by Tim Green
“Let me at her!” Benji struggled.
“If she knocks your lights out in front of all the guys, you’ll never live it down, Benji,” Josh said.
“I’m not afraid of that karate stuff! Fufitsu or jujitsu or poop-it-sue or whatever it is! Let me at her!”
Josh’s dad stepped into their midst. “Benji, cut it.”
Crazy about Josh’s father, Benji quickly fell into line.
“Let’s get the trophies, you guys, and then we need to get this show on the road.”
Sensing his dad’s impatience, Josh’s stomach turned. His dad acted like the huge victory was nothing more than the small and annoying bite of a bug. In fact, his father tapped his foot impatiently as the presenter bragged about the tournament’s sixty-seven-year history.
But he was all smiles when he raised the four-foot-high trophy above his head before setting it on the grass. He took the microphone from the presenter and gave thanks to everyone involved in the tournament and the ceremony. He praised the sponsors, then the players on both teams and said they were all wonderful kids. He ended with a big finish.
“This has been a fantastic tournament! Thank you. Thank you all!” Josh’s father handed the mic back to the presenter and walked away, leaving people in the stands cheering as the team followed him, laughing and backslapping all the way into the dugout to gather their gear.
“Guys,” Josh’s dad said after they were settled on the bus back to Syracuse. “This was my last game as your coach, and it was great to go out on a win. I’ll never forget it.”
The mouths of Josh’s teammates dropped open all at once.
Coach Moose looked like he already knew what was happening, and he popped up from his seat and gave Josh’s dad a hearty handshake.
“I’ve taken a job at Crosby College in the sunshine baseball state of Florida,” Josh’s dad said. He rubbed the younger coach’s bristly crew cut with affection. “And don’t worry. Coach Moose would never leave Syracuse. He’ll be here with you guys for fall ball, and he’ll help with the transition.”
His father scratched his neck and gave one of his smiles. “You’ve been an outstanding team, and I know you’ll do great this fall.”
Josh blinked as if he’d been slapped, and he didn’t care that everyone could hear him speak. “But Dad . . . he offered it to you, like, five minutes ago. You . . . you can’t take it just like that. Without . . . like, thinking.”
“But, son,” his dad said, “I already did.”
CHAPTER FIVE
JOSH HUDDLED IN THE backseat of the bus with Jaden and Benji. His mind spun like his little sister twirling fast on the back lawn until she fell in a heap. He just couldn’t believe his father would simply move, and to Florida. How far away was that? A thousand miles? More. He grabbed his head and banged it softly into the seat in front of him.
The big machine grumbled and vibrated as it ate up the road. Syracuse, New York, where they lived, was about six hours from Baltimore. The tinted windows and constant bus sounds hypnotized their brains into the lie that they were not even moving. No one paid attention to the darkening trees whisking past. Benji rustled a huge bag of Doritos, slamming chips down by the fistful and crunching, his jaw swinging like a lantern in the wind.
Josh leaned forward and kept his voice low, despite there being no way his dad could hear them from his seat in the front, even if he hadn’t been napping. “I mean, I can’t believe he’s even serious. I had no idea.”
“I wonder who’s going to coach the team.” Jaden had her mother’s worry beads out. She’d recently found them in an old box her father had tucked away when they’d moved up from Texas after her mom died. Now Jaden was kneading them with her slim fingers. She said they kept her calm.
“It doesn’t even make sense,” Benji said through a messy mouthful of chips. “And I’m not saying it to be mean, but really? Crosby College? Who ever heard of that? And did you see that athletic director? Like a clown or something with that orange spiked hair?”
Jaden shook her head. “You can’t judge a book by its cover.”
“Well, I do.” Benji stuck a dusty orange thumb in his own chest. “I don’t like the cover, I am not reading that book. Don’t wag your eyes at me, either. I heard this story on Entertainment Tonight that said the most important thing for book sales is the cover.”
“Is that where we’re getting our news now?” Jaden asked. “Entertainment Tonight? Seriously, Lido.”
“You two stop already,” Josh said. “Come on. My dad has lost his mind for real this time, and you two are talking about a stupid TV program.”
“You’re siding with her? My dad loves ET, and you’re calling it stupid? You might as well be calling my dad stupid, and I know you’re not doin’ that cuz he’ll bring the pain like a dentist’s drill.” Benji swelled his chest like a hot-air balloon.
Benji took a lot of pride in his dad, a giant of a man who wreaked havoc in the local semipro football league. Even though his real job was in an appliance factory, Benji relished calling his dad a football player.
Josh shuddered. “Just . . . just stop it. Both of you! This could be the end for me.”
Benji’s hand froze in the bag of Doritos, and he rumpled his brow. “Are you sick?”
“If I move to Florida, I won’t see you guys. It’s over,” Josh said.
Benji looked stunned. “Well . . . you can’t. I mean . . . heavy hitters. It’s a dynamic-duo thing. It’s not all about me. Dude, you’re the bomb. I’d be like birthday cake without the ice cream.”
Jaden’s beads sagged in her hand. She chewed on a knuckle but said nothing.
“Maybe they’ll let you stay if you tell them you gotta win that house,” Benji said.
“House? What house?” Josh asked. “What are you talking about, Lido?”
“That Home Run Derby,” Benji said. “You didn’t hear about it? My dad was talking. First you gotta qualify. You’ve gotta be on a Youth Baseball Elite League team—which the Titans already are—and you gotta hit twenty home runs during fall ball to qualify for the derby. It’s down in Houston in late October. Anyone in YBEL can win. They put a bathtub twenty feet behind the center-field fence. If you qualify and get down there, all you have to do is dump a home run into the tub during the derby and you win a new house.”
“You’re kidding,” Josh said.
“Nope.” Benji wagged his head proudly. “This Qwik-E-Builders—the sponsors—sell modular homes. Twenty long balls and you’re in. For you? You could win that thing easy.”
“It’s not easy, Lido,” Jaden said. “It’s like one of those scams they have at golf tournaments where you can win a free car if you get a hole in one. No one ever wins those things.”
“It’s a promotion, Miss Smarty-Pants. It’s legit. The FTC regulates these things. My mom said so when my dad got in her face about a sweepstakes she entered. Yeah, the FTC, that’s the Federal Trade Commission. You’re not the only brains around this joint, sorry to tell you. There’s no reason Josh can’t win.”
Josh huffed. “My dad’s not staying here so I can maybe win a house. The last thing my dad cares about is a new home. He wouldn’t give a nickel for the home we’ve already got. Stuff is breaking all the time.”
They rode for a few more minutes, each of them thinking.
“Wait!” Benji waved a hand in the air, then lovingly folded his arms around the Doritos bag and leaned back in the seat, beaming at them. “I got it!”
“This better not be some other kind of bone-headed contest with a million-to-one odds.” Jaden looked at him sharply. “This is serious. Josh could be leaving.”
Benji held up a finger, scowling. “I do not mess around about something as serious as cake and ice cream. You know that.”
Josh felt a ray of hope.
It was obvious by the rare, thoughtful look on Benji’s face that he had the answer Josh needed.
CHAPTER SIX
“YOU RUN AWAY.” BENJI stared at them, confident.
“Aw, jeez, Benji,” Josh said. “I’m not some little kid with a blanket and an Elmo doll in his lunch box.”
Josh looked at Jaden, expecting her to launch an attack on Benji. He got confused when she merely raised an eyebrow.
“Not you too?” he asked.
“Listen, I’m serious,” Benji said. “My older brother ran away once, and he was fourteen. Whew. You should’ve seen the action around my house for those three days.”
Jaden wasn’t whipping Benji with words, so Josh asked, “What happened?”
Benji licked Doritos dust from his lips and looked around to see if anyone else was listening, then he lowered his voice. “He went camping. Took our pup tent and a couple boxes of cereal. Three days in the woods. Said he needed to find himself. He really did it because my dad was talking about going to Alaska. Had a job on a fishing boat. Wanted to use the money he’d make to race monster trucks. That and the NFL were his childhood dreams, and the NFL . . . . well, you know about his knees. My mom called it a midlife crisis, whatever the heck that is.”
Benji reached into his bag for a chip. “Anyway, my brother disappears. They call the cops. People are thinking the worst. It’s on the news. Crackpots come out of the woodwork. One guy says he saw my brother get on board an alien spaceship. A crazy lady in a turban says he’s locked inside a car trunk somewhere, and she can hear him calling for help.
“My mom’s going out of her gourd. Now, I barely remember this because I was, like, five, but my dad? Forget Alaska! He and my mom almost got back together.”
Benji’s words hung in the air like a genie from Aladdin’s lamp, waiting to grant Josh the wish of a lifetime.
Josh swallowed. “They did?”
“Well, yeah, but then my dad ate a pie and it all fell apart.” Benji frowned. “That’s according to my brother anyway.”
“Do we even want to know?” Jaden twisted up her lips.
Benji huffed and popped another bunch of chips into his mouth, talking through a flurry of crumbs. “Well, my mom made a pie. It was for my grandmother’s birthday, and he ate it. All of it.”
Josh could tell Benji had a story. “Your mom didn’t get back together with your dad because he ate your grandmother’s pie?”
“Well, I think she would have forgiven him for that, but then he got sick and puked it all up on her wedding dress, and she said that’s what you get for eating a whole pie anyway.”
“Wait a minute,” Josh said. “What are you talking about? Why would your mom’s wedding dress be out? They were already married. You said your brother was fourteen.”
Benji swallowed. “Yeah. So, he’s getting ready for bed and he starts to get sick, gagging and all that, knows he’s gonna blow chunks, but my mom’s in the bathroom with the door locked, and he tells her he’s gonna be sick. She shouts at him through the door that she can’t open it and for him to just take his fat, pie-eating butt outside to hurl. He can’t make it down the stairs—or so he said—and he’s trying to open the window to puke out, but he can’t get it open because she painted without taping the seams while he was living on his own and so he grabs a box from the closet, first box he sees, and just heaves and . . .”
Benji’s head swayed with monumental disappointment. “Her wedding dress was in it. Why, we’ll never know.”
“A lot of women store their wedding dresses in a box.” Jaden piped up. “You can’t just hang them.”
“Of course not.” Benji rolled his eyes and rattled the Doritos bag as he dug his fist in. Josh knew he was restraining himself.
Josh held his hand out for a chip. “My parents would think I went crazy, and I don’t have a pup tent. I was already thinking about saying I won’t go with him . . . to Florida, but who’s gonna coach me? I gotta make it to the majors. Jaden, you can’t be serious about this running-away thing, can you?”
Jaden closed her eyes and shook her head. “Yes and no. Not a pup tent, but you tell them you’re running away. You tell them you can’t live like this anymore. I mean, maybe you disappear for a day. Hide out in my basement or something.”
“My basement is better than yours,” Benji said, handing Josh another chip and offering the bag to Jaden. “I got an Xbox down there.”
Jaden shook her head at the bag and turned to Josh. “Yeah, but my dad’s out of town overnight, and I can play dumb and no one gets in trouble. At night Josh can even sleep in his room.”
“He lets you stay alone?” Benji couldn’t believe it.
Jaden shrugged. “I’m thirteen. He knows I can take care of myself. Plus, my neighbor across the street checks up on me every now and then.”
Benji shook his head with disapproval. “Dude, there’s been all those break-ins. Druggies from Bricktown. One old man over on Lamont Street got busted up bad last week. Kids stole his TV and some money. Didn’t you hear about that?”
Jaden continued as if Benji hadn’t interrupted her. “It’s the mental thing that’ll get your parents. You might have to go to counseling or something, but that’s okay. That could keep your dad from leaving. Reevaluate things, just like Benji’s dad did.”
Benji looked sadly at a chip. “Until the pie.”
“Until the pie, yes.” Jaden nodded.
Josh munched his chip, and they sat there in silence for a minute before he swallowed and spoke. “My dad would kill me if I ran away. My mom would freak out.”
Benji nodded. “Which could actually bring them back together. A common enemy. Like Churchill and Stalin uniting against Hitler, bitter enemies became allies to save the world.”
“Hitler?” Josh knew Benji was still trying to get some mileage from the A he got on the World War II essay he’d written on their history final back at the end of the last school year. A week hadn’t gone by without him bringing up Winston Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin, or Hitler so he could remind them about his expertise on the subject.
“Well, not you,” Benji said. “But your mental condition. That’d be the common enemy. Your twisted runaway brain is like Hitler, who had a total twisted runaway brain.”
Jaden dismissed Benji with the wave of her hand, then said, “Your dad got all those sponsorships for the Titans, Josh. Things are going well here. Look at the tournament you just won. A college job sounds good, but college coaches these days sometimes only last a year or two before they get fired, and the money can’t be all that great.”
“It’s so . . . desperate. Crazy,” Josh said.
“Exactly, dude.” Benji pointed a chip at him. “And desperate times require desperate measures.”
“And if I say yes to this plan?” Josh asked. “When would I so-called ‘run away’?”
Benji and Jaden looked at each other before speaking at the same time:
“Tonight.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
A FEW HOURS LATER they were in New York, making good headway, when the rain began to fall. By Binghamton it was a downpour. With about an hour left to Syracuse, they made their plan and helped Josh come up with the note he would leave for his parents to find, a note that would make them realize what they’d done.
Mom & Dad—
Our family is ruined.
My life is ruined and I can’t do this anymore.
I’m leaving to find a better place.
As the bus pulled into the school parking lot where parents waited inside their wet cars, Josh examined the words written in his own solid hand for the fiftieth time. “I don’t know, guys. It sounds pretty desperate. I mean, ‘a better place’? That sounds like I’m gonna jump off a bridge or something.”
“Exactly!” Benji smacked the note with the back of his fingers. “You gotta put that kind of fear into their hearts if you want to have an impact. No sense doing it halfway.”
“What do you think?” Josh asked Jaden.
“I think it scares me that I am so much in agreement with this thing,” she said, pointing to Benji.
Benji nodded wisely and slurped the last bit of a strand of a red li
corice string into his mouth like a lizard’s tongue. “It’s true. Great minds do think alike.”
They parted on the steps of the bus and ran to their respective cars in the downpour. Josh got into the new red Camaro and rode beside his father in silence. Tires hissed through the puddles, and windshield wipers squeaked out their steady rhythm. When his father missed the turn to their house, all he said was “Gotta get gas.”
The silence resumed. Josh waited without a word while his father filled the tank under the fluorescent lights of the overhang. After a thump and a click, his father replaced the nozzle and climbed back in.
On the way home from the gas station they had to pass a bad part of the city. Josh wasn’t sure about the real name of the six blocks cramped with three-story brick buildings, but Bricktown was what everyone on the north side of Syracuse called it. Beneath a broken streetlight, a handful of young men stood around an oil drum, burning something that smelled awful. Josh saw the glint of bottles flash from beneath their jackets as they raised them to take long swigs.
Just before their car reached the corner, one of the men staggered out into the street, and Josh’s father swerved crazily, blaring his horn. Josh’s heart galloped, and he turned in his seat to see the man holding up his middle finger, yelling.
“Idiot!” Josh’s dad glanced in the mirror but kept going. “You stay away from that place, right?”
“Of course.” Josh turned to face front. “I never go there.”
“Good,” his father said. “I don’t even want you walking down that street.”
Josh poked his fingers into his pants pocket, toying nervously with the edge of the running-away note he’d written until they stopped in the driveway of the house where they had all once lived together. It was a narrow red house jammed between its neighbors, with a tall, sagging roof. It needed paint and it needed repair.
There they sat, his father thinking and Josh waiting. Silence was no stranger to Josh and his father. It didn’t mean anything was wrong. So when his dad patted Josh’s leg and spoke, Josh wasn’t totally surprised that his father sounded upbeat. “Great win today, on and off the field, right?”
