The Bear in Right Field

Jordan choked down another neon-orange vitamin C gummy. Mom swore they'd help him focus during baseball tryouts, but mostly they just made his tongue feel weird.

"You gonna stare at the fence all day?" Coach Miller barked. Miller was a bull of a man—shoulders like a boulder, patience like a match in a hurricane. Jordan's palms were already sweating through his batting gloves.

First pitch: *WHIFF.* Second pitch: *WHIFF.* The team snickered. Jordan's face burned.

Then he saw it. A black bear cub, no bigger than a golden retriever, wandering through the woods beyond right field. Jordan froze. Everybody else kept playing. Was he hallucinating? Stress did weird things to people.

"Kid!" Miller yelled. "You gonna hit or just stand there like a statue?"

Jordan pointed. "There's a—"

But the cub was gone. Just like that. Vanished into the trees like it had never existed.

"There's a what?" Miller's eyebrows rose. "A brain? An excuse?"

Jordan gripped the bat. Something shifted in his chest. Maybe it was the vitamins kicking in. Maybe it was just pure, stubborn indignation. But he suddenly didn't care about looking cool. He didn't care that Emma Rodriguez was watching from the bleachers, probably texting her friends about how he was choking.

He stepped in, eyes locked on the pitcher.

*CRACK.*

The ball soared over everyone's heads, clearing the fence by ten feet. Right about where the bear had been.

Jordan trotted the bases, grinning like an idiot. Emma actually looked up from her phone.

Later, walking home, Jordan found himself scanning the tree line. The cub peeked back out, blinking before disappearing again.

"Thanks, little dude," Jordan whispered, pulling another vitamin from his pocket. His hands weren't shaking anymore.

Maybe tomorrow he'd ask Emma to help him search for prints. Maybe he wouldn't. Either way, something had changed. Jordan was done playing it safe. Life was too short for that.