Benny Rodriguez; 1962

Letters to Friends

July 7th, 1962

Coming to the sandlot today was probably one of the worst decisions I've ever made in my life. It's awkward between me and Benny and he hasn't said a word to me.

The boys know something's up because they keep looking at me with questioning facial expressions. I just shrug my shoulders and they go back to playing.

We haven't discussed the whole problem with the ball but I'm sure we'll do something about it after we get done playing.

"That's all for today guys, we need to try and get the ball back."

"Why don't we just go over the fence?"

"Are you dumb?"

"Are you ugly?"

"Damn, she got you man."

"Well I mean, Isabella is dumb sometimes so Benny man..."

"Oh shut up."

"It would be easier to just go over the fence, I'm pretty sure there's a door somewhere over there we can go through and talk to Mr.Mertle inside the house."

"You're crazy, that plan would no go very far."

"Do you have a better one?"

"Yeah, I do actually."

~~~~~~

"Just look out the window." We look out the window of the treehouse and there are things everywhere. The Beast barks and the boys run back to their seats.

"Anybody got any bright ideas?"

"Yeah."

~~~~~~

We put a stick through a hole in the fence and Squints watches from above us.

"Just a little further." We push it further and the Beast puts his paw down.

"Agh!" Ham screams and pulls the stick back. The end of it is bitten off and Ham screams even louder.

"What the hell are we gonna do now?"

"I have an idea. Go get that metal thing over there and someone get a pot from your kitchen and get duck tape."

"This better work Bella."

Timmy and Tommy come running back to us with everything we need and I tape a pot to the end of the metal pole and then we push it through the hole once again.

"A little bit farther."

"Almost..." we put the pot over the ball and Squints smiles "you guys got it, pull the ball back."

We start to pull back and the Beast puts his paw down once again. Ham screams and let's go of our invention and the Beast somehow pulls it through.

This dog is starting to scare me honestly.

"Watch out!" Our invention comes over the fence and fly's through the air. It lands a few feet away from us bent in several different ways and the boys look traumatized.

"I think we've seriously underestimated the Beast."

"Obviously we're dealing with powerful intelligence."
~~~~~~

"Okay guys, just a few more minutes. We're connecting power now."

We put Hams mask on a pole and hook them together with some sort of vacuum. I wasn't really watching how it happened.

"Initiate retrieval suction."

"Initiate retrieval section number one."

Scotty turns on the vacuum and Squints whispers up to him.