The Curveball at Midnight

The pool at the Marriott Courtyard was empty, the water still except for the single floating leaf that had drifted in from somewhere. Elena sat at the edge, her feet in the water, nursing the last dregs of a gin and tonic she'd charged to the company card. The regional sales meeting had ended three hours ago. Her boss had made a passes-at-women joke during dinner. Again. Everyone laughed. She'd laughed too, the practiced response of someone who'd learned that calling it out cost more than swallowing it.

A cat — a mangy calico with half an ear — materialized from the hedgerow and watched her with what looked uncomfortably like judgment.

"You going to jump?" Elena asked it. The cat sat down and began cleaning its paw.

She thought about baseball. Specifically, she thought about her father's voice explaining the curveball when she was twelve, how it looked like it was coming straight at you until it didn't, how the best hitters learned to trust their gut when their eyes were being fooled. She'd never been good at sports, but she'd understood the physics of deception.

That's when it hit her: David's text hadn't been about working late. The curveball had been breaking for months, and she'd been swinging at air.

The cat was now staring at something in the water. Elena followed its gaze. At the bottom of the pool, barely visible in the reflected city lights, lay a single baseball cap. Someone's lost property, or maybe an intentional offering to the chlorine gods.

She stood up, water dripping from her ankles. The cat watched her go, already bored, already moving on to whatever came next.

"Curveball," she said aloud to no one, and for the first time all evening, she didn't smile.