Poolside Curveball

Marcus stood at the edge of the pool, clutching his towel like a shield. They can smell fear. Just get in the water, he told himself.

Chloe was there, laughing with her friends by the diving board. She was the kind of girl who made swimming look like a sport for Instagram models, not clumsy fifteen-year-olds who still got duckweed stuck in their hair at the local pond.

"You gonna stand there all day or actually vibe?" his best friend Ty called from the shallow end, splashing water everywhere.

The July heat pressed down. Marcus had played varsity baseball since freshman year—he could knock a fastball out of the park, no sweat. But this? This was different. In baseball, you knew what was coming. Here, everything felt unscripted.

He thought about last summer's tournament, how the whole town had cheered when he'd hit that game-winning triple. That was easy. This wasn't.

But then Chloe waved at him.

"You coming in? The water's actually decent!"

Marcus took a breath and jumped—

—and surfaced to laughter. His trunks had slid down to his knees.

"I meant to do that," he sputtered, pulling them up.

"You're ridiculous," Chloe said, but she was smiling. She swam over. "I heard you hit that triple last month. That was insane."

Marcus's brain short-circuited. "You watched?"

"Whole team did." She splashed him. "We're going to state finals. My brother's the pitcher."

Wait.

"Your brother's... Miller? The one who always stares at me during warm-ups?"

Chloe laughed—a real laugh, not the performative one from earlier. "He says you have the weirdest stance. Like you're about to sit on an invisible chair."

"That's the stance!"

"It's absurd."

"It works!"

They were both laughing now, treading water as the party buzzed around them. Marcus realized his shoulders had dropped three inches since he'd jumped in. The knot in his chest had loosened.

"You know," Chloe said, "Miller's having people over after the game Saturday. You should come."

"I—yeah. I'd like that."

She splashed him again. "Good. But maybe work on the cannonball form first."

Marcus grinned. He'd take the loss on the cannonball. The win on the invitation? That he'd take.