This was really pissing me off! It was just a stupid postcard. No one else needed it as badly as I did. The current bid was up to sixteen dollars. There were only six minutes left in the auction.
No way was I going to let this jerk get the postcard. I decided to treat it like a basketball game. I'd let the clock run down and go for a final shot just before the buzzer. If I made the highest bid just before time ran out, I'd be the winner.
There were five minutes left in the auction. I just sat there and stared at the screen.
Four.
Three.
Two.
With one minute left, I typed in my final bid. Twenty bucks. My allowance wasn't due for another two weeks. This was all the money I had. I waited as long as I could and then I hit the Enter key.
YOU HAVE BEEN OUTBID.
In the words of the immortal Babe Ruth, "!@#$%&!!!"
What? How could I lose?! I was really bummed.
I turned off the computer and tried to go back to sleep. It wasn't easy. I kept thinking about the stupid auction. The only good thing that came out of it was that I still had my twenty bucks.
A few days later, there was a knock at the door. Flip Valentini was standing on the front porch.
"Hey, Stosh," he said, "guess what I just got?"
He pulled the Satchel Paige postcard out of his jacket pocket. It was in a plastic sleeve.
"Where'd you get that?" I asked.
"I bought it on eBay," he said gleefully. "Twenty-three bucks. Some bum kept tryin' to outbid me, but I beat 'im at the last second."
"That bum was me!" I yelled. "I was bidding for it!"
"You?" Flip said, laughing. "I coulda got it fer four stinkin' bucks if you hadn't been biddin' against me, you bum!"
"I didn't know it was you!" I said.
We were both laughing so hard it hurt.
Flip pulled the postcard out of its plastic sleeve and handed it to me. Just touching it made my fingertips tingle.
6.
That Tingling Sensation I WAS IN THE KITCHEN HAVING A SNACK THE NEXT DAY when the doorbell rang. Mom was upstairs, so I went to get it. I heard some strange guy outside, mumbling to himself in a weird voice.
"You dirty rat," he said, "you killed my brother."
Maybe I should call the police, I thought. This guy sounded like a nut. I peeked through the peephole in the front door to get a look at him.
It was Flip.
He was wearing a gray suit and a hat with a brim, so he looked like a gangster. He had one of those old-time hard-shell suitcases in one hand. His other hand kept jabbing the air while he repeated, "You dirty ratyou dirty rat"
I opened the door.
Flip pointed a finger and poked me in the chest.
"You dirty rat, you killed my brother. It's gonna be curtains for you, mister. Curtains!"
Except that he said "doity" for "dirty," and "brudder" for "brother," and "coytins" for "curtains."
"Flip, are you losing your mind?" I asked.
"Whatsa matter?" he said. "You don't like my Jimmy Cagney impersonation?"
"Jimmy who?"
"Cagney!" Flip said. "He was a great actor. Ain'tcha never seen White Heat or Angels with Dirty Faces? Ah, never mind. How do I look, Stosh? Do I look like a heavy?"
"A heavy what?" I asked.
"A heavy. That's what they used to call bad guys in the movies," Flip said. "Don't mess with me, sonny. I may be packing heat."
I had no idea what "heat" meant either, but I figured it must be something bad guys used to pack when they went on vacation.
"Nice suit, Flip," I said. "Did you go to one of those antique clothing stores?"
"Heck no," he replied, stepping through the doorway. "I went to my closet. I knew this suit would come back in style someday. Just goes to show you should never throw anything away. Still fits perfect, huh?"
Actually, the suit kind of hung off him. Flip must have been a lot more muscular when he was younger. I didn't want to hurt his feelings, though.
"You look great, Flip," I said. "Do you have the radar gun?"
"Right here."
Flip tapped his suitcase and put it down on the living-room table. It didn't open with a zipper. Instead, Flip clicked open two metal latches, one on each side.
"I brought some duds for you too."
He took out some old clothes that looked like a smaller version of what he was wearing. For all I knew, he had saved it since he was my age.
"Oh, man, I can't wear this stuff," I complained.
"Why not?" Flip said. "When you play ball, you wear a baseball uniform. When you go to church, you wear another uniform. And when you go to 1942, you gotta wear a different uniform. Come on. Put it on, or I'll murder ya."
Flip said "murder" like "moyda."
I went to the bathroom and put on the weird clothes. Looking at myself in the mirror, I actually thought I looked pretty cool. Flip said I looked like a young John Dillinger, whoever he was.
"Your mom knows we're doin' this, right, Stosh?" Flip asked.
"Of course."
"And she's okay with it?"
When I first discovered I had the power to travel through time with baseball cards, my mother wasn't exactly what you'd call supportive. She thought it was dangerous. She thought I might get hurt, or worse. She was right. I almost got killed a few times. But after I took her back to 1863 with me to meet Abner Doubleday, she was hooked. I didn't have to talk her into letting me go anymore.
"Believe me, Flip, she said it's okay. My mom is totally into this."
At that, my mother came downstairs. Flip did one of those wolf whistles guys do when they see a pretty girl. I did a double take. Mom was wearing one of those weird old dresses with shoulder pads, and her hair was all pinned up on top of her head. Her lips and fingernails were bright red. And she was singing.
"'Don't sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me," she sang, "anyone else but me, anyone else but me.'"
Ugh. I can't believe old people think hip-hop is bad. The music they used to listen to is horrible.
My mom hardly ever sings. But there she was, singing that goofball song and dancing around the living room.
"Come on, Mr. Valentini!" she said, grabbing Flip's hand. "I took a swing dance class at the Y. Let's you and me cut a rug, daddy-o!"
Mom and Flip started dancing around the living room. They were doing the jitterbug or the Charles-ton, or one of those wacky dances people did a zillion years ago. It was totally embarrassing. If anybody from school had been there to see it, I would have had to pretend I didn't know them.
Fortunately, Flip got winded pretty quickly and had to sit down on the couch. My mom kept right on dancing without him.
"So what do you say?" she asked, swirling her dress around. "Can I come to 1942 too? You might need me to sweet talk some of those old baseball players. Or maybe I could drive your getaway car."
"Not this time, Mom," I said. "Flip and I have important baseball research to conduct."
"Oh, pooh on that," Mom said with a pout. "I was hoping I could meet some handsome dreamboat out-fielder and we'd run off and live happily ever after. Isn't that the way it always happened back in the 1940s, Mr. Valentini?"
"Uh, not in my case, no," Flip said.
"Well, I packed you some lunch anyway," she said, skipping into the kitchen to get two paper bags from the refrigerator. "And here are some Band-Aids, just in case anything happens."
She is so overprotective. Flip put the bags in the suitcase.
"Do you have your baseball cards?" she asked.
That's right! I almost forgot. Besides the Satchel Paige postcard, I needed to bring a new baseball card with me too. Just like the 1942 card would take us to 1942, the new card would bring Flip and me back to the present day.
I ran upstairs and grabbed a pack of new cards from my desk drawer. I stuck it in my pants pocket and ran back downstairs to sit on the couch next to Flip. He had the suitcase on his lap now, and the Satchel Paige card was on top of it.
It was time.
"Let's do it," I said.
I took Flip's hand in mine. It was sweaty.
"You nervous?" I asked.
"A little."
"It's gonna be great, Flip. Trust me. I'm getting good at this."
"I hope we don't have to do any runnin'," Flip said. "I don't get around too good anymore. The legs are shot."
"You won't have to run. I promise."
Flip handed me the Satchel Paige card. I closed my eyes and concentrated. "You boys be careful, now," Mom said. "I don't want anything to happen."
"I'm always careful, Mom," I said. "Don't worry. Nothing's going to happen."
"Joey, you take care of Mr. Valentini and do everything he says."
"I will, Mom."
"And Mr. Valentini, you take care of Joey, and don't do anything he says."
"Yes, Mrs. Stoshack."
"Please fasten your seat belts and put your tray tables in the upright and locked position," my mother said.
"Mom, I can't concentrate," I said. "Would you mind, uh"
"Okay, okay. I'm leaving!" Mom said. She kissed me on the forehead. "You are such a big boy!"
I heard her footsteps tramp up the stairs. It was quiet. I concentrated on the card in my hand.
"What if something goes wrong?" Flip whispered. "Does anything ever go wrong?"
"Yeah," I said. "Sometimes. Time travel isn't an exact science. You never know where we're gonna wind up or what's gonna happen. Whatever it is, we'll deal with it."
I didn't mention to Flip that something always seems to go wrong. In my previous trips through time, I had a nasty habit of attracting gunfire in my direction.
I thought I felt a slight tingle in my fingertips. It might have been a false alarm.
"What if we never come back?" Flip asked.
"Shhh. Just relax," I said.
I could definitely feel that tingling sensation in my fingers that were holding the card.
"But what if we don't?" Flip asked. "You know, 1942 was such a long time ago."