Three Strikes and a Splash

The baseball sat heavy in my glove like a judgment I couldn't catch. Coach Miller was yelling something about "keeping your eye on the ball," but my eyes kept drifting to the bleachers where Sarah sat with her varsity jacket and that effortless confidence I'd been trying to replica since freshman year.

"You good, man?" Tyler asked, tossing me a Gatorade. "You look like you're about to puke."

"I'm solid," I lied, wiping sweat that wasn't really there. "Just thinking about that calculus test."

Lightning cracked across the sky – actual weather this time, not the weird electric feeling I got whenever Sarah looked my way. The storm had been threatening all afternoon, a mirror to the chaos in my head. My dad wanted me on varsity. My mom wanted me at Stanford. Sarah wanted me to be... well, I wasn't actually sure what she wanted me to be, but I was pretty sure it wasn't the guy who still kept a goldfish bowl on his nightstand.

Yeah, a goldfish. My little sister won him at the carnival last summer, named him "Swim Shady," then promptly lost interest when she discovered TikTok. I'd been stuck with him ever since.

"Practice is called!" Coach Miller hollered as thunder rattled the concession stand. "Hit the showers, ladies!"

I grabbed my gear and headed to my bike, Sarah's laugh trailing behind me as she ran toward her friend's car. She'd never notice me gone. I pedaled home in the rain, water dripping down my face and mixing with whatever salty tears I refused to acknowledge. My parents were at another dinner with the neighbors, the house quiet except for the bubble filter humming from my room.

Swim Shady was doing laps, orange scales flashing like underwater lightning. I dropped my baseball bag on the floor and flopped onto my bed, watching him.

"You're living your best life, huh?" I whispered. "Just swimming in circles, not caring who's watching."

He ignored me, obviously. But something about his complete indifference to expectations hit me like a – okay, fine, like a baseball to the face. I'd been trying to be everyone's version of me: the jock, the student, the crush. What if I just... didn't?

I pulled out my phone and texted Tyler: *not feeling tomorrow's game. you guys crush tho.*

Then I texted Sarah: *hey, you seem cool. want to hang sometime? not as baseball boy, just as me.*

My hands were shaking, but not from fear this time. The real storm was outside, but I'd just started my own. And for once, I wasn't waiting for someone else to call the plays.