Grand Slam

Part 6

Dansby's POV

On the way back to Ashlyn's house, I called Austin back because he'd told me to let him know what happens.

Hello

Hey man. I took your advice and we're going to get food and play putt-putt. I couldn't keep the smile off my face as I told Austin this.

That's great man! Now you just have to hope Snit doesn't call an emergency practice or whatever.

I know right. Well, I just called to thank you and tell you that.

Alright, man. I'll see you later.

See you.

As I pulled into mama's driveway and got out of my truck, I saw my niece, Lily, run out the front door and off the porch. Both mama and my sister, Lindsey, tried to stop her but couldn't. I opened the backdoor of my truck, letting Bentley out, laughing at my niece. "Hey baby," mama said, holding her arms out for a hug. "Hey mama," I replied hugging her as Lily ran up and grabbed my leg. "Will you stay and play Dansby?" she asked, giving me puppy dog eyes. "I really wish I could Lils but I've got a date today," I said, chuckling at her whining. "Who'd actually go on a date with you?" Lindsey asked "Uh you have no room to talk Lindsey. You only went on like one date through high school." "Mama Dansby's being mean to me," Lindsey said, sounding like a child.

"Okay, but seriously, who are you going on a date with?" Mama asked, walking in the kitchen while Lily played with Bentley. "Our new teammate and your neighbor mama." I said, smiling. "Someone bought Mr. Greene's old place?" Mama asked, stirring her food for supper. "Well it's his grandaughter. She might've just inherited it." I said, dipping my finger in mama's cake batter and tasting it. "Keep your hands out of my batter! Go on and take Ashlyn out before you make a mess in here." Mama said, slapping my hand and shooing me out of the kitchen. "Alright fine mama, love you." I said, laughing at Bentley and Lily asleep in the floor. "Love you baby, have fun." "Alright mama. Bye." I said, walking out to my truck and heading over to Ashlyn's house.

I got out of my truck at Ashlyn's house and knocked on the door. When she answered, there was a granola bar half hanging out of her mouth, and she was buckling her belt around her waist. After she emptied her mouth, she said, "Hey. I just have to use the bathroom and I'm ready. You can get anyhting out of the kitchen you want, there's all kinds of drinks in the fridge and snacks in the cabinet." "Alright," I said, laughing at her. As Ashlyn walked out, her dog came over and sniffed me. Then she laid down at my feet so I could rub her stomach. I straightened up when Ashlyn came back in the room, seeing the wall of medals and buckles behind her. "Are these your rodeo trophies?" I asked, going to get a closer look. "Oh yeah, some of them at least." Ashlyn replied, pulling on her boots over at the door. "Only some?" I looked over in surprise. "Are you sure you shouldn't have done rodeo instead of baseball?" she laughed and said, "If I didn't make it in baseball, I was going to go pro in rodeo. Well are you ready?" Ashlyn asked, grabbing her hat and truck keys. When I held my hand out for her keys, she snatched them back and said, "If we're taking my truck, I'm driving. Nothing against you, I just love my truck and worked way to hard on it to let someone else drive it." "Fine, you win this one." I sighed, shaking my head.

As we got in the truck, I saw two cross necklaces hanging on the rearview mirror. "Those were my friend's and her boyfriend's." Ashlyn said, sounding sad. I'd heard Freddie and Ashlyn talking about her friend on the plane that day, so I knew some of what happened.

"If you don't mind me asking, what happened?" I asked as she started the truck and plugged in her phone for music. "We were all a rodeo family, so we went together and took turns driving and stuff like that. The last one we went to was in Oklahoma, so we got there a day early to rest. It was a two day rodeo, and they both did their thing the first day, while mine run was the second day. So after the rodeo, they were going to go to a local bar and celebrate. They asked me to come, since I'm not old enough to go into bars yet, so they could both get basically black out drunk but I wanted to rest since I drove most of the way and took care of the horses basically by myself. We got into a small yelling match, when Carson, Maggie's boyfriend said he just wouldn't drink much and he'd drive. They agreed and I went to sleep." After she said this, Ashlyn took a deep breath, like she was preparing herself for what she had to say next. "I heard sirens really close to the trailer around 3:00 in the morning, so I went outside to see two cops and the rodeo owner about to knock on the trailer door. On the way back from the bar, Carson was a little drunker than he probably should've been. He ran a stop sign and they got hit. Maggie was on the bleeding side, so she was dead instantly. Carson died about two hours later in the hospital." As she finished I looked over and saw little tears in her eyes. "I'm so sorry Ashlyn." "Well, it's not your fault so whatever." She shrugged and looked over at me. "So where are we going first?" Ashlyn asked as both our phones went off with a text.

"Oh no." I said, looking at my phone. "What? Did something happen?" Ashlyn asked, looking over at me as I groaned. "Well Snit just called for an emergency practice since we've got that big series this week." "Dang. I guess we'll have to do this another time then?" Ashlyn asked, sounding dissapointed. "Yeah, I guess." I said. "Well since we're already halfway there, do you just want to ride with me and we can get food or something on the way back?" Ashlyn asked, glancing over at me before looking back at the road. "Yeah that's fine with me," I replied, smiling.

When we pulled into Ashlyn's parking spot at the field, I saw Freddie, Max, and Austin standing at Austin's truck, which was only a couple spaces over from Ashlyn's. "They don't know about this do they?" Ashlyn asked me as she cut off the truck. "Well Austin does, but the other two don't." I replied, already imagining what they were going to say. "Well this'll be fun." Ashlyn said, getting out of the truck as I did the same on the other side.

Ashlyn's POV

"Hey y'all!" I said as I got walked over to Freddie, Max, and Austin. As Dansby walked up behind me and Max and Freddie gave me a look. "Hey Ashlyn and Dansby," Freddie said as Dansby turned red and looked down. "Y'all are a bunch of children, you know that?" I said, laughing as we started walking to the locker room to change. "Yeah we know," Freddie said, laughing with me.