The Hit-Away Kid Read online

  To Stephanie Owens Lurie

  Copyright

  Text copyright © 1998 by Catherine M. Christopher

  Illustrations copyright © 1988 by Little Brown

  and Company (Inc.)

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM OR BY ANY ELECTRONIC OR MECHANICAL MEANS, INCLUDING INFORMATION STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEMS, WITHOUT PERMISSION IN WRITING FROM THE PUBLISHER, EXCEPT BY A REVIEWER WHO MAY QUOTE BRIEF PASSAGES IN A REVIEW.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are

  fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or

  dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Matt Christopher® is a registered trademark of

  Catherine M. Christopher.

  Hachette Book Group

  237 Park Avenue

  New York, NY 10017

  Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com

  First eBook Edition: December 2009

  ISBN: 978-0-316-09595-2

  Contents

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  1

  It was the top of the fourth inning and Barry McGee, left fielder for the Peach Street Mudders, was bored. He loved baseball, and he loved to win. He would do almost anything to win. But today’s game was slow as molasses. A ball hadn’t been hit out to him since the first inning, when the Belk’s Junk Shop batters had knocked out seven hits and racked up six runs. It sure had looked as if they would never get out.

  Then the Mudders had scored three times in the second inning and once in the third, proving to the Junk Shoppers that they were still in the game.

  But now Barry felt as if he were just one of the spectators. The Shoppers were hitting the ball in every direction but left field.

  Crack! Barry reacted to the sharp sound of the bat connecting with the ball and saw the white pill zip past pitcher Sparrow Fisher’s head. Center fielder José Mendez scooped it up and whipped it in to second baseman Nicky Chong, holding the Belk’s Joe Tuttle to a single.

  Maybe good ol’ Brian Feinberg will pop one out to me, Barry thought hopefully.

  Good ol’ Brian popped one out, all right, but it was to right fielder Alfie Maples.

  Then Eddie Lathan hit a hard one to shortstop Bus Mercer, who had to go to his right a little to catch the ball. But he flubbed it. And by the time he had control of it, Joe was on second and Eddie was on first.

  “That’s okay, Bus!” Barry yelled, knowing how Bus must feel after making an error. He hated making errors, too. Nothing was worse, except maybe striking out with runners on base.

  Sparrow mowed Monk Solomon down with three straight strikes, bringing up the Belk’s left fielder, Jerry Moon. Jerry was a righthander, but he batted from the left side of the plate. No way, Barry thought, will he hit a ball out to me.

  Crack! Jerry belted Sparrow’s first pitch to deep left field. Surprised, Barry turned and sprinted toward the sign-covered fence. A hit would score a run. A catch would end the inning. He glanced back over his shoulder, saw the ball dropping down fast over his head, and reached out for it.

  Just then he tripped over a lump of sod. He lost his balance and started to fall. But he kept his eye on the ball and got his glove under it just as he hit the ground.

  It was a great play … until the ball rolled off his glove and onto the grass! In a flash Barry retrieved it. His back was to the umpire and the crowd — who could see what he did? He jumped to his feet, shouting, “I’ve got it! I’ve got it!”

  “Out!” yelled the base umpire.

  Barry ran in, holding the ball up in his gloved hand and grinning widely. He heard some Peach Street Mudders fans yell, “Nice catch, Barry!”

  Then another voice from the sideline said, “You dropped it. I saw you.”

  2

  Barry’s smile faded and his heart leaped as he glanced toward the sideline. There sat his sister, Susan, and their little brother, Tommy. Barry had seen them there earlier but had practically forgotten about them.

  He gave Susan a dirty look that said Keep your mouth shut. Then he turned away and continued on toward the dugout.

  But some of the Belk’s Junk Shop fans must have seen him drop the ball, too. “He dropped it, ump! What are you, blind?” a couple of them yelled.

  Luckily, the umpire’s decision held. Jerry Moon was out.

  So much for your big mouth, Susan, he thought. But at the same time, deep down he felt guilty. What he’d done wasn’t right. Well, he’d have to forget it, that’s all. If he could.

  Sparrow, batting last in the lineup, led off with a single. Then Barry stepped to the plate. He felt comfortable here. He’d rather bat than field any day. Maybe, he thought, he could get a long hit and make up for his cover-up.

  He glanced at Coach Parker, who was coaching third base, and got the bunt signal.

  Barry couldn’t believe it.

  “Oh, no!” he moaned. “I can’t bunt!”

  He decided he wouldn’t bunt, no matter what the coach had signaled him to do. Even though he was leadoff hitter for the Mudders, he was known by a lot of the players and fans as a hit-away batter, and he liked that. It made him feel good. Important.

  Anyway, so far today he had gotten a single and a walk. He deserved to keep swinging. Maybe this time he could sock the old apple out of the lot for a two-run homer. He was due for a round-tripper.

  Barry stepped into the box, waited for the first pitch, and shifted into a bunting position. He missed the pitch deliberately. He missed the second one, too, even though both pitches were almost directly over the heart of the plate.

  Then he looked at the coach again and saw him give the hit-away sign. Barry hid a grin. I fooled him, he thought.

  He didn’t hit a round-tripper, but he managed to lace a line drive between third base and shortstop for a single.

  “That-away, hit-away!” a fan yelled.

  Barry smiled.

  “Tell me something, Barry,” Monk, the Belk’s first baseman, said. “Did you really catch that fly ball?”

  Barry stared at him. “Of course I did!” he snapped. He let his eyes bore into Monk’s dark ones for a moment, then he leaned over to tuck his blue socks under his white pant-legs. He hated to lie. But it was too late to tell the truth now. Like his father used to say when such situations came up, Never trouble trouble till trouble troubles you.

  Turtleneck Jones — who got his nickname from the turtleneck sweaters he usually wore — batted next and drove a double between left and center fields. Sparrow scored, and Barry circled the bases to third.

  Coach Parker approached Barry from the coaching box. His eyes were shadowed by the baseball cap pushed low over his forehead. “Barry, who do you think you’re kidding?” the coach said sharply. “You missed bunting those balls on purpose. You were lucky to get a hit, but the next time I give you a bunt sign, you bunt. Understand?”

  Barry blushed. So he hadn’t fooled him.

  Silent, he nodded.

  “Okay. Play it safe,” Coach Parker cautioned. “Make sure the ball goes through the infield before you run for home.”

  The coach returned to the coaching box, and Barry turned his attention back to the batter, his best friend, José Mendez. José took a called strike, then popped out to short for the first out, bringing up T.V. Adams. T.V. was short, stocky, and smart, and he could hit the ball a mile — if he connected. Barry remembered that T.V. had doubled in the second inning and flied out in the third. As a cleanup hit
ter, he’s due for another long hit, Barry thought.

  He glanced back over his shoulder at the scoreboard. Junk Shop 6, Mudders 5.

  A hit could score two runs, putting the Mudders ahead, Barry reflected. But suppose T.V. didn’t get a hit? Suppose he popped up, or hit a grounder …?

  “Keep on your toes,” Coach Parker’s soft voice reached him. “If he hits it, make sure it goes through.”

  “Strike two!” cried the umpire, as Finky O’Dell, the Junk Shop’s left-handed pitcher, steamed his second pitch past T.V.

  Oh, no! Barry thought. What’s T.V. going to do? Strike out?

  Then … crack! A sharp grounder down toward first base! T.V. dropped his bat and scooted for first. And Barry, seeing that the ball seemed to be heading past Monk’s right side, bolted for home.

  “Barry! Wait up!” Barry heard the coach yell.

  But he was several running steps away from third base by now, too late to turn around and go back. Monk was diving after the ball, which was between him and the bag, and Barry thought, I should be able to make it. And we need this run to tie the score.

  3

  “Hit the dirt! Hit it!” cried Bus, standing beside the plate with a bat in his hand.

  Barry’s cap had already blown off halfway down the basepath, and he was puffing like a steam engine as he raced for home, where Brian Feinberg was waiting for the throw-in from first base. Barry hit the dirt just as Brian caught the ball. Barry tried to slide around him, but Brian had the plate covered like an umbrella.

  “Out!” yelled the ump.

  Barry sat there a minute, looking up at the ump, then at Brian, and finally toward first base, where Monk was poking a fist into the air in triumph.

  “Nice play, Monk!” a Junk Shop fan yelled.

  Monk got T.V. out, then threw me out, Barry realized. It sure was a good play.

  He rose to his feet, brushed the dust off his white uniform, and ran to get his glove and cap off the roof of the dugout. As he headed for third base, he almost collided with Coach Parker.

  “Hold it, speedy,” the coach snapped.

  Barry froze. That voice meant business.

  “Don’t tell me that you didn’t hear me yell at you to wait on third,” the coach said firmly. “I yelled it loud enough for the whole crowd to hear me.”

  “Yes, I heard you,” Barry admitted, glancing briefly at the coach. His dark, angry eyes sent shivers through him. “I’m sorry. I … I thought I had a good enough lead.”

  “You thought. Listen, you’re no different from the other players, Barry. You play by the same rules as everybody else. So let me do most of the thinking here, okay?”

  Barry nodded, embarrassed. Lowering his eyes, he started to trot out to left field.

  “Hold it,” the coach said. “After all that running, you need to sit for a while.” He glanced toward the dugout. “Tootsie! Take left!” the coach ordered.

  A short, stout kid sitting near the middle of the dugout cried, “Yippee!” Then, pulling a glove onto his left hand and tugging at his cap with his right, he ran to the outfield. He flashed a smile as he passed by Barry, but Barry didn’t see it. He was heading, head bowed, toward the dugout.

  “Jack, take short.” He heard the coach snap another order.

  Jack Livingston, a tall, thin redhead, ran out to replace Bus at shortstop. All at once Barry didn’t feel so bad. The coach was putting in other substitutes, too.

  Barry could still hear the coach’s strong words ringing in his ears. He sure knows how to drill them into a guy, he thought. But was the coach 100 percent right? I almost scored, Barry said to himself. I wonder what the coach would’ve said if I’d been safe? He probably would have clapped like crazy.

  “You play by the same rules as everybody else,” the coach had said. Barry remembered the fly ball he had dropped and retrieved in time to fool everybody. Well, almost everybody. Why did Susan have to be sitting in that particular spot on the sideline, anyway? Now he’d think about that play every time he saw her. And he saw her a lot.

  “Hey, man, can’t wait till we play you guys next week.” A strong, husky voice broke into his thoughts.

  Barry turned to see a kid peeking around the edge of the dugout. A kid whose face was more familiar than any other pitcher’s in the Summer Baseball Junior League.

  “Why?” Barry asked Alec Frost, the High Street Bunkers’ fastball pitcher.

  “Why?” Alec laughed. “Because you haven’t struck out yet. And that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to strike you out so bad the fans will forget they ever called you the hit-away kid.”

  4

  “Deeper! Deeper!”

  Barry looked up and saw T.V. Adams motioning Tootsie Malone to back up toward the fence. T.V. did that a lot. He seemed to have a real knack for predicting where the opposing batters were going to hit the ball.

  As usual, he was right on the button. Arnie Nobles, the Junk Shop’s leadoff batter, had blasted a home run his first time up, and it looked as if he was ready to do it again. He was a tall kid and had a lot of power in his swing.

  Crack! He connected a two-two pitch for a long drive toward deep left field, just as T.V. had figured he might. If Tootsie hadn’t played deep, the ball would have gone over his head for at least a triple. But Tootsie only had to take two steps back, raise his gloved hand, and catch it.

  Neither team scored again. The game went to Belk’s Junk Shoppers, 6 to 5.

  “Well, it made no difference anyway,” Susan said as she and Tommy walked home with Barry.

  “What made no difference?” Barry asked.

  “That you missed the ball,” she said. “We lost anyway.”

  He glared at her. “Will you stop saying that?” he snapped. “You weren’t there; I was. And the ump called the guy out. That’s it.”

  “I saw you drop it,” Susan said evenly. “And I know you like to cheat.”

  “I do not!” he almost shouted. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because it’s true,” Susan said. “Whenever we play board games, you —”

  “Okay, okay!” Barry cut her off short. “Maybe I do cheat sometimes, but not all the time. And I don’t do it to hurt anybody.”

  “Maybe not. But you hate to lose,” Susan argued. “And if you can cheat a little, and make up your own rules —”

  “You sound like Coach Parker,” Barry interrupted her again. He tried not to let her arguments get under his skin, but he couldn’t help it. “He said something to me about making up my own rules, too. What’s wrong with liking to win, anyway? Everybody likes to win, don’t they?”

  “Yes. But not by cheating.”

  His face burned. Cheating. He was really beginning to hate that word. “Just don’t say anything about it to Mom and Dad,” he said gruffly. “I don’t want them jumping on my back, too.”

  Susan shrugged. “Okay by me. It’s your problem, not mine.”

  Barry looked at her a long minute. He thought he’d feel better after she said that, but he didn’t. He felt worse.

  At dinner, Barry’s father didn’t lose any time asking about the game. “How’d it come out?” he wanted to know.

  “They lost!” Tommy yelled.

  Everyone laughed. Tommy didn’t talk a lot, but whenever he did he made a point.

  “You’re pretty quiet, Barry,” Mr. McGee observed. “Didn’t you get any hits?”

  “Two singles and a walk,” he answered.

  “Great!” His father beamed.

  “And I made a tough catch,” Barry went on. He thought he could feel Susan’s eyes on him, but she was calmly eating. Suddenly Barry didn’t have much of an appetite.

  “Well, that’s good work, son,” Mr. McGee said proudly.

  “There’s more. I dropped it …, ” Barry confessed. “But I pretended I didn’t.”

  5

  Barry’s parents stared at him. “You what?” his mother exclaimed.

  Barry’s heart pounded. “I pretended I caught the ball,
” he said.

  Susan cleared her throat, and Barry looked at her. Their eyes locked, and he wished she could read his mind: Keep out of this, little sister.

  “And you got away with it?” his father said and shook his head. “Barry, I’m surprised at you.”

  “And I’m disappointed,” his mother added, her eyes wide as she looked at him. “What a terrible thing to do, Barry. I think you should tell Coach Parker.”

  “It’s too late for that, Mom,” Barry said. “I’m sorry I did it. Okay? I promise I won’t do it again.”

  Susan coughed, and their eyes clinched again.

  “I said I won’t, and I won’t,” he said to her, his voice higher. “Okay?”

  “Okay!” Susan cried. “I didn’t say a word, did I?”

  “No, but you coughed,” he said. “That’s almost like saying something.”

  “Okay, okay,” Mr. McGee cut in to settle the argument. “Barry apologized for what he did, and I’m sure he won’t let it happen again. Now let’s finish our dinner.”

  Barry breathed a sigh of relief. Boy! he thought. What a big deal over a stupid dropped ball!

  The next morning Barry felt like skateboarding with José. Just as he lifted his green-and-white skateboard out of the closet, he heard his sister’s high-pitched voice ask, “Can I skateboard with you? I won’t be in your way, I promise.”

  He looked at her, and then at Tommy, who was clinging onto Susan’s blue jeans.

  “Aw, Susan,” Barry moaned. “You’re always butting in.”

  “Butting in? I didn’t butt in at the dinner table last night, did I?” she said with a gleam in her eye. “You cooked your own goose.”

  Barry had to smile. “Well, all right,” he said. “But Tommy stays here.” He leaned over and tickled his little brother’s chin. “Keep an eye on Mom, pal. Okay?”