Kristy and the Walking Disaster Read Free Page B

said, "What about me? I could catch those balls if I were taller."
    "I know you could," I replied. "So let's work on your hitting and pitching instead. The only way to make you taller is to give you stilts. Or else hold up this game for a year or two while you grow."
    Andrew giggled.
    I divided the kids into teams - the four younger kids versus the three older ones. "Now!" I cried. "Let's play ball!"
    David Michael pitched to Hannie. Hannie swung her bat. She missed the ball by about two feet. Three times. He pitched to Karen. Karen hit the ball. Smack! It sailed right to Amanda, who appeared to be looking at the ball - until just before it reached her glove. Then she glanced at her glove to see how things were going. The ball flew over her head.
    Everyone groaned. Even Karen, who was running bases.
    I gathered the kids around me again. "We're going to stop the game," I announced, "and have a softball clinic instead."
    "Clinic?" repeated Amanda nervously. "You mean, like a hospital?"
    "No. No, I mean when 1 work with each of you on your weak points - the stuff you need help with. I'll be your coach and trainer."
    The kids looked excited. And David Michael said, "If I were in Little League, there'd be a coach to help me all the time."
    "You should join," 1 told him. "The rest of you should, too. Or play T-ball."
    "I can't," said Andrew. "I'm not old enough."
    "I can't either," said Karen and Hannie.
    "Why not?" 1 asked. "Girls can play."
    "Yeah," said Karen, "but no one would want
    me."
    "Or me," said Hannie.
    "Or me," said Linny, David Michael, and Max.
    "1 don't want to join," announced Amanda. "I don't like playing ball that much."
    "Well, the rest of us do," said Hannie, who does not get along with Amanda and probably never will.
    "We want to be on a team," added David
    Michael. "We just don't want to embarrass ourselves."
    "No Little League?" I asked, knowing what the answer would be.
    "Nope," he replied, and the other kids agreed with him.
    Then Amanda spoke up. "Hey, Kristy, do you know Bart Taylor? He coaches his own team right here in the neighborhood. A whole bunch of kids belong. His team is called Bart's Bashers."
    "Maybe we could join!" exclaimed David Michael.
    "I could talk to Bart," I said slowly. "Where does he live, Amanda? And who is he, anyway?"
    "He's this kid. He goes to Stoneybrook Day School. I think he's in eighth grade, just like you, Kristy." Amanda told me where he lives, which isn't too far from my house.
    Well, I thought, I could go talk to him. I wouldn't like it - but I would do it. Why wouldn't I like it? A lot of reasons. For one thing, you can never tell about eighth-grade boys. Half of them are normal, the other half are jerks. And in this neighborhood, about half of both groups are also snobs. I figured my odds. I had a twenty-five percent chance of getting a plain jerk, a twenty-five percent
    chance of getting a snobby jerk, a twenty-five percent chance of getting a plain snob, and a twenty-five percent chance of getting a regular, old nice guy.
    The odds were not great, but I would risk them.
    If only my brothers and 1 went to private school like the rest of the kids in this neighborhood, then the kids wouldn't have to lord their snobbishness over us. On the other hand, we might be jerks ourselves then, and besides, I wouldn't be in the same school with Claudia, Mary Anne, Dawn, Jessi, and Mal.
    Mom and Watson came home at three-thirty that afternoon. At four o'clock, 1 put Shannon on her leash and walked her over to Bart's house.
    A very, very, very cute guy was in the Taylors' yard, raking up dead grass and twigs and things. It couldn't be Bart. Most people around here have gardeners to take care of their lawns.
    The boy saw me slow down and look curiously at him.
    "Can I help you?" he called.
    "I'm, um, I'm looking for Bart Taylor," I replied.
    "Well, you found him." Bart grinned.
    I grinned back. So far, so good. Maybe Bart was from that normal nonjerky twenty-five percent.
    Bart