Three Seconds Under

The hat was stupid. Dad's old fishing hat, frayed at the brim, smelling like lake water and poor decisions. But Jax wore it anyway, pulled low over his eyes like armor against the world, or at least against the fluorescent lights of the community center where everyone who was somehow already part of everything hung out.

"You coming?" Maya called from the padel court. She'd been playing since seventh grade, back when it was still that weird Spanish sport nobody talked about. Now she was varsity captain, moving across the court like she owned the space between the lines.

Jax adjusted the hat. His padel racket felt foreign in his hand, like holding a stranger's phone.

"Yeah," he said. "Just."

"Just what?"

"Just thinking about my goldfish."

Maya laughed, and it was the good kind—not the mean kind, not the remember-that-time-you-fell-off-your-skateboard kind. "Your goldfish? You've had that thing since, what, third grade?"

"Barnaby? Yeah. He's still kicking. Mostly." Jax stepped onto the court, the blue surface slightly springy under his sneakers. "Sometimes I just stare at him, you know? Swimming in circles. Same tiny castle, same plastic plant. And I wonder if he's, like, fulfilled. Does he know there's a whole world out here? Or is the castle enough?"

Maya studied him, really looked at him, which was dangerous because that's when things usually happened to Jax's heart rate.

"That's deep, Jax." She bounced the padel ball on her racket, a satisfying thwack-thwack-thwack. "You know, goldfish actually have way better memories than people think. They're not just swimming in circles forgetting everything. They recognize faces. They learn tricks. They remember who feeds them."

Jax pulled the hat lower. "So what, I'm a goldfish?"

"I'm saying you don't have to stay in the bowl." Maya tossed him the ball. "Play."

His first swing was terrible. The ball sailed into the net.

"Your form's all weird with that hat," Maya said.

Jax took it off. His hair was flattened underneath, probably ridiculous. He felt exposed without it, like someone had peeled off a layer of skin.

"Better?"

"Much."

They played for an hour. Jax missed most of his shots, but Maya kept feeding him balls, kept encouraging him, kept not making him feel like the world's most uncoordinated human. And somewhere around the third time he actually returned a serve, something shifted. The hat stayed on the bench. His hands stopped shaking. The court didn't feel like someone else's territory anymore.

Later, sitting on the edge of the fountain outside, sharing a bag of pretzels, Maya said, "You know, Barnaby's probably fine in his castle. But you? You're doing okay out here."

Jax smiled. He didn't pull the hat back on. "Yeah. Maybe."

"Next week? Same time?"

"Only if you go easy on me."

"No promises." She bumped his shoulder with hers. "But I'll bring extra pretzels."