Shoeless Joe & Me by Dan Gutman Read Free Book Online

planning the World Series fix. They would have to keep me quiet for the entire Series so they could make their money betting against the White Sox without me “blabbing.” Maybe they would decide it would be easier to just kill me so they wouldn’t have to worry about me anymore.
    And if they killed me, who would know? My mother wouldn’t even be born until the 1960s.
    Suddenly, another thought occurred to me. I didn’t have to sit there and do nothing. I had the pack of baseball cards in my pocket. I could get out of the closet whenever I wanted to. I could use my new cards and travel back to my own time. I didn’t have to alert Shoeless Joe Jackson. I could go home to my own house, my own bed, my own mom. I could be safe.
    Obviously, that was the smart solution. I tore open the pack of new cards, holding one of them in my hand and slipping the others back inside my pocket. I closed my eyes and thought about going home.
    Just as the first tingling sensation tickled my fingertips, there was a voice.
    â€œCheap Commy.”
    The voice was coming from the back of the closet, the opposite side away from the door. It must be coming from the room next to the room I was locked in. Somebody was in there.
    â€œYer out, busher.”
    There it was again. A mysterious voice.
    I let the card slip from my fingers. The tingling sensation stopped.

10
Room with a View
    I COULDN’T TELL IF THE VOICE COMING FROM THE NEXT room was male or female, but it didn’t matter. Somebody was there and that somebody could get me out of the closet I had been locked in. “Hey!” I shouted, putting my mouth against the back wall of the closet. “Can you hear me?”
    No response.
    â€œHelp!” I screamed, pounding the wall. “I’m locked in the closet of the room next door! Get me out, will you?”
    Nothing.
    â€œWhat are you, deaf?” I hollered.
    Then it occurred to me that maybe there was a deaf person in the room next door. Why else wouldn’t somebody respond?
    As I leaned on the back wall of the closet, my finger brushed against something sharp. I ran myfingers all over the wall until I found the spot again. It was a screw. The back panel of the closet was held on by screws!
    Excitedly, I felt around until I found the screw in each corner of the wall. If I could loosen the screws, maybe I could remove the panel and get out of there.
    I didn’t have a screwdriver or anything, but I felt in my pockets to see if anything could serve the same purpose. All I had was my camera, a twenty-dollar bill, my baseball cards, and the container of medicine.
    I felt around on the floor. I couldn’t see anything, so I slid my hands all over, trying to cover every inch. After a few minutes, my hand felt something. It was a coin. I could tell it was a dime because the edges were ridged. Perfect.
    The dime fit into the head of the screw. Righty tighty, lefty loosey , I remembered. The screw didn’t turn easily, but it did turn. I was able to slowly remove the top left screw from the wall. Three more to go.
    â€œCheap Commy.”
    There it was again! The voice. What did “cheap Commy” mean? I pounded the wall.
    â€œWho’s Commy?” I yelled. “Push the wall out!”
    No response. Whoever it was in the next room was starting to get on my nerves. I decided to forget about the voice and just get all four screws out. It didn’t matter who was on the other side. All thatmattered was that I would get out of there.
    It took about ten minutes to get the second screw out of the wall. Dimes are not made to be used as screwdrivers, and my fingers were tired. I didn’t look forward to spending twenty minutes to remove the bottom two screws.
    I pulled on the panel on the off chance that it might come off with two screws still attached. Surprisingly, it pulled away from the wall. I gave it a good pull, and the bottom two screws ripped right out. The board fell off