Spinach Between the Lines

The neon green piece of spinach stuck in my braces might as well have been a flashing sign reading SOCIAL SUICIDE. I'd been talking to Maya for five minutes about how epic the varsity baseball game was before Tyler whispered the heads-up.

"Dude, you've got—" he made a circular motion at his own mouth.

I wiped my chin. Nothing. He shook his head, pointing at his teeth. My reflection in the cafeteria window confirmed it: a vibrant green banner declaring my existence as a human salad bar.

Maya didn't notice. She was too busy scrolling through some padel tournament highlights on her phone. The sport was huge at her old school in Barcelona, and now she was trying to get an intramural club started. Nobody joined except me, because honestly? I'd signed up for anything that meant spending more time with her.

"So Saturday, 2 PM?" she asked, finally looking up. "We can teach you the basics. It's kind of like squash meets tennis, but—"

"But with walls, yeah, I watched the videos you sent," I said, fighting the urge to cover my mouth. "Absolutely. Can't wait."

The locker room before baseball practice was its own ecosystem. Coach Miller called it controlled chaos. I called it emotional warfare with a side of Axe body spray.

"Padel? Really?" Jason, our shortstop, leaned against his locker like he owned the place. "That's like tennis for people who couldn't make the tennis team."

"It's actually harder than it looks," I said, which was true because I'd watched twelve YouTube tutorials and still couldn't figure out the serve.

"Bro, you're the starting pitcher. You don't need to chase after every girl with a racket."

Jason's voice dropped on "racket." Just enough that other guys turned. Just enough that the room went quiet in that way where you know something's about to happen.

What happened was that I charged. Like a bull, as Tyler would describe it later, which was a compliment maybe except bulls also die in arenas.

I shoved Jason. Harder than I meant to. His back hit the lockers with a hollow clang that echoed like a gavel striking.

"Say it again," I said.

"I didn't—"

"Say. It. Again."

The silence stretched. Coach's whistle blew from the field, faint and distant, like it belonged to a different world where I wasn't about to get suspended for fighting.

"I'm just saying," Jason said, hands up like I was pointing a gun at him instead of just my dignity, "that you're throwing away your season for someone who's leaving in June. Her dad's military, bro. They're transferring to Germany."

The rage drained out of me like water from a broken pipe. All that was left was the hollow sound of something I'd refused to see.

"She told me August," I said quietly.

"She told everyone August, dude. That's the joke. We've been making bets about how long you'd keep believing it."

I found Maya after school behind the gym, where she was taping up flyers for the padel club. SPOTS STILL OPEN. ALL SKILL LEVELS.

"You're leaving in June," I said without preamble.

She stopped. The tape dispenser made a ripping sound.

"Did I say June?" she asked, which was such a Maya response that I almost laughed. "I meant July. Beginning of July."

"Jason told me—"

"Jason's an idiot who thinks I'm moving to Germany because my cousin is moving to Germany." She turned around, flyers in hand. "My dad's deploying to Germany, yes. But we're staying here. My mom's tenure-track. We just downsized to a smaller apartment."

The relief hit me so hard my knees actually felt weak.

"Oh."

"Yeah, oh." She held up a flyer. "So, padel? Unless you're only interested because you thought I was leaving and that made it safe to—"

"No," I said quickly. "I mean, yes, but no. I want to learn. Regardless. Of any of that."

She smiled, and I knew she was going to mention the spinach because that's the kind of person she was—genuine to a fault.

"Good," she said instead. "Because you're going to need a partner, and I've seen you on the mound. You've got decent hand-eye coordination. We can work with that."

Saturday at 2 PM, I showed up with a racket I'd bought used and enough nerves to power a small city. Maya was already there, hitting serves against the backboard, the ball making a satisfying thwack-thwack rhythm that somehow made everything feel possible.

She turned when I approached.

"Hey," she said. "You've got a little—" she motioned at her teeth.

I wiped my mouth automatically. Nothing.

"Got you," she grinned. "Come on. Show me what you've got, Baseball Boy."

And the thing was? I did. Not perfectly, not elegantly, but I showed up. That's got to count for something.