"And her email address, too. How lucky for me."

Susie nudged Marlee in the arm. "Look at you. You're a chick magnet."

"Shut up." Marlee nudged her in return. "You're the only chick I want. But what am I supposed to do?" She unlocked the passenger door of the van and gestured for Susie to hop in. Susie grabbed the cream sodas and potato chips and climbed in. Marlee climbed in the driver's side.

Marlee opened her soda, took a swig, and waved the note around as if still waiting for an answer.

"Mi vida, I don't know what you're supposed to do. She obviously likes you, but you're, uh, taken." Susie took a drink from her soda. "Mmm, you're right. Cream soda is good." She took another sip.

"Told ya. So how do I let her down gently?"

"Hmm," Susie looked out the windshield at the softball field in front of her, "I don't know. We could always--"

"What?"

"We could let her know that you're with me."

"How?"

"I don't know. Let her catch us kissing or something?"

Marlee sucked her breath through her teeth. "In the van?"

"Or in the dugout after a game?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Marlee agreed. "Maybe she'll get the hint and back off."

Susie nodded. "Maybe."

Marlee carefully tore Bree's note into the tiniest bits she could manage and tossed the lot into the plastic litter bag her mother kept in the van. She wiped her hands. "All gone."

"Good." Susie raised an eyebrow at Marlee. "I wish I could kiss you here."

"I know. Me, too. There's too many people around. Kids, too."

"Yeah." Susie reached for Marlee's hand. "We can get married now in New York, but we're still too scared to let anybody see us. It's kind of stupid."

"I know, but I'm not ready to come out of the closet in front of the whole world, you know?"

Susie nodded in agreement.

Marlee leaned back in the driver's seat and pointed to the sky. "See those puffy white clouds?"

"Cumulus clouds."

"You really are a science geek, aren't you?"

"Not really. Just when it comes to rocks and earth science. I like the weather, too."

Marlee squeezed Susie's hand. It was the equivalent of a hug, one of those hugs they couldn't share in public. "Well, anyway," Marlee continued, "this was the kind of day I pictured when I had that wicked crush on you last March, and your team came to Clarksonville to play us."

"Ahh, the day I fell in love with you."

Marlee's cheeks turned instant crimson. "Mm hmm. But that day wasn't like this one. That day was cold and gray. I think it even rained."

"That didn't stop us from getting together."

"Nope."

Marlee made such puppy-dog eyes at Susie that she wanted to ignore the rest of the world and swoop in and kiss her like there was no tomorrow. Instead she cleared her throat.

"Did you know that clouds are just tiny water droplets?" Susie pointed back to the clouds. "Cumulus clouds are made when warm air rises into the atmosphere and reaches cold air. The water in the air condenses and then slowly drifts up into the atmosphere. That's how they get that cottony look. When I was growing up, though, my papi told me that clouds were created differently."

"Oh yeah? What'd he say?"

"Well," Susie continued, "he said that every day God assigned an angel to paint the sky. So every day, before Papi drove me to school, we'd stop to look at the sky to see what the angel had painted that morning. And every morning we'd thank God and the angel who'd provided us with that day's canvas." Susie laughed. "Of course, some mornings in the winter it would be pitch black, and Papi would scold the angel for taking the easy way out with a roller and black paint."

Marlee chuckled. "It sounds like you have a great relationship with your dad."

"Yeah." Susie grinned, but then remembered. She kicked herself mentally. "I hope I didn't--"

"What?"

"I hope I didn't make you sad. Make you think about your own dad."

"I did think of him, but not in a sad way. He died almost six years ago, so most of the time I can call up the good memories without losing it."

Susie reached over and hugged Marlee. "Te quiero, mi vida."

"I love you, too." Marlee pulled back, squeezing Susie's hand again. "There. That's your kiss."

"Nice." Susie squeezed back. "There's yours."

They sat in silence for a moment. Susie didn't want the moment to end, but knew it had to.

"Marlee, I gotta--"

"I know."

"Call me on my cell when you get home." Susie opened the passenger door. "Te quiero," she whispered not wanting anyone except Marlee to hear.

"Me, too." Marlee pressed two fingers to her lips and kissed them. She flicked the kiss to Susie who scooped it out of the air with her hand and then smashed the kiss against her heart.

"Bye." Susie waved and then headed toward her car. Leaving Marlee was getting harder and harder, but she had to get home. She unlocked the car door, but couldn't bring herself to get in. She turned and leaned against the door, so she could watch Marlee pull out of the parking lot.

Once the speck of Marlee's van had disappeared in the distance, Susie groaned. When would they ever be alone? With a grunt she got in the car and turned the key in the ignition. It whined and whined, but the starter didn't catch.

"C'mon," Susie said gently as if not to offend the car. She tried again, this time pumping the gas pedal a few times. The car still wouldn't start, so she smacked the steering wheel as panic rose in her stomach. "Come on!" she pleaded, but to no avail. No matter how many times she tried to start the car, it stubbornly wouldn't.

She pounded the steering wheel again in frustration. She couldn't let her parents catch her at Sandstoner Fields. They'd know she went there to meet her friends, or worse, to be alone with Marlee. She thought about calling Marlee to come back, but then what? What if they couldn't get the car started? And she couldn't bother Sam. Sam was off alone with Lisa. She'd done too much for her already.

With a deep breath, she decided to call the lesser of two evils. She opened her phone and said, "Papi," into the receiver.

She prayed and prayed that he'd left his cell phone on. He usually did because he worked as a regional salesman for a paper product company covering the entire New York North Country and parts of Vermont. He had to be reachable at all times.

When he answered the phone, relief washed over her. Thank God she didn't have to call the home phone, or worse, her mother's cell phone.

She tried to start the car again as she talked to him, but to no avail. He didn't hesitate when she said she needed him to come get her. She cringed waiting for the reprimand when she told him she wasn't at Stewart's or at the Waste Management dump. He didn't seem to care that she was at Sandstoner Fields.

Once she hung up with her father, she got out of the car and hopped up on the hood. She watched the young softball players on the field. There was a time when she was that young and played catch with her dad in the yard. She couldn't remember the last time they'd done that. His promotion to regional manager a few years back probably had something to do with it. She was so caught up in her thoughts that she didn't hear his car pull up alongside hers.

"Mariposita," her father said, "are you okay?"

Susie jumped. "Yeah." She heard the frustration in her voice. "It's just annoying that she won't start." She slid off the hood and gave her father a quick hug. She loved how good looking her father was with his short dark brown hair, cut impeccably. She even liked his stylish sideburns and precise eyebrows.

She looked at the car and practically held her breath waiting for him to ask her why she was at the fields when she wasn't supposed to be. She relaxed a micron when he simply took her key and got in the driver's seat.

"When was the last time you tried to start it?"

"When I called you."

"Okay, let me try." He turned the key and the car roared to life.

"Papi, how did you do that?"

"Magic." He wiggled his fingers as he stepped out of the car. "We need to get this fixed." He held the door open for her to get in. "Tomorrow I'm leaving for another road trip, but I'll be back on Saturday. How about we take this clunker to Moe's on Sunday and have him give us an estimate for a new starter?"

"Sounds good to me, Papi." Susie hoped he wasn't about to tell her she'd have to pay for it all by herself. She had a savings account, but it didn't have much money in it. Filling up the gas tank for trips to Clarksonville was a serious drain on her already limited resources.

"Okay, I'll follow you home." He started to head back to his car, but then turned around. "If your mother asks, your car broke down at Stewart's."

"Stewart's?"

Her father's eyes became sharp laser beams directed right at her as he repeated, "Stewart's."

She had an ally. "Thanks, Papi," she called after him.

He nodded once without turning around.

Chapter Eleven.

We've Got Your Back SAM PULLED HER Sebring into a parking spot at the Elmhurst Rage softball field. Susie leaped out of the passenger side and jumped onto Marlee's back. "I'm ba-ack," she singsonged in Marlee's ear.

"Yeah, and I've got the backache to prove it." Marlee hung on to Susie for a moment and then grunted. She let go, and Susie hopped down. They headed for the dugout.

Lisa leaped off the bench when she saw Susie. "Welcome back, stranger." She gave her a quick hug.

"Thanks." Susie grinned at her friends.

"Does Coach Gellar know you're here today?" Lisa pointed toward home plate where Coach Gellar stood with the Elmhurst coach. Something on Lisa's face put Susie on alert. Maybe Coach Gellar really did hate her.

"Uh, yeah," Susie said. "I called her last night when my mother gave me the happy news. Dios mio, I can't believe my mother let me out a day early."

"It was your dad's doing," Sam said knowingly. "It had to be." She sat on the bench to put on her cleats.

"You're probably right." Susie's second week of incarceration had been worse than the first. Not only did her mother pile on the chores, but she had been even colder, if that was possible. But Susie didn't care at that moment, because she was off restrictions and free, free, free. Aay, except for the fact that she kind of didn't have a car. Her dad was due back from his trip later that night and then on Sunday they were going to bring her car to Moe's Garage to get an estimate.

Susie looked around the shabby visitors' dugout. There was no helmet rack, no water fountain, and no cubbies to put your gear in. No bat rack, either. All the bats were leaning against the fence. "This dugout sucks," she said to no one in particular.

Sam made a face. "Yeah, there's nothing to it."

Marlee and Lisa exchanged a glance, but neither said anything. It was then that Susie remembered that Marlee and Lisa went to Clarksonville High School, one of the poorest schools in the county. Their field didn't have much, just a rusty backstop and a couple of rickety old benches that didn't even fit the whole team. Forget about dugouts.

Susie grimaced at Sam who seemed to catch her meaning.

"We're pigs," Sam whispered.

Susie nodded. The East Valley High School softball team had almost every amenity in their dugout that a team could ever want.

"Oh, hey, thanks for the ride," Susie said to Sam desperately trying to change the subject. "I'll return the favor when my car's fixed."

"No problem," Sam said. "I've got your back."

Marlee and Lisa must have heard Sam's comment because they turned around at the same time.

"Me, too," Marlee said.

"Same." Lisa smiled.

"My friends are the best." Susie stood up and stretched her sore muscles. She looked at Marlee and couldn't help laughing.

"What's so funny?" Marlee asked, hand on hip.

"You two look really weird in East Valley red uniforms."

Marlee looked down at her red shirt with a look of disgust on her face. "I, for one," she said with disdain, "can't wait to peel this thing off after every game."

Susie, having impure thoughts about Marlee peeling off her shirt, felt her cheeks get warm.

"Oh, you said it, sister." Lisa knocked fists with Marlee.