Silas knew all the rules, and he touched his toe on second then kept right on going. Running like the wind, the sun on his face, his mother’s voice in his ear.
She had the prettiest one. Always singing loud in the car and in the house.
“All the way home!” She was jumping at the fence then, smiling so wide as he rounded third and pushed with all his might to make it.
He couldn’t wait to make her proud the way she always told him he did, his chest puffed out as he pounded his feet across the dirt.
The other team was shouting, too, and he was pretty sure someone was coming up on his tail.
He tried to run even faster. His heart went pound, pound, pound as he felt someone getting closer.
The base was super close, but he could hear the footsteps right behind him.
He dove his feet for the base like his coach taught him to do since he wasn’t on the baby team anymore.
He slid, the side of his body scraping across the rough dirt as he stretched out his toes, reaching for home plate.
He touched it.
Cheers and shouts rose all around him.
He made it.
“Home run, baby!” his momma called, and his chest was puffing out again as he climbed to his feet, his grin as big as his momma’s as the rest of his team cheered the winning point.
He ran for his mom when she stepped around the fence. “Did you see it?”
“I sure did. You hit that ball so far, I thought it was going to go into outer space.”
Silas beamed. “I’m as fast as Flash!”
With a light laugh, she brushed her fingers through his hair. “I bet you are. How about we go for ice cream to celebrate?”
“Because I did so good?”
She tapped his nose. “No, because you tried really hard.”
“I know, I know, we just always gotta try our best even if it doesn’t feel like we’re the best.”
At least, that’s what she always told him.
“That’s right. We try hard and we love harder. Because we’ve got love inside.” She touched his chest.
He got that gooey feeling, then he started running out ahead of her, laughing as he looked back. “Bet you can’t catch up to me even if you try your best.”
She laughed and tried to chase after him, but her stomach was giant because he was getting a little sister, so her best was super slow.
It didn’t seem to make her upset, though.
But his stomach was sinking to the ground when he made it across the field to the parking lot because his daddy was pulling into the spot next to his momma’s, and he looked real mad the way he always did.
EIGHT
BRINLEY
“That stupid, arrogant, assface, piece of—”I clipped off the slew of profanities I was gritting through my teeth when the front door of the office swept open.
Great.
