The New Girl

Prologue

"Strike three!"

"And that is another strike out for Nick Harper and the Eagles. The score is still tied at zero going into the seventh inning of the ball game," the announcer broadcasting the game said. 

"Oh, come on! Did you see that, Sarah? That was terrible," Abby turned to Sarah saying. 

"I know! He has been making terrible calls all day." 

Today is the championship game between two rival schools in Santa Barbara, the Eagles, and the Warriors. A rivalry going back to 1945. The two schools' athletics nearly despised each other without a reason at all. A different turf created such a brutal hatred. At football games, there could be and actually have been fights breaking out between the players, schoolmates and even parents. Today the two schools have been in a non-stop deadlock at a tie score of zero. A pitcher's game they would call it. Two pitchers battling it out on the mound against each others' teams until the one fatal miss queue. It's usually how these games work when they were this close. 

Abby Watson, a simple girl who loved to support her school and her boyfriend, Derek Elis who was the pitcher for the Barbara Warriors. He was the hardest thrower on their team and had the dirtiest of pitches that they had seen, but one pitcher could out do his arm any day. That pitcher was Nick Harper of the Northend Eagles. Though Abby, and her friend Sarah did not know much about baseball, they could have told you this themselves. 

Derek walked onto the mound to begin the seventh inning and began warming up. Fastball, fastball, curveball, curveball, change up, fastball, in that order and the catcher threw up his arms. It was a signal that Derek was ready to begin the inning. Derek had a few hits off him in the game up until this last inning. The pressure was definitely eating at him because of the flawless performance Nick Harper had done today allowing no hits but one error by the shortstop. 

"First up to bat for the Eagles, second baseman, Alan Tanner." Derek looked towards the catcher as he took tall on the mound and nodded. He went through his wined up and released the ball. Fastball outside, ball one. 

"Come on babe!" Abby yelled out to encourage him. Derek stepped back onto the mound, got his sign and threw again to home. Alan stepped forward and sprung his back hip to the ball, throwing his bat and the ball screamed up the middle nearly hitting Derek in the face. 

"A base hit for Alan Tanner!" The centerfielder received the ball and threw it in. Derek stood back on the mound and got into the stretch, in which is mandatory when runners are on base. "Next up for the Eagles, the pitcher, Nick Harper." Abby shifted in her seat and grabbed Sarah's arm.

"Sarah, I'm scared." 

"Me too!" 

Derek looked towards home, nodded and stood straight up with his hand in his glove. He glanced out of the corner of his eye to peak at Alan who was leading off of first and slide stepped home. The ball swung wide and looped, but not enough and fell straight into Nick's shoulder. The crowd roared as Abby and Sarah cringed knowing that probably hurt, but Nick trotted down the first base without any sign of pain. Derek stood bent over with his hands on his knees taking deep breaths. He was rattled, or simply nervous from the situation. 

"Next up for the Eagles, the third basemen, Lem Davis who has been on fire all day." Lem stepped into the right side of the batter's box and dug his foot in. Derek took another deep breath as he took off his hat. 

"He's nervous," Abby said.

"How can you tell?" Sarah asked.

"He always does that when he gets nervous."

Derek stood on the mound, got his sign and threw the ball to home. It loop and fell away from the plate. Curveball, ball one. Derek became noticeably frustrated. 

"Keep calm, babe!" Abby yelled to him. Derek threw another pitch. Fastball, which skipped in the dirt, ball two. Derek kicked the dirt on the mound. He took off his hat and wiped his face with his black jersey. Lem stood outside of the white chalked box. He began to chuckle as he knew how intimidated Derek was. He pointed to his head and blew him a kiss. Derek's face began to become red from the anger being provoked. In a normal situation of baseball, Lem would have been beamed by the pitcher just for provoking, but Derek knew he could not of done that. That would have made the bases loaded with no outs. He knew he had to pitch to Lem. He stepped back onto the mound and threw another pitch. Lem's eyes widened as he anticipated the location of the pitch and stepped into the it and drove his bat into the ball. It took off without any regards of coming back to Earth. The crowd got to their feet in awe and began to roar and cheer.

"A three run homerun for Lem Davis which puts the Eagles up three to zero!" Abby shut her eyes as she knew defeat was certain. 

As the inning ended, the score was three to zero and Derek and his team got ready to bat as Nick walked up to the mound. He began to warm up and threw as hard as he did in the first inning of play. The amount of velocity Nick was able to throw as a junior was a force not to be underestimated by. He was almost able to top off at ninety miles an hour, and he was a southpaw, a left hander. This added to the factor of his threat because they're more right handed pitchers than there are left handed pitchers in their league which means they didn't see a hard throwing lefty often. The catch threw up his arms and Nick threw his last pitch. 

"You think there's a chance?" Sarah asked.

"I don't know. This guy is really good."

Nick walked to the side of the mound and froze. He looked into the stands and stared. His eyes widened, and he bolted off the field. Murmurs roared among the crowd of confusion. The coach began to yell at him as he was leaving the dugout leaving his belongings behind asking where he was going, but he ignored the question and left the game.

"Did...Did that just happen?" Abby asked aloud. Sarah was speechless. None of them at that game have ever seen someone just run out of the game like that. As the murmurs continued, the Eagles' coach put another pitcher in to replace Nick. Their pitcher gave up hits left and right, long and short. The Warriors came back and won the game four to three. The Warriors rushed the field and tackled their teammate who hit the winning hit. They poured the Gatorade container filled with water on their coach as they celebrated the come from behind victory. 

But Abby did not cheer along side Sarah and the rest of the crowd. She knew Nick would have destroyed them in that last inning. To her, it didn't feel like a true victory, but Derek was happy, and that was the only thing she cared about at that game. He ran over to her and picked her up off her feet, and they celebrated the victory that night with everyone together. 

Abby truly cared about Derek. She did anything he asked and things that he didn't even ask to be done. During the year she did most of his homework, helped him study for tests, went to all of his games, home and away, she always went with him and his family on holidays and even bought him a very nice watch. By looking at it, you could have guessed it cost over a hundred dollars. But in all of this, Derek never returned any of the affection that she did for him. He was very neglectful and deep down didn't truly appreciate what Abby did or even does for him still. Their relationship spanned over a year and a half, but it would soon come to close. 

After summer, the two went back to school still as a couple, yet Derek didn't treat her as if they were. There were times where he would give her the cold shoulder, times where she would call him and he just wouldn't contribute to the conversation making it too dull to continue and also stopped going places with her. Everything between them began to rip apart, and Abby remained trying, for she was stubborn about giving up. She felt that giving up on a relationship was a disgraceful thing, a dishonorable thing and pride to her was a very important thing. Her pride carried her through the tough and the thick moments of life, but Derek refused to try with her. She would fight for his affection, and it would also end with a cold shoulder or him being rude. It seemed Derek began to become angrier and angrier as the fall semester continued. He began becoming aggressive to where Abby began becoming scared of him. She wasn't sure what was happening to her loved one, but he wasn't the boy she remembered. It took her to the homecoming after party to realize that he truly was not the same guy she fell for when they had a falling out. But that was just the beginning of it and Abby hasn't been the same since.