When they’d watched her place it there tonight, Kathleen had said, “She’s like a softball neat freak.”
“Wade Boggs, who used to play for the real Red Sox, ate chicken at the same time before every game,” Cassie said. “And he’s in the Baseball Hall of Fame.”
This was before they’d all taken the field. Sarah had been sitting at the end of the bench, by herself, where the bat bag was.
“Look at her,” Kathleen said, at least keeping her voice low. “It’s like she’s on the team and not on the team at the same time.”
“C’mon, Kath,” Cassie said. “You’ve seen her play. You don’t think she’s gonna help us?”
“I didn’t know we needed help.”
“You can always get better,” Cassie said. “Do you know who Kevin Durant is?”
“No.”
“Never mind,” Cassie said.
“I just don’t want anything to get in our way this season,” Kathleen said. “Or anybody.”
“Maybe we should all just concentrate on staying out of our own way,” Cassie said. “And remembering that being on this team is supposed to be fun.”
Kathleen nodded at Sarah. “Does she look as if she’s having any?” she said.
They did some baserunning drills after everybody had gotten their swings during batting practice. Cassie’s dad would put runners on first and second, or first and third. Sometimes he would load the bases. Then he’d tell them how many outs there were, maybe even make up a game score and an inning, before he’d hit a ball to one of the outfielders. Sometimes it would be a base hit, sometimes a fly ball. Sometimes one of them would try to score from third on a fly ball, or just take an extra base. It went like that. He kept rotating the outfielders. But by now everybody had figured out that if the ball was hit to Sarah, it was a losing play to try to run on her arm.
One time Cassie was on second base and Chris Bennett hit a hard single to Sarah in center. Her dad had announced that there were two outs, so Cassie was running as soon as he hit the ball. As she came around third, she was able to pick up Sarah’s throw to the plate with her eyes, saw it tracking toward Brooke behind the plate. As fast as Cassie was, she wasn’t fast enough to outrun a throw that ended up in Brooke’s mitt on the fly.
Cassie was out by ten feet.
She’s a freak, Cassie thought.
In a good way. A sports way.
Kathleen had scored from third ahead of Cassie on the play, and was standing next to the plate when Brooke easily tagged out Cassie.
Cassie shook her head and said to Kathleen, “She might not look as if she’s having any fun out there. But I’ll bet it’s fun to throw a ball like that.”
Kathleen just stared at her. “What is she, your new best friend?”
“Just a new teammate,” Cassie said, before she went to get her glove and run out to shortstop.
“Not the same thing,” Kathleen called after her.
Cassie ran right past her and said, “To me, it is.”
• • •
Because the season was starting on Saturday, Cassie’s dad had scheduled practices for the next two nights. Jack and Teddy and Gus were coming to Highland Park on Thursday night. When practice was over, around seven o’clock, they all planned to walk into town and have pizza at Fierro’s.
Cassie had told them she could just meet them, but Jack had said, “We want to see NG.”
New Girl. Sarah.
“What about me?” Cassie said.
“Of course we always want to watch you,” Jack said.
“Just remember that means watch, and not make observations I can hear,” she said.
They had finished playing two-on-two basketball at the hoop in Cassie’s driveway and were now in the car with Cassie’s mom on their way to the field. Baseball All-Stars for the guys didn’t start for another week, and Jack and Teddy and Gus had worked out a little at Walton Middle in the morning, something they loved doing now that school was out. But they said that if they didn’t have some real competition, they were going to go crazy. So it had been Jack and Cassie today against the other two, with Jack and Cassie crushing them.
Teddy said, “But if we make amusing observations you can’t hear, that doesn’t count against us, right?”
Cassie said, “I’ll know you’re making them.”
“But you won’t know exactly what we’re saying,” Gus said.
Mrs. Bennett said, “I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”
Jack said, “We know what you can do, Cass. We do want to see the new girl.”
“Is she fitting in any better?” Gus asked.
“Not even a little bit,” Cassie said.
“What does she do?” Teddy asked.
“Hits and runs and catches and throws,” Cassie said. “Then one of her parents or both of her parents pick her up and she goes home.”
There was a time, back when Cassie first started playing team sports, when practice felt like homework to her. Like a chore. But not anymore. There had been a night last season when her dad had pulled her aside after practice, when it had been clear to everybody, starting with her dad, that she had just been going through the motions. She’d been goofing around on the field, even batting left-handed when it was her last turn to hit, showing off for her teammates, nearly hitting a home run.
Before they’d even gotten into the car, Chris Bennett had walked her down the right-field line, away from the rest of the Orioles, and said, “What were you doing out there tonight?”
“Having fun.”
“You’re the best player on this team, and you know it,” he said. “If you don’t take this stuff seriously, none of your teammates will either.”
“I’m always serious once the game starts,” she said, knowing how defensive she sounded.
“I want you
