The Last Inning

Marcus sat on the back porch, the old baseball glove clutched in his lap like a dead thing. His father's glove—worn leather, creased with decades of hope and failure. Inside the house, Sarah was packing. The sound of tape ripping across cardboard boxes echoed through the screen door, sharp as bone snapping.

The cat, a ragged calico they'd rescued together seven years ago, pressed against his leg. She purred, a small motor of attachment that made his chest ache. He'd been the zombie lately, not Sarah. Moving through days on autopilot, grief for his father hollowing him out from the inside until he was just a shell going through motions.

"Marcus?" Sarah stood in the doorway. Her eyes were red-rimmed, exhausted. "I found the photos. From the game."

He remembered that day—him and his dad at the stadium, bear of a man with hands that could crush a beer can but gentled everything else. His father had bought them both foam bear claws, ridiculous things they'd worn despite the heat, laughing until it hurt. Two weeks later, the diagnosis. Six months after that, the funeral.

"I don't know who I am anymore," Marcus said, the confession tearing loose. "Without him. Without us."

Sarah crossed the porch, sat beside him. The cat wound between them, a bridge of fur and warmth. Outside, beyond the fence, neighbor kids played baseball—crack of bat, shouting, the pure uncomplicated joy of belonging somewhere.

"You're Marcus," she said quietly. "The man who held me when I lost my brother. The one who keeps trying even when it's hopeless."

He looked at her, really looked, and saw the love still there beneath the exhaustion. The glove in his hands wasn't dead weight. It was heritage, memory, a way to hold onto something good without letting it consume him.

"Stay," he said. "One more inning."

Sarah leaned into him. "Yeah. Okay. One more."

The cat settled across their laps. Somewhere, a bat connected with ball—a clean, perfect sound. For the first time in months, Marcus felt something besides grief stir in his chest. Something like possibility.