Free Hit & Miss by Derek Jeter

said. “You’re with me, and you’re my friend now. They dis you, they’re dissing me, too.”
    â€œOkay, then . . . I guess,” Dave said, giving in. “You sure they’ll be okay with me being there?”
    â€œAre you kidding?” Derek said, laughing. “There’s always room for one more on the Hill!”

Chapter Eight
PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT?
    Derek sat in class, staring at the second hand as it wound slowly around the clock. As soon as the final bell rang, Gary Parnell was all over him.
    â€œSo? How’d you do, my friend?” He held up his own science test, with the big red 98 circled in red twice, and waited for Derek’s answer.
    Derek scowled and held up his own paper. It was nothing to be ashamed of—a 92—but not close to Gary’s grade. Once again the king of the hill had kept his throne.
    It was like this all the time, or at least it had been for the past two years. At the end of the previous school year, Derek had actually outdone Gary on one single, solitarytest, but that had only made Gary study harder. Derek hadn’t beaten him since.
    Still, the whole competition wasn’t such a bad thing. Derek hadn’t scored less than 90 on any of his tests all spring. Remembering his contract, he felt satisfied that he wasn’t going to break the rule about working hard and getting good grades.
    â€œI’ve gotta go,” Derek said, gathering his papers and stuffing them into his book bag.
    â€œGotta go do what? Play baseball?” Gary snorted. His contempt for sports knew no bounds.
    â€œI think you should try it sometime,” Derek told him. “It might help you stay sharp. You might even get a ninety-nine or a hundred next time.”
    Gary rolled his eyes and looked like he wanted to say something clever, but before he could think what to say, Derek was gone, leaving him there with his mouth open.
    Derek jogged down the hall and out the front doors, looking for Dave, who’d already left the classroom. But Dave was gone.
    Derek hoped he would show up at the Hill and not chicken out. But Derek didn’t have to worry for long. When Derek arrived, Dave was there, waiting patiently for everyone to arrive. Across the parking lot sat the Mercedes. Chase stood next to it, polishing the shiny chrome wheels with a towel.
    â€œHey,” Dave said, holding up his mitt. “Glad you made it so quick.”
    â€œHow’d you do on the test?” Derek asked.
    â€œEighty-nine. You?”
    â€œSomewhere like that,” Derek said. He didn’t want to get into a grades competition with Dave. He wanted to teach him to play better baseball, and to make sure the other kids accepted him as part of the group.
    They started tossing the ball back and forth. Vijay showed up after a few minutes, and while he was surprised to see Dave there, he didn’t seem at all upset about it.
    Derek put Vijay at first and Dave at third. He sent some grounders and line drives Dave’s way and called out situations, to teach Dave what to do with the ball when it came his way.
    If there were a runner on third, for instance, Dave would need to check the runner back to the base on a grounder before throwing to first. If he caught a liner with the runner on third, he didn’t need to throw to first. Instead he had to get to third before the runner got back to the base, but he didn’t need to tag him.
    â€œWow, there sure are a lot of rules in baseball,” Dave said, shaking his head.
    â€œIt’s a lot to learn all in one session,” Derek admitted. “But it’s gonna help. You’ll see.”
    Things were going well for a while—until Jeff andJason showed up with Isaiah. When they saw Dave there, they stopped where they were and started murmuring to one another.
    Dave saw them too, and Derek could tell he was worried. “Hey,” Derek told him, “chill for a minute. I’ll be right