The Green Between My Teeth

Marcus stood at home plate, the **baseball** bat feeling slick in his sweating palms. Sixth inning. Two outs. Bases loaded. The entire school was watching—or at least that's how it felt with Maya in the bleachers, her laughter carrying like sunshine through the afternoon air.

He'd practiced his swing for weeks. Visualized this exact moment. But what he hadn't visualized was the massive piece of **spinach** wedged between his front teeth, leftover from lunch at Salad King. His best friend Ty had pointed it out with the subtlety of a sledgehammer: "Bro, you look like you've been chewing on a forest."

Marcus had tried to dislodge it with his tongue, but no luck. Now every time he smiled at Maya between pitches, he was flashing green like some sort of vegetable-loving mutant.

"Batter up!" the umpire shouted.

The pitcher wound up. Marcus's brain was running on 1% battery. He'd stayed up until 3 AM finishing his English essay and then TikTok spiraled until dawn. He felt like a **zombie** going through the motions of being alive—dead eyes, slow reflexes, questionable decision-making skills.

The pitch came. Fastball. Right down the middle.

He swung. Connected. The ball soared toward left field, kept going, going...

"HOLY—" Ty screamed as the ball cleared the fence. Grand slam.

The team rushed him. Maya was actually smiling at him now, spinach be damned. In that moment, running the bases with his fist in the air, Marcus realized something: maybe life wasn't about being perfect. Maybe it was about being the exhausted, spinach-toothed weirdo who somehow still managed to hit it out of the park.

He touched home plate and finally dislodged the spinach with his tongue.

"Swallow it," Ty whispered, dying. "For luck."

Marcus laughed so hard he couldn't breathe. Being a teenager was weird. Being human was weirder. But this? This wasn't half bad.