S A M

"Who's Wendy Peffercorn?" Sam asked. Everyone's jaw dropped, except Benny's.

"You don't know who she is?" Squints gaped. Sam shook her head. He, along with the rest of the boys, must've forgotten already that she was an orphan and that she really didn't know anybody. "She's the hottest babe in the valley!"

"Yeah!" DeNunez agreed. "She has blonde hair, and either green or blue eyes. She's hot!"

"Okay so...you guys think that I can find my family, if I meet this Wendy Peffercorn?" Sam asked. Yeah, her parents gave up her up for adoption but she's would still like to at least meet them once. Everyone agreed. "Okay, so where can I find her?"

"She works at the pool." Bertram answered.

"Alright then. I'll go by later."

"Anyways! This pop isn't working, Benny. I'm baking like a toasted cheeser! It's so hot here!" Ham complained. It was hot. Sam was starting to sweat and the sun started to burn her skin.

"It's one hundred fifty degrees out there. You can't play baseball." Squints pointed out. "You have to call it for the day."

"You gotta listen to him, Benny." Bertram said before taking a swig of his pop.

"Vote then." Benny snapped. "Anyone who wants to be...a 'can't hack it' pantywaist...who wears their mama's bra, raise your hand."

Everyone raised their hands, except Sam. They all looked at her.

"What? I already wear a bra, thank you very much. But," She turned to Benny. "It would be nice to do something for a change. No offense, but watching you guys play baseball all day everyday gets pretty boring sometimes."

"Fine, fine, fine! Be like that. So what are we gonna do?"

Yeah-Yeah started laughing creepily while glancing at everyone.

"SCAM POOL HONEYS!" The boys chorused. Sam rolled her eyes. At least Sam wasn't going to go the pool alone to talk to Wendy Peffercorn.

S M A L L S

Benny would've played ball all day, all night, rain, shine, tidal wave, whatever. Baseball was the only thing he cared about. Well not the only thing, of course there was Sam. But of all the things we ever did besides baseball-and him swoonin' over Sam-going to the pool was what he tolerated best. Even though none of us had ever seen a Playboy magazine, which we constantly lied about, we figured going to the pool was the next big thing to being there.

One day, we went to the pool and Sam tagged along of course. She needed to talk to Wendy Peffercorn. Benny introduced them both, and they really hit it off.

S A M

"Samantha, is that really you?" Wendy asked after Benny walked away.

"How do you—" Suddenly, something hit Sam. Broken pieces of memories kept flashing through her mind as she kept staring at her. Sam doesn't remember much since she was three the last time she saw her and Wendy was six. Her blonde hair and blue eyes kept reminding her of something. Wendy was wearing a red one piece bathing suit, so apparently she was the lifeguard.

"Wendy!" Sam squealed, and hugged her tight. She remembered now; she was her big sister. "I missed you so much!"

"I missed you too, Sam!" Wendy hugged back. The she pulled back and took Sam's face in her hands. "Look how much you've grown! We were so worried when the police announced you were missing! How did you run away? You were only three! How did you survive out there?"

"I don't know, it was in me I guess, you know the instinct to survive? And what do you mean by 'we'? Please, Mom and Dad wouldn't care. Why do you think they gave me up for adoption?"

"They gave you up because they couldn't afford to raise the both of us. Wait, 'till they find out I found you!"

Sam forced a smile and Wendy smiled back. Wendy started asking a whole lot of questions like where San lived, how she got clothes, blah blah blah. Sam explained everything to her; Sam lived in the dump, she had the same clothes since she was ten, she goes over to a family's house and does laundry, shower, eat etc.

She was shocked after Sam's explanation, but she couldn't be happier to see her little sister. Wendy turned around for a second when someone tapped her shoulder. Sam started to look around and her eyes landed on Benny, who was staring at her. He slowly licked his lips, then sunk his teeth on his lower lip, his eyes trailing up and down Sam's body.

Is he checking me out? Oh my god, he is, Sam thought.

Her cheeks started burning and his eyes locked on hers. He then quickly turned around, pretending nothing happened.

Sam looked down at what she wearing. She got a two piece, blue and pink bathing suit from the drug store. The family who always welcomed her, owned the Vincent Drug Store, so they lent her a bathing suit, along with sandals and a towel.

"Okay, I'm done. Sorry for taking so long." Wendy said, making Sam quickly look up at her.

"It's fine." Sam answered.

"Do you want to go up the lifeguard's tower?" Wendy asked.

"Yes!" Sam squealed.

S M A L L S

It wasn't really the pool honeys like we said, because if any one of them had come up to any one of us, we'd have just peed our pants. We all went because-well, because Wendy Peffercorn was the lifeguard. And at that day, Sam was with her, up in that tower.

S A M

"So, how do I do this?" Sam asked Wendy as she handed her a bottle of sunscreen lotion.

"Just squeeze some on your hand and rub them on your arms and legs. Like this." She placed on her white glasses, and started to demonstrate. Sam learned quite quickly.

"Remember, you have to rub the lotion slowly so that it can actually work." Wendy reminded.

Sam nodded and started to rub lotion on her legs. When Sam went to the drug store earlier today, she put on sun lotion only on her arms because she didn't have much time.

B E N N Y

"Aw, man." Benny whispered. Sam was on the lifeguard tower with Wendy, rubbing on lotion. To Benny, she looked hotter than every up there.

"Yeah, yeah. Too cool." Yeah-Yeah said.

"She don't know what she's doing." Timmy stated.

"She don't know what she's doing." Tommy repeated. Benny knew they were talking about Wendy but, he was more focused on Sam then ever.

"Yeah she does. She knows exactly what she's doing." Benny said, louder this time.

"I've swum here every summer of my adult life." Squints wiped his glasses. "And every summer, there she is, lotioning, oiling, oiling, lotioning."

S M A L L S

One day it became too much...

"Smiling." Squints kept going.

for Michael "Squints" Palledorous.

"Smiling! I can't take this no more! Move!" Squints started to swim away.

And he did the most desperate thing...

"Lotioning, oiling."

any of us...had ever seen.

"Lotioning, oiling."

"And apparently, Wendy has a partner now." DeNunez commented. All of the boys' attention went from Wendy, to Sam. Benny's attention was already on her.

No surprise there.

Scott heard Squints chuckle from far, and he looked at him.

"What's wrong with him?" Scott asked. Now everyone, even Benny, looked at Squints.

"What's he doing?" Ham asked next.

Squints walked to a big diving board, and climbed on it.

"Three summers of this, I think he finally cracked." DeNunez realized.

"I don't know. But that's the deep end, and Squints can't swim." Yeah-Yeah pointed out.

Squints, took off his glasses and waved at Wendy. Sam didn't notice. She was looking around, her legs crossed. Squints then covered his nose and dived in.

"SQUINTS!" The Sandlot team shouted, desperately swimming out.

S A M

"Wendy, what's wrong?" Sam asked as she heard yelling. Wendy quickly looked up and started looking around.

"I don't know, but I think someone's drowning." She stood up, taking off her glasses and diving into the water. Sam then stood up immediately when she saw the boys running around. She jumped down and walked as fast as she could to the boys.

"What's wrong?" Sam asked when she arrived to where they were.

"Squints is drowning!" Benny answered.

"Yeah, yeah, he dove into the deep end!" Yeah-Yeah said. She groaned, her head falling back. How can he be so stupid, he can't swim! Sam thought.

Sam may have just met the boys, but she knows a decent amount of information about them.

Suddenly, Wendy stepped out with Squints. A crowd formed around then and the boys. Wendy laid Squints down and started performing CPR on him.

The boys started encouraging him to wake up.

"Come on, Squints."

"Come on!"

"Squints!"

"Come on, Squints. Squints."

"Come on, Squints. Come on."

"Wake up."

"Come on, breathe, would you?"

"Come on, Squints! You can do it! Pull through, bud!"

"Come on, man! Come on!"

"Yeah, yeah. He looks pretty crappy."

"Squints! Come on, man."

Sam started to stare at Benny. She obviously have never seen him shirtless; but she was loving his tone, tan, body.

Snap out of it, Sam! Something bad's happening! Sam scolded herself mentally.

"Oh, God, he looks like a dead fish."

All of a sudden, Squints opened his eyes and smiled at everyone.

"What?" Sam muttered.

Wendy placed her mouth on Squints' more time, exhaling. Then Squints placed his hands on Wendy's head, not letting her pull back. He was forcing her to kiss him.

Sam scrunched her nose and narrowed her eyes at Squints when Wendy pulled back.

"Little pervert!" Wendy screamed.

"Oh, man, he's in deep shit." Timmy stated.

Wendy dragged him out of the pool area and kicked him out. The boys quickly followed.

"And stay out!"

Sam sped-walked to Wendy.

"I really have to go now." Sam muttered, her nose flaring. "I'll walk by later. Same house right?"

"Mhm!" Wendy furiously wiped her lips.

S M A L L S

Michael "Squints" Palledourous walked a little taller that day. And we had to tip our hats to him. He was lucky she hadn't beat the crap out of him. We wouldn't have blamed her. What he'd done was sneaky, rotten and low...and cool. Not another one among us would've ever in a million years even for a million dollars had the guts to put the move on the lifeguard. He did. He had kissed a woman, and he had kissed her long and good. We got banned from the pool forever that day. But every time we walked by after that, the lifeguard looked down from her tower, right over at Squints...and smiled.

That same day, Sam walked out of there furious. She quickly changed and ran off with crossed arms, narrowed eyes, and a flaring nose. When we all saw how she acted, we quickly knew the reason why.

Wendy...was Sam's sister.