my tongue. It was a complete mess, luckily though I did not break anything. Last time that happened I had to make a quick run to change clothes and pretend that I was working on the garden in the backyard; thank god they bought it because I surprisingly did make work on it. Frowning a bit I started to pick up pots and plastic plates and bring them to the kitchen, better to clean up now instead of face the wrath of them when they returned. As I turned around to go back to picking up items, I saw Benny carrying in some of the pots and grinning at me as he passed me putting them away. I smiled lightly while walking back, Benny had his way with me. And was the only guy who knew who I was close to truly being.