Seventh Inning Stretch

The ballpark organ swelled, but Marcus couldn't feel the rhythm anymore.

His palm slick against the cold metal railing, he checked his iphone for the third time in two minutes. Nothing from Sarah. The lawyer had said she'd sign by noon.

"Rough day?"

Marcus turned. The woman next to him wore an oversized jersey, cradling an orange in one hand like it was something holy. She peeled it slowly, methodically, the citrus scent cutting through the stale beer and hot dog air.

"Something like that," Marcus said.

She nodded toward the field, where the baseball players stretched like waking giants. "My husband used to love this. Before."

The word hung between them, heavy with unspoken loss.

Marcus felt his phone vibrate against his thigh. He almost didn't look.

"What's her name?" the woman asked, nodding at the locked screen.

"Sarah. Twenty years next month."

"My David's been gone three years." She offered him a section of orange. "The cat died last week. That's when I finally came back here. First time since."

Marcus took the orange. "I'm sorry."

"We all end up alone eventually," she said, not unkindly. "Some of us just admit it sooner."

His phone lit up. One word: Done.

Marcus watched the players take their positions. The inning was ending. Everything was ending.

"You know what I learned?" the woman said, feeding a calico cat that had appeared near the concession stand, threading its way through empty seats like it owned the place. "Sometimes the thing you think will destroy you—that's the thing that finally lets you breathe."

Marcus looked at his palm again. The sweat had dried. The phone in his pocket felt lighter somehow.

He took a bite of the orange. It was tart and bright and tasted like something that hadn't been ruined yet.

"Thank you," he said.

She smiled, and something in her face shifted—younger suddenly, or maybe just no longer old. "Baseball's better with company anyway."

The crowd roared. Something good had happened on the field. Marcus didn't know what, and for the first time in twenty years, he realized he didn't need to care. The cat rubbed against his ankle, and he reached down, fingers finding soft fur, and something in his chest unlocked.

He was free. He was alone. He was fine.