Last Inning

The spinach sat limp and abandoned in its colander, much like the last three years of my marriage. I'd planned to cook something real—something that required chopping and sautéing and intention—but instead I'd stood at the kitchen sink, water running over my hands, watching the clock tick toward eight.

Elena was at another baseball game with Mark from Accounting. Not a date, she'd insisted, but they'd gone to three games this month, and I'd stopped asking what happened during the ninth inning.

My hair had started turning silver at the temples two years ago, around the time I stopped sleeping through the night. I caught my reflection in the window above the sink—gray skin, dull eyes, a corporate zombie moving through motions I'd memorized so well they required no consciousness at all. Wake, commute, spreadsheet, commute, sleep. Repeat until death.

I turned off the water. The house was too quiet.

The spinach had been for her dinner, back when I still believed in trying. Now it was just another testament to good intentions abandoned midway through.

When the front door opened, I didn't turn around.

"You missed it," she called from the hallway, her voice bright with something I hadn't heard in our kitchen in years. "Bottom of the ninth, two outs, bases loaded." She paused. "Rami hit it out of the park. You should have seen your face when you finally showed up."

I hadn't gone to the game. She hadn't noticed.

The realization settled in my stomach like something heavy and inevitable. I dried my hands on a towel that smelled faintly of her lavender shampoo.

"David?" She appeared in the doorway, still wearing her jersey, still flushed with excitement. "Why are you standing in the dark?"

"I'm not," I said.

"You are." She stepped toward me, then stopped. The light from the hallway caught the gray in my hair, the resignation in my shoulders. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," I said. "That's the problem."

She didn't understand. She'd understand soon.

"I packed a bag," I said, and her smile faded like the last light of day. "I'll be at the Hilton. You can have the house. The spinach is yours too."

"David—"

"Bottom of the ninth, Elena." I walked past her toward the bedroom. "Two outs. I'm done swinging at air."