Kelly’s dad was supposed to take her to the city that weekend, to stay at his apartment and do lots of cool stuff like see shows and maybe go to a ball game at the stadium. But like he’d done so many times in the past, he failed to meet her at the appointed hour.

  Kelly was willing to wait around for him, figuring he’d show up eventually. But her mom wasn’t having any of it.

  “Ken and I are going to the museum,” she informed Kelly, “and I’m not going to leave you here alone all day.”

  “It won’t be all day,” Kelly assured her. “Dad’ll come for me eventually.”

  Her mom scowled darkly. “That’s what you say, but I’ve known him too long to put any trust in his promises. And you should know better, too.”

  She picked up the phone and dialed his number. She stood and listened for a moment, then hung up. “His machine isn’t even on. Look, Kelly, that’s it. You’ll have to come with us.”

  “But —”

  “I’ll take the cell phone along, and we can try him once we’re in the city.”

  “Mom, I hate museums!”

  “I’m sorry, but you’ll just have to come with us. If you don’t like it, you can blame your father. It’s not my fault he’s so irresponsible.”

  Kelly kicked at the air, but even she could see there was no way out of it. She was just resigning herself to a boring, awful day when they pulled up in front of Ken’s house to pick him up. Ken was standing outside, and beside him stood Ryan.

  “Is Ryan coming, too?” Kelly asked her mom.

  “Yes, didn’t I tell you? It’s Ken’s day to be with him. So you see? You’ll have some company. It won’t be so bad.”

  Kelly clucked her tongue, to show her mother that it didn’t make any difference. But of course it did. What was going to be merely boring was now going to be tense and awkward. The last time she’d been around Ryan, she’d made a fool of herself, blushing and getting tongue-tied. She was sure he thought she was a total geek.

  “Hi!” Ryan said cheerfully as he slid into the backseat next to her.

  “Oh. Hi,” Kelly mumbled, not daring to look at him. They sat in silence while Ken and her mom yakked it up in the front seat all the way to town.

  Inside the museum, they followed the grown-ups at a safe distance. Ken was obviously a big art freak. He stood in front of each painting, going on and on about how great it was. Kelly’s mom nodded, a blissful smile on her face, and occasionally said something in agreement.

  “I hate museums,” Ryan suddenly said to Kelly. “You?”

  “Big-time,” Kelly agreed, a small smile emerging at one corner of her mouth. “I’d rather be in a dentist’s chair.”

  “The only one I like is the Natural History Museum,” he told her.

  “Me, too,” she said, nodding. “I like those rocks that look like jewels and the stuffed dodo birds and things.”

  “Dino bones?” he asked, smiling broadly.

  “Scary, but yeah.”

  “I keep thinking it would be really cool to have had one for a pet,” Ryan said.

  “Yeah, right?” she said with a laugh.

  “Hey,” he said, his voice hushed. “You wanna ditch this place and go outside? We could hang out at the fountain and wait for them.”

  Kelly regarded her mom and Ken, who seemed to have forgotten their children were even there. “I don’t know,” she said. “They might get mad.”

  “We could ask them,” Ryan suggested. “I brought something along….” He pulled a tennis ball out of his pocket. “We could, you know, toss it around.”

  “Cool!” Kelly said, thrilled to have a way out of this horrible boredom. “But you ask, okay?”

  “Sure,” he said, bouncing the ball once before putting it back in his pocket. “Wait here.”

  Soon they were outside in the sunshine, playing catch in the open air, showing off by making leaping catches and stuff while their parents strolled the cavernous halls of the museum.

  Kelly was actually having fun. She darted among the people on the sidewalk, fielding pop-ups and grounders, dodging them to make quick throws back to Ryan. It was a good time she’d never expected to have, and those can be the best kind of all.

  “Hey, you’re not bad!” he told her when they finally sat down at one of the outdoor café tables to take a break.

  “You’re not so bad yourself,” she complimented him back. She knew he was offhandedly telling her she was a great fielder, because she really was. And so was he. They shared a way of saying so that all real ballplayers understand.

  “Want a soda?” he asked her. “My treat.”

  “In that case,” she said as she grinned back at him, all her shyness gone after their shared good time, “I’ll have an extra-super-sized one.”

  “You got it.” He laughed, eyeing her with such genuine affection that it suddenly made her self-conscious. She started blushing and had to look down at her sneakers so he wouldn’t notice.

  Ryan was a really cool kid, she’d decided. She wondered how he could have a jerk like Ken for a dad, but of course she couldn’t ask him that. “Um …how come your mom and dad got divorced?” she managed to say as they walked toward the concession stand.

  Ryan’s smile faded. “I, um …I don’t really wanna talk about it. Sorry.”

  “Oh. Sorry I asked.”

  “No, it’s okay. It’s just — I don’t know. Let’s talk about something else.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like …I don’t know. How’s your softball team?”

  “We stink,” Kelly said forthrightly.

  “Really?”

  “Well, we’re one and one, but I don’t think we’re a .500 team, if you get my drift.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “How about the Colts?” she asked.

  “Don’t you follow our games?”

  “Not too closely. What are you, four and three so far?”

  “Three and four,” he told her. “But we’re two and oh when I pitch.”

  “So how come they don’t pitch you every game?”

  “I dunno. I guess they want to give everybody a chance.”

  “Huh.”

  “You should come see me pitch sometime.”

  Was he asking her out? Kelly felt her cheeks burning. No, of course he wasn’t. It was just a friendly gesture. He was asking her to come to one of his ball games, that was all. It wasn’t a dance or something, or a movie. A guy like Ryan would never ask a seventh-grader out. Especially not one whose mom was dating his dad!

  “When are you pitching next?”

  “Not for a few days,” he said. “I’ll let you know. How about you?”

  “Huh?”

  “When’s your team playing next?”

  “Um, tomorrow. Why?”

  “Well, I could come see you play.”

  “For real?” She felt pleased and scared at the same time. Pleased that he wanted to see more of her, and scared that she’d mess up in front of him.

  But wait — why was she so worried? She’d hit two home runs in her last game, hadn’t she? Allie had said Kelly was just tight playing her old team, and she’d been right, of course. What did Kelly have to be afraid of?

  “So, can I come?” he asked her.

  Kelly shrugged. “Sure, I guess so. It’s a free country.”

  “I won’t if you don’t want me to.” He looked into her eyes as if he could see right through her, and Kelly felt herself go dizzy for a moment.

  She sipped hard on her soda. “No, it’s okay,” she finally said. “But if we lose, don’t say I didn’t tell you so.”

  “I’m coming to see you play, not the team,” he told her, giving her a smile that shot warm lightning through her.

  She smiled back, then turned away before he could see her go red in the face. “Where are those two, anyway?” she said, feigning impatience. “Isn’t it gross the way they’re all ooey-gooey?”

  But inside, she was thinking, He likes me!

  9

  The Phillies had been last season’s doormat team, the one everyone else walked all over. But no longer. This year, they had a windmill pitcher who made Laurie Solomon’s fireballs look like batting-practice meatballs. If Dorien Day hadn’t been hit in the leg, and Kyla Sutton in the arm, there wouldn’t have been two runners on in the first for Allie Warheit to drive in with a monstrous three-run homer.

  Needless to say, the D’backs fans were screaming with excitement by the time Kelly came up to bat. A 3–0 lead, and the Phillies hadn’t even recorded an out yet. Their coach was already out on the mound, calming down his pitcher, while Kelly stood at the plate, taking practice swings and getting more and more nervous.

  Partly, her nerves came from watching the speed of the pitches. But mostly, it was because Ryan Randall was in the stands, sitting next to his dad and her mom, watching her. Of course, Ryan had heard what an all-star she was. Even if her mom hadn’t bragged on her, it wouldn’t have mattered. Everyone knew about Kelly Conroy, the female phenom, from last fall. Even the boys in school kidded her about it.

  And now, Allie had gone and stolen her thunder again! Kelly knew that unless she hit a home run right there and then, she was going to look bad by comparison. She stepped into the batter’s box determined to smack a four-bagger, even if there wasn’t anyone on base for her to drive in.

  “Stee-rike one!” yelled the umpire, after Kelly whiffed at the first pitch, a heater way over her head. A murmur went up from the fans and her teammates as they watched her flail fruitlessly at the empty air. “Stee-rike two!” came the call as the second pitch hit the catcher’s mitt before she’d even gotten around on it.

  Kelly braced herself. There was no way she was going to let this third pitch get by her!

  Wumhph!! She heard the buzzing sound of the ball coming her way, but she never saw the pitch that struck her out. She swung because she didn’t want to go down with the bat on her shoulder, but there was no way she could ever have hit it. She was way too tense and wound up. “Stee-rike three. Yer out!” the umpire called.

  Kelly trudged back to the bench, her cheeks on fire, not daring to look up in the direction of the stands. Why had she let Ryan come see her play? Last week’s home runs had been an aberration — they came off a non-windmill pitcher! How had she let herself forget that?

  The Phillies soon came back to take the lead, and it was all Kelly’s fault. A grounder, a ball she normally would have scarfed up with no problem, dribbled right through her legs.

  Then things got even worse. She came off the bag to field a ball that should have been the second baseman’s, and the batter was safe, making it two on, nobody out. A three-run homer followed, and before the D’backs knew it, they were down, 6–3. Their fans had fallen silent, Ryan Randall among them.

  Kelly whiffed two more times, stranding Allie Warheit both times at second, where she’d wound up as a result of two scorching doubles. Kelly didn’t think she could feel any lower, until Coach Beigelman came up to her in the bottom of the fifth and told her he was putting in a sub for her.

  “What?” Kelly gasped. “But —”

  “I think you need to cool down a little, Kelly,” he told her, patting her on the shoulder. “We’ll get you back in there next game.”

  “Next game!” Kelly cried, and then she fell speechless. She’d never been subbed for in her entire life! It was the final humiliation. If Ryan hadn’t been sitting there, she would have stormed off and walked home, right in the middle of the game, rather than sit on the bench with everyone looking at her. But with him there, she had no choice but to act like a team player.

  When the game mercifully ended, the score was 7–4, Phillies. Kelly gathered up her stuff and got ready to accept condolences from Ryan, her mom, and Ken. This was going to be the worst moment of the whole miserable day.

  Looking up, Kelly saw a sight that made her freeze in her tracks. There was Ryan, talking with Allie Warheit! Even from this distance, Kelly could see that Allie was flirting with him. She remembered now how Allie had talked about liking him.

  At the time, Kelly had been amused by Allie’s crush, thinking how stupid and hopeless it was. Now, with a budding crush of her own, it seemed threatening, not cute. She wanted to go over there and pull Allie away by that sleek, black hair of hers.

  Ryan was smiling, obviously enjoying the attention. She heard him say, “You were awesome!” to Allie, obviously impressed by her performance. What would he say to Kelly? “Good game”? No possible way, unless he was the world’s biggest liar.

  “Hi, baby.” Kelly heard her mom’s voice behind her. She turned to see her mom and Ken standing there with sympathetic looks on their faces. “Rough game, huh?”

  “I hate this team!” Kelly said, kicking the dirt with her cleats.

  “Hey, you know what?” Ken said. “If you like, I could work with you a little on that swing of yours. I think I could help you —”

  Kelly cut him off before he could finish. “Stay out of this!” she yelled at him. “Stay out of my life, okay? Just leave me alone!”

  She ran off toward home, leaving her mom and Ken standing there, and she didn’t stop until the front door had slammed closed behind her.

  Under the circumstances, it was almost a relief when spring break finally came and Kelly was shipped off to softball camp. All the way there on the bus, she avoided talking with any of the other kids, none of whom she knew — or wanted to know.

  She was determined not to make any friends there, or even talk to anybody. But that resolve soon broke down. The counselors had them on the field all day long, except for meals, and Kelly soon found herself wrapped up in games and clinics.

  Her first order of business was fixing her messed-up swing. The coaches made her open her stance, so she could get a better look at the ball. But when that only made things worse, they told her to center her feet again.

  By the third day, Kelly’s swing was such a mess that she was ready to give up and go home — except that no one was home to meet her. Her mom and Ken had gone off to their little romantic hideaway, and Kelly was stuck here in this torture chamber, humiliating herself day after day, unable to find her lost home-run swing.

  On the fourth day, as she sat miserably on the bench alongside a bunch of chattering girls, one of the coaches came up to them and said, “Okay, girls, today we’re going to teach you all how to windmill pitch.”

  Kelly blinked and looked up at him. It suddenly hit her. If she couldn’t hit, at least she could learn how to pitch. It might give her a way out of her dilemma. She got up and followed the other girls to the mound, where one after the other, they learned the mechanics of windmill pitching.

  “Okay, you stand like this,” the coach instructed them, “with the heel of your front foot on the front of the rubber, and the toe of your back foot on the back of the rubber. Got that? Good.”

  He checked around to see that they all had it right before continuing. “Now this is key. You’re only allowed to bring your hands together once during the windup, otherwise it’s a ‘fault.’ That’s like a balk. It means the base runners advance one base, or, if there aren’t any runners, the pitch is called a ball.

  “Okay. So, hands at your sides. Then lean back — don’t move your feet, though, that’s a fault too — now bring your hands up and together …good … now the glove hand slaps the thigh on the way down, as you bring the hand with the ball back, then forward, and all the way around in a windmill motion. As you do it, the glove hand goes back from the thigh, then forward, pointing to the plate, to give you more speed and control. Follow through with the elbow of your throwing arm pointing straight out, and end with that hand on your shoulder.”

  One after the other, the girls all tried to mimic the complicated windup. When it came to Kelly’s turn, she went into the motion, trying to visualize it as she’d seen the coach do it. Her arm wound up and back and around, and she let the ball fly. It sailed high over the backstop, at least twenty feet in the air.

  “Good! Good!” the coach encouraged her, not letting Kelly sag into depression. “Just release it sooner, Kelly, when your arm is pointing at the catcher’s mitt. Then, as you finish the motion, your hand should be on your shoulder. Right. Now set your feet in fielding position. That’s it.”

  Kelly tried it again, and this time the ball whizzed from her hand with that familiar buzzing sound she’d come to fear as a hitter. The ball popped into the catcher’s mitt with a loud smack. “OW!” the girl who was catching shouted. “Hey, take it easy, will you?”

  “Hey, there you go!” the coach congratulated her. “Now work on that for the rest of the week, and I guarantee you, you’ll have it down!”

  10

  Kelly spent the next three days doing nothing but pitching. She’d given up on hitting altogether. What did it matter if she struck out every time at bat? If she could pitch windmill with the best of them, the other team wouldn’t be able to get a runner on base!

  She arrived home and was picked up by her very tanned, happy-looking mom. When she asked Kelly how her week had been, Kelly said, “Fabulous,” in her most sarcastic tone. But really, it hadn’t been so bad. Not nearly as awful as she’d anticipated.

  The following afternoon, right after school, was the Diamondbacks’ next game. Actually, the team had played two games over the break — without Kelly — and, much to her annoyance and surprise, had won them both. “Allie’s been awesome!” Dorien Day enthused. “Five homers and seven extra-base hits! Coach says he’s sending her to the all-star game!”

  “Fabulous,” said Kelly, in the same sarcastic tone she’d used on her mom.

  She hated Allie Warheit. Not only had the girl stolen her spotlight as the star of the team, but she’d had the nerve to move in on Ryan Randall, a guy who was two years older than her, two grades ahead of her — and the very same guy Kelly had developed a crush on. Worst of all, she’d shown Kelly up in front of him at the last game before vacation. Well, today Kelly was going to get some of her own back.