Danny was lying across his bed, fingers dancing over the controller as he merrily wiped out the security robots of the evil Alistair Smythe, Spider-Man’s archenemy.

After all, what was the point of being bitten by a genetically altered spider and given the awesome power of a million arachnids if you couldn’t dish out payback to the bad guys?

Suddenly something hit his ear. He looked down to see a wet washcloth.

He turned to see his brother standing in the doorway smiling broadly. Joey was naked except for a towel wrapped around his waist.

“Mom! Dad! There’s a sicko-pervert in my room!” Danny yelled, turning back to the video game. “Somebody call 911!”

Joey took a few steps and launched himself into the air with a loud “AAAIIEEEYAH!” He landed with a thud on Danny’s back. The two went crashing to the floor as Joey laughed hysterically.

Quickly Joey pounced on his brother. He took hold of Danny’s wrists, crossed Danny’s arms, and pulled them back and around Danny’s neck.

“Oh, he gets him in the Japanese Stranglehold!” Joey said, imitating the frenzied tone of a pro wrestling announcer. “The pain must be unbearable! Ladies and gentlemen, I don’t see how this match can continue much longer!”

“Doesn’t…hurt…at…all,” Danny wheezed.

Then Joey put him in a headlock, squeezing around both ears.

“Now look!” he continued in announcer mode. “The wily veteran hits his opponent with the Brain Buster! Blood flow to the cerebral cortex stops in ten seconds! In twenty seconds, paralysis and even death can occur! For the love of God, somebody please stop the match!”

Somehow, with his face mashed into the carpet, Danny managed to croak, “Still…doesn’t…hurt.”

Only when Joey pulled him up by the hair, crooked an arm under his neck, and shouted, “No! Not the dreaded Sleeper Hold!” did Danny gasp, “Okay, okay…I…surrender!”

Joey shot to his feet and thrust his hands in the air. “Still the undisputed one-hundred-and-seventy-five-pound champion of the World Wrestling Federation!” he cried, dancing around the room. “The crowd is going wild! Listen to the chants of this sellout crowd: ‘JO-EY! JO-EY!’”

“No, they’re chanting ‘WEIRD-O! WEIRD-O!’” Danny said, scowling and massaging his neck. “Why do I have to go through this every time you’re a little bored?”

“Gotta work on my wrestling moves, bro,” Joey said, flopping on the other bed. “And you’re fresh meat.”

He shot to his feet and flexed his biceps. Then, kissing each one lovingly, he pointed at Danny and shouted, “You can run, fool, but you can’t hide!”

As usual, Danny couldn’t help cracking up at his brother’s antics.

This was how it always went. The truth was that Danny loved horsing around with Joey, even though these sessions generally ended with Danny being planted headfirst in the clothes hamper or tossed unceremoniously in the closet like an old duffel bag.

Despite the gap in their ages—Joey was a rising senior at Stevenson High while Danny was going into eighth grade at York Middle—the two brothers had always been close. Whenever he was home, Joey always made a point of stopping by Danny’s room at the end of the day to talk or joke around, even if it was just for a minute or two.

“Heard you were All-World in Metro League again today,” Danny said, retrieving the controller from the floor.

Joey shrugged. “I was okay. The Titans don’t have too many sticks in that lineup. Don’t let anybody tell you I was great, ’cause I wasn’t.”

“I don’t know,” Danny said. “‘The All About Joey Hour’ had you mowing them down like Clayton Kershaw.”

Joey grinned knowingly. “Mom gets a little carried away, doesn’t she? Want some advice? Start wearing headphones on the ride home. Then you won’t have to listen to that stuff.”

That was another thing Danny admired about his brother: Joey never took himself too seriously. Even though everyone in town—including his two starstruck parents—seemed to be buzzing about the seemingly boundless future he had as a major league prospect, Joey didn’t let it affect him. He was as modest and unassuming now as he had been two years ago, when he’d struggled as an inconsistent starter with an ugly delivery and big-time control problems on the Stevenson jayvee team.

“How ’bout you?” Joey said, sitting down again. “Did you light it up for the O’s tonight?”

Danny snorted and shook his head.

“Not really,” he said. “The truth is, I sucked. I mean, really, really sucked. If I was on a baseball card, that’s what they’d put underneath my photo: ‘Danny Connolly, right-hander. Five feet seven, one hundred and fifty pounds. Lifetime stats: Don’t bother. He sucks.’”

Joey’s eyes widened. “Whoa! What’s going on here? Someone get hit hard tonight?”

“More like for the past three weeks,” Danny said mournfully.

“Gotta stay positive, little bro,” said Joey. “It’s the only way to be in this—”

Danny cut him off. “You want positive? Okay, how’s this: I positively suck. I don’t know where my fastball’s going. My curve is nonexistent. And every time I throw a changeup, they hit it so far you need a passport to retrieve it.”

“Great line,” Joey said. “Except you stole it from SportsCenter.”

Danny nodded. “Guilty as charged. See? Not only don’t I have a future in baseball—I don’t have one as a sports anchor, either.”

He turned back to the video game and pretended to concentrate. But he could feel Joey’s eyes boring into the back of his head. And since Joey was being quiet, that meant he was thinking.

Danny knew exactly what he was thinking, too.

“Anything I can do to help?” Joey said finally.

Danny shook his head softly. Good ol’ Joey. Always the first to look after his little brother; the first to worry about him when things went wrong.

Whenever Danny had a problem with any of the kids in the neighborhood, Joey would come to the rescue, defusing the situation before Danny started running his mouth and possibly got his butt beat.

It was the same at York Middle. Like when Danny had had an issue with Mr. Ferguson, his math teacher. Joey, who’d had Mr. F previously, made it a point to drop by the classroom after school. With his breezy manner and disarming smile, Joey had regaled Mr. F with stories about what a good kid and dedicated student Danny was—even though both brothers knew that last part wasn’t exactly true. More like a load of bull, actually. But it had worked.

“Only way you could help,” Danny said mournfully now, “would be to take the mound for me on Friday, when we play the Indians. Only I’m pretty sure the Indians would get suspicious when you tried squeezing into one of our uniforms. It’d be like Bruce Banner transforming into the Hulk. You’d be shredding those sleeves.”

He looked at Joey with a sad smile. “And once you threw one of those ninety-mile-per-hour heaters that goes under the batter’s chin? And the kid goes back to the dugout with his pants wet and his knees shaking, wailing for his mommy? They’d totally check your birth certificate then.”

Joey laughed and held up a hand.

“Dude, I meant if you want me to check out your windup and delivery, see if anything’s out of whack…”

“Everything’s out of whack,” Danny said. “Thanks for the offer, big bro. But I have to work out of this myself.”

Joey shot him a sympathetic look. He climbed to his feet and headed for the door.

“Okay, let me leave you with one piece of advice,” he said. “Ready? It goes like this: whatever you’re doing now, do something different.”

“That’s deep,” Danny said, rolling his eyes. “Very, very deep.”

“Not really,” Joey said. “Sometimes you just gotta change things up. If you normally warm up a certain way before a game, warm up a different way. If you usually throw a fastball on the first pitch, try a curve. Just do something—anything—to shake up your normal routine. Sometimes it helps get you back on track again.”

When he was gone, Danny thought, How ’bout I never play this stupid game again? How ’bout if I throw my glove in the trash and torch my uniform on the front lawn in full view of the neighbors?

Would that qualify as shaking things up?

He could imagine the look on his parents’ faces, especially his dad’s, when he delivered that little bombshell. Mom? Dad? Don’t need a ride to the game Friday. Why? Oh, because I hate baseball. And I’m quitting the Orioles.

If his dad was drinking coffee, he’d spit it halfway across the room. Jim Connolly loved baseball only slightly less than he loved breathing and double cheeseburgers. The idea of one of his sons not playing the game would be unthinkable.

It would upset his brother, too. Joey would try to fix this—Danny had no doubt about that. But Joey had enough on his mind already, trying to pitch well and impress the scouts every night while also trying to decide whether to sign a pro contract or go to college next year.

He sure didn’t need his head-case little brother throwing a hissy fit just because he’d lost a few games, making things even more stressful around the house.

As Danny gazed around the room distractedly, his eyes came to rest on his dog, Scooter. The big chocolate Lab was curled up in a corner near the closet, doing what he seemed to do best: sleeping.

“What about you, Scooter?” Danny asked. “What do you think I should do about all this?”

At the sound of his name, the dog opened one eye before quickly closing it again. Within seconds, he was back asleep, breathing deeply and contentedly.

“That’s it?” Danny said. “That’s all you got?”

Apparently it was.

Danny sighed and hit the controller again. He was done thinking about baseball for one day.

Done thinking about anything except blasting Alistair Smythe’s security robots.

Which were really starting to get on his nerves.