SUNSHINE POV

I awoke to the sound of someone pounding on the door, it had been another week since my outburst at dinner, I hadn't seen much of any body since then and it was starting to take a toll on me.

I had taken to sleeping until 1 every afternoon, it was difficult without Benny waking me up every morning for a practice to go to.

I threw myself out of bed and pulled the door open. "What?!" I demanded only to see my Uncle James standing there, he didn't say anything just pushed past me and into the house. "Uh, come in?" He walked straight to the kitchen pulling out some bread and putting it into the toaster.

"Get dressed." He told me.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Get dressed." He repeated, I rubbed my eyes attempting to wake up and try to understand what he was doing.

"What you don't have food at your house?"

He turned to look at me, peanut butter in one hand and a glass in the other. "Your not sleeping all day, get dressed we're going somewhere."

"I'm not going anywhere with you." Clara had informed me that not only had I embarrassed her at dinner, but the conversation continued with them dismissing everything I had said, I hadn't expected to see any of them any time soon.

"Get dressed!" he snapped. Rolling my eyes I stomped up the stairs and pulled on some jeans and a t-shirt, he obviously wasn't going to leave without me and if he was taking me on a drive to dump me somewhere I guess it wouldn't be that terrible a situation.

When I came back down the stairs, he placed the toast with peanut butter on the table and pointed to it. "Eat."

"I haven't had an adult make me breakfast since I was seven."

"EAT!" He snapped, I did as instructed, I even finished the ridiculous amount of milk he had poured for me. I was just a little surprised that we even had milk in the house, I had never seen Clara grocery shop.

Once I was finished I pushed the plate away and slammed down the glass a little harder than intended. "Now what?"

"Come on." He walked to the front of the house and out the door, leaving it wide open for me to follow. I did follow but what the hell was he doing?

He was already in the car when I walked out, a nice looking red dodge, it was shining in the sun and looked as if it had never left the garage other than the mud on the tires. I got into the passengers seat and didn't bother saying anything to him, I was itching to ask where the hell we were going but I kept quiet.

The drive was only a few minutes, twenty at the most and it was a lot of random streets to get to our destination, turned out it was the college.

"No." I said as he pulled into the parking lot, "No way. I'm not enrolling in school."

He ignored me and undid his seatbelt opening the car door. "Get out of the car Toni."

"You can't make me go to school!" I said not moving an inch from my seat.

"Get out of the car." He slammed the door closed, and started to walk around the rear towards the school. In anger I pushed the door open and exited the car.

"Are you deaf or just stupid?" I yelled at, when he didn't turn around I slammed the car door and stomped after him. "I'm not enrolling here you can't make me! Take me home!" I was creating a scene for the few kids and their parents in the parking lot, but I didn't care. "For fuck sakes!" I snapped, I ran up to my uncle and grabbed him by the shoulder forcing him to stop.

"Take me home!"

"Oh shut up!" He yelled back at me, I was shocked that he had yelled at me, it was something that I hadn't been expecting. "You don't have to enrol, but I promised my foster parents that I would take you here to at least see the school."

"Why?"

"Because it's the only way to keep them from turning you over to some kind of delinquent class so you can 'become a proper young lady'"

"I went. It's called cotillion."

He rolled his eyes at me. "You lied straight to their faces Toni, you told them a pretty screwed up story and they didn't like it. You have to at least show that you're thinking about college or they're going to attempt to send you to some kind of military style school."

I stared at James, he didn't believe me, they didn't believe me, no one believed the truth and they all believed Clara's lies. Back in the Valley everyone knew the truth, but here Clara had them all wrapped around her finger. "I didn't fucking lie!"

He sighed hands slapping against his thighs in annoyance. "Toni, I'm trying to help you. I don't want to see you sent away."

"They can't send me away-"

"Yes they can." He interrupted. "And if you actually plan on leaving when you're eighteen you're going to have to be in Clara's care, not some school, they can make you stay until you complete a program which with your attitude, and physical skill level could take years." It was unfair, it was completely unfair, I told the truth and now they wanted to screw me over for it. I was vibrating with anger, but I managed to stay calm long enough to avert the attention of the onlookers. "Are you going to come in or what?"

I didn't say anything, just pushed past him and towards the school doors with the large sign that read OPEN HOUSE.

I didn't really fit in, I kind of stuck out, for some reason all the kids were dressed up, not suit and tie, but hair brushed and nice shirt and pants. I was in my grass stained jeans and an old T-shirt, my hair was still in the ponytail I had slept in and I was wearing my PF flyers from three years ago.

"So what course did you apply to again?" I hadn't noticed that James had followed me inside.

"Fuck off." I muttered loud enough for him to hear, I walked on into the halls of the school, James didn't follow me thankfully. There were booths set up everywhere, and it was almost impossible for me to squeeze my way through the cluster of students surrounding them.

"Hey there!" A voice called out. I kept walking but then it came again "Hello? Hi!" I turned to see a very blonde girl with a high pony tail and a clipboard smiling far too wide at me.

"What?" I asked.

"You look like you're super sporty." Oh jesus. Although I may have looked like a sports person, she did not. She reminded me of Wendy, very pretty with red lipstick and perky air about her, but her happiness didn't seem genuine like Wendy's was, she seemed annoyed to be there and was one rude student away from snapping the clipboard in half. "Would you be interested in playing some team sports this year? It's a great way to stay healthy and be apart of a group and make new friends." Despite the fact that I wasn't really listening to her, I approached the table anyways. There was a stack of the lists of sports the school offered, I scanned over it not finding the only sport I was looking for. "Are you an athlete?" She asked.

"Uh, I think your list is wrong, the baseball team isn't on here." I told her holding the sheet up so she could see.

"Oh no." She said her smile never wavering. "You see this is the girls sign up for sports. The boys is down there." She pointed with the clipboard down the hall but with the crowd of students I couldn't see where she meant. "We have softball though."

I put the paper down and went in search of the booth that she was talking about receiving a not so nice, 'nice talking to you' from her.

I didn't find the booth that she was talking about, I assumed it was the booth that was surrounded by teenage boys hollering and cheering but I strayed away from it. The next hallway I turned down happened to be a lot emptier. I could read the banners now and it seemed I was in the hallways for more sports.

The one with the baseball on it caught my eye, and I approached it.

"Hi." There was another volunteer behind the table, a male, that seemed a little more relaxed about being there. I gave him a nod and looked around the table for a registry form but didn't find one, there were a bunch of booklets with a baseball player on the front though. "Can I help you with something?"

"Is this where you sign up for the baseball team?" He gave me a funny look.

"Uh, this is where you register to try out for the team, yes."

"All the other booths have sign ups-" He stopped me then.

"Oh, the other hallway is like the fun part of it. You know on Thursday nights where you can drink beer and forget what the score was at the end of the night? This is the registry for the teams, students looking to play competitive baseball for the school and compete in tournaments and for scholarships."

"That makes more sense." I said and he laughed a little bit. "So how does this work?"

"Well we have scouts that have done recruiting and have either given spots to players or have offered for players to come and try out for the team. We can take as many players as we need, last year they took twenty."

"Twenty?" He laughed again.

"You have to have a starting roster, and then a second string for each position and you know only some players can pitch-"

"No I get it. . . it's just thats alot."

"Yeah. So anyways there are some kids that don't have the scout come so we offer the opportunity here to sign up to tryout." I nodded picking up on of the booklets.

"Do you have a brother or something play ball?" I looked up at the green eyed and blond haired boy.

"No. I'm a baseball player." He seemed surprised, just like everyone else was. "When are tryouts."

He held up his hands to stop me before I said anything else ridiculous. "Hold on. The team is Varsity, meaning any age can come and tryout, but it's Varsity boys. We don't allow girls on the team."

"Why not?"

"Well, if we did then the entire rules would have to be changed, they would demand that we accept a certain number of girls and then there would be issues if we didn't take any. It's just how it is."

I rolled my eyes at him, "I asked you when tryouts were."

"If you show up to the tryouts, they won't let you on the field, even if they did they wouldn't take you." He was being as calm as possible and as reasonable as possible, but it still aggravated me.

"Hey Spena!" Kenny's cheerful voice came from down the hallway, taking my attention away from the boy at the table.

"Hey Kenny." I had to force a smile at him. "I didn't really think I was going to see you around anytime soon."

"Whys that?" I shrugged, not really wanting to tell him that I thought he was going to be too busy to hang with me. "Oh, so did Benny really get chased out of town, cause I have to tell you that is badass-"

"Shhh shut up!" I snapped covering his big fat mouth with my hand which he pushed off.

"Hey I want you to meet someone."

"It's not another teammate is it?" I asked, he only laughed and shook his head leading me down the halls again. "Hey coach."

"Oh god." I muttered ready to run the other way, it wasn't because of his coach, it was because he was standing next to the scout that had come to our game a few weeks ago.

"This is Toni Spena, Toni this is Coach O'Niall." I shook his hand. "Coach this is one of my childhood friends, and the best pitcher out of the Valley."

"Hi." I smiled.

"Well nice to meet you Toni." He didn't ask me anything about playing baseball, figured he must have thought Kenny was exaggerating. "You planning on going to school here in the fall?"

"Ah well, no not really." He raised an eyebrow at me.

"Whatcha doing here then?" I didn't know what to say, I couldn't tell him that I was being blackmailed to show up here and look around.

"I was kinda looking for a job I guess." I lied.

"A job?" I nodded.

"Yes sir." He was an older gentlemen with salt and pepper hair and deep laugh lines creased on his face. He was taller than me but only by an inch or two and his skin was very tan from hours out in the son. I glanced at the scout, he seemed disinterested in the conversation, he hadn't even given me a second look.

"Well now, you tell me, you like baseball Toni?"

"yes."

"And you know baseball?" I nodded. "Well hows about you come work for me?"

I must have looked as shocked as was because he let out a hearty laugh.

"As a coach?"

"No no no, kind of like a equipment manager, you know make sure all the equipment is in order, and with tryouts coming up I'm going to need a smart young girl like you to keep all these

boys in line."

I stared at him, in bewilderment. "Are you seriously offering me a job?"

"Well come and help out with the tryouts, help me see things that I might not be able to, you like it you can stay on and help with the scheduling and equipment. How does that sound?" I looked at Kenny, who was beaming at me and nodding in encouragement. "Kenny had talked about you. If you don't like it you can quit."

"I uh. I don't really know what to say other than yes. Thank you." I shook his hand smiling. This could work, I would be going to the school as a worker and no one else needed to know why I was going, I would say it was some kind of school prep and at the same time I would be making some money and on the diamond.

"Alright, if you come here tomorrow I'll introduce you to the rest of the team. How's Ten o'clock sound?"

"Sounds great. Thank you." He gave me another smile and then directed the scout away to finish their conversation.

"You can thank me." Kenny said nudging my shoulder with his.

"And why would I do that?"

"I just got you free access to the ball diamond. You'll get a key to the shed and diamond, you are welcome."

I rolled my eyes at him but I was grateful, maybe this would make things a little more bearable.

Any ideas on what might happen next? I like to hear your predictions, sometimes I even like them better than my own Ideas LOL