Extra Innings

Marcus stared at the wilted spinach on his plate, the same dinner Sarah had made every Tuesday for seventeen years of marriage. Now the apartment sat silent, her cancer treatments having stolen even her appetite long before they took her.

"You need your vitamins," she'd whisper even when she could barely keep water down, her hand trembling as she pushed the plate toward him.

He dumped the spinach into the garbage. It landed with a wet thud that echoed too loudly in the empty kitchen.

The television droned in the living room—the baseball game he'd pretended to care about because her father had loved the Cubs. They were down by three runs in the eighth. Marcus felt like he'd been playing defense his whole life, always swinging late, always missing.

His phone buzzed. Another text from David, his business partner: *We need to talk about the embezzlement accusations. The auditors aren't buying your story.*

Marcus had told himself the same lie he'd fed Sarah for years: that he was protecting their future, that the ends justified the means. But standing here now, staring at his own hollowed-out reflection in the dark window, he recognized what he'd become. A man who'd spent decades bullshitting everyone, including himself.

The vitamin bottle on the counter mocked him. Sarah had been the one with the terminal illness, but Marcus realized now that he was the one who'd been dying—slowly, dishonestly, one compromised choice at a time.

The baseball crowd erupted on TV. Someone had hit a home run. Too little, too late.

Marcus picked up his phone. He would tell David the truth. He would contact the auditors. It was the bottom of the ninth, two outs, and he was finally stepping up to the plate.

For once in his life, he would swing honest.