The Seventh Inning Stretch

The bleachers pressed against Mark's back, hard and unforgiving, much like the last three years of his marriage. He watched his son Liam in the outfield, the boy's baseball cap too large, swimming on his head like a tiny boat in rough seas. The metaphor felt too apt.

"He's got your arm," Sarah said beside him, though she wasn't looking at the field. She was texting someone, her thumb swimming across the screen in that practiced, secretive rhythm that had become their new normal.

Mark had found the cat – their cat, technically, though Sarah had brought Barnaby home seven years ago – sleeping in his sock drawer that morning. The orange tabby had started avoiding Sarah's bedside, preferring Mark's discarded laundry, the dirty laundry of their marriage.

"Did you hear me?" Sarah asked. "I said he's got your arm."

"He's ten, Sarah. His arm's going to change."

"Everything changes." She pocketed her phone. "Even things that were supposed to be permanent."

The pitcher wound up, threw high and wild. Liam's glove remained at his side. The ball kept swimming upward into the bright Saturday sky, mocking gravity, mocking expectations.

"I'm staying with Jenna tonight," Sarah said.

"Jenna lives in Chicago."

"Exactly."

The confession hit him with the brutal efficiency of a fastball. He'd suspected, of course. The late nights, the showering at the gym, the way she'd started swimming laps every morning – exercise, she'd claimed, though her body had needed no improvement. She'd been swimming toward someone else, leaving him submerged in the deep end of their domestic life, holding his breath.

Liam turned in the outfield, searching for where the ball had landed. His father stood up.

"I'll be gone when you get back," Mark said. "Barnaby too."

"You're taking the cat?" Her laugh was sharp, surprised.

"He likes my socks better anyway."

Their son spotted the ball in the grass beyond the fence. He ran toward it, toward the world beyond the baseball diamond, while his father walked in the opposite direction, toward the parking lot, toward whatever came after this particular game ended.