the sandlot orphan » b.rodriguez

; one

B E N N Y - JUNE 16, 1962

"Anyway, Scott, that's Timmy and Tommy Timmons." Benny said to Scott, starting to introduce the gang.

"Mike 'Squints' Palledorous."

"Alan McClellan-we call him Yeah Yeah."

"Bertram Grover Weeks."

"Kenny DeNunez and Hamilton Porter. We call him Ham. Guys, this is—"

Benny stopped talking when a familiar blonde started walking towards him.

Her again; The Mystery Girl.

Her hair was still straight but let loose, so her hair was flying behind her as she walked. The sun made her face shine and right then Benny realized she had sparkling blue eyes.

"Um, I'm Scott Smalls?" A fuzzy voice said in the background as Benny admired the girl in front of him.

God, I wished I knew her name, He thought.

Mystery Girl passed all of the boys and turned right and out of sight, going through the way they all used to go to the sandlot.

Benny shook his head and mentally slapped himself.

"Anyways, yeah, um, well, Scott's gonna play with us 'cause he makes nine." He stuttered, turning back to the boys. "So now we've got a whole team. We're wasting time. Let's go to the sandlot."

"He was swoonin' over her again!" Yeah-Yeah chuckled behind Benny as they started walking to The Sandlot. That made him want to turn around and snap at him, but he ignored him.

⚾

"Why'd you bring him Benny?" Bertram asked moments later as they were walking to the worn out and dusty baseball diamond.

"'Cause there's eight of us, and he makes nine." Benny answered.

"Yeah, yeah, so would my sister but I didn't bring her." Yeah-Yeah piped in.

"With nine guys we've got a whole team, Yeah-Yeah." Benny kept saying.

"No. With Elswenger we had a whole team. Elswenger could catch." Ham muttered.

"And throw." Bertram added.

"Come on, Benny, man. He ain't game." DeNunez said.

Benny shook his head and tried ignoring them. He did, but his mind went straight to Mystery Girl. She was sitting on her usual spot on the fence, tucking stray pieces of her shiny blonde hair behind her ears and swinging her bare legs back and forth. Questions and insults to Scott were kept thrown around and Benny was being drifted elsewhere, imagining everything what could happen if he just walked up to her and asked for her name...

"Come on, Benny, man. The kid is an L7 weenie!" Squints exclaimed, bringing Benny back to reality as he made a sign with his fingers.

"Yeah, yeah, Oscar Mayer! Foot-long! Dodger dog! A weenie!" Yeah-Yeah almost screamed and Benny knew he did so that that Smalls would hear. Benny turned around to look at him and he had his head down in embarrassment, but Mystery Girl was walking toward him.