Strike Zone by Mike Lupica

Author:Mike Lupica
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
Published: 2019-09-09T16:00:00+00:00

22

Amelia was on the couch reading. The book said To Kill a Mockingbird in big cursive letters at the top, by an author named Harper Lee.

“Summer reading?” Nick asked.

Amelia didn’t even glance up from the page. “Well, it’s summer, and I’m reading. But it’s not on my required reading list, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Then she looked up from the book and studied Nick’s face. “You look like you saw a ghost,” she said.

“Everybody wants to talk about ghosts lately,” Nick said, hanging his Blazers cap on the hook by the door.

Neither of their parents was home yet, so Nick took the opportunity to tell Amelia about his run-in with Mr. Gasson. She was relieved to hear that he wasn’t the ICE Man after all.

Nick handed Amelia one of the flyers, and she read through it quickly, nodding her head as she did.

“You think he was telling the truth?” Nick asked his sister.

“If he’s not, I don’t know why he’d waste his time handing out these flyers,” she said.

“I think he must be hanging around our neighborhood because so many people don’t seem to know the facts,” Nick said.

“Maybe Dad should talk to Mr. Gasson,” Amelia said. “He’s always worried about the law. Who better to talk to than an immigration lawyer?”

They sat there in silence for a couple of minutes, Nick in the armchair across from Amelia, a small coffee table between them covered in flyers.

“Are you okay now?” Amelia said finally.

Nick grinned. “Yeah, I think so. It was just so strange. Took a while for my brain to separate the ICE Man from Mr. Gasson.”

Amelia nodded.

Another silence filled the room before Nick broke it. “Do you think our prayers really will be answered one of these days?”

“A hundred percent,” she said.

“You sound as sure as Mrs. Gurriel.”

Amelia laughed. “No one could be that sure.”

“You really mean it, don’t you?” Nick said.

“I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t believe it,” she said. “I’m even trying to figure out a way to fire up a prayer of my own.”

“Oh yeah? How?”

“You know I can’t say,” she said. “You’re the one who’s always so superstitious about saying your dreams aloud.”

“Good point.”

“But I’ll make you a deal,” she said. “If this one does come through, I promise, you’ll be the first to know.”

“Deal,” Nick said.

Amelia picked up her book again, and Nick went to go put his stuff away in his room. But when he got there, he saw the laptop open on his desk and felt an overwhelming desire to write.

Nick wasn’t sure if meeting Mr. Gasson qualified as a happy ending. But finding out he wasn’t the ICE Man would certainly do for now.

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