Never Blame the Umpire Read Online Free PDF Page A

if I bring Ginny along whenever we go somewhere.
    When I tell Ginny and her mom that Mama wants me at home, Ginny says, “Too bad. I was going to play my new Lisalette Krebs CD for you.”
    I don’t tell her about the picnic. She might not understand why she’s not invited. Since I don’t really understand either, I decide it’s better not to even tell her.
    I run home fast. Dad is tying a rope around the inner tubes we always take to the lake with us. They’re big—too big to fit inside our van. Mama is carrying out a cooler. I can guess what’s inside: hamburgers, hot dogs, tomatoes, relish, onions, jello squares, cans of soda. I would guess potato salad, but probably not today. If Mama just got home from work, she probably wouldn’t have had time to make it. Along with the marshmallows, Ken is carrying a bag of potato chips.
    Dad must have seen the puzzled look on my face. He says, “It’s too nice a day to spend working.”
    I’m not used to seeing Dad dressed like this on a weekday. He almost always wears a suit, or at least a pair of slacks and nice shirt and a tie and sport coat. Today he’s wearing faded blue jeans, sneakers, and a tattered t-shirt he picked up at a yard sale. The shirt is gray with the word DOGS in red print. On the front of the shirt are faces of four dogs. The back of the shirt shows the same four dogs from behind.
    “Hurry up,” Ken urges. “I can hardly wait to get to the water.”
    Dad laughs. “And that food, I imagine.”
    “That, too,” Ken says. He says to me, “Come on, slowpoke.”
    It’s a strange day. But all I say is, “Do I have time to go to the bathroom and get my swimming suit?”
    Mama smiles. “Of course. The lake will wait for us.”
    I go inside. From the living room window I see the three of them outside our van, and it looks like a normal family outing.
    Except it sure doesn’t feel like one.

Seven
the picnic
    Three things I like best about Corbin Lake: it’s close enough to home that we can go there a lot, it has a sandy beach and sandy bottom that makes it nicer than lakes with sharp rocks that poke your feet, and the water is almost the perfect temperature in the summer. On a hot day like today, you want to stay in forever.
    What’s even better about today is it’s a weekday and we’re about the only ones here. We have the lake practically to ourselves. On summer weekends it’s pretty crowded.
    We float for awhile on our inner tubes. Then Dad calls out, “Time for a game of Keep-Away Frisbee!”
    We take the inner tubes up by our picnic table and divide into teams. Dad and I are on one team,Ken and Mama on the other. We’re all good swimmers, so the teams are evenly matched. In the shallow water I love to crouch and time my leap so I can shoot up over Ken’s back and snatch the Frisbee inches before he can grab it.
    After fifteen minutes of Keep-Away and the joy of dunking Ken at least a dozen times, we all swim out to the raft.
    “When do we eat?” Ken says. “That made me hungry. Especially with Kate landing on my back all the time and practically drowning me.”
    “That’s just because you don’t have my strength and stamina,” I say. “You can’t keep up with me.”
    “Yeah? Race you around the raft!”
    We jump off. Ken gets the inside track. The only thing that keeps him from winning is that I grab his foot on the final turn, pulling him under. While he gasps for air, I swim to victory.
    “Not fair!” he protests. He pleads his case to Mama and Dad. “You saw it!”
    Mama smiles. “Do you need an umpire?”
    I know how an umpire would have called it. “I guess not,” I say. “I guess you might have won, little brother, in a fair race.”
    “Might have? I was so far ahead, it was awesome!”
    “Well,” Mama says, “after that awesome victory, I guess you deserve some dinner. I’ll swim back andget it ready.”
    “I’ll help,” I tell her.
    “No, that’s okay,” Dad says. “I’ll help your mother. I know