Evvie Drake Starts Over(11)

She nodded, and he tossed her a small plastic water bottle. “We had an Atlanta Braves farm team back in the ’80s, and then we lost it, and a few years later we got the Claws, who play in the same park. They’re part of the Northern Atlantic League. Unaffiliated minors.”

He hopped up to sit on the kitchen counter. “Is this okay?” he asked, gesturing generally to his perch. She waved dismissively. “So,” he said, “Claws are big.”

“They’re huge. Couple summers ago, there was a scandal, though.” She raised then lowered her eyebrows.

“You don’t say.”

“Intrigue at the cereal-box races.” She swiveled in the chair so she was sitting in it sideways with her legs slung over one of its wide, soft arms. “At every home game, between the third and fourth innings, three kids from town get into these foam cereal-box costumes. There’s a Cheerios box, a Wheaties box, and a Chex box. And they run around the bases, and whoever comes in first gets an autographed ball and a gift certificate to the DQ.”

“Wow, the DQ!” he said. “Giving away the good stuff.”

“Exactly. As you can imagine, it’s very serious. And everybody in the stands jumps up and knocks over their beers, you know, ‘CHEEEERIOOOOS!’ or ‘WHEEEEEEATIEEEES!’ So. Anyway. There’s this kid Mike Parco, who at the time is eight years old and is a serious, total asshole. I know you’re not supposed to say that about children, but I swear, it takes most men at least two divorces to be as mean as this twerp. His mom, Talley, ran the lobster-roll stand at the ballpark, and everybody knew that, at the time, she was sleeping with Doug Lexington, who was in charge of fan relations, like, ha ha.”

Dean grinned at her. “Oh, Talley.”

“So, probably because of favoritism, Mike got to race in the Cheerios costume for about ten games in a row. But, because fan relations can get you into the outfit but not around the bases, he never won. And Talley started to complain that it was the costume. She believed that the cereal-box races were rigged. So she writes a letter to the Calcasset Neighbor, and she’s demanding that somebody do something about this injustice and restore public confidence.”

   “Boy, that’s a lady going a long way for a free Dilly Bar.”

Evvie laughed. “Right? So she raises this huge stink, and finally, the word goes out—Mike Parco is going to wear the Wheaties box at the game against Concord. By the time the night arrives, this story has everything—sex, sports, official corruption—so everybody is there. Everybody. You could have walked into any house in the entire town and cleaned it out. Taken absolutely everything they owned. And they’re not there for the game; they’re there for the cereal-box race. Not for love of the community, not for the spirit of the town—they’re there because they care who wins the cereal-box race. It is the least uplifting thing that has ever brought a town together. It is the opposite of the end of a Hallmark Channel movie.”

He nodded. “I’m not going to lie; this would not happen in New York.”

“Yes. Here’s to MidCoast Maine, home of a surprising number of people whose Fridays are available.” She smiled, raising her water bottle. “So Mike’s in the Wheaties. Dutch Halloran’s kid—we call him Double Dutch because his real name is Addison and it does not fit him—is wearing the Chex. And in the supposedly cursed Cheerios box is Bree Blythe Netherington, who is the shortest girl in the third grade. In fact, Bree is so short that we’re all pretty sure she can’t see out of the eyeholes.”

Dean smacked his hand to his forehead. “Oh, no.”

“Oh, yes. So they’re all standing there, and finally Denny Paraday—who plays shortstop and is emceeing the thing—says, ‘GO!’ and they go. And they’re sort of run-waddling toward first, and Bree is so short that the costume comes down to her ankles, but for reasons that defy the laws of physics, she’s motoring. And she’s the first one to get to first base, but the actual bases have been removed so the kids won’t trip. And she can’t see, so she keeps going, and she’s clearly going to run straight into the Righteous Heating and Plumbing sign on the right-field fence. Somebody yells, ‘Turn, Cheerios!’ And she pivots, and with some kind of internal GPS or magnets in her head or whatever, she heads straight for second. She’s like a bloodhound. And when she gets there, they have to do it again—‘Turn, Cheerios!’ She turns.

   “After they get her around the turn at third, it looks like she’s going to win. Mike is ahead of Double Dutch, but he’s about a step behind Bree. And then somebody thinks they see him trying to trip her. And you hear these voices going, ‘Wheaties is cheating! Wheaties is cheating!’ Bree is still on her feet. She’s still going to beat him. But then—absolutely everybody sees it this time—out from Mike’s Wheaties box comes this foot, he sticks it right out in front of her, and she trips and falls flat on what is, under about half a foot of foam, her face. So Mike crosses the plate while Bree is lying on the ground with her hands and feet sticking out, waggling. She’s like a foam turtle. In the shape of a Cheerios box.”

“I assume somebody helped her up. I mean, she’s not still there.”

Evvie cackled. “No, no. She’s not. They got her up, and her mom put the video on YouTube and called it, ‘The Video the Claws Lobster-Roll Stand Doesn’t Want You to See.’ Eventually they revoked Mike’s gift certificate, and Bree got free DQ for a year. Fan Relations Doug dumped Talley out of shame, and she had to quit the lobster-roll stand, so now she’s a manager at the CVS in Camden. Mike was banned from the cereal-box races for life, in part because he was told to give a public apology, got up to the microphone at a game, and made fart noises with his elbow.” Evvie took a deep swallow from her water bottle. “That is all true. My hand to God.”