The Fox at Third Base

My mom swore those gummy vitamins would fix everything. "They're magic, Leo," she'd say, tossing the bottle at me like I was still twelve instead of fifteen. But no amount of processed fruit shapes could fix what happened at the padel courts that Tuesday.

I was supposed to be at baseball practice. Dad's idea, obviously. Baseball was serious business in our neighborhood — you played, you talked about it, you lived it. But I'd been skipping lately, haunting the padel courts behind the community center instead. Padel was different — newer, weirdly European, nobody's dad cared about it. Which meant nobody cared about me there.

That's where I saw the fox.

She was curled under the bench where I dumped my backpack, this rust-colored streak with eyes like shattered amber. Not moving. I froze, racquet still in hand, my heart doing this weird hitch thing.

"Hey," I whispered. "You okay?"

She blinked at me like I was the strangest thing she'd ever seen. Then she lifted her head, revealing this gash along her side, fresh and angry-looking.

I did what any rational teenager would do — I called my crush, Sofia, who happened to be walking her dog, Buster, past the courts. Because apparently my brain had short-circuited completely.

"There's a fox," I said when she picked up. "A hurt one."

Sofia showed up three minutes later with Buster — this fluffy golden retriever mix who was basically a therapist in dog form — and her mom's car keys. We spent the next hour figuring out how to get the fox to the wildlife rehab place without her dad finding out, because apparently Sofia's dad was terrified of rabies and would've called animal control to euthanize everything within a five-mile radius.

"You're not at baseball," Sofia said as we waited in her mom's hatchback for the wildlife lady to come out.

"You're not at student council," I countered.

"Touché."

We didn't talk much after that. Just watched the wildlife lady carry the fox into her clinic, this little box of wild that we'd somehow saved together.

"Want to get food?" Sofia asked.

"Hell yes."

We ended up at this taco place, talking about everything and nothing, while Buster snored under the table. I told her about the pressure to play baseball, how padel felt like this secret rebellion. She told me about student council being actually horrible and how she wanted to drop out to join the drama club.

"Why don't you?" I asked.

"Same reason you don't quit baseball," she said, dipping a chip in salsa. "Expectations."

We traded phones. I put her number in mine. She put hers in mine. Neither of us mentioned we were maybe kind of definitely going to text each other later.

The next morning, I found a bottle of gummy vitamins on my nightstand with a note from my mom: For energy! xo

I threw them in the trash.

Some things you have to grow out of. And some things — like foxes, and girls who save them with you, and sports your dad doesn't understand — those you keep.