Backhand Summer

Maya's first week at Pinecrest Academy and she was already vertically challenged in the social hierarchy. The cafeteria had designated zones, and she'd been drifting toward the table near the recycling bins when Leo tapped her shoulder.

"Hey, you play padel?"

She stared at him. Leo, whose smile could launch a thousand TikTok followers, whose hair fell perfectly even though he'd obviously just run his fingers through it.

"I—what?"

"Padel. It's like tennis but cooler. We need a fourth for courts after school. You in?"

Her brain short-circuited. She'd never held a racquet in her life. But somehow her mouth formed, "Sure."

Three hours later, she stood at home plate (was it called a plate? she had no idea) wearing her dad's old backwards baseball cap because Leo had said, "No hat, no game." Her dog Buster watched through the chain-link fence, probably judging her.

"Just hit it, Maya!" Leo called from across the court.

She swung and missed entirely, spinning herself into a dizzy stumble. The competitive guy—something with a J name—laughed. Not mean laughing, but still. Laughing.

Then it happened. Her phone slid from her pocket, charging cable and all, and skittered across the court. She lunged for it, somehow—some miraculously—connected with the ball, which sailed over J-guy's head and landed perfectly in the corner. Winner.

"Whoa!" Leo's eyes went wide. "Where'd you learn to hit like that?"

"Pure instinct," she said, already convinced this would be her origin story. The girl who accidentally became a padel legend because her charging cable saved her life.

Afterward, Leo sat beside her on the bench while Buster investigated his shoes. "My mom's making me take these vitamin D supplements," he said, pulling a bottle from his bag. "Says I'm always inside gaming too much. Want one? They're gross orange flavor."

Maya took one. "Gross orange sounds perfect."

She couldn't feel her toes. She couldn't believe this was happening. Her phone was cracked, her dog was currently humping Leo's sneaker, and she had no idea what padel even was. But for the first time since moving to Pinecrest, Maya thought maybe—just maybe—she'd accidentally landed exactly where she was supposed to be.