It started as a simple bet with my sister-in-law. Kendra, my wife's younger sister, is never without a smile on her face. Brunette with big brown eyes, average build, she has some similar features as Amber but is about four years younger. Somewhat competitive, she's always up for a game of some sort.

Visiting from out of state one weekend, she sat down on the couch and watched me play baseball on my PS4 for a few minutes before grabbing the second controller. "How do I join?"

We started up an exhibition game and I quickly instructed Kendra on the controls and gameplay as Amber walked into the living room. "Loser buying breakfast?" she asked as she sat next to Kendra and perused the morning paper.

Kendra either caught on to the gameplay quickly or she was having beginner's luck, because she was proving to be a rather difficult challenger. After four innings, the game was still scoreless. "Hey look," Amber said as she held the paper out for Kendra to see. "They're holding auditions for a TV show in town today."

"Are you going to try out?" Kendra asked with a giggle. "What's the show about?"

"I think you should go audition." I suggested they both go down there and read some lines, and I could see the light bulb above Kendra's head the moment the words escaped my mouth. "How about this" Kendra began. Oh boy, here we go. "Whoever loses this game has to go audition."

I thought about it for what seemed like an eternity. The girls may have thought I was making up my mind about it in reality, I was trying to think of a good excuse to throw out the idea completely. Amber chimed in before I had a chance to voice my dissent. "I like it that idea. Since I'm not playing, I know I won't have to do it. Besides, are you really afraid Kendra's going to beat you?" After a "Hey!" and a soft punch on the shoulder from Kendra, Amber laughed and looked over at me questioningly.

"Alright, it's a bet." Amber cheered, kissed my cheek, and said, "Good luck!" before heading off to the shower. The pressure was on now as we entered the sixth inning, still scoreless.

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I was confident going into the bottom of the 9th up 5-2. Kendra looked nervous, and I quickly got the first two outs of the inning as Amber, mostly dressed after her shower, sat down to watch the final out. "You should at least give Kendra a chance. Make it exciting. Let her load the bases and then finish her off," she said as she winked toward her sister with a grin. I decided that might be fun, so I beaned her next three batters to load the bases.

Everything conspired against me in the next few moments. It was at this exact moment that Amber decided the shirt she was wearing was unsuitable and promptly removed it to find a different one. As I started my pitch, she pulled the shirt over her head, revealing a sexy red bra that pushed her breasts up nicely and presented a generous amount of cleavage.

My eyes looked away from the screen for only a moment, but it was enough to make me slightly miss my pitching accuracy. My pitcher fired a fastball directly over the center of the plate, not the location I'd intended. For the first time all game, Kendra pushed the button on her controller with precise timing. Crack! The batter watched the ball sail toward left-center field, tossed his bat in celebration, and began rounding the bases. His teammates met him at home plate and the game was over. Kendra had just hit a walk-off grand slam. The final score was 6 to 5. I was in shock.

Kendra jumped up, yelling and laughing in celebration. All I could do was stare at the screen, waiting for some magical rule change that said I get one more inning to tie and win the game. "So when is this audition?" Oh no. My mind was pulled back to reality. There must be some way out of this. I would have won if I hadn't loaded the bases. I was showing generosity. She's not really going to hold me to this bet now, is she?

"Auditions are all day. We can go down there any time." Amber was apparently entertaining the idea of this bet, but obviously we weren't going to actually go through with this were we?

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We still had no idea what this show was or what it was about. My stomach was turning over as we neared the location in the paper. I prayed there would be no singing and no required nudity. Entering the building, we saw signs pointing us in the direction of the auditions. There were only a few people, and they all looked busy, like they worked there. A blonde woman walked toward us with a big smile and asked if we were there to audition. When I told her that I was, her face lit up.

"Hello, I'm Jen. We haven't had many people in today. Only a few. I'm so glad you decided to come down." She handed me a clipboard and asked me to fill out some biographical information. Upon completion, she led the girls and me to the room where the auditions were taking place. I imagined it would just be a simple reading in a small room in front of a few people. Instead she took us to what looked like the actual set of the show. There were a few people in the room, as well as cameras, backdrops and lights. I felt nauseated. "Oh, don't worry. The cameras won't be on. We're just doing the auditions in here because it's easier." Whew! That was a bit of a relief.

Jen handed me a copy of the script and handed another copy to Kendra. "Oh, I'm not auditioning. Just him." The scripts were in a small three-ring binder, and each page was laminated. Strange.

"I'm actually not auditioning either." I figured I'd better get the truth out there before we get much further. "I'll be honest, we made a bet and I lost, so that's why we're here. But I'm not an actor, and I don't want to be an actor."

"So you don't want to audition?" Jen looked confused.

"I have to audition, because I lost the bet, but I don't actually want to be considered for whatever this show is."

She nodded in understanding. "Well, since you're here, why don't you both just audition, and when you're done, you can rescind your application for the show. Did you want to audition too?" she asked Amber, who quickly shook her head and backed away. Jen then walked Kendra toward a table near the side of the stage. I couldn't hear what they were saying, but Jen was pointing to the script and, I assume, giving some type of instruction. She then escorted Kendra to her spot on the stage and asked her to sit, before bringing me to the stage and sitting me just a few feet away, facing toward Kendra. Jen then sat in her chair next to one of the cameras and said, "Whenever you're ready, we'll do the whole scene starting on page five. Any place where you see '(NAME)' in parentheses, just insert the other person's name into the conversation. Any questions?"

I flipped through my script as Kendra began to read her line aloud. "I can't believe it's finally summer! Any big plans?"

"I'm looking forward to doing as little as possible. What about you?"

"Same here. I did some baking today though."

"Oh, did you bake me some cookies?" I winked at Kendra as I read the line, proud of myself for a short moment for my improvisational skills.

"No, but I did make a banana cream pie. Would you like some?" With that, she pulled out a pie that had been sitting on the stage behind her. I didn't even realize it was there. Jen must have placed it there when she escorted Kendra to the stage. Kendra held it in her hands, waiting for me to continue the scene.

I made eye contact with Kendra and got lost for a moment. I'd always thought her beautiful brown eyes were captivating, and I was brought back to the moment when she began to scoot closer to me on the stage, so that she was sitting right next to me.

I was confused, unsure what to do, when she pointed to my script and whispered, "Your next line."

"Oh. Sorry. Uh" I found my place in the script again and quickly read off my line. "Sure, Kendra, I'd love some pie. Let me have it!" She promptly reached over and smashed the pie into my face, twisting the pie tin clockwise and counterclockwise before dropping the tin to the floor. Cream engulfed my face before dripping onto my lap. I sat still, again in shock over transpired events. I cleared the cream from my eyes and looked around. Amber was laughing, her hand over her mouth to conceal any sound that might disrupt the goings on.

I looked at Jen and she gave a thumbs up and said, "You're doing great! Keep going." I was ready to throw in the towel on the audition when I noticed Kendra grinning at me and giving me those eyes. She had this terrible gift for convincing me of almost anything by giving an exceedingly cute look and batting her eyes in such a way. I sighed and looked down to my script and, wiping cream away from the page, found my place.

"Wow. That was delicious pie. I could use a drink to wash it down, though."

"Sure, James! Let me get you some water." A stream of water poured down on Kendra from the stagehand above. Amber laughed aloud as Kendra involuntarily met the stream of water face-on. The deluge pushed her brown hair back from her face and pinned her black t-shirt against her skin. She shook her head, smiling at me in humility. "Well, I guess there's no point in stopping now. Might as well move forward." She smiled at me again as I picked up my script to continue.

Oh no. I sighed, and delivered my line. "Well, thanks for your help, but I was thinking more like a glass of water." I looked up as a torrent of water poured down, covering me from head to toe. The cream from the pie was washed away as the water dripped down and soaked me all the way through. I laughed and picked up my script. All of a sudden, the laminated pages made sense.

"That was refreshing. How about we enjoy some dessert?"

I looked a few lines ahead in my script and saw what was coming. I felt butterflies in my stomach as I reflected on whether to continue on and read my next line. A small part of me wanted to quit, but I was more excited about continuing. I found that I was actually looking forward to what was coming next, so I mustered all my courage and forced my words out before I could change my mind. "But the pie that you baked is gone."

Kendra gave me a great big smile. I think she was unsure if I would actually say my line, and when I did, it was like Christmas, because that was the cue for her next line. "Oh, I baked a chocolate pie too." With that, she smashed the pie into my face, again twisting the pie to ensure maximum coverage. I just sat there and gladly took the pie full-on as the chocolate cream covered my face and dripped down on my pants. I could hear Amber and Kendra laughing, and I was genuinely delighted that they were enjoying themselves. I wiped the cream from my eyes and grabbed my script to continue the scene. Kendra did the same.

"As always, your pie was fantastic."

"Thank you, James." She gave me a quick kiss on the nose, despite that not being in the script. "Would you like anything else?"

"Well, I could probably use some more water." Again a stream of water covered me and swept away the pie from my face and hair. I looked up into the water as it washed over me.

"That's definitely one way to stay cool on a hot summer day," Kendra said right on cue.

"Yeah do you have any more desserts hidden back there?" I improvised, with slight hope that she'd produce a third hidden pie. When she just shook her head, I continued on. "Oh well what should we do now?"

"Gee, James, I don't know." A torrent of green slime poured down on Kendra. It covered her face, dripped down her cheeks and shoulders, and covered her all in green. I immediately looked at my script and read ahead a bit. I began to shiver with anticipation. For saying, 'I don't know,' Kendra had been slimed with green slime, and I was to echo those same words a few lines down. I was afraid I'd be too excited to get the words out.

After clearing the slime from her eyes, Kendra continued reading. "Well, so much for staying clean today. What caused that to happen?"

Here it was. "I I don" I was trembling with exhilaration. My mouth was dry. I could hardly speak. "I" I looked at Kendra, watching me expectantly.

I looked at Amber. She must have caught the message behind my glance, because she offered me some quick help. "Just say you don't know, Babe!"

Suddenly I was calm and composed. I spoke clearly and deliberately, anticipating what was to come. "I don't know." I immediately got slimed. Green slime cascaded down over me, covering my hair and my face. I had memorized my next line and spoke it as soon as the sliming had finished. "You know what, Kendra?"

"What, James?"

"I figured it out. I know what causes the slime. We get slimed whenever we say, 'I don't know.' " Again I was slimed with green slime. The slime flowed down from above, completely covering me. We flipped to the last page of our script. Apparently our scene was nearly over. "How do we go through a whole summer without saying those words? That seems impossible."

"Beats me." Wait a minute. That wasn't Kendra's line.

"What?" I asked, unsure if she just got lost and needed to find her place in the script.

"I said 'beats me.' I really have no idea." This time she winked at me, and I caught on to her game. Alright, I'll play along.

"No, no, Kendra, look in your script. That's not your line. You're supposed to say, 'I don't know.' " For the final time, I was slimed with green slime. I immediately wrapped my arms around Kendra and squeezed her for a tight hug. The slime enveloped both of us. We looked up as the torrent lapped over our faces and shoulders and collected in our laps. Amber and Jen were clapping and laughing.

"That was marvelous!" Jen suddenly feigned a professional tone and continued, "but as casting director, I have to tell you that you two just aren't right for the part. I'm sorry although," leaving the professional tone behind, "That must have been quite a bet to endure all this and not even want to be on TV."

"Oh, well, we didn't know what the show was about when we made the bet," I explained.

"Didn't you read the newspaper article?"

I looked at Amber, and she winked at me before kissing my cheek and whispering, "That article is pretty interesting. You should read it when you get home. It tells allllll about the show."


THE END