“Haley, come on. I can’t be late!” I yelled up the stairs. My baseball glove was on my hand. I was ready for my game. All I needed was for Haley to be ready, too.
“Haley!” I yelled again.
“Coming!” she finally shouted back. I heard her door slam and the slapping of her bare feet on the hardwood floor.
As she came down the stairs, I could see why it had taken her so long. She had changed her clothes. Earlier, she’d had on her normal T-shirt and shorts, but she’d replaced them with a jean miniskirt and a tank top that looked like it was a size too small. Plus she had put some kind of glittery makeup all over her eyes.
“Why are you all dressed up?” I asked. “It’s just a baseball game.”
“I’m not,” she said, grabbing her car keys off the hook by the door and slipping into a pair of flip-flops. “Come on. Didn’t you say we needed to go?”
Yes, you are, I wanted to say back. But I didn’t.
The whole ride to the baseball field, Haley’s phone kept buzzing and buzzing inside her bag. “Who keeps calling you?” I finally asked when we were stopped at a red light.
“Probably Zack. He’s going to meet me at the game.”
“Zack’s coming to my game?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Is that a problem or something?”
“No,” I said quietly. I stared at the car in front of us. There were a lot of bumper stickers on the back. There was even that funny one boasting about how the driver’s kindergartener is on the honor roll; Mom really liked that one. But it didn’t seem so funny right then.
“Real convincing,” Haley said.
“Why do you like him so much?” It was something I’d been thinking about since that night two weeks earlier when he’d come over for dinner. He called Haley on the phone all the time, but I couldn’t figure out how they could talk so much. Didn’t they see each other every day at camp? What did she have to tell him? What we ate for dinner? What toothpaste she used?
“There are lots of reasons,” she said. “I mean, he’s artistic and he’s smart. He really thinks about things, you know? He doesn’t just do what everyone else is doing because that’s what you’re supposed to do.” She got that one right. Zack was the only person I knew with a lip ring who wasn’t in some band on TV. “I thought you’d like him.” She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel.
Is she waiting for me to say that I do? That I like Zack, too? Am I supposed to lie?
“Oh,” I said. “Is Zack…is he your boyfriend?”
“I’m not sure yet,” she said. “But maybe soon.”
“Let’s go, Panthers, let’s go!” Katie and I sat next to each other on the bench, slapping our laps and clapping our hands as we did our cheer. “Let’s go, Panthers, let’s go!” Clap, clap. One of the best hitters on our team, Joe, was batting, and Casey was on third, ready to score if Joe could get a hit.
“Come on, Joe!” Katie yelled.
If Casey scored, we’d have the lead again. We kept going back and forth with the Orioles, but we were running out of innings. We needed to score the go-ahead run and then shut them down. A win’s a win, Coach always said. No arguing with that.
Joe swung and missed. Strike three. Two outs.
“Go get ’em, QD,” Katie whisper-yelled. I grabbed my bat and made my way to the on-deck circle while Tommy Sullivan stepped up to the plate. I took a few practice swings and looked out to where Haley and Zack were sitting.
They weren’t there.
Haley’s rainbow chair was there, and Zack’s Chicago Bears fold-up chair was there, but both were empty. Maybe they went to the bathroom, I told myself. They’ll be back by the time I get up to bat. If I get to bat…
“Let’s go, Tommy, let’s go!” Katie and the others cheered from the bench. I took another practice swing. I was ready.
“Come on, Tommy,” I said. “You’ve got this.” The Orioles pitcher was one pitch away from walking him. It’d be awesome for Tommy to get a hit right now and give us the lead, but a tiny part of me wanted it to be me who got the big hit.
Tommy stood there as the pitch came in. The Orioles catcher jumped up to catch it. Way too high. Ball four.
Tommy took first base. Casey stayed at third.
“Let’s go, QD!” Katie yelled. She let out a huge whistle as I stepped into the batter’s box.
You’ve got this, I told myself. You’ve got this.
“There’s two girls on your team?” the Orioles catcher asked through his mask.
“Yeah,” I answered, digging my heels into the dirt, holding my bat back behind my head. “Wait—you just figured that out now?”
The pitcher wound up and threw.
I didn’t budge an inch. Way outside.
“Ball one!” the umpire called.
“Come on, Quinnen. Crush it.” That was Coach Napoli. I didn’t have to look to know he was twiddling his beard. He always did that during close games.
I choked up on my bat as the pitcher wound up again. I didn’t swing at that one, either; it was high and outside. “Ball two!” the umpire said.
I stepped out of the batter’s box to adjust my gloves and glanced over at where Haley and Zack should be. How long could Haley be in the bathroom? It was a porta-potty! She always cheered for me when I was batting, even when we were creaming the other team. And I always heard her loudest of anyone when it was close, when my at-bats really mattered.
I checked the on-deck circle. Kyle Monaghan was there. I liked Kyle all right, but he was one of the worst batters on our team. I needed more than a walk. I needed a hit. I stepped back into the batter’s box and gripped the bat tight. Be ready to swing away, QD.
The pitcher stepped forward and hurled the next pitch. It probably wasn’t a strike, but that didn’t matter. I reached out for it and hit it hard with the barrel of the bat. The ball found the gap between the first baseman and the second baseman and kept going. I was running. Rounding first base, going for second. I could hear the team cheering as Casey scored and then as Tommy beat the throw to the plate. I stopped at third, panting. We did it! I did it! We have the lead again! Panthers rule!
I took off my batting gloves and tucked them in my pocket. And then I looked over to where Haley was supposed to be. Her rainbow-striped chair was still empty.
She’d missed it.
“Great game, everybody. I wish I could take you all out for ice cream today, but you just keep winning, and I’m going broke. See you at practice on Tuesday.” Coach fake-saluted, and then all of us players started talking at the same time.
“Want to come over to my house?” Katie asked me. “We can do flips on the trampoline.”
“I wish I could,” I said. “Tonight’s family dinner, though. Mom’s idea.”
Katie sighed loudly. “Moms.”
“Tell me about it. Have your neighbor make a video and send it to me if you can do ten in a row.”
“Of course!” She waved good-bye, and I walked over to where we hung up the bats. I wanted to bring mine home so I could practice hitting with Dad over the weekend.
“Nice game.” I looked up and saw Zack. He was holding hands with Haley.
“Thanks,” I mumbled. I pretended I couldn’t tell which bat was mine and took an extra-long time to find it.
When I finally grabbed it, Zack and Haley weren’t holding hands anymore. Haley’s hand was touching something on her neck. There was a splotch there, a purple-red spot. There’s no way that was there before. I would have seen it in the car.
“What happened to your neck?” I reached out my finger to point at the spot.
“It’s nothing,” she said.
I shook my head. “Come on. What is it?”
“You wouldn’t understand. I’ll explain later.”
I hated when she said that. If she knew, she should tell me. We didn’t used to keep secrets from each other. But now I didn’t know how many secrets she was keeping from me, how many things I would have to wait to find out. I had lost track.
She went to grab my bag, but I shooed her off. “I’ve got it,” I said.
“We’re giving Zack a ride home. Come on. I don’t want to be late.”
We? Right, Haley.
Zack carried both their chairs as we walked back to the car.
“I don’t know what’s up with you,” Haley said as I put my stuff in the trunk. “Your team won. Why are you in such a bad mood?”
I shrugged.
She was right. We’d won. My team had won, and I’d come through with the most important hit of the whole game. The winning hit.
But she’d missed it because she was off doing something with Zack, and she wouldn’t even tell me about it.