High school sophomore Annie Smith is just hoping to live a normal life after she moves from Arkansas to the quiet little town of Reston, Texas. But it does not take long for her new friends to figure out that Annie is anything but normal. Annie's goal

CHASING NORMAL

A Chip Fullerton/Annie Smith Sports NovelBy T. L. Hoch

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2012 T. L. Hoch
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4697-5148-1

Contents

Chapter 1: New Girl...............................1Chapter 2: New Friends............................22Chapter 3: Big Shirley............................35Chapter 4: The Real Deal..........................55Chapter 5: Future Stars...........................77Chapter 6: Number One Fan.........................94Chapter 7: Doc's Reward...........................118Chapter 8: Team Player............................136Chapter 9: Scrimmage..............................163Chapter 10: Voodoo Child..........................182Chapter 11: Mojo Rising...........................192Chapter 12: Sportswriter..........................207Chapter 13: Equipment Failure.....................226Chapter 14: The Incident..........................244Chapter 15: The Big Get-Even......................256

Chapter One

New Girl

Annie Smith followed her mom's car as it passed the sign indicating they were now in Reston, Texas. She had one major goal for her new life in Texas—to live the life of a normal teenager. She was looking forward to not being hassled by the media or her teammates. Life is going to be totally different in this quiet little town, she thought.

She reached over and turned down her CD player, which was playing some serious Led Zeppelin. The people in this small town were probably all country music lovers, and she didn't want to get off on the wrong foot. The brake lights on her mom's Buick came on ahead of her. She downshifted her Ford Ranger into third gear and looked to her right. About forty boys in football practice gear were hard at it, just east of a very modern-looking building. The western end of the school was two stories high and threw a huge shadow over the practice field. Knowing how serious Texans were about their football, Annie wondered if the school was designed to provide shade for early-evening practices. The summer Texas sun can be brutal.

What a nice school for such a small town, she thought. That tall portion must be the gym. I hope the locals won't mind a new face on the basketball team. Two blocks later, her mom turned into an area filled with fairly modern ranch homes. At the end of Jefferson Street sat a nice two-bedroom, split-level house that Annie recognized from the picture her mom had shown her three weeks earlier. But she hadn't told her the best thing about the house—no neighbors! There was a vacant lot on either side of the house and a field behind it. She wouldn't have to worry about bothering the neighbors when she turned up her music. This was a nice start to a new, normal life.

* * *

Two days of unpacking and moving furniture around was enough to last Annie a lifetime. She sat on her bed and looked at her reflection in the mirror on the closet door. Her shoulder-length hair was somewhere between blonde and brown. She always felt that her features, except for her eyes, were fairly normal—just the way she liked them. Her green eyes seemed to have a perpetual sparkle in them. Her mom and dad always told her that her eyes were the reflection of her inner goodness. She liked that, and the fact that her dad had written a song about them. He was still working on that song when he died. Below the neck, Annie was different from most teenage girls. She stood about 5'7" which, by itself, wouldn't draw any special attention. However, her broad shoulders and lean body had "athlete" written all over them. The muscles on her arms and shoulders, which she usually kept covered, were well-defined. To the experienced eye, it was obvious that she had spent some time in the weight room. She gave herself a little wave and the girl in the mirror reciprocated. The simple gesture conveyed a feeling of guarded anticipation. School, sports, and friendships were all huge question marks now.

Annie looked around her room and gave a nod of satisfaction. A queen-sized bed was centered against the right-hand wall as you walked through the door. Two monster Electra-Voice speakers occupied the corners on the opposite wall. Two guitars leaned against the wall to her right, and her stereo system was within an arm's length to her left. The guitars were special to her. The bass was hers, and the other one was one of her dad's. He had been killed in a plane crash just before she started the eighth grade. It had been a rough year for her. She threw herself into basketball and softball, which laid the foundation for the player she was today. The six-string was autographed by her dad, Eric Clapton, and Kim Simmonds. She was pretty sure it was worth a lot of money, but that meant little to her. Her dad's memory could not be bought for any price.

A big box of trophies and a scrapbook of her softball and basketball exploits were already tucked away in the back of her closet. She just knew things would be different here in Texas. It was a huge state, easy to get lost in. There were probably hundreds of female athletes better than her in both sports. That was fine with her. That would mean no reporters to bother her and no weirdo teammates to make life miserable.

* * *

Annie lay back on her bed and relived her freshman year back in Arkansas. The basketball season had been stressful, but it had been nothing like the softball season. You wouldn't think throwing three consecutive no-hitters would be a problem, but it was. Annie and Sally Phelps were supposed to share the pitching duties for Franklin High School. Annie actually lived in Jones Ferry, a little town of about 900. Franklin High was in DeWitt, about twelve miles away. Each school had its own basketball team, but they had to coop to field a softball team. Sally lost the first game of the season 3 to 2, even though she pitched a good game. She was fairly fast, with good control. She also had an excellent sinker that caused the opposition to hit a lot of playable grounders against her. With some fine-tuning, she would probably have a chance to pitch at the junior college level.

Annie started the second game against a weak team and threw a five-inning no-hitter. The game was stopped because Franklin was ahead by more than ten runs. Her second no-hitter came in the second game of a double header. She had all the pitches: blazing fastball, sinker, changeup, and a fantastic rise-ball. She was also experimenting with a hook that started out at the right-hand batter's box, and then curved across the plate. Most batters just froze, wide-eyed, when that pitch came at them. She didn't throw it often, but when she did it was very effective. Her catcher, Darcy Turner, had names for three of her pitches. "Godzilla" was her fastball, "Bad Boy" was the hook and "The Sleeper" was the change-up.

Her third game of the season was against a pretty good team, and it was Franklin's first home game. The Lady Cougars from Charles City were conference champions from the previous year. Annie wasn't playing high school softball then, but she did remember them from the basketball season that had just finished. They played real rough and even dirty at times. It was obvious that they were coached that way, but the players seemed to like it. She wondered if their coach had the same philosophy in softball as he did for basketball. Annie didn't like them—not even a little bit. She was throwing her warm-ups to Darcy behind the equipment...