The Empty Court

Marcus stood alone on the padel court at 2 AM, the glass walls reflecting the harsh sodium lights. His divorce papers were final today—twelve years dissolved into ink and signatures. He gripped his racquet tighter, knuckles white, and served into the empty space where his doubles partner used to stand.

The ball rebounded with a hollow thud. Marcus missed, stumbled, went down hard on one knee.

"Fucking bullshit," he muttered. That's what his broker called it—a bullshit market, a bullshit year. The bull run had ended months ago, taking his portfolio and half his net worth with it. Now the bear ruled everything, even his sleep.

He'd started seeing things. Not hallucinations, exactly, but patterns where none existed. The way his neighbor's cat moved across the courtyard—predatory, patient—reminded him of market charts. The animal would crouch in the garden, tail twitching, waiting for something to move. Sometimes Marcus watched it for hours from his window, nursing whatever whiskey was on sale that week.

Tonight, lightning flickered in the distance, a silent strobe against the clouds. Storm was coming. Everything was coming.

He thought about Elena, somewhere in Barcelona with someone who probably didn't check his phone every seven minutes, someone who could sleep through the night without waking up gasping, convinced he'd made the wrong trade, the wrong choice, the wrong everything.

His phone buzzed on the bench. His broker. Margin call.

Marcus laughed, the sound echoing off the glass. What a fucking joke. The cat on his balcony, the bear in his portfolio, the bull that had already left the barn, the lightning that never struck but always threatened. Padel at 2 AM, a sport for people who still believed in games with rules and winners and outcomes you could predict.

He stood up, knees aching, and served again.

The ball hit the wire fence.

Again.

Again.

Somewhere in the distance, real thunder finally rolled in.