"Just remember, it's your first time trying so no one really expects you to be good at it." Smalls whispers, smiling a soft, reassuring smile as they continued to walk towards the baseball field. From their perspective view, they could see Squints and Yeah-Yeah abhorously bantering with one another while the other guys all stood hovered around them trying to bring their irate arguing down to a simmer.
"Guys, can we please just get back to the game before lunch hour is over?" Benny sighs exasperatedly, flickering his pleading gaze between his two friends; who'd both made no initiative in halting their rebuttals.
"Yeah, we've only been playing for ten minutes! What the hell are you two yackos fighting about anyway?" Bertram inquisitively inquires, standing with his arms akimbo and his countenance marring a bored expression.
Cree quietly stood back, observing as the squabble began to increase. "Do they always act like this?" She asks, glancing over at Smalls who only sighed heavily and nodded his head in response. He raises his forefinger mid-air, indicating that he would be right back then jogged over to where the rest of the guys where.
She could see Smalls exchanging words with his friends, then suddenly the arguing halted and all of their scrutinizing glares all flickered towards her. She felt an inadvertent blush flushing her cheeks as she stood their under their gawk. She exhaled a deep breath and slowly lugged her feet towards their direction once she saw Smalls waving her over.
"Hi." Cree says, bringing her hand up in a small wave and offering them a genial smile.
"She was sitting alone over there under the tree and I invited her to come over." He explained, mostly to Benny who only stood there mute with his mouth hung slightly agape. "I figured she could spend the rest of the lunch hour with us instead, you know?"
"You play?" DeNunez asked as he chewed down on the waddled up piece of cherry flavored bubble gum that was in his mouth. Cree shook her head and chanced a hesitant glance over at Smalls. "Well, we already have a full team but you can play left center with Smalls if you want. What do you say, Benny?" He asked and it was now Benny who felt his cheeks pooling a warm blush in chagrin.
He cleared his throat and sheepishly rubbed at the back of his neck before shrugging his shoulders. "Uh, yeah-yeah okay." He stammers, causing Cree to smile softly at him.
"Are we seriously letting a girl play with us?" She hears Ham utter in a scoff. She raises a challenging eyebrow up at him, he falters under the heat of her scrutiny.
"We play with you everyday, you don't hear us complaining." Smalls hastily interjected, patting Ham on the shoulder as he smirked at Cree — who mimicked the gesture upon feeling grateful for his amicability and for him coming to her defense.
"Oh! Piss off Smalls and get your ass over there so we can finish the game." Ham deflects, brushing the resting hand off of his shoulder before reaching down to pick us his catchers gear. He places his helmet on, giving Smalls a jovial grimace before returning to his crouched position behind the home base.
For the remaining duration of their lunch hour, they finished playing the game as intended. While Smalls encouragingly urged her to attempt to catch a ball, Cree preferred to stand back and observe. She watched as the guys bellowed vulgar obscurities to each other whenever they were angry or if someone hit the ball too far for anyone's reach. While watching the guys clamor loudly at each other was certainly entertaining, what Cree heeded at mostly was Benny.
