Coach Amos Read Free

beside him. “Sparky, you have to keep your eyes open when you swing at the ball. And another thing.” Amos whispered something in his ear.
    This time Sparky swung and hit a high fly that went almost to the pitcher’s mound. Dunc brought the ball in. “What did you to say to him, Amos? That was great.”
    Amos leaned over. “I told him to pretend that the ball was the kid who called him Francis.”
    Dunc smiled. “Amos, you may be a born coach. Just one thing, though.”
    “What’s that?”
    “You might want to tell him where first base is.”
    Amos looked up. Sparky was still running full blast. He had turned at the backstop and run behind the bleachers, off the playing field toward the fence.

“All in all, I think practice went pretty well, don’t you?” Dunc said.
    They were in Amos’s room bandaging his thumb. Dunc measured the ointment precisely and cut the three gauze strips into exactly two-point-three-decimeter lengths.
    “Let me explain something to you, Dunc. When you get hit between the eyes by a rock, lose your allowance to a bunch of shrimps, and nearly get your thumb bit off, things are not going well.”
    “The part about the thumb isn’t too good. But now you know Tommy Johnson doesn’t like anybody to touch him. Next time, youwon’t push him up to the plate. Hold still, or this won’t look neat.”
    Amos looked at his swollen thumb. “Only you would be worried about my having a neat-looking thumb. And as for Tommy, he could have told me. He didn’t have to try and bite my thumb off to get his point across. I just hope the kid doesn’t have rabies or something.”
    “Well, I think you’ve made a lot of progress. At least your team all knows where first base is. And they know they have to hit the ball before they can run.” Dunc taped the gauze in place. “Except for Sarah. She still likes to run first. But she’ll get the hang of it. I think you’re doing a great job, Amos. I’m impressed. I didn’t know you had it in you.”
    Amos sat on his bed. “I guess things could be worse. And we do have one more practice to try and get the bugs worked out.”
    “Don’t you think it’s kind of strange that in all this time, Coach Sanders didn’t teach them anything about T-ball?”
    “Not really. Some people just don’t have my incredible way with kids.”
    “Right.”
    Amos put his hands behind his head. “When you’ve got it, you’ve got it.”
    “I think I’ll give him a call later and see if he’s feeling any better.”
    “It won’t work.”
    “What?”
    “You’re not going to be able to find some big dark mystery in this. I know you’re trying hard, but all we have here is a bunch of little kids and a coach who couldn’t handle them. That’s why he resigned. That’s it. There’s nothing else to it.”
    “Then you won’t mind if we go talk to him before practice tomorrow?” Dunc asked.
    Amos eyed him suspiciously. “You had that in mind the whole time, didn’t you?”
    “Don’t worry. You said yourself there was nothing to it. Let’s work on a lineup for tomorrow’s practice.”
    “You’re going to help me?”
    “Of course. We’re best friends. Why wouldn’t I?”
    “But I thought you said—”
    “I think Precious would make a great pitcher. She can throw like nobody’s business.”
    Amos rubbed the knot between his eyes. “I’ll go along with that. But we really don’t need a good pitcher. They hit the ball off of the T.”
    “I told you to read the handbook.” Dunc pulled it out of his pocket and quickly found the page. “It says here to put someone who can throw at pitcher, so they can get the ball and throw it to first base. Because that’s where most of your outs take place.”
    “Why should I bother to read the book when I have you? I’d bet my grandma’s false teeth that you’ve already read that handbook from cover to cover—memorized every rule in it, made notes, corrected the punctuation in red ink, and probably have the