Screaming at the Ump by Audrey Vernick

after that, she told my father she was in love with Bob the Baker. And that she couldn’t stand living at Behind the Plate another minute, with all its rules and people in and out of our lives and noise on the fields all day and a husband who was not really available to her during the five weeks of Academy and every last thing about it. She didn’t even want to keep the books anymore, which is what they called it when she handled the money. She left us to go live with that stupid baker, and I stayed with Dad. And Mrs. G. had another job added to her long list—bookkeeping.
    Most kids I knew with divorced parents lived with their mothers. But I guess it must have seemed obvious to everyone that I belonged at BTP. When the lawyers worked out everything about the divorce, they said I was supposed to spend time with her too, but I just couldn’t.
    In the beginning, it didn’t even matter, because once the divorce was finalized, Mr. and Mrs. Bob the Baker went on some long vacation, sending postcards I refused to read from Florida and Georgia and South Carolina. And then when they came back and tried to make me stay with her on the weekends, I fought and screamed with my dad and refused to talk to my mother or that baker the whole time I was at their stupid house. At some point, they must have gotten tired of fighting with me or maybe she just wanted to see me as much as I wanted to see her—as in not at all.
    When I thought about it, I felt that hurt snaking through me all over again. Which, of course, was why I didn’t think about it anymore. Or talk to her either.
    You couldn’t choose to leave.
    Correction: You could choose to leave. But then you couldn’t decide you wanted another chance.
    Any umpire knew that once you made the call, you had to stick with it.

Stepping Up to the Plate
    W HEN I stepped outside to see how Zeke was doing with the videos, I could sense that the place didn’t feel as full as it should. It was hard not to think about the guys who were missing—Steamboat, Phillip, To-Go. And twenty or more students. I was worried about this, how there weren’t enough students, and what if it was worse next year? What if there were fewer and fewer students? Would the school survive?
    You couldn’t blame my dad or Pop. You had to blame New Jersey.
    Poor New Jersey. It got blamed for so much already. But the other umpire schools were in Florida, where you could hold class in January. In New Jersey, all you could do during January was complain about how long it was until April. New Jersey was the last place you’d want to be if you were interested in doing anything having to do with baseball in the winter. Summer was baseball time in New Jersey, but Dad couldn’t hold Umpire Academy then either, because our instructors all worked as minor league umpires until around Labor Day. So BTP had to hold its classes in the fall. By the time Dad’s top grads got to Cocoa, five months later, I guess they must’ve forgotten what they’d learned in the fall. The umpires coming out of the Florida schools had just finished their classes; everything was still fresh in their minds. And there you have it: third-best umpire school.
    ***
    On my way out to the fields, I stopped by the dining hall. The tables were all empty, but I heard noise from the kitchen. I pushed through the door and saw Chet at the counter, behind a huge tower of meatballs. “Casey!” he said, sort of pointing at me with his chin, to let me know a high-five with a meatball-handed chef was out of the question. Chet never changed—a big bald guy with kind eyes and a bandanna over his head.
    â€œThose brownies last night were killer.”
    Chet smiled. I’d almost forgotten how much he liked compliments about his food. Well, duh. Who doesn’t like to be complimented about what they do?
    â€œI have some stashed away for your lunch tomorrow,” he