Baseball is Not Just for Boys

Chapter 17

Chapter 17

I stayed in place, laying on the road, my chest heaving and my heart pounding. I closed my eyes and licked my lips, I tried to slow down my breathing and get my heart beat back to normal. I opened my eyes and scanned the now empty road with poorly lit street lights, dripping with rain from the other night. I watched as the light shown off the puddles under the light posts. I pushed off the ground with my hands and stood on my feet, looking behind me at the road my mother was somewhere, I let out a long sigh and turned to follow the road again.

The same question was in my head and started to give me a headache, maybe it was when I fell on the concrete, I don’t know. Who was that and why doesn’t he like the boys? I looked over my shoulder, determined to punch the next creepy man who shoves me down and interrogates me on who I hang out. Suddenly a gas station came into my view a small smile crept on my face, finally! I continued walking towards the blessed gas station, I walked into the little store behind the gas station.

A little bell dinged when I opened the door. A few people looked up from the racks of the food they were inspecting at me, gave me a look, then looked back down at the junk food in front of them.

An older man was standing at the coffee machine, looking at all the flavors with a cup in his hand. His eyes had a lost look in them, he really wasn’t looking at the coffee flavors, and he was remembering a memory. Maybe from a war, a past lover, a lost family member, or just a memory. A middle aged man in a button-down shirt with jeans touched his arm. The older gentleman looked up with glazed eyes, and looked back down at his coffee cup, remembered where he was, then pushed the button for black coffee and held his coffee underneath.

The man in the button-down shirt stood next to him getting cappuccino, talking on his cell phone, but he kept an eye on the old man next to him. I connected the dots and realized the two men must be related. The old man looked up at the younger man and grinned, the younger man smiled back and went back to his coffee.

A few aisles away, a mother in a designer coat was being dragged into the candy rack by her little daughter, who couldn’t be anymore than six. The little girl had her eyes fixed on a king size Hershey bar a few feet away from her little hands. The woman was on her phone talking away about something business, while also trying to tell her daughter to slow down or to stop. The little girl ignored her mother and continued to race towards the candy waiting for her to get her grabby hands on. As soon as her hands touched the candy, she let go of her mothers hand and looked up at her mother with the candy bar pressed to her chest, big brown eyes looking up at the mother’s stern green ones. The annoyed mother was now frowning at her daughter standing in front her, she was still talking into her phone and shaking her head. The little girl didn’t let a second go by before letting out a loud wale, signaling her distress to everyone in the store.

By now I was standing by the freezers that held all the drinks watching the mother and daughter now yelling at each other. I felt around in my pocket and pulled out five dollars. I looked up at the daughter who now had tears flowing down her cheeks screaming out “why!” at her mother. Her mother just kept shaking her head and pointing towards the door. I walked over to the candy rack and grabbed another Hershey bar and walked over to the cash register. A teenage boy covered in ache with red hair falling in his eyes slowly looked up at me.

“That’ll be $1” he slowly said to me, a giant grin crept on his face. I took out one of my dollars and handed it to him. “You’re hot.”

“Shut up and give me the candy bar, asshole.”

“Oh, feisty, just the way I like them in bed.” He slipped his hand closer to mine.

“Suck a dick.” I grabbed the candy bar and slapped his hand, turned on my heel, and walked towards the daughter who was still crying while her mother was getting a large coffee. I walked over slowly with the candy bar in my hand the little girl still sniffled as she watched me approach her.