Passion

We were woken up at the crack of dawn, much to my displeasure. We all ate, as a team in the breakfast lounge. Once we finished eating we were hurried back into our rooms to change into our uniforms, when we were done changing we sat in the lobby waiting for our coach.

“I see you guys are all ready,” we all nodded lazily. “Wonderful! So as most of you know we were ranked 7th in the state of Florida therefore we play the team ranked 8th, the Hellcats. Our game starts in an hour and a half; we’ll be leaving the hotel in 10 minutes. Once were on the bus I will discuss the starting line-up.” We all groaned in response, and boarded the bus. I took my seat next to Luke and tried to fall asleep again but was poked repeatedly by Derek telling me that ‘if he couldn’t sleep nether could I’.

“Coach we have a problem,” Aden our left fielder yelled from the back of the bus.

“What is it?” Our coach sounded concerned.

“Uh Mitch just threw up,” we all turned around to see our shortstop clutching his stomach for dear life.

“Oh dear god, get him to the room and call a nurse!” He barked out orders as we saw our teammates carry him back into the hotel with coach cursing under his breath.

“Cam,” I turned my head towards Coach.

“Uh yes Coach?” I asked confused, he just gave me a weak smile.

“Hope you can handle short,” and with that the bus lurched forward off to our game.

***

“Please rise for our national anthem,” the voice over the intercom announced, we did as we were told and took of our hats placing them over our hearts. Once that was done, they announced each team, team member and the positions they were playing.

“Play ball!” The ump yelled, and we went to our positions. Derek threw the first pitch and the batter hit it hard to me, I fielded it with ease and made a good throw to first base.

“Out!” The ump called, I smiled at the look of disbelief on his face. The next batter bunted it and made it to first. Derek pitch again, the batter hit it to first, Oliver threw it to me, I touched second base and threw it to Christian, our second baseman who was standing on first. The ump called both of them out, we all ran back to the dugout.

“Nice double play,” Coach congratulated all of us, before we took our much needed drinks and gulped them down. “Cam your hitting first,” Coach called from the side of the dug-out, I nodded and grabbed my bat out of my bag. “Hit it hard cam!” Coach told me before giving me a slap on the back. I took position waiting for the ball to be pitched.

“A girl playing baseball? What a disgrace to the sport.” The ball was pitch and I didn’t even swing, the catcher distracted me.

“Strike!” The ump called out in his annoyingly loud voice.

“Can’t even hit the ball, shame.” Another ball pitched another strike, by then their team was laughing.

“Cam,” Coach motioned for me to go over there, and I did. “Don’t let what there saying get to you, that’s the whole point of dirty talk. Hit the ball hard and aim for someone’s face, got it?”

“Yes sir,” I took position again at the batters boxes, but this time when the ball was pitched I hit it hard over third baseman’s head, I made it to first safe. Oliver hit after me, he bunted and got out, but he advanced me which was the goal. Juan hit the ball in the air I took a lead-off, they caught it and I went back to the bag tagging up and then running as fast as I could to third sliding under the third base man’s tag.

“Safe!”

I stood up smiling and wiped some dirt off my arms; Derek took the plate and hit me home. We ended the first inning with 2-0, us winning.

By the time we were in the bottom of the eight we were tied, 6-6. Mike struck out, and it was the top of the ninth. We all ran out to our positions, while the batter was taking his sweet time getting to the plate. I wiped the sweat off my forehead, it was noon in Florida and my god was it hot. The batter hit it hard to my right; I dove for it, shot up and threw it the first.

“Safe!” I cursed silently, “He was so out,” I mumbled to myself. The next batter struck out, but the person on first stole second and we weren’t quick enough.

“Come on! You guys are playing like shit today, get your game together!” Our coach yelled from the dugout. The next batter hit it straight to Oliver; he fielded it and then threw it to Ross, our third baseman.

“Out on first!” The ump called.

“Come on guys! We got this!” I yelled words of encouragement, hoping that it would help everyone improve, this batter could not score. The next batter hit it deep into center, Frank almost caught it but it went a little more left than he thought it would. I groaned as I watch the batter on third score, and the batter that hit it make his way to second. Derek struck out the next batter, but it didn’t matter they got their run.

“The line-up is Ross, Ike, Paul, and Cam you’re in the whole.” We all got our equipment ready. Ross hit it to third but got out, Ike made his way to first safe, and Paul hit Ike to second but got himself out. I started walking up to the home plate taking deep breathes.

“Cam, no pressure or anything but were counting on you. Its bottom of the ninth, two outs we just need you to get on, okay? Juan will get Ike home, just a clean hit.” I stood there with a frown on my face. “No funny business,” Coach told me sternly. I rolled my eyes and went to the plate.

“Welcome back cutie, ready to end this game?” There catcher asked and I smirked.

“Most definitely,” the ball was pitch and I hit it with all my might, sending it up in the air, exactly the opposite of what coach asked me to do. I ran with the remaining energy I had to first, as I took my lead off from first I didn’t see the ball anywhere, and all I could here was cheering from my side of the field. That’s when I dawned on me, the only girl baseball player at this whole championship, just hit a home run. I jogged past second with a shit-eating grin on my face, I rounded third and winked at the pitcher sending a silent ‘fuck you’ and as I stopped at home were my team was waiting for me I looked at the catcher and smiled.

“There I ended it for you,” he shook his head in disbelief and walked off the field along with the rest of his team. Luke hosted me on his shoulders, chanting my name over and over till we reached our bus. Coach walked up to me as we were waiting for everyone to board the bus.

“Thought I said no funny business?” He told me grinning.

“I am a woman! You should know that whatever you tell us to do we do the opposite,” He just laughed and motioned me to get on the bus. Once we were all safely on the bus, coach started his congratulation speech.

“I’m so gosh dang proud of you guys, I mean you sucked ass but you still pulled threw to wipe those ignorant smiles off the other team. And Cam, damn that was an awesome hit,” He paused as the team busted out cheering and applauding, I blushed a deep shade of red. “As I was saying we have four hours till we will be playing again, use that time wisely.”

***

“Ah, the famous Camille Henderson,” I turned around at the sound of my name. The boys and I just finished eating at the pizza parlor a few blocks down and I was on my way up to take a short nap.

“It’s Cam, call me Camille and you will die a painful death.” I glared at the boy standing in front of me.

“My apologies, I just wanted to say congratulations. A little birdie told me you hit the first homerun of this championship.” The boy from last night told me, I just gave him an annoyed look.

“Is that all?” I asked wanting more than anything to go pass out in the nice soft bed upstairs.

“Not quite, I also wanted to introduce myself, I’m Blake.” He held out his hand to shake, I extended mine and we shook.

“Well you already know mine, so goodbye.” I told him heading off to my room.

“I look forward to playing against you, Camille.” I could hear the smirk in his voice and I narrowed my eyes at him, but before I could say anything the elevator doors close and I was whisked off to floor 22.

We were woken up at a more sensible time the next morning, 8 o’clock sharp. We showered, dressed, and ate and before we knew it we were off to go play baseball. Yesterday we won the first game, 8-7 and our last game 6-3. We were 2-0 in the championships putting us in 5th place; we are playing who ever wins the game before us. When we arrived at the stadium, the team who was ranked 3rd was winning by 5 points, the umps called the game after the 7th inning, the score being 11-4.

“Come on guys, warm up.” Our coach yelled and we all took our bags and put them in the dugout. We warmed up are arms and stretched, when we finished coach gave us a quick pep talked and soon we were on the field. I wasn’t playing because our shortstop was feeling better, but I was a designated batter for him because he sucked at hitting. We were doing really great the first two innings, but after we let a few bad plays bring our sprits down. We ended up losing that game by two points; everyone was bummed out to say the least.

“Guys cheer up! It’s a double elimination, its not over for us! We can still win!” I tried to cheer up my teammates, most of them just rolled there eyes and went back to complaining.

“Cam, you don’t understand. We lost, if we lose our next game were going home.”

“That’s not going to happen, you know why? Because were going to cheer up before our next game and were going to go out there and kick major booty!” I yelled the last part, standing up in my seat with a super man pose.

“No we aren’t, we suck compared to these guys,” Luke whined from next to me.

“Do you want some cheese with that whine?” I asked sarcastically before turning my attention back to my mopping team. “Guys if we have this type of attitude we might as well just give up. I know were better than all this crap you’re giving me, now let’s go back to the hotel with our heads held high and get some grub.” No one said anything, they just stared at me with dumb expressions on there faces.

“She’s right guys, we cant just give up over one lose, lets go back out there and show those snobs that we are better than they will ever be.” Derek stood up next to me, putting a hand on my shoulder “we can do it guys, I know it.” The boys nodded there heads, giving a silent ‘your right’ but not daring to speak.

We all ate small sub sandwiches and waters, we couldn’t be too full for the game or we would get sick. After we finished eating we had just enough time to make it back to the baseball field and warm up. Coach informed me that I would be playing second because our second baseman hurt his ankle pretty bad the last game.

We kept our sprits up the entire game and played with smiles on our faces. It worked too. We ended up winning the game by 4 points, advancing us into the finals. We were playing team number 2 tomorrow, the same team that creamed us today and if we won we would be playing the number one ranked team in the state. And if we won that, we would be state champs, just two more games until that trophy is ours