Snooky dropped his bike and hurried toward Syl. “I know you don’t want me to shadow you,” he said. “In fact, I almost couldn’t because I didn’t know where you’d gone. I called your house, and your mom said you were at bunting practice. But the tee-ball league has the field. Then I remembered this place.”
“What made you think I’d come here?” Syl wanted to know.
Snooky shot Syl a confident look. “You had a peculiar expression on your face when standing in this old ball field the other day. It’s an expression I’ve seen before. You’ve had another encounter from the beyond, haven’t you?” He kicked at a weed. “Just my luck to get here too late to see the ghost.”
Syl knew then that Mr. Teacy and Mr. Baruth had vanished. He gritted his teeth in frustration. He’d hoped to spend more time with Mr. Baruth. But unless Snooky left, that wasn’t going to happen. With a sigh, he zipped up his bag. “There’s nothing to see here, Snooky,” he said.
Snooky didn’t look convinced. “Nothing to see here now,” he amended. He held his hands out toward the field as if testing the air. “But I sense a cosmic energy here. If we stick around, I bet your ghost will return.”
“Bet anything you like,” Syl said. “I’m leaving.”
Snooky’s shoulders slumped. “No point in my staying then,” he said, his voice thick with disappointment. “You’re the key that unlocks the door to the other side. I could knock until my knuckles are raw. Without you, that door just won’t open.”
Syl bit his lip. He hated seeing his friend upset, but what could he do? He didn’t control who saw the ghosts.
Or did he? He blinked. If the photo he’d taken came out, he could show it to Snooky. It wouldn’t be the same as seeing the real thing, but it was better than nothing. And he owed his friend at least that much. After all, Snooky was the only one of his buddies who truly believed in his mysterious ballplayers.
I’ll drop off the film on the way home, he decided, and pick it up later tonight. If the photo is good, I’ll call Snooky to come see it. He laughed to himself. Who knows? Maybe I’ll call the newspapers, too!
“Cheer up, Snooky,” he said, slinging a leg over his bike. “Just because you didn’t see anything here doesn’t mean you won’t see something someday.”
Sylvester and Snooky rode back to town together but parted at the ballpark. Once Syl was sure Snooky was gone, he veered toward the local shopping mall to find the camera store.
He was so busy looking at store signs that he didn’t notice that his bike wasn’t riding smoothly. When he finally did, he groaned. His back tire was flat!
He pulled into the mall parking lot to consider his options. He carried a patch kit for just such emergencies, so he could fix the tire. Or he could call his mother to come get him. He decided to call. But when he looked for his phone inside his gear bag, he couldn’t find it. He groaned again, remembering that he’d left it at home, plugged into its charger.
Patch kit it is! He removed his gear bag from the back of the bike to make the job easier. He’d just started working when he heard a familiar voice.
“Ew, pew, what’s that smell? Must be a Codd-fish!”
It was his archenemy, Duke Farrell. Duke was a pitcher; every time they met on the diamond, he did his best to make Syl look like a loser at the plate. But Syl had always let his bat do the talking and turned the tables so that it was Duke who ended up with egg on his face.
Syl glanced back and saw that Duke’s sidekick, Steve Button, was with him. “Leave me alone, you guys,” he growled.
“Let’s play a game first,” Duke said. “This is one of my favorites. I call it keep-away!” He grabbed Syl’s gear bag.
“Hey, give it back!” Sylvester shouted, standing up.
Duke waggled his finger. “Not until you play!” He flung the bag over Syl’s head into Steve’s waiting hands.
Syl tried to snatch it, with no success. Frustration boiled up inside him. “I don’t have time for this! Give me my bag!”
Steve hefted the bag over his head. “Make me!”
“You asked for it!” Syl said and then barreled straight at Steve.
“Ooof!” Steve fell onto his backside. The bag flew out of his hands and landed right in front of an oncoming pickup truck!
Crunch!
As the truck rolled over the bag, the driver’s head snapped up. Steve scrambled to his feet and took off with Duke right behind him. The woman leaned out her window and stared at the lump behind her tire, a look of horror on her face. “What is that?”
“It is—was—my baseball stuff,” Syl replied sadly.
While the woman parked the pickup, Syl retrieved his belongings. He sat on the curb and examined the contents one by one. His glove and ball were fine, but his water bottle had been crushed to smithereens. So had the camera.
The woman put her hand to her mouth. “Oh, no, look what I did!”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Syl protested. “It was those other boys. They threw the bag in your way.”
But the woman shook her head. “You don’t understand,” she said. “I was texting when I pulled in here. I should have been paying attention to my driving, but I wasn’t.” She sat down next to him and put her head in her hands. “What if that had been a child?”
Sylvester patted her back awkwardly. “It wasn’t, though.”
After a few minutes, the woman took a deep breath and stood up. “I’ll replace your things, I promise,” she said. “But for now, let me give you a lift home.”
Syl nodded. “Can I use your phone to call my mom first?”
Fifteen minutes later, the truck pulled into the Coddmyers driveway. Mrs. Coddmyer hurried out.
“I’m fine, Mom,” Syl said before she could pepper him with questions.
The woman and his mother talked while Syl unloaded his bike and his gear. He gave the broken camera one last look before dropping it into the trash can.
Sorry, Snooky, he thought. I tried.
After the woman left, Mrs. Coddmyer showed Syl a check she had given her. “She insisted on buying us a new camera,” she said. “I told her it wasn’t necessary, that your phone can take pictures and that the camera hadn’t been used in years anyway. But she felt so bad, she wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
It wasn’t until Sylvester was in bed that night that something his mother had said came back to him. “Your phone can take pictures.” He sat up.
My phone can take pictures! he thought excitedly. Maybe I’ll be able to show Snooky photos of Mr. Baruth and Mr. Teacy after all!
Then he realized his plan had a flaw. It was only one problem, but it was major: He had no way of knowing if Mr. Teacy or Mr. Baruth would show up at the field again the next day. They’d vanished that afternoon before he could ask.
All I can do is go back to that field tomorrow, he decided, and hope!
Getting to the old ball field alone the following day wasn’t easy, however. First, he had to persuade his mom to let him go right after school. “I’ll help with the yard sale tonight, I promise!” Then, Trent cornered him after school to coax him into playing the video game with Duane and Jim again.
“Uh, I have a lot of homework and I might have to help my mom,” Syl said. “So I have to go home.”
Trent didn’t press him further, but then Duane caught him strapping Mr. Teacy’s bat onto the back of his bike.
“What’s that for?” Duane asked curiously. “Trent said you were heading home.”
“I am,” Syl replied. “I have the bat because, uh… because I hoped Coach Corbin would check it out, see if it’s regulation so I can use it during practices and games!”
“Didn’t he do that already, when you first showed it to him?”
“I, uh, yeah, I’d forgotten about that,” Syl answered. “So now I’m bringing it back home. See you!”
Before Duane could ask any more questions, Syl jumped onto his bike and pedaled off. He only went a short distance, however, before looking back to see if Duane was still there. He wasn’t, so Syl switched his direction from home to the bike path. He stopped only once, to change into his baseball pants.
Fifteen minutes later, he arrived at the old ball field. To his disappointment, neither Mr. Teacy nor Mr. Baruth was there. He sat down, opened his bag, and pulled out his cell phone to check the battery. The power bar indicated that the phone was fully charged. He took a few test photos of his feet. They came out fine, so he dropped the phone back into his pack.
“How you?”
Syl started. There was Mr. Teacy, leaning against the oak tree, a spot Syl knew had been empty just moments before.
“I’m fine, Mr. Teacy!” he replied. “And ready for some more practice. We were going to work on beating the throw to first today, right? Hmm, guess I better switch into my baseball shoes for that, huh? I’ve got them right here in my bag, so I’ll just get ’em and put ’em on!”
Stop babbling, he berated himself, and just do it!
Heart racing, he reached into his bag and flipped the cover of the phone open. The tiny screen glowed.
“What’s taking you so long?” Mr. Teacy barked.
Syl grabbed one of his baseball shoes to use as cover. With shaking hands, he raised the phone out of the pack, centered Mr. Teacy in the middle of the screen, moved his thumb over the buttons —
And the screen went black.