Back from my cleaning break to take a break! I just have to say, this was fun to write. :p I need to get it finished and to chapter 4. You want to see chapter 4... there's a little egg present for you. eggs are fun to find ... even at Christmas, right? But there might be one or two in here as well. Actually, I just finished a little research with commuted sentences. It was tough going I tell you. sigh. If only we could have more commuted sentences. :)

Chapter 2:

It was hot. Danny jerked awake, surprised to feel the heat, the sweat on his brow. He looked around, surprised to find himself in his old bedroom. His childhood bedroom, with the baseball memorabilia on the wall. It confused him as it was still decorated with Yankees memorabilla, because it hadn't been that way in years, not since he'd still been in the stage where he did everything his father did. At some point he'd added in his own pieces of the Mets. He couldn't replace one with the other. Both were part of him.

But he frowned. His dad hadn't come in his room and taken it down ... had he?

"You're up. Finally."

At the sound of the familiar voice he turned his head. His brother sat there at his bed side. "Louie."

Louie grinned that trademark Messer snarl. "In the flesh. At least for a little while."

"What are you doing here? You're..."

"Dead?" he shrugged. "No, not yet. There's still a little time for me yet."

He pushed up, reached over and tossed a stack of clothes at Danny. "Put these on. We don't have much time."

Danny stared down at the jeans and t-shirt that lay folded on his chest—and smelled, he thought—oddly of his mother.

"For what?"

"Always with the questions. Just get dressed."

It was odd, but he did what his brother told him. Maybe for once he knew what it meant to waste time, and that sometimes you wanted, needed to savor it.

They walked through the house, the sounds familiar. His mother was banging around in the kitchen. For all the noise she made about him, she could never cook quietly. And there was a television on—an afternoon game. It was funny how you could tell the difference. Baseball. Night vs. afternoon.

That was summer. It wasn't summer. Was it? The heat was rolling over them, the sounds of baseball on the tv and outside, in the yard. There was always a game to be found somewhere in the summer. It was summer in the city-and for a moment he thought back, thought back and felt what it felt like to be there, on the edge of growing up.

But when they stepped outside, and the screen door slammed behind them, they weren't in New York anymore.

"What the ..." the curse slid off his tongue and he stared out at the flat land scape, with the wheatfield in the distance. Or rather, he assumed it was wheat. Something was growing golden in the distance.

And there, in the yard, with a tractor to the side was a group of kids, playing ball. He watched the girl, who'd come to the plate. She stood, ready to hit—her stance so determined.

Over determined, he thought and he couldn't help but smile at the spirit. The kid, he thought, had spirit.

Reuban—

He felt a hand on his arm and he looked over at Louie. "Don't go there."

"What?"

"Just don't go there. It wasn't your fault. Freak things happen. Bad things happen. You made a choice that day to do the right thing, you followed your instinct. It brought you to Montana before didn't it?"

"And cost a kid his life."

"No-that wouldn't have changed, I'm afriad. But other things would have ... you can't not be you, be a cop, be sworn to protect. Take it from me. I made the wrong choices, but your instinct saved you then, and maybe in the end, it saved a whole lot of other people. Maybe it even saved your Montana," Louie looked out across the field, his eyes dark with memories. "I made my own choices and you were going to pay for them. You could have paid earlier," he reached out, slapped the back of his head. "But at least one of us has brains in there. Sometimes, there's nothing you could do. Nothing you could have done. You could ask her about it."

Danny frowned. "Who?"

Louie nodded toward the game and Danny looked back. The girl swung, fast and hard—and struck out.

The boys on the field, two on base started yelling at her, even as they ran in. "You're such a dreamer." one said.

"Get your head out of the clouds," said another.

"You're fired," said a third.

"You can't fire someone from baseball!" said the girl. She threw down her bat and shoved—at the largest of the boys.

The screen door openned behind them. "Lindsay!" came the cry—and even as Danny turned, a jolt of surprise in his stomach at the name. But he knew, however it was, he knew. He could recognize the sound of a mother.

She had Lindsay's eyes, not the rich brown color, but the shape of them. And she had Lindsay's lips, her height. He heard the heavy trodden footfall on the porch steps. When he turned around to watch her, he felt an ache—one of surprise and memory. Softer, gentler, then what he thought now.

She wasn't as young as she'd seemed from far away. But she was still a child.

And yet there was the same spirit in her eyes, the same ... determination.

"Mom, they—"

"Do not mom, me. What have I told you about fighting with your brothers?"

"They started it."

"And they can finish it and beat the daylights out of you in the same way they do each other. You're not going to get into that."

"But—"

"Why are we having this conversation? Didn't I recently take a certain Trumar double-oh-eight slingshot from you?" her look was narrow and pointed, and Danny felt the memory he shared with Lindsay roll over him.

What, you should pebbles at squirrels back in Montana?

No, I used to shoot boys.

It made him smile a little, at the defiance and disappointment that clashed in Lindsay's eyes as she slowly lowered her gaze. Her mother nodded. She had something—the same something—his own mother had when she wanted her way. "If you can't behave yourself, I'll have to tell the girls to go home."

"The girls," little Montana muttered still frowning at the porch, her arms crossed,"aren't here."

Lindsay's mother reached out and turned her daughter, then pointed down the road. "I made a few calls."

A SUV came down the road, dust flying behind it. As Danny watched, the girls arrived. They piled out of the car, they're squealing and talking the stuff of little girls.

He followed them for the day, simply because he couldn't look away. Even as the ball game continued with her brothers and their friends, he stayed with Lindsay-the young Lindsay. For the first time in his life, Danny spent the day in the presence of girls as they talked boys, music and movies. She was already spouting facts, it came naturally to her, but it was facts about teen heart throbs and movies. Some about science.

The girls laughed. They finished each other's sentences. There was a depth between them. They talked. And talked. And talked... and he didn't mind. He just ... aborbed.

And then as evening fell, it got quiet. They built a fire in the back yard, and sat around it. The tone changed. They talked about their futures. Lindsay, for once, was silent. She listened to the dreams and plans of the girls around her. One wanted to marry some crush—the others laughed. That one wanted to stay near her family. Another wanted to go to Nashville, and make a record. Another planned to be a lawyer or a doctor or whatever it took to get her out of Montana.

They teased Lindsay that she would end up on a pit crew in Nascar—but before she could open up and share her dream for herself—the girls were called inside. It was time to go home.

He turned, and watched them run inside, and he started to ache, for he knew—suddenly—what Lindsay had lost. It wasn't just a friendship.

The cold returned. He hadn't realized how warm he'd felt all day. But he recognized the cold. And with a sinking feeling he turned back. The bonfire was gone, the pit dark and cold. Lindsay sat—older now—on the edge of the blackened earth. The look on her face was ... ashen.

Alone.

He felt for her, the crushing loss. The deep wound.

He stepped forward. He wanted to ...

And then she was gone, and it was dark.

It was just dark.

Dun dun dun ... feeling depressed? Hopefully not! It's Christmas! More to come soon. I hope. :p Time to do more winter cleaning. Cleaning out. Moving furniture. Cleaning cleaning cleaning!