Boys in Control Read Free

amateur teams from the area.
    There were sixteen sixth-grade teams competing for the championship, which meant there would be eight baseball games going on at once in different parts of the district the first Saturday in May. The eight winners would play each other the following week, the four winners would play the week after that, and on the last Saturday in May, the twenty-ninth, the two winners would play each other to see who would win the sixth-grade championship for the school district. Losing teams, however, still met at local schools to play each other, just for fun, with parents doing the coaching, so it wasn't as though you had one chance to play baseball and that was it.
    But Caroline knew that Eddie had her heart set on the championship game. If the Badgers didn't make it to the finals, baseball season would be over as far asEddie was concerned. None of that Saturday-morning neighborhood baseball stuff for her.
    Caroline had mixed feelings as she followed her two blond sisters out to the ball field behind the school. It seemed wrong to wish that Buckman would lose, and for Eddie's sake, Caroline hoped they wouldn't. But if the Badgers won the first game, and they played every Saturday in May, it would be hard to get anyone interested in her play till the games were over.
    Beth, who was in fifth grade, crawled up on the bleachers beside Josh and Peter, but Caroline climbed up farther still and sat a couple of feet away from Wally Hatford, who was leaning his elbows on the riser behind him, studying a branch of the maple tree that hung out over the stands.
    Wally moved a few more inches away from her, and Caroline decided right then and there that if ever she was to persuade Wally Hatford to be in a play with her, she would have to be nice to him, starting
now.
    “Hello, Wally,” she said. “Nice day, isn't it?”
    “We just saw each other two minutes ago,” said Wally.
    “So, can't I say it's a nice day anyhow?” asked Caroline.
    “What do you want?” asked Wally, looking at her sideways.
    “Do I have to
want
something? I just like sitting up here with you because I know you don't like baseball any more than I do,” said Caroline.
    “I never said I didn't like it,” said Wally.
    Down on the field, the coach was yelling at one of the players. “Hey, Mike! You playing baseball or chopping wood?” he called. “Don't start swinging your bat around until the pitch. You could let a ball go right past you if you're not ready.”
    Jake was on the pitcher's mound, and he threw a hard fastball. Sure enough, the boy in the batter's box wasn't ready. As he started his swing, the catcher had already caught the ball.
    Eddie was playing shortstop in the practice game, and when the batter merely tapped the next ball, she leaped forward and caught it. Then the players changed sides and she and Jake were up to bat.
    “I personally don't really care who wins the championship,” Caroline said to Wally, “but Eddie and Jake will be unbearable if it's not the Buckman Badgers.”
    Wally shrugged. “I'm not going to be at the last game anyway, so it's no skin off my nose,” he said.
    “Why aren't you going to be at the game, Wally?
Everybody
's going to that game if the Badgers make it that far.”
    “Everybody but me and Mrs. Larson,” said Wally, and his voice sounded angry and disappointed.
    “Where are you going with Mrs. Larson?” Caroline asked.
    “I'm not going anywhere. I'm staying home. I have to be in charge of the Treats and Treasures yard sale of the Women's Auxiliary of the Buckman Fire Departmentthe last Saturday of the month,” Wally explained.
    “Somebody goofed and scheduled the sale the same day as the championship game, and it's already on posters all over town.”
    Caroline felt like laughing, but she checked herself in time and put on her most sympathetic face. “How did you get stuck with
that
?” she asked.
    “Mom's making me, because everyone else in the family likes baseball more