Service Fault

Elena's hair clung to her neck in the humidity as she adjusted the grip on her padel racket. Court Four at the club, where she'd met Marcus three years ago. Where he'd told her about his wife—a casual confession between games, as if discussing brand preferences in overgrips.

'Your serve,' he called from the opposite side. His palm wrapped around his own racket, casual and unbothered. How easily he'd moved through the world, leaving wreckage behind him that he never saw.

A storm had been brewing all afternoon. The air felt heavy, charged. Elena remembered the night she'd found the text messages on his phone, how she'd lain in bed afterward, staring at the coaxial cable where it disappeared into the wall behind her nightstand. Something that connected and transmitted—carrying signals she'd never bothered to decode until it was too late.

She served. The ball clipped the net cord and dribbled back onto her side.

'Fault,' Marcus said. He came to the net. 'You're tense, El. You need to loosen up.' His familiar nickname. The intimacy of it made her stomach turn.

Lightning fractured the sky—a white scar opening above them. One one-thousand, two one-thousand. Thunder arrived several seconds later, still distant. She remembered her therapist's voice: *Closure isn't something they give you. It's something you make for yourself.*

'Good game,' she said, lowering her racket. 'But I'm done here.'

Marcus frowned. 'We have another twenty minutes booked.'

'No,' said Elena, and the certainty of it surprised her. 'I don't mean just today. I mean—I'm done.' The second serve would have been out anyway. She walked toward the gate, racket bouncing lightly against her leg. Behind her, thunder rumbled closer, but she didn't look back.