JUNE

"No, really, I'm serious, Hancock! We're going to play baseball!"

Jamie dropped the sack of baseballs she had been holding on the roof of the old state house, a bat she was now leaning on in her other hand. Across from her stood Hancock, his signature red frock coat draped over his bare shoulders, having forsaken his shirt in the summer heat. He leaned against the central tower of the building, arms crossed.

"Baseball... that's some old-school Americana right there. And here I thought when you brought that sack of baseballs and the bat and said 'come to the roof now'you wanted to fool around."

Hancock's sly, chapped ghoul smile spread on his face, his tricorn hat casting his black eyes in shadow under the noon sun.

"Honestly, literally any other time, probably yeah, but not right now, Hancock. I'm on a mission, and by extension, so are you." Jamie said.

"Well, to the first part, that's a damn shame. As for the second, what are you conscripting me into now, huh?" he asked, raising one ghoulish brow.

"Alright, well," Jamie launched off, "it started a few days ago. I was coming back from that case with Nick, right, and we got to talking baseball—Hancock, you should talk to some of the pre-war ghouls here sometime to get a sense of how nuts we all were for baseball. Like, the world was about to end and we all knew it, but we still cared about baseball, right? We just didn't give a fuck. Anyway, we were talking about the world series—"

"Are you going to get started on this world series thing again? You've literally cried to me about this already. You know, actual tears. All over me." Hancock interjected.

"Look," Jamie gestured at him with her free hand, "there was a lot of jet and booze involved in that night, I honestly don't remember much of it and I'll dispute some things but okay, you know how emotional I can be, but that's good, you already know how much this means to me. So anyway, yeah, we were talking about the world series. You know the bombs fell the DAY BEFORE the deciding game?"

"Oh, do I!"

Hancock put a hand on his chest and another on his forehead in a dramatic flair before continuing on, throwing his voice high.

"Ooooh, Hancock! Hancock! The DAY BEFORE! It's SO SAD, Hancock! The daaaaAAaaay before! I had TICKETS, Hancock!—"

"Alright, alright!" Jamie cut him off, "I get the gist. I'd like to say that doesn't sound like me but then I'd be lying. So continuing, I definitely remember telling you about Nick's weird memory thing, so it shouldn't come out of left-field when I say that he's a Sox fan. But I'm a Rangers fan. So naturally we started to debate over who would've won the world series, but there is just no definitive way to ever really figure that out, right? But then it hit me—as clear as the crack of a good ball on a bat—" she clenched her fist, "we would host the world series. He'd be Dusty Wilder and I'd be Daryl Wayne. So now we have, at latest, until the end of summer to get our teams together, train them, hunt down a diamond, and schedule a game. So, let's find out how your batting arm is, Hancock."

"Wow."

He cocked his head a little, looking at her. Jamie pouted at his curt response.

"You think it's silly, don't you? You've never—baseball is something you wouldn't—I know you'd at least make a good batter, and I—"

"Hey, hey hey, relax. I was just taking in the view. You're so cute when you get fired up. I'm on board, love. You're getting a little scattered again, though. C'mere."

Hancock beckoned for her and then pulled out a jet inhaler from his pants pocket.

"Let's chill out a bit, yeah?" he said, taking the first drag of the inhaler and blowing out a thin, fast line of vapor.

"Yeah, good idea." Jamie replied, putting down her bat and crossing over to him.

"Hey..."

He grabbed her waist, pulling her up close against him. Jamie smiled, the familiar feel of his rough ghoul skin under a hand that she slowly ran over his chest. He took another drag of the inhaler and puffed out a perfect vapor ring in front of Jamie's face, then leaned through it to peck a kiss on her lips. She could taste the rest of the jet in his breath.

"Bullseye." Hancock grinned, handing the inhaler over to Jamie.

"Ooh, that's a new trick. I like it." she grinned back, taking a deep inhale of the jet, the world slowing a little.

"Thought you would. You polish that baby off, and then let's get back to America's favorite pastime."

Jamie nodded and leaned away, taking another drag of jet, and as she exhaled watched the vapor in front of her swirl through sunbeams, this time slower than the first. Hancock got up from against the central pillar and shrugged off his coat, and then strolled towards the bat and baseballs, picking up the former and giving it a few wild test swings.

"Your stance is terrible." Jamie said, her words flowing out with the last of the inhaler's vapor.

"Well then Mr. Wayne, give this friendly ghoul a little guidance."

"Gladly."

Jamie pocketed the empty inhaler and went behind Hancock, placing her right hand over his own hands on the bat, and her left on his left elbow.

"Your elbow's too high, and you're holding the bat too low. We're not breaking knees, here. Speaking of knees, bend yours a little and widen your stance, but keep your feet parallel."

She gently guided him into the right pose and then stepped back, admiring her work.

"Mmm, I like a lady who knows what she's doing." Hancock said, waggling an eyebrow at her.

"And I like a man who can hit a home run. You ready?" she said, stepping back and taking a baseball from the sack.

"For you, I always am."

"That's nice." she gripped the ball and turned sideways, entering her pitching pose, "Batter up!"

She pitched the ball, Hancock swung, and WHAM! The crack of it against the bat rang out across Goodneighbor and sent a shiver down her spine, the ball flying out over the town's walls and out into the commons.

"Yow!" she jumped giddily, "that's at least three bases there, I tell ya!"

"What can I say, I'm a natural." Hancock responded, a toothy grin spread out over his scarred ghoul face as he put the bat behind his neck and leaned his wrists over it.

"This is going to work! This is going to work!" Jamie shouted, Hancock's grin somehow getting wider.

Already, a solid batter on the team! This is going to work, she thought ecstatic, everything's going to work out!