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From: "Gina Marie Wylie" <gmwylie98260@hotmail.com>
Subject: {ASSM} Spitfire and Messerschmitt Ch 41 {Gina Marie Wylie} (teen, mff, cons)
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Date: Sun, 14 Aug 2005 10:10:03 -0400
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<1st attachment, "Davey Ch 41.doc" begin>

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	The following is fiction of an adult nature.  If I believed in
setting age limits for things, you'd have to be eighteen to read
this and I'd never have bothered to write it.  IMHO, if you can
read and enjoy, then you're old enough to read and enjoy.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	All persons here depicted are figments of my imagination and any
resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly a blunder on my
part.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	Official stuff:  Story codes: teen, mff, cons.

	If stories like this offend you, you will offend ME if you read
further and complain. Copyright 2004, by Gina Marie Wylie.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	I can be reached at gmwylie98260@hothothotmail.com, at least if
you remove some of the hots.  All comments and reasoned
discussion welcome.

Below is my site on ASSTR:
http://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/Gina_Marie_Wylie/www/

My stories are also posted on StoriesOnline:
http://Storiesonline.net/

Check out my website: <a
href="http://beyondthefarhorizon.com/">http://beyondthefarhorizon
.com/</a> Taking Your Mind to New Places!

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Spitfire and Messerschmitt

Chapter 41 :: Aging Starts to Set In

After dinner I sat down with a book, but I wasn't really very
focused on it.  My mind was wandering all over the place, tossing
and turning the events in my life over and over.  Was it really
bravery on my part to try to live my life without thinking about
the risks I was facing?  I laughed.  No, it was abject cowardice.
 If I recognized the threat, I wouldn't be able to expose
Mercedes and Shellie and all my other friends to the danger.

I needed them.  Thinking about life without them was terrible;
thinking about how to deal with people running around trying to
kill me would quickly drive me nuts.  Now we were going on a
vacation that I'd been looking forward to for weeks.  There were,
I thought, just two choices, unless you counted staying home as a
choice.  Go and have fun and ignore the fact that behind every
rock was going to be a policeman making sure no one was sneaking
up on us, or go and spend the weekend cowering in my boots.

The problem with either choice, though, was I wanted very much to
make love to the two women in my life that I cared about more
than all the rest of the women I'd met combined.

I was still trying to sort out my desire to keep my friends safe
with my lack of desire to face my problems alone, when Dad sat
down next to me on the couch.

"I just need a second," he told me.

"Sure," I replied.  I hefted the book.  "I'm not even reading it
anyway.  Just sitting here thinking."

"Yeah," he said bitterly, "tell me about it.  Like you, I wanted
this vacation; I have some of my own reasons, some just because
we need a vacation.  And this is probably the closest your mother
and I have come to taking your wishes into account.

"Now, I find out we're bait in a trap.  Rationally, I should pull
the plug and stay home.  Except would we be safer?  Everyone I
know says you can't be safe.  Maybe this is the best way, after
all.  I don't know.  So, we'll go."

"I've pretty much come to the same conclusions.  I could go live
on a mountaintop, I suppose.  But I still can't believe anyone
would want to kill me because I won a hundred bucks from them at
poker.  And if it's all a pretext, a ploy, a convenient target...
then my friends won't be safe unless they're off on the mountain
top and I stay here."

"After a certain point," Dad said, agreeing with me, "you're
running around in so many circles that nothing makes sense.  So,
off we go this weekend.  I want bright and shining eyes, happy
faces and above all, I want smiles all around when we get back."

"Fine by me," I told him.

"Now, another thing.  I've talked to everyone else about what I
said at dinner tonight, now it's your turn.  It's something I've
made up my mind to do -- but it's not a done deal yet.  I need to
get my ducks in a row first, before I start making any final
commitments.  So, in that spirit, I'd just as soon you didn't say
anything about my plans to anyone, until I tell you it's okay.  I
could probably give four months notice at the plant, but that's
just a wild-assed guess.  They are also capable of deciding I'm
heading for a competitor and I'd be retired the day after
tomorrow.

"I would like to make the process more orderly, without any
financial shocks to the family.  Right now I can afford to put
you or your sister into a top Ivy League school, and the other
into the University of Texas.  Wanda tells me that she wants to
go to Austin, but that was before she and Pammie went on the
outs.  If I do well as a coach, in four years I could well be at
a college... or unemployed, depending on if I'm as good as I
think I am or not."

"I won't tell anyone."

He stood up.  "Actually, with you I'm just covering my bases; I
talked to your mother and Wanda first, because if I hadn't, one
or the other would have already been on the phone."

I nodded.  Yeah, I'd noticed that...  I didn't say it out loud,
though.

Off he went and after a second I got up and started up Yahoo
Messenger.  Shellie was, she told me, busy.  Mercedes must have
been too, because she wasn't visible.

In fact, I didn't have a very long friends list and the only one
who showed up was Natsumi, Shellie's Japanese friend who sat
naked in front of the computer with a camera on.  I said hello
and after a few minutes of exchanging pleasantries she asked me
if I wanted the camera on.

"No," I told her.  "Thanks, but I'd rather be distracted by
Shellie or Mercedes."

"Am I not pretty?" She typed <pout> before her question.

"Sure, you're pretty.  But you're there, and I'm here."

"Shellie says you are going to the beach this weekend.  Will you
watch a sunrise or sunset even though you can't have them?  Will
you watch the beauty of the ocean even though if you eat very
much of it, you'll get sick?"

That last made me laugh.  "No, you're right."

I got the message about her camera and I clicked on it.  It's a
good thing I wasn't sitting in front of a camera; I'd have been
terribly embarrassed.  She was wearing a white blouse and a
neckerchief or bandana around her neck.  I could see she was
laughing on camera.

"Fooled you!  I'm still at school!  One more hour!"

I decided that when you've made yourself into a fool, the least
you can do is be gallant.  "You're still as pretty as a
sunrise!"

"Ah!  Good for you!  If I liked boys, I might like you.  TTFN, I
have to go to my next class."

The camera vanished and so did Natsumi.

I ended the messenger program and stared at the wall of my room.
Wanda had noticed my fascination with her breasts, even if I'd
been positive she wouldn't notice.  Hers weren't the only girl's
breasts I'd stared at.  How many of them thought of me as a
clueless loser?

I ran that back in my head.  Clearly Wanda hadn't thought so.  To
a degree, she thought guys paying attention to them was
flattering.  Natsumi also seemed to think that people looking at
her breasts was flattering and she had a lot less on display than
Wanda.  I chuckled to myself.  Was there a league of
small-breasted women that Mercedes, Shellie, Chris and Natsumi
belonged to?  I made a mental note.  Tomorrow we were going to
visit Chris again.

Thinking of visiting Chris brought to mind my plan to have a
party with the football team with their helmets and Chris.  If I
had to go through the football coach I had my doubts if it was
going to happen.  I turned around in my seat and stared at my
bedroom door.  Out there was my father.  I could go to him,
explain my idea and if the football coach didn't like it, my
father could, I was reasonably certain, persuade him it was a
wonderful idea.

Maybe my idea wasn't so wonderful after all.  If the coach hated
my guts, hated my father's guts, like as not he'd hate Chris, and
probably Mercedes and Shellie as well.   I seriously doubted if
any of them would care one way or the other, but maybe there was
another way.

It was like a gleaming star, the first one to shine at night! 
Ah!  Change the plan!  Chris was pretty smart; she'd like the
idea of having people wearing football helmets, but the football
players?  They were used to it!  Now, the baseball team... that
was a different story!  And maybe I could get the adults who
would inevitably come along to wear helmets, too.

I made a sound that startled me.  A low, awful, mean and nasty
snicker.  Like the worst villain in the world getting the hero
trapped.  The only thing I would have to do is find a bunch of
football helmets.  For that, I had just the thing!

I got up and went out through the family room into the living
room, without seeing a soul.  I heard voices in the kitchen and I
found Wanda sitting on a counter, talking to Emily about English
homework.  "Where's Dad?" I asked.

Emily blushed and Wanda grinned.  "The reason why we're here,
dear brother, are the awful sounds of rut coming from the other
end of the house.  Highly distracting."

"Why here and not the family room?"  I asked.

"Davey, dear sweet brother, there is no ice cream in the family
room."

"I'm always hungry, lately," Emily said, sounding apologetic.

"That's because you're eating for two," Wanda agreed.  "And of
course, being the good spirit I am, I was only to willing to help
you out by eating some myself.  I still have trouble imagining a
craving for pickles at the same time as ice cream, but I
certainly understand cravings for ice cream by itself!"

I shook my head.  "I'll catch Dad tomorrow, then."

"What do you want?" Wanda asked.

"I was wondering if the Lions might be interested in a little
coming home party for Chris, along the lines of the football game
the other day.  Some pizza and that sort of thing.  I was
thinking we could find some football helmets and get the other
kids to wear them, instead of the football players."

Wanda snickered.  "Davey, I love you!  If I didn't love you
before, I'd love you now!  That's a nice thing you want to do,
and this latest version of your plan kills a couple of birds with
one stone, right?  It gets you off the hook for the cost, and
more importantly, you'll likely get more than a couple of guys
from the football team attending, because no matter what you
offered, they weren't likely to come.  I mean, a party for a
teenie-bopper?  Not!"

"I'll help pay for it," I told her.

"Oh, I'm sure they'll take any contribution you want to give,
Davey.  Mom told me once that when a kid goes home from the
hospital they like to throw a party, sometimes.  Keeping their
spirits up is important, she says."

We talked a while longer about nothing of consequence.  Emily
yawned, smiled at us and headed off for bed.

Wanda watched her go.  "I don't know, Davey.  I'd like to think
I'd be as brave as Emily, but I honestly can't say as I could. 
She's really torn up about the decision about keeping the baby or
putting it up for adoption."

"I don't know, either," I told her.

She sighed.

"What?" I asked.

"Oh, Jack.  He's a nice enough guy, but he's from here.  Barring
a miracle, he's going to be here the rest of his life.  He's not
stupid, but this is what he knows; he's content with it.  I'm
not.  I start liking him, then he says or does something stupid
and I go a little crazy."

"Did you guys have a fight?" I asked, not sure if it was any of
my business.

She made a disgusted sound.  "Not a fight, not really.  He wanted
to come along for the weekend and I told him I didn't think it
would work.  He's convinced that I've given up on him, that I
don't want sex with him any more."

"Do you?"

She stuck her tongue out at me.  "Not as much as I once did, but
what's a horny girl going to do, eh?  Tell me that?  I'm not
staying here, pure and simple.  Next fall I'm going to be a happy
freshman at some school far, far from San Angelo.  I plan to come
back to visit, but that's it.   Dad has his work; Mom has her
friends and causes; that's enough for them.  I don't know what I
want, but I don't think I'll find it here.

"So I think about us.  Jack and me.  Where are we going from
here?  The answer is, I can't see us going very far.  Hell, I
can't even tell him I like girls!  He'd totally freak."

"He didn't freak about Mercedes and the girl in the bus."

"Davey, that's because one of the girls wasn't me.  You know what
he said about it?"

"I can hardly wait to find out," I told her.

"Poor Davey!"

I giggled.  "He should be so poor!"

"Yeah, two girlfriends!  And don't think I don't understand about
Chris, Davey!

"Jack has never said anything mean about gays, but he's made it
clear he doesn't think it's 'natural' whatever that means, and
that people should feel sorry for them."

"I don't feel like that."

"I know.  Everyone knows."

"If San Angelo had a seashore," I told her, "I'd be content
here."

There was a rustle behind me and I turned and saw Dad leaning
against the jam of the kitchen door.  He was wearing a robe and a
grin.  "Davey, a very brilliant man once said that there are two
types of people.  People who are happy and content because
they've adapted themselves to their surroundings.  And there are
those that are happy and content because they've changed their
surroundings to suit themselves.  The latter group, Bertrand
Russell thought, are the source of all progress."

"What has that got to do with anything?" Wanda said.

"Because, dearest daughter, the two of you are young and
impressionable.  You don't know what you want to do with your
lives.  You are in between those two groups.  I think you, Wanda,
are in danger of going the first way.  You are uncomfortable
here, and want to find a place to be comfortable in.  That's your
mother's forte, by the way.  There's nothing wrong with it, it's
just one way of living.

"Davey, on the other hand, wants to live where he can see
breaking waves.  He's as determined as any other fourteen year
old in his quest to get what he wants, no matter what he has to
do to get it.  Me, when I get to a new town, I set out to make it
fit me."

"Which is why you're living and working in the town you grew up
in, and aren't planning on moving anytime soon."  Wanda sounded
bitter.

Dad grinned.  "I thought you were listening at dinner.  High
school ball at first, then college ball.  Do you think I'd be
content at San Angelo State?"

Wanda shrugged.

"Well, I think I'll do well, so I'm already getting together
ideas of what to do in a second phase.  I won't do much, because
there is nothing worse than counting boobies or ideas before they
hatch."

Wanda ran her hand over her breasts.  "Two boobies."

Dad glanced at her and grinned.  "I'm glad you can count to two.
If there's anything better than two birds in hand, it's a mouth
on a boobie or two... or a hand in a bush for that matter."

I saw him start to glance down, catch himself and look over my
head.  I glanced down as he swirled the robe to cover himself
better.  But just for a second, I saw that what Wanda had said
once upon a time about Dad was true.  Good grief!  I'd never seen
anything that size!

"I think I'll go see if I can wake your mom," Dad said after a
second.  He vanished towards the bedroom.

Wanda giggled and I looked at her.  "You've never seen one that
big before, eh?"

"No," I said simply.  Words still failed me; one was all I could
manage.

"Neither have I."

For a moment there was silence, then Wanda stepped towards me. 
"Davey, Mom told me once that there are no absolutes."

"I don't understand."

"It boils down to never say never, because there are exceptions
to any rule.   Please, Davey, let me spend the night with you."

I thought about it, my eyes resting on her breasts.  "What ever
gave you the idea I'd say no?"

"It was my choice, wasn't it?" she grinned broadly, and then
licked her lips lasciviously.

"Well, come into my parlor, Miss Fly," I said with a laugh.

She grabbed my hand and started leading me towards my room. 
"Just be sure, Mr. Spider, that you eat me all up, first!"

"I can do that," I promised.

I did, too.  Twice.  And then she curled my toes and left me a
limp noodle.

I was the one, though who snuggled up in the crook of her arm,
but that was because she was already asleep.  A good day, I
thought, for the men of the Harper family.




I sat down next to Mercedes at school Tuesday morning and she
smiled.  "Slept good, eh?"

"A very relaxing evening," I told her.

"Well, I'm glad someone is relaxed.  You better not have any
plans for after practice, this afternoon."

"No plans," I told her.  "Well, except later I'd like to visit
Chris."

"Sure, but it'll have to be after dinner.  I think if I ask nice,
my mom would take us."

"That would be nice."  I explained my new idea about Chris's
party and she liked it.  "I haven't talked it over with my dad
yet," I told her.  "He and Mom slept in this morning."  Something
that I'd never seen in my entire life, up until that day.  Now
and then one or the other would sleep in, but usually on a
weekend, but then we all did on the weekend, pretty much.

A couple of times I saw Mercedes glance my way during biology.  I
wasn't sure she was smiling, but I was feeling pretty mellow. 
And it was even better when Shellie joined us for English; even
if we did get assigned a research paper that was going to be due
the Friday after Columbus Day.

Algebra was great, too, and then Shellie and I headed off to our
Microsoft Office class.  "Numi told me about her joke on you last
night," Shellie said.  She was grinning at me.

"Numi?" I asked.  I know it was Natsumi, but I wasn't sure how
the nickname was derived, then I said her name to myself and
realized how it worked.

"Natsumi.  Isn't she cute in her school uniform?"

"She looks like a sailor or something," I told her.

Shellie grinned.  "One night she did a strip tease for me;
something that almost every Japanese man, I guess, dreams about.
A schoolgirl taking off her uniform, I mean.  The Japanese do
things very differently than we do.  Sometimes the things they
do, the things they believe are just impossibly different from
what we do."

We had to go in, then, so I didn't get to ask my "What do you
mean?" question.

At lunch the conversation was on movie making again.  "I talked
to a guy in Austin last night," Rob told us.  "He was thinking we
shouldn't be so quick to dismiss the idea of a making a movie
about what's happening to Davey."

"The legal issues you talked about yesterday," I said,
surprised.

"Yeah, but see, we were talking about a movie about what's
happened, only with a few changed names or something.  No, he
suggested a documentary."

"A little late for that now," Mercedes said.

"Or worse," I told him.  "There was another incident yesterday
with someone they think was Hannelore Kimmel."

So I explained about that, which had Rob nodding.

"Yeah, this is really good, you know?  Do you think you could
talk to these guys for me, Davey?  See if you can get me
permission to film a briefing or two?"

"I don't think they're going to want to go on the record," I said
dubiously.  "For one thing, they sound all helpful, but a lot of
the time they have their own agenda, and what you get is a tiny
part of it."

"I wish I could go with you guys this weekend," Rob said,
sighing.

"No you don't," I said almost instantly.  "I'm not sure I want to
go this weekend."

"It's going to be fun," Mercedes said firmly.  "We'll get to see
and learn a lot of interesting things."

I saw Rob was eyeing me, obviously expecting me to say something.
 When he saw I wasn't, he went on.  "Look, I know it sounds
crazy, Davey, but I'm not stupid, okay?  Let me explain what I
was thinking about.  I want to find these people.  I'd like some
help tracking them down.  If we find them, we score big."

Shellie turned pale, and Mercedes was laughing.  Mercedes'
expression ranged from someone having heard the biggest joke in
the universe, to someone who's just heard the stupidest idea in
the universe.

"Rob," I said patiently, "there are probably zero Texas Highway
Patrol officers right now who wouldn't love to catch them.  Ditto
for the Texas Rangers and the San Angelo Police Department.  The
FBI has people working on it, and now I guess the Border Patrol.
There are military agents trying to catch them, too.  Rob, there
are hundreds, if not thousands of people looking for Hannelore
Kimmel, Terry Toohey and his bunch and Irene.  They get to spend
eight hours a day looking for them, or longer. I keep hearing the
word 'overtime' a lot.  They have resources and things we
couldn't begin to match."

"And what if you did catch them?" Shellie said, her voice soft. 
"This isn't an anime or movie; this is real life.  Those people
have tried to kill Davey.  They did kill a policeman and shot at
another.  The only way to survive catching them would be to do it
so that they didn't notice.  Since everyone is looking for them,
I'm sure they're careful to avoid notice and at the same time
watching to see if anyone spots them."

I was stunned when Mercedes looked across the table to Emily. 
"How about you, Emily.  What would you think if Rob came along
this weekend?"

I saw Emily's pained expression and I realized that Mercedes had
hit a nerve.

"Please, Mercedes," Emily told her.  "I'm having a hard time
right now.  I don't need more complications.  I like Rob, and I
know Rob likes me.  But I don't want to make it complicated,
okay?  Asking Rob along would be complicated.  I'm a guest, after
all."

"What if I just show up?" Rob asked.  "A fait accompli?"

I saw tears in Emily's eyes.

"Rob," I said softly, "you're starting to bother Emily."

He turned and saw the tears himself.  He reached out lightly with
a fingertip and brushed a tear from her cheek.  "Emily, I never
meant this, okay?  I'm just tossing ideas around.  I don't want
to hurt you, even a little."

"Rob," Emily said looking at him intently, her voice little
better than a whisper.  "There are going to be policemen all
around us.  You couldn't get close.  No one is supposed to get
close."

He nodded, and then it must have perked through his head.

"Rob!" I said abruptly, "I don't care what you think you have to
say just now, just put a lid on it!"

He glanced around the cafeteria.  "I guess so!  Don't mind me,
Davey.  You know the problem with guys like me.  Always thinking
with my... camera."  There was a perceptible pause before the
last word.  And sure enough everyone at the table leapt to the
wrong conclusion about what the last word was going to be,
including me.

Emily playfully punched him on the arm.  "Bozo!"

He patted her shoulder.  "To see you smiling again instead of
crying, I'll be whatever you want, Emily."

She smiled at him.  "I'll forgive everything if you promise to
come over after school and study with me."

"I can do that, sounds good!" Rob said with a grin.

I smiled.  "Mercedes and I have baseball practice, after school.
We probably won't be home until after six."

"I'm going to spend some time in the library," Shellie told us,
"and then I'll go sit and watch the practice.  I can get some
reading done."

I decided to defuse the emotions, so I mentioned that I'd talked
to Natsumi.

Shellie giggled.  "I bet you got a surprise!"

"Let's just say, they don't wear what we do to school!"

"I bet I know what you were hoping to see!" Mercedes said.

"Actually, I told her I didn't hope to see anything, but she
insisted anyway.  Then I saw she was wearing school clothes, so
it all worked out in the end."

"They wear plaid skirts that come below the knee," Shellie
explained, "and white blouses with a Sailor Scout scarf around
their necks.  The girls anyway."

"That sounds like parochial school," Mercedes told her.  "I've
never been sure what made my parents become Baptists, but a
Catholic school, like some of my cousins go to..."  She shuddered
dramatically.

"Japanese schools aren't like schools here," Shellie told
Mercedes.  "Natsumi is in middle school, she's what's called a
sannensei, which means 'third year.'  That's the third year of
middle school, a freshman like we are."

"That's not so different," Mercedes replied.

"Oh, it's different.  It's really different," Shellie told her. 
"They do things we'd never do.  Ever.  And the way they study. 
You think we study hard?  In Japan they'd think we're crazy,
because we don't study half enough."

"We study more than two or three times more than most of the
kids," I said.  It was kind of a matter of faith for me.

"And they study double or triple what we do.  We miss days, now
and then.  Yeah, I know, we try to make it up ourselves, but in
Japan study groups aren't the norm.  It's you against everyone
else."

"Sounds very competitive," Rob said.

"It is.  What's bizarre is that when you get to college?  You
cruise.  You have to do something really dumb to get kicked out
of college, once you're in, you graduate."

"That doesn't sound good," Mercedes told her.

"They have a very different culture.  They believe, well, a lot
of them believe, that at a certain point, you've earned a life
entitlement.  A job that lasts forever.  Of course, you're
expected to work at that job seventy, eighty, ninety hours a
week.  But, in theory, once it's yours; it's yours."

"I wouldn't want to work that hard," I told her.

"Me either," Mercedes echoed.  "There are a lot of things I like
to do... but none seventy or ninety hours a week's worth!"

"It's just a different way of doing things," Shellie told us. 
"You just have no idea how different things are there."  She
paused, and then grinned.  "She'd be proud to hear I told you...
Natsumi is a Kancho assassin."

"Is that something like a ninja?" Emily asked.

That reduced Shellie to hysterics.  Finally, wiping away tears of
laughter, Shellie told her no.  "Davey, would you do what I ask,
no questions?"

"Sure," I told her.

"Fold your hands together like you're praying."

I did as I was bid.

"Now, take your two index fingers and make a steeple; keep your
thumbs crossed."

I did that too and got an acknowledging nod from Shellie.

"Okay, now what?" I asked.

She looked around, and pointed to a girl I knew slightly.  She
was hugely fat, had a sour personality, a sour outlook, and hated
everyone who weighed less than she did: which was everyone in
school.

"You take your pointy fingers and go shove them up her ass."

My jaw dropped, my hands flew apart and I shook my head, "No!" so
fast I was in danger of whiplash.

"Shellie," Mercedes said, "that's crazy!  You can't possibly mean
it."

"Oh, I mean it.  Kancho is a sport among kids and teenagers in
Japan, and I guess Korea.  You make pointy fingers and shove them
up someone's ass.  It's supposed to be a surprise.  You sneak up
behind them and let them have it.  If they catch you, after that,
you're not supposed to try again."

"Shellie," Rob said patiently, "could you explain to me why the
Japanese aren't extinct?  I mean..."

Yeah, words failed me too.

Shellie shook her head.  "Look, I don't make up these things. 
Natsumi is proud of how many people assume a nice sweet little
girl couldn't possibly be a Kancho player.  If they turn their
backs, even for a second..."

"That's what I call self-selecting for exclusion from the gene
pool," Mercedes told Shellie.

"Once upon a time guys used to whistle at pretty girls," Shellie
said.  "It's like that."

"Except that a lot of guys started getting slapped across the
chops, and lot more got cut off," Rob said.  "We've moved on."

"Well, the Japanese haven't.  Of course, don't try it as an
adult, because then you can go to jail."

"That makes no sense," I told her.

"It's the way they do things," Shellie said stubbornly.

The bell rang and we all had to get up.

On the way to geography, Shellie looked at me anxiously.  "I
never thought they wouldn't believe me."

"That's because some customs are too bizarre to believe.  For
instance, tell me that I'd see a Japanese girl, comfortable
sitting bare from the waist up... I'd have said no."

"The Japanese have different ways of doing things than we do,"
Shellie told me as we walked.  "In Japan, it's not against the
law to keep your shoes on in someone's house.  Mostly, people
don't do it, it's considered rude and impolite.  It's not a law,
it's a custom."  She paused, thinking.  "It's like burning the
flag here.  Some people would like to ban it, but others see it
as a form of free expression; others don't want to change the
Constitution for something like that."

"Sure, but that's flag burning," I told her.  "For leaving your
shoes on?  That's silly."

"It's something we do, a custom," she told me.  "The Japanese
have different customs."

I could only shrug.

It was clear Colonel Terrell wasn't going to say anything in his
class about Karen; I wasn't sure if I liked that or not.  It
would have been nice if an adult in town stood up for her a
little more publicly.

Then off to PE, which consisted of warm-ups, and then a trip to
the football players' weight room.  There each apparatus was
explained in detail, and then we had a little bit of time to try
them out.  I had to admit, those machines were a lot sexier than
my chin-up bar, but I was content not to have bulging muscles. 
Swimming and chin-ups were good enough for me!

The first person I saw at baseball practice was Lou Rain.  He was
waiting inside the locker room for me.  "Did you make up your
mind?"

"Yes, sir.  Yes, sir, I'd like a coach."

"A buck a week okay with you?"

"Sir, that's hardly worth it."

"Son, it's not worth it.  It is, however, an exchange of value. 
It's a term you see in contract law sometimes, 'for a dollar and
other valuable considerations...'  It's a symbol of something
larger."

"Okay."

"Payable in advance."

I grinned, dipped into my wallet and pulled out a $5 dollar bill.
 I was stunned when he pulled a receipt book out of his back
pocket and wrote me a receipt for the money, and showing the
weeks of October 8th to 14th, the 15th to the 21st and so on.

"Get dressed," he told me. "I'll see you after warm-ups."

He headed for the coach's office and I went and got dressed.

After warm-ups Lou Rain called me over.  "We're going to do some
pitching practice."  He tossed me a ball and waved me off to one
side, the pitching warm-up enclosure.  Josh was there, all togged
out in his catching gear.

"Not going to happen," I told Lou.  "If he's going to catch, I'm
going to sit down."

He grinned at me.  "Davey, you're going to throw a fast ball, a
change up and what looks like a fast ball, but without that last
bit of effort.  One, two, three and repeat."

"He's not going to call pitches?" I asked suspiciously.

"You don't like the pitches he calls?" he asked.

"No."

"Well, a twofer learning experience!  Coach Delgado is no fool,
is he?"

He called Josh to him and explained the system.  "One finger is a
fast ball.  Two fingers, a change-up and three fingers something
in the middle."

"Those aren't the right signals.  What about placement?" Josh
asked.  I suspect he wasn't much happier than I was.

"First, I'm not one of your coaches, I'm not helping your team. 
Just Davey.  Your coach wouldn't want me seeing your signals, you
shouldn't show them to me either.  As for placement, right now
Davey's going to throw down the middle.  I'll be behind you."

Josh looked at Lou, who was wearing tan slacks, a white,
open-necked golf-shirt and a baseball cap.  After a second Josh
shrugged and in a few minutes I was throwing.

I did two times through and then Lou came to talk to me.

"Good control, Davey.  How's the arm?"

"Comfortable, sir."

"It's Lou, up until you forget who is the coach and who is the
coached."

"I'm comfortable, sir."

He laughed.  He waved at Josh, who hustled out to see what Lou
wanted.  "Okay, we're going to see how Davey does on placement. 
Same sequence of pitches, but something new.  Hold your fingers
close to your crotch for waist high.  Push them out six inches or
so for high, drop them six inches or so for a low.  Got that?"

"How about inside and outside?" Josh asked.

"One thing at a time, son.  Three high pitches, three down the
middle, three low."

Josh and Lou went back to the plate and I threw nine pitches this
time.

Sure enough, Lou came to me after them, this time Josh trailed
along behind him.  "Davey, you've got really good control. 
Except throwing low.  What's the problem?"

I frowned.  Why was he asking me what the problem was?  Wasn't he
the coach?  Shouldn't he be telling me what I was doing wrong and
how to fix it?

"The other pitches, it's all there in my head.  I picture it and
throw.  When I try that when I'm throwing low, the ground is
always in the picture.  I don't want to hit it."

"Picture a batter standing there on an invisible pedestal, high
up in the air.  You can see him and the plate, nothing else. 
Let's try another repetition.  This time alternating belt high
and low, so every other pitch is one or the other.  Got that, Mr.
Catcher?"

"Yes, sir."

The first time I tried to throw low it simply didn't work.  The
crystal pedestal thing just didn't work for me.  The second time
I pretended I put my hand up, blocking out my view of the ground.
 Yeah, I know, pretty stupid, but it worked.  By the time I got
through the rest of the pitch sequence I was doing pretty good.

Then Lou showed Josh how he wanted Josh to signal inside, outside
and down the middle.  Since it was just a matter of pointing left
or right, or not pointing at all, Josh had no trouble with that.

It was a long set of pitches, twenty-seven in all.

At the end, everyone else was gathering to choose up sides for
the scrimmage, so we hustled over and joined them.

Mercedes and I ended up on the "visiting" team, along with Trace.
 It was pretty clear the upperclassmen had deliberately split us
along grade lines.

Sure enough, when I got up we had one person on base, and they
pitched out to me.  All I could do was stand there and fume, then
fume some more when the next batter popped up to second base.

Still, I pitched next, and if there was anything like sweet
revenge, I had it.  I threw a fastball, inside, as my first
pitch.  Jack hit it solidly to third base.  The third baseman
fumbled it, dropped it, and made up for it with a picture-perfect
throw to Mercedes, beating Jack by two steps.

Chuck came up and I threw him another fastball, but high.  He
popped it up, this time to me.  I stood still, waiting for it to
come down, and made the catch.  Chuck was nearly at first, but he
pulled up when he saw I had the ball and grinned at me.

He held up his right hand, and uncrossed his fingers.  I stuck my
tongue out at him, which was greeted by laughter from both
benches.

Then it was Josh up third.  I shrugged, considering.  Trace said
change-up, down the middle.  Why not?  I let fly and instantly
Josh came around and bunted the ball hard down the first
baseline.  Mercedes charged it, grabbed it and turned to shovel
it to the moron who should have been covering first.  Except the
idiot was still standing clueless out there on the mound, with an
idiot grin on his face.

It sure looked like an accident to me.  She'd been crouched down,
and now she stood up, as if she was going to turn and tag Josh. 
Instead she met him coming and he went sprawling on the ground. 
That's when she tagged him.  "Sorry, guy, didn't see where you
were," she said apologetically.

Josh was obviously shaken, and they gave him a few extra minutes
to pull himself together, before we started the next inning.

Was that three errors on our side or two?  How many times do you
get three people up and down on one pitch each, averaging an
error a batter?  It wasn't very pretty.

Worse, when we were sitting on the bench, Mercedes was next to
me.  She turned her head a little bit and said in an exultant
whisper, "Did you see the way I cold-cocked the son of a bitch?"

"You did it on purpose?" I was stunned.

"Well, it's not like you were where you were supposed to be," she
growled.  "You had a big shit-eating grin on your face, expecting
someone else to do all the work."

"I got one of them out all by myself," I reminded her.

She laughed.  "He'll learn not to mess with my guy!"

"Mercedes..."  I didn't know what to say.  "Please.  Promise me,
never again."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I don't cold-cock someone just because I don't like
them."

"You sure did a number on Terry Toohey that time in the
cafeteria."

"I was scared," I told her.  "It's one thing to be scared and
react, it's another thing to do it deliberately."

She was silent for a second; looking at me without an expression
I could read.  "Friday, I'd have taken your head off about now,"
she said matter-of-factly.  "But that was then and this is now. 
Let me think about it."

The juniors and seniors were trying really hard, but so were we.
We won, two to one.  And they pitched out to me again, too.

When we were done and showered, I met Mercedes outside the locker
rooms.  "Let's get Shellie, I'll see if I can get Wanda to come
and get us," I told her.

"I saw Wanda talking to Shellie a while ago, but then I lost
track of them," Mercedes told me.

When we got outside, though, there was no Shellie to be found. 
"Call Wanda," Mercedes said, like me, a little worried.

So I called Wanda.  "You're a worry-wart, Davey," Wanda told me
after I asked her if she'd seen Shellie.  "She's standing oh,
about six inches from me right now.  She and I have been playing
patty-cake.  You and Mercedes need a ride?"

My eyes were bulging in shock.  Shellie and Wanda?  "Ah, yeah,
sure.  We need a ride."

"We'll be right there after we clean up," Wanda told me and was
gone in that soundless way conversations end on cell phones.

I turned to Mercedes.  "Ah, Shellie's with Wanda.  I'm not sure
what she meant, but they'll be here in a few minutes."

"You're not sure what she meant about what?" Mercedes asked.

"She said they were playing patty-cake and had to clean up before
they could come and get us."

Mercedes got a cheshire grin on her face.  "Oh, that.  I wouldn't
worry about that, if I were you.  I wish I could think as dirty
as your sister all the time."

I cleared my throat and she laughed at me.  We walked out and sat
down in front of the school waiting for Wanda.

"I am so looking forward to this weekend," Mercedes said.  "All
the time in the world.  We can check out the aquarium, we can
talk to people about octopi and salt-water aquariums.  We can
walk on the beach, watch the waves roll in.  We can..."  She
grinned lasciviously at me.

"Yeah!"  I agreed.

Wanda and Shellie arrived a few minutes later and we joined
Shellie in the back seat, trading a few "Hi ya!" kisses.  Wanda
hadn't driven very far before I realized, kisses or not, we
weren't heading home.

"Wanda, where are we going?"

"I know how much you want to eat out, Davey.  So that's what
we're doing tonight."

I wanted to thump something.  I wanted to go home and "study"
with Mercedes and Shellie.  If I couldn't do that, I'd like to go
home and study with them and Emily too.  My parents liked to eat
out too much.

I laughed at that, half aloud.  Yeah, they probably did.  I
wondered what time Dad had gotten to work this morning?  And
taking off relatively early?  Someone was going to figure out
something was up!

<1st attachment end>


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