Three Strikes

Mark sat alone in the corporate suite, the baseball game below a blur of white uniforms and green grass. His iPhone buzzed against the mahogany table — sixth missed call from Sarah. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, lightning splintered the sky, illuminating the empty seat beside him.

He'd stopped taking the vitamins weeks ago. The D3 supplement Sarah had placed ceremoniously on his nightstand, along with the prenatal vitamins she'd started taking secretly, hoping he'd notice. He had noticed. He just hadn't said anything.

"You're always choosing something else," she'd told him that morning, her voice not angry but hollowed out. "The game, the phone, the job. Mark, there's nothing left for us."

On the field, the batter struck out. One out.

His phone lit up again. Not Sarah this time — his boss. The merger announcement needed revision. Again. Mark swiped the notification away, his thumb hovering over Sarah's text instead. *I'm staying at my sister's. Take your time.*

What did that mean? Take your time deciding? Take your time packing?

Lightning flashed closer now, and the stadium crowd flinched. The players scattered toward dugouts. Tarp rolled out across the infield as rain began to hammer against the glass, relentless and indifferent.

He opened the nightstand drawer at home later that night — he'd left the game early, driven through the storm. Inside lay the vitamin bottle, half-full. Next to it, a pregnancy test, positive.

Two strikes.

Mark's phone vibrated in his pocket. Sarah again.

He stood in the bedroom of their empty apartment, lightning through the window throwing everything into stark relief. The vitamins. The test. The years of choosing work games, baseball games, any game but the one that mattered.

The phone stopped ringing.

Outside, thunder shook the windows. Mark sank onto the edge of the bed, the vitamin bottle clicking against the nightstand. Three strikes, he thought. And somewhere in the storm, he understood: he'd already struck out.