My Brother On The Mound

“Hot pretzel and a package of candy,” says the woman in pink. She has a glazed look, like she’s been standing in line for a thousand years.

“Six fifty.”

She gives me a credit card, and I go for the pretzel. We’re shorthanded, so I’m my own runner.

“Get me one,” Brady calls from his register.

“The syrup’s out in the diet cola,” Kelly shouts.

Their voices blend together with the clanging, whirring, and popping that is a ballpark concession stand. The PTA gets funds, Minor League baseball gets good neighbor points, and I get a headache. I can’t hear the score over the cacophony.

I’d really like to know how the guys are doing. My brother’s on that team, after all. But all I know is we’re in the 7th, and I’m not going anyplace except back to my register with the pretzel. “Cheese?” I ask Ms. Pink.

“Nah, but don’t forget my candy.”

Finally, the printer spits out a receipt for the woman to sign.  “What’s the score?” I ask as I hand her a pen.

“We’re winning three to nothing.”

Another crash in the background means I barely hear her. Mandy shouts, “Ah crap, I just dumped magic soap everywhere!”

“It’s hand sanitizer,” scolds one of the adults, like the real problem is Mandy calling it by a preschool name.

“Whatever. It’s all over the floor back here now. Watch your step.”

I take the receipt from the woman and put it in my drawer. “Three to nothing?” I repeat.

She’s walking away now, but she says, “Yeah, Claymore’s working on a perfect game.”

Suddenly, I tear off my apron and hoist the counter to let myself through. They yell after me, but I don’t hear their words. I smack two insects off my arm, but I don’t even feel the sting from the blood they’ve drawn. The visitors can’t get so much as a hit, and that’s my brother on the mound. That’s my brother on the mound.

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This weekend at Trifextra, we have between 33 and 333 words to use the words cacophony, soap, and insects in order.  The timer’s ticking if you want to come play!

The picture above is probably of Montgomery Biscuits pitcher Jim Paduch. I say probably because I’m not sure if I ever reset my little camera from Eastern Time when we moved to Montgomery from Lexington. The camera thinks the picture was taken at 8:43 on July 16, 2011. Meaning it was probably 7:43. Meaning it’s probably the starting pitcher still on the mound. Or rather, stepping off the mound for a second. If not, though, it’s either Frank De Los Santos or Zachary Quate.

About jesterqueen:
Jessie Powell is the Jester Queen. She likes to tell you about her dog, her kids, her fiction, and her blog, but not necessarily in that order.

Comments

My Brother On The Mound — 19 Comments

    • Do it do it chug chug … oh wait. Peer pressure works differently in writer’s circles. OK umm… type type…

  1. Great story! It took me back to younger days when I would attend my brother’s little league games.

    • I’ve worked a concession stand or two in my time. There’s something about them that blends together, so that they could all really work at any event.

  2. Nice little scene. You barely even noticed the three words hidden in there.

    I felt so delightfully chaotic. I could see the frantic workers in the concession.
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    • And the long, LONG line of people cursing that kid as he shirks off and they have to get somebody else to take over the register.

  3. As a HUGE fan of baseball (it’s on right now while I’m reading this) and great writing, I loved this post. You set the scene so well I could almost smell the mixture of grass and burnt popcorn. Great post.
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    • And as a fan, you also appreciate how rare a perfect game is and what it really means to throw one!

    • Thanks! For me, the worst weeks are the ones when the word forces a stilted story out of me. The ones that don’t feel forced are the ones when the prompt works right. This weekend, it worked very right.

  4. I want to hate baseball, but I still love it. This did not help. Lovely writing, Jessie.
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    • I totally want to hate it. It’s one of the most sexist professional sports left. Worse even than golf, where there are still isolated courses (hello Augusta, GA, I AM looking at you) where sexism is the norm. But the games are just SO MUCH FUN, especially the minor league ones. I prefer to hope that my fandom will eventually mean that some woman WILL break the fucking wall down.

  5. Great writing, as usual. I remember those days working in the Snack Shack at Little League games when my sons played. Every year the noise was intense, stuff spilled, and the wasps invaded and stung. Thanks for a lovely trip back to gentler days. Nice work.

  6. You know I liked it. Can’t watch the game, but I love stories about it. This one was a winner. I really love how she went to see her brother. 🙂

  7. Thanks for linking up this weekend. We hope you can come back for the weekday challenge too. Remember to check out our Facebook and Twitter pages for news on what’s happening on the site.
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  8. Nice shot, I’m always forgetting to change the time zones! And that reminds me, I better go check and see whether they’re on summer time now too! PS. Might need to start calling hand gel magic soap from now on. 😉
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