she's alright {benny rodriguez}

~21~

You and everyone else ran around town, collecting bottles and cashing them in. After a few minutes, you had enough to buy a ball.

You grabbed all the money from the others and handed it to the cashier, who rung it up and handed it back to you.

"Thank you!" you call back, and toss the box to Benny before running back outside. 

"C'mon, open it up! Hurry up!" everyone gathered on the sidewalk and watched as Benny opened the box and took out the ball.

"Gimme somethin' to write with!" Benny says.

"Here, I got it. I got a pencil, I got a pencil," Bertram offers, and hands it to Benny.

"Not a pencil, a pen!" Benny waves him away.

"Sorry!"

There was some more rustling and moving, but someone found a pen.

"I got a pen!"

Benny takes the writing utensil and starts to write on the ball. "Baby Ruthie?" someone asks. It sure looked like that.

"Ah, I dunno, Benny, man," Kenny says skeptically.

"Yeah, boy, that looks pretty crappy," Yeah-Yeah admits.

"It doesn't matter what it looks like, his mom's never gonna know the difference! This'll just buy us some time, ya dorks!" Benny says as if his plan was the most obvious in the world.

"C'mon, okay! Let's go!" everyone runs down the street, and Smalls takes the ball to put in his stepdad's trophy room while the rest of you head back to the sandlot.

"Benny, you sure this's gonna work? I ain't so sure," you say, unsure of what y'all were going to do now.

"It has to. His dad's gonna kill him if he finds out!"

"I know, but how are we gonna get the ball back if the Beast has it? There's no way we can go over there."

Benny turned to you and put his hands on your shoulders. "Y/N, don't think like that. We're gonna figure out a way to get this ball back, don't worry," he gives you a confident smile and walks towards the tree house.

+++++

Smalls had come back from his house, and relayed what happened during his encounter with his mom. The replacement ball had actually worked.

Now, everyone was trying to brainstorm ways of getting the actual ball back.

"Hey, I got it!" Smalls states. "Why don't we just go over, and knock on the door, and ask Mr. Mertle if he can get it for us!"

"Hey, I can go do that now! Good idea, Smalls," you say. You start to stand up, but Squints stops you.

"Are you out of your mind?" Squints says. "Mr. Mertle's the meanest old man that ever lived. He's the one who made the Beast eat that kid." Smalls looks down in defeat. "It's not an option, you guys. Forget about it."

"Oh, okay. Sorry. I will."

"Hey, it was a good idea, Smalls," you pat his shoulder and he nods sadly.

"Let's just look out the window," Squints suggests, and everybody moves in that direction. You all peek your heads out, and look into the junkyard. There was a baby doll with an arrow in its eye, broken toy planes, and a kite, among other things. Suddenly, there was a growl and the priceless ball flies out of the Beast's lean-to. It was all chewed up and slobbery.

"He's darin' us," Timmy says as you all sit back down again.

"We're in his territory, now." Ham states.

"Anybody got any bright ideas?" Benny asks, looking around. As he looked at you, you shook your head. "'Kay, everybody keep thinking."

After about ten minutes, the only thing you had suggested was trying to pull it back with a stick. Since that was the best idea anybody had come up with in the span of thirty minutes, you decided to do it.

++++++

You kicked out the lowest board on the fence and Squints took up watch position in the tree house. He had a periscope made of cereal boxes and toilet paper rolls, but he claimed it worked, so you didn't argue.

Ham lay down on his stomach, holding a long, wooden stick and started feeding it into the junkyard.

From up above came Squints' whisper. "Farther."

"Shhh!"

Ham kept pushing the stick farther, until it touched the ball. You were looking through the hole right next to him. "Just a little bit farther."

A huge paw stepped on the stick, and Ham started screaming in your ear. You yelped and covered your ears, trying to block out all the noise. Benny was pulling Ham who was holding on to the stick, but the stick broke and came back all splintered and slobbery, which prompted more yells.

+++++

The second idea someone came up with was a bit more advanced stick method. They had gotten a metal square pole and stick a pan on the end. Ham, yet again, fed it through the hole and got closer and closer to the ball.

"You got it, pull it back," Smalls states when the pan covered the ball.

Before he could pull the pan back, the Beast crushed the pan with his paw. "Oh my god!" Ham screamed. More yelling ensued.

The Beast started another game of tug-of-war, and you tried to help pull it back. However, the Beast pulled the bar on to his side, and everyone fell back. You land on top of Benny, and Ham landed on your leg.

"Ow, Ham! Get off me, you idiot!"

Smoke billowed from the hole, and something went flying over the fence. It was the bar and pan, all bent up and deformed.

When you all had gathered around the twisted metal, Timmy said, "I think we've seriously underestimated the Beast." You all nod in agreement.

"Obviously, we're dealing with a superior intelligence."