Thursday
"Alright twerp, what do you want?"
Brian revealed the baseball he'd been hiding behind his back. "Guess!"
Eric just rolled his eyes. "Don't you have anything better to do?"
"No. And according to mom, you don't either!"
Eric muttered someting involving the phrase "according too," but not loudly enough for Brian to hear.
"Come on! You have to."
"I don't even know where my glove is. It's been years since I've used it."
"Don't worry, I found it! See, there's no reason you can't play"
"Fine."
"Yeah!" Brian shouted excitedly as the went outside.
"Yeah..." Eric said, with somewhat less enthusiasm.
"Stop that! If I were the older brother, I'd play catch with you!"
"Sure you would."
"Don't you believe me?"
"Why would you? You'd have better things to do with your time."
"Yeah, but I'd still spend time with my brother. Let's try it out...we'll pretend that I'm the big brother, and I'm taking you to play catch."
"What?"
"We'll just pretend." Brian went on in an exaggerated, slow voice, "You're real excited that I'm playing catch with you, right Eric?"
Eric rolled his eyes and nodded his head, feigning excitement.
"Okay, we have to cross the street to get to the park. You'd better hold my hand."
Rolling his eyes again, Eric took hold of Brian's hand.
"Okay Eric, let's look both ways."
Both boys made a show of looking both ways down the street.
"Okay Eric, here's your glove. Stand there."
"OK, I'm ready!"
"OK"
Brian tossed the ball likely to Eric, who caught it and threw it back. Brian threw again, a little harder, and Eric missed.
"That was a good try."
"But...I shoula caught it."
"That's okay. Maybe catch is too hard. You wanna play hide and seek instead?"
"No...I'm a good catcher!"
"Sure you are...but even good 6 year old catchers miss a lot of balls"
"But...I'm not six...I'm a big boy...like you!"
"Oh...well, why don't I throw another ball, then."
"Yeah!"
Brian threw the ball, hard.
"OWW!"
Brian ran over "Sorry, I shouldn't have thrown it that hard."
"It hurts!"
"Well, let me see it."
Eric took off the glove, revealing a slightly red palm and fighting hard to hold back tears.
"Ooh, I bet that hurts. It looks like you'll be okay, though. You can cry if you want to."
"But...big boys don't cry!"
"Oh. You sure you don't need to cry?"
Eric nodded resolutely. "I'm a big boy! Not a baby."
"That's right, you're a big six year old!"
"Six...I'm older, aren't I?"
"Than six? That's pretty silly. Remember, you're half my age?"
"I'm six and a quarter! That's more then half your age."
"Oh, that's right."
Eric grinned, happy to have outsmarted his brother.
"Want to play hide and seek, Eric?"
"It's not so fun with only two people. Could we go get ice cream?"
"Sure. Race you to the truck!"
Brian initially took the lead, but let Eric win.
"I beat you!"
"Yup. You're fast."
"But you let me win."
"No I didn't."
"Really?"
"Yup. You're just really fast."
"So, what ice cream do you want?"
"Cookies n' Cream!"
"Okay." Brian lifted Eric up so he could order.
"Can I have a scoop of Cookies n' Cweam, please?"
"Are you ready to go back?"
"Yeah, I guess. I wish I could play catch better."
"When you're older."
"But you'll always be bigger'n me."
"Well, we'll see." Brian grinned to himself as they walked back home. "So, did you have a good time?"
"Yeah! Except my hand got hurt...see?"
"Oh, that's right. Have you tried putting some ice cream on it? That's cold, so maybe it'll feel better."
"OK!" And with that Eric upended the rest of the ice cream onto his hand.
"See, I told you that if I were the big brother I'd play catch with you."
Eric blinked as if just waking up. "What's going on?"
"You stuck your hand in the ice cream for some reason, I guess."
Eric rushed out of the room.