Cracked Screen Summer

The sun was setting in streaks of orange across the sky when it happened. Tyler's iphone slipped from his sweaty grip at the worst possible moment—right as Mackenzie, the girl he'd been crushing on since seventh grade, finally walked over to say hey.

"I'm just gonna, uh..." Tyler mumbled, watching in horror as his phone tumbled toward the plastic cup of ice water on the bleacher. Splash. Perfect timing. His life was officially a sitcom.

Mackenzie laughed, but not mean-sounding. "Classic. My brother did that last week during his baseball game—phone straight into a Gatorade."

"Great minds think alike?" Tyler winced, fishing his dripping phone from the cup. The screen flickered ominously.

"You're Tyler, right? From algebra?" She sat down on the bleacher below him, like it was the most natural thing in the world. "I'm Mackenzie."

He knew exactly who she was, obviously. Everyone knew Mackenzie—varsity softball captain, somehow managed to be friends with literally everyone, and had this way of making conversations feel easy. Tyler, meanwhile, had spent the past three years perfecting the art of blending into lockers.

"Yeah, Tyler. I sit behind you in third period," he said, then immediately regretted how awkward that sounded. She probably had like, a thousand classes.

"I know," she said, smiling at him in a way that made his stomach do this weird flip thing. "I've been meaning to ask—what's that app you're always on? The one with all the baseball stats?"

His heart literally stopped. She'd noticed?

"Oh! It's this analytics thing, I'm kind of obsessed—"

"Baseball!" someone yelled from the field. "Anyone up for catch while we wait for Coach?"

"You play?" Mackenzie asked, and Tyler nodded, suddenly feeling brave.

"Yeah, actually. You?"

"Softball, but same deal. Come on." She grabbed his wrist—actually touched him—and pulled him toward the field, leaving his waterlogged phone on the bleacher like it didn't even matter. The orange sky was fading to purple, and for the first time ever, Tyler didn't care about his screen. Some things were way better than wifi.