Batter Up!

Didja ever have a friend who would literally give you the shirt off his back? I did.

I’d just turned seven that summer of 1961. There were four of us … five if you included my younger brother. He was five and followed us everywhere. You know what I mean.

Mom would say, “Take care of your brother.” That was code for ‘Watch out for him’.

Anyway, that kept us pretty close to home. We couldn’t even ride the bikes we all got for Christmas because Ricky still had a trike—you know, a tricycle. Well, not often anyway. It was tough to find things to do in the neighborhood.

South-central Texas made for some hot, dry summers. As soon as breakfast and chores were done, we’d meet outside my house and plan our day. Oh yeah, I forgot. I’m Mikey. There was Pete, my best friend; Scott; and Irelann—we just called him Lanny. Lanny was the one with the ideas.

Today he had a doozy.

Dad called our neighborhood a tract development—lots of new homes that looked the same. And more were being built. That’s where Lanny’s idea came from.

He’d found a large wasp nest in a bush at one construction site. Though forbidden to go there, we couldn’t pass this up. We had check it out. Grabbing a bat we headed for the site. Being hot already, I was shirtless. We moved in for a closer look, and seeing no activity, I figured I’d hit the bush.

“Wait,” Pete said. “You better take my shirt.”

Just as I began to swing the bat, Scott yelled, “Let’s get out of here!” Startled, I hit the nest dead center.

Dropping the bat, we bolted!

Thanks to Pete’s shirt I was only stung three times.


Contest: Submitted to "Daily Flash Fiction Challenge" 
Prompt: Include the words "Let's get out of here."

Word Count: 297 words