“We’re leaving.”

        I can’t believe I’m hearing this. I can’t believe he could actually even think to joke, to say that we are leaving.

        “What?” A roar from the crowd floods over my little sound. I hope I look in shock enough for Pete to take back what he said.

         “Jason and I have to work tomorrow. We have to get going.”

         “But, it’s a tied score. It might take only one more inning and they are in the playoffs!”

         “It’s already the bottom of the tenth. This could take all night. We could have left after the ninth but we didn’t.”

         “Look, Boston has started playing again. They are in the eighth. If they lost, the Rays are in the playoffs. Don’t you want to be here for that? They have come back seven runs, starting in the eighth, from being shut out, to tie. I don’t know if any team has done that so late in a game. We’re watching history. It seems like nothing can stop them. How can you live with yourself if they win and we leave now and don’t see it here?”

         “If you want to know the truth, Jason wants to go. It’s his birthday. You know I always do things for other people, and not so much for myself. I’m doing it for him. I’d like to stay. And you don’t have to work tomorrow anyway.”

         “How about if you guys show up tomorrow for work and people ask you how the game was and you tell them you left before it was over? Maybe left the game of the century. I’d say take the day off, call in sick, come in late, go to bed early tomorrow night, go home early because you don’t feel well. It’s only one night. You haven’t been to a game all year. They will understand. They won’t understand walking out on a game like this!”