Three Strikes and You're Spying

Maya's thumb hovered over the send button on her cracked iPhone screen, heart doing that stupid flutter thing it always did when texting him. The baseball diamond stretched out before her, empty and echoing, while she sat in the dugout waiting for practice to start.

"You're literally staring at your phone like it's a zombie that's about to eat your brain," said Jordan, dropping his gear beside her. "Just text him already or I'm gonna lose it."

"Shut up," Maya muttered, but she pocketed the phone. "I'm not texting him first. Again."

"You're overthinking this whole thing," Jordan said, stretching his arm like he always did before pitching. "He's into you. Even I can tell, and I have the emotional intelligence of literally my dog."

Speaking of dogs—Buster, Jordan's golden retriever, was currently sprinting across the outfield after a squirrel, tongue flapping, completely unaware of the social crisis unfolding in the dugout.

"Whatever," Maya said. "I'm just saying, if he liked me, he would've texted back after that party. Instead of leaving me on read for three days like some total ghost."

"Or," Jordan lowered his voice, "he's just as nervous as you are, and someone—" he shot her a look "—should just go for it instead of playing this whole 'I'm too cool to care' act."

Coach blew the whistle from home plate. "Alright, team! Let's get moving! Jordan, you're pitching. Maya, you're up first at bat."

Maya grabbed her helmet and bat, stepping to the plate. Jordan wound up and threw the first pitch. Strike one. She adjusted her stance, thinking about last Friday, when Lucas had smiled at her across the bonfire, and she'd smiled back, and they'd talked for like two hours about everything and nothing until her mom called.

Second pitch. Strike two.

"You're thinking too hard!" Jordan called from the mound. "Just swing!"

Third pitch came, and Maya didn't think—she just swung. CRACK. The ball sailed toward left field, perfect and impossible.

"YESSS!" Jordan shouted from the mound. "NOW TEXT HIM!"

Her phone buzzed in her pocket where she'd left it in the dugout. Lucas: *Hey, sorry about the delay. I wanted to ask—would you want to come to my game Friday?*

Maya grinned. Sometimes, you just had to swing.