Page 114 of The Third Baseman

“Yeah, it’s a big game today. Jupe said he thinks there’ll be Dodgers scouts there, too.” I frowned as she spun again and nearly walked into a couple of guys from the football team who jogged past us. “What are you looking for?”

“Mallory said she’d meet us here with the McAvoy twins, but I can’t see her anywhere.”

“Have you called her?”

She held up her phone. “No cell reception. It’s always so shitty when the crowds are big. Seems kind of pointless as that’s when you need to find people the most.”

I was just about to suggest we went and found seats to save, because Mallory would figure out eventually that we’d gone to sit down, and then at least she’d have a spot once she arrived. But then I heard a loud cry, and the problem was solved.

“God, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” she huffed, as she tried to catch her breath from wherever she’d sprinted, which seemed to be somewhere with water given the drips still flying off her short blonde hair. “Hey, Marn, how’s it going?”

“Hey, I’m good. Why are you wet?” I pulled the two of them off the path, as another crowd of people surged past us, all heading to the stadium.

“I came from the beach. I didn’t realize the time. I just had enough to rinse the sand off and wash my hair.”

Emerson’s nose wrinkled up, her freckles spreading almost the exact same way as Jupiter’s. “Where are the others?’

“They not here?”

Emerson and I both shook our heads.

“Oh, they said to meet them here…” She looked around like Emerson had done. “But if they’re not, I say let’s go and get seats. They can find us there. My legs are already like Jell-O, I don’t want to be standing all night.”

Finally, a plan I could get behind.

“Great, let’s go.”

We got back on the path and joined the swarm, a bright shock of orange as everyone headed in the same direction wearing team shirts or school sweaters. I was wearing one of Jupiter’s baseball sweaters, his initials sewn into the breast, along with his name across the back. Emerson had one on too, while Mallory was wearing her own school sweater.

The crowds in front of us had begun to bottle neck as everyone tried to get into the stadium. Mallory and I found ourselves being swiftly yanked to the side by Emerson. “This way, it’s quicker.”

We snuck behind a row of billboards and found ourselves going through a darkened tunnel underneath the stadium, made darker by the early evening twilight. Turing a corner, we were blasted by the bright floodlights and finally came out the other end… and onto the side of the field.

“Ohmygod, Emerson, how did you know about this?” Mallory hissed.

“Crew showed me.” The only Crew I knew was Crew Hollander, wide receiver, which would make sense seeing as this stadium housed the football team in the winter. “Come on, we don’t want to get caught here.”

We ran along the far outside wall of the field until there was an opening we could sneak into. I spied an empty bench halfway up, and pointed. “We can sit up there.”

All three of us sprinted up the steps to get there before anyone else could, and then collapsed.

“I need to do more cardio,” Emerson wheezed, looking at her phone as it pinged. “Ooh cell reception. Spread out, we’re going to have to save some seats between us. I’ll let the twins know where we are.”

Where we were was in really amazing seats halfway up behind home plate. We couldn’t have gotten better ones if we’d been lining up outside since lunchtime. I had just enough view that I could make out our team in their tunnel by the dugout. I pushed my glasses up to get a clearer picture, and my heart thumped hard. Jupiter was in the shadows with Jenson. I could make him out by his shirt, though I’d probably have recognized his ass too.

I stared until I couldn’t see any longer, given the speed at which the stadium was filling up, and the amount of people passing through my eye line, as well as trying to squash me closer to Emerson.

“How’d your parents get down at the front?” cried Mallory when she spotted Emerson’s mom and dad, sitting behind the dugout.

“They always sit there. The parents get preferential seating.”

“Huh, that’s cool.” Mallory rolled her lips, then spun around to a guy trying to sit next to her, “Sorry, saved.”

He trundled off.

“The twins had better get here soon,” she grumbled. “We can’t save seats all night.”

I shifted up a little as someone wedged themselves into the space next to me, and he was too big to argue with. “Have you never been to a game before?”

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