Free Tessa Masterson Will Go to Prom by Brendan Halpin & Emily Franklin Page B

off to her room. Soon I hear the electronic beats of Miss Kaboom drifting out.
    I try. I really do. I say this to the reporters outside school the next morning. “I just want everybody to go home and go back to not knowing Brookfield, Indiana, even exists. It’s really … This is not that big of a deal, it’s really not.”
    But then this question comes out of the crowd: “Have you been targeted by liberal activists? Why are you changing your position?”
    “I’m not changing my position.”
    “So you still feel like it’s wrong to have a gay couple at your Prom?”
    “No. I don’t think I ever said that. Look, I was mad, and—”
    “So you’re angry about what’s happening in this town?”
    I look at the crowd of people slavering for a good quote from me. I look over at the protesters with their antigay signs. “Yeah, I’m angry about what’s happening in this town.” I realize that they might use that quote to make it look like I’m some big antigay crusader, so I add this: “I mean, look. I don’t know much about religion. So I need somebody to explain to me why God is going to get so angry about two kids who like each other dancing on Prom night. I don’t go to church, but isn’t loving your neighbor supposed to be part of the deal? So why are so many people so full of hate?”
    I feel like everybody is staring at me all day long. I don’t talk to anyone, and I guess I’m doing an okay job of giving off don’t-talk-to-me vibes because nobody approaches me and tries to talk to me.
    And then there’s baseball practice. Despite Danny’s earlier threat, nothing’s really happened. But then again, Danny hasn’t been pitching at batting practice since then. Until today.
    As promised, an inside fastball “gets away” from Danny, and I have to hop back to avoid getting hit on the hip. The general chatter of practice stops, but I barely notice since I’m staring out at Danny on the mound. He’s giving me a pretty good intimidating-pitcher stare. But I’ve got one of those too, so I give it right back to him.
    It seems like a long time passes until Danny’s next windup, but in pretty much no time at all after that, I’m onthe ground with my batting helmet about ten feet away from me.
    He hit me. In the head.
    Baseball has rules, and one of them is that pitchers who throw at the head get dealt with outside the rules. Anybody who watches baseball knows this. Danny knows this. And even if he didn’t before making varsity, he would have as soon as Coach Hupfer said this at our first practice: “Anybody throws at your head, you charge the mound. We’ll take whatever happens, but every team in this league needs to know they can’t intimidate us. If you let anybody throw at your head without throwing a punch at them, you’re benched for one game and probably forever, because you’re just not tough enough to play the game.”
    It’s never happened, but even still, Danny’s ready for me by the time I get to the mound. I still get in a hard shot to his face and he goes down. Then I’m on top of him, and the world disappears in a bloodred fury of fists and feet until eventually I’m being held back by three or four guys while another three or four guys hold Danny back.
    I spit at him, and my bloody spit makes a little stain on his uniform shirt. “You gonna kill me? You wanna kill me? You’re gonna have to do better than that!” I scream at him.
    “This isn’t over!” he screams back.
    And then we’re sitting in Coach Hupfer’s office, and he’s yelling at both of us about team unity, and about how he hopes we’re happy with ourselves because we’ve each justearned three-day suspensions from school, which means missing two games, and about how we really need to think about the team before we think of ourselves.
    “Masterson,” he barks, “haven’t you and your family caused enough trouble for this school yet?” Danny doesn’t threaten to rip the coach’s guts out, but he really