IT WAS a perfect autumn day. The sun shone brightly in a nearly cloudless sky, and a cool breeze kept the playground from getting too warm. It had been a long, hot summer, and even though it meant returning to school, everybody was relieved that fall had finally arrived.
Kerby crouched confidently at home plate, slowly waving his bat in anticipation of the softball; he was waiting for a nice, fat one to pound into the outfield. But as the first pitch lazily arced toward him, it drifted more and more to the left and crowded him off the plate.
"Ball one!" said the gym teacher, Mr. Wallis.
The second pitch followed the same flight path, making Kerby back out of the batter's box to avoid getting hit. What's this guy's problem? he thought. I know he can pitch straight.
"Ball two!" said Mr. Wallis, apparently not noticing anything unusual about the pitcher's aim, or rather, lack of aim.
The next pitch was just like the first two, but it was also short, landing directly on the pinky toe of Kirby's left foot. It didn't hurt much, but it was a bit annoying.
"Oops," said the pitcher with a chuckle. He had done it on purpose.
Kerby started to jog to first base, since he had been hit by the pitch. I wish that guy had let me have a good one to hit, he thought. Maybe I could've gotten a double, or even a triple, if I had hit it into the gap—
"Get back here, Maxwell! Where are you running? That was ball three!" Mr. Wallis yelled from behind home plate.
"What?" Kerby demanded. "That ball landed right on my foot! On my little toe!"
"That's not what I saw," said Mr. Wallis. "Now get back behind the plate!"
Fuming, Kerby stormed back to the batter's box. How could the teacher have missed that? Well, he would show everybody, now. He would knock the next pitch all the way into the woods—it'd take a party of explorers to find the ball—
The next pitch came, and this one was right over the plate. Kerby flailed at it wildly...and hit a weak little dribbler that barely made it back to the pitcher's mound. He stared for a second and then took off for first base. The pitcher, grinning, bent down, picked up the ball, and casually tossed it to the first baseman. Kerby was out by a mile.
"Out!" yelled Mr. Wallis, his fist in the air.
Kerby angrily tromped back to the old wooden bench where his teammates sat. A splinter poked him right through the leg of his jeans as he sat down.
"Yow! Darn this old bench, anyway!" he said angrily. "And what's wrong with that pitcher? What's he trying to pull?"
"That's Spivey MacIntyre. He's one of those three new kids who just started at our school this fall. Not the most honorable guy I've ever met," said Fenton.
Fenton Claypool was Kerby's best friend. Taller than Kerby by several inches, with large jug-handle ears, Fenton was not only the smartest kid Kerby knew, but also the most polite. He had been brought up with the if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all saying drilled in thoroughly by his parents, and calling somebody "not the most honorable guy" was about as close as he could come to a real put-down.
"He was trying to rattle you with those inside pitches, and it worked," Fenton said. "If you'd kept your cool, you could have really smacked that last one."
"I know, I know," said Kerby, kicking at the ground. "But did you see the way he was smirking the whole time? And Mr. Wallis didn't even call him out for hitting me with that pitch!"
"Well, just see if you can control yourself next time you come up to bat. It's all about the power of the mind," Fenton said, tapping himself on the side of the head and smiling.
Kerby never got his second chance, though. The gym class was so big that Mr. Wallis had to have some of the players sit out so everyone would get to play. So while Kerby and Fenton kept the splintery bench warm, they had the chance to watch Spivey's team come to bat and get hit after hit. Even worse, a couple of the other guys on the team seemed to be out to annoy their opponents as well as beat them. One guy was small but really fast, and he had the habit of stepping on infielders' toes as he rounded the bases, always making it look like an accident.
"Taylor VonNewhauer," Fenton said. "His family just moved into that big new house down the block."
Nothing really stood out about Taylor, except his head, which made Kerby think of the top of a scrubbing brush: his short, bristly hair was nearly white, and it stood straight up. Kerby thought briefly that if you picked Taylor up and held him sideways, you could use his head to strip old paint off a barn door. But what he mostly noticed about the boy was his sneakers. They were the fanciest looking pair he had ever seen, and he realized they were probably very expensive.
Kerby turned to Fenton and said, "Hey, are those Olympics he's wearing? Those are the newest shoes at the department store downtown. I saw them when my mom dragged me out shopping last week, and when she saw the price tag, she just shook her head and went 'Hmmph!'"
"Yes, I think so," said Fenton distractedly. He was watching the other team's catcher lumber around the bases after hitting a long drive between the center and right fielders. The boy moved slowly, pounding the ground with feet that seemed to have been attached to tree trunks. Kerby thought he could feel the ground shaking with each step he took.
As the giant middle schooler rounded third base, the throw came in from the outfield and was caught neatly by the second baseman, who turned and fired it to the catcher—the large and formidable "Bumps" Burton.
Bumps was a friend of Kerby's and Fenton's, and a big kid himself. He was nicknamed Bumps due to his clumsiness, and until an incident a couple of years ago when he, Fenton, and Kerby fought off a group of boys misbehaving at the local church pageant, he had been a bully. The experience had brought the boys together, and they even formed a club (with Bumps as the elected president, of course).
As the large boy continued running towards home, it became obvious that there was no way he could beat the throw. Also, Bumps was an intimidating figure guarding the plate, and trying to get past him was not the smartest idea. Any kid with a nickel's worth of common sense would have realized this, put on the brakes, and hustled back to third base, hoping the next batter would get a hit and knock him in. However, the behemoth of a boy kept on running, heading slowly for the plate like some kind of … of … Kerby's imagination failed him.
Suddenly, the boy stopped. He took a good look at Bumps behind the plate, and charged. The tree-trunk legs now pounded even harder than before, and this time Kerby was positive he felt the ground shaking. The huge body was moving along at a surprising speed, meaty arms flailing wildly back and forth with each step.
Bumps was no coward. He held the softball tightly, planted his feet apart, bent slightly at the knees, and blocked the plate, ready to make the tag.
"I hope Bumps is careful," said Fenton. "You don't want to get run over by somebody with a name like—"
BAM! Bumps was knocked head over heels and actually performed one and a half backward somersaults before hitting the chain link backstop behind home plate. The ball he had been holding went flying, and the large boy ran across home plate before skidding to a stop, tripping, and falling right on top of him.
"—Bull Clodsky," Fenton finished.
The large boy—Bull, apparently—slowly got off Bumps and joined his teammates on their bench. They hooped and hollered, slapping him on his meaty back. He was none the worse from the collision and was even smiling slightly.
"Come on, Burton, get up!" said Mr. Wallis, who did not seem too concerned that Bumps had just been run over by a twelve-year-old built like a cement truck.
Kerby and Fenton hurried to Bumps' side and helped him stand. He was covered in dirt and wood chips, and Kerby noticed a small cut on Bumps' chin where he must have hit the fence. The three boys made their way back to the bench, Bumps shaking his head groggily.
"Nice hit," he mumbled.
Kerby came home from school that afternoon in a foul mood. Not only was he still mad about the way Spivey, Taylor, and Bull had cheated during the softball game (and gotten away with it!), he had also gotten yelled at for falling asleep during a boring movie in Social Studies and received a ton of homework from Ms. Pease. What a way to start the week!
"C'mere, Waldo!" Kerby called as he came in the front door, feeling the need for some cheering up.
Waldo was Kerby's wiry-haired dog. He was no longer a puppy, but he still had plenty of energy, as well as a tendency for mischief. But even though he sometimes did things he probably shouldn't be doing, like digging up Kerby's mother's flower bed, or chasing Xerxes, the cat of crotchety old Mrs. Pembroke, he was a good dog who loved to greet his master when he came home from school.
Normally, Waldo, at hearing this summons, would immediately drop whatever he was doing and bolt straight at Kerby, leaping up and licking his face, maybe engaging in a friendly wrestling match. But today Kerby did not hear the familiar scrabble of claws on the floor.
Kerby called again. "C'mon, Waldo! I'm home from school! Let's have a little rough-house before I wash up for supper, what do you say?"
Still nothing. Kerby set down his school books on the kitchen table and started for the hallway to look for Waldo, when he heard a polite tik-tik-tik-tik coming from the family room.
"I hear you, boy! Come on, are you trying to sneak up on me, or whaaa—?"
Waldo had come into the hallway, smiled proudly, and sat down. He lolled his head stupidly at Kerby, his tongue hanging out of the side of his mouth. His normally unkempt hair had been neatly combed, and tied around his head was – no, it couldn't be – a huge, floppy red bow!
"Oh gosh, no!" Kerby said. "This could only mean one thing!"
"Kerby, dear, I meant to tell you," his mother's voice came from the kitchen. "Your cousin Gay is staying with us for a few days. Isn't that nice?"
Kerby groaned. It was going to be a long week.