Page 2 of The Way We Swing Back

When I reached my grandparents’ house, the porch light was still shining brightly. They always left it on when I had a game, like it could change the outcome.

I let myself in as quietly as I could. But of course, Grandma was waiting at the kitchen table with a mug of decaf coffee and a smile that said she recognized me but wasn’t positive how.

“How was your day?”

I stood in the doorway, hat still low over my eyes. “It was fine.”

She nodded as if she believed me. She probably didn’t even realize we were having a conversation. “Did you have fun, at least?”

“Yeah.” I wasn’t sure I’d said a single true thing since the game had ended.

Grandpa’s recliner creaked in the living room as he stood. He shuffled in, still wearing his robe, adjusting his glasses. His hair was straggly and thin, the color of a freshly opened baseball. “You boys win?”

“No,” I said. “Close, though.”

He gave a quiet grunt and nodded. “You’ll get ’em next year.” Typical Cubs fan.

I forced a smile. “Yeah. Maybe.”

They didn’t ask for more; they never did. They wanted to help but didn’t know how. To them, you didn’t discuss feelings unless someone was already in the hospital. I didn’t fault them. They’d taken me in when they hadn’t had to. They fed me. They let me be quiet.

Sometimes that was what I needed.

“I’m gonna go to bed,” I said, even though it wasn’t even ten yet.

“Alright, honey,” Grandma said. “Proud of you anyway.”

I mumbled thanks and headed down the hallway, past the crooked photos of my mom at age six and then again at twenty-three, holding me in the hospital, cheeks flushed and smiling too big. I hated that photo. She looked like someone who planned to stay, not end her life instead of leaving her joke of a husband.

My bedroom door clicked shut behind me; it was the sound that told me I wouldn’t be bothered until I wanted to be. I pulled the duffel bag from under my bed, the one I kept zipped up and “forgot” to take to games and practices. The zipper stuck when I pulled it open; I yanked at it, half-hoping it’d rip and I’d feel anything different. The bag survived, though, and I reached under the pile of socks and found the bottle tucked beneath.

It was only half full. Or half empty. Whatever.

I didn’t bother with a cup. Just twisted off the cap and took a long pull. The vodka burned at my throat—it was cheap stuff I’d stolen from a gas station shelf one night last month. I’d started with beer like most kids. That’d stopped working quickly. This did the job faster.

I leaned back against the wall, uniform still on, and let the numbness spread.

The thing no one warned me about losing the biggest game of my life was that there was no ceremony. No tragedy. No music swelling as the credits rolled. I just had to sit in my room, overcome with darkness, buzzed and hollow, wondering if I’d ever get another shot—and knowing even if I did, it wouldn’t undo this one.

My eyes were dry and empty, the faucet finally turned off. Pressure built behind them; I was ready for sleep, but I couldn’t get there.

Another swig. The taste was worse the second time. The third went down easier as a familiar, hazy fog returned. It wasn’t the first time I’d drunk myself to sleep. To forget. To fill something. I wasn’t even sure what anymore.

Sometimes it was my mom. Sometimes it was this house that would never truly be home. Sometimes it was the way Tanner used to look at me. Now I could add to this list the sound of my name over the loudspeaker just before I’d blown the biggest at-bat of my life.

Tonight, it was all of it.

The light wasn’t even worth turning off. I just crawled under the covers fully clothed with the bottle on the floor beside me. I stared at the ceiling, at the cracks in the plaster, at the shadow of my failure stretched against the wall.

The thought of failure dragged me back to a memory from when I was thirteen, before my family fell apart, before I lived here.

The air in the garage is heavy with oil and sawdust and that sweet-metal smell of old tools. It’s the kind of place where silence feels normal. Expected.

It’s summer. Late. The light is dim—just the hanging bulb over the workbench humming and swaying. Bugs buzz against the bulb. My shirt sticks to my back.

Dad’s got a wrench in his hand, knuckles stained, sleeves rolled up past the elbows. I’m sitting on the tool chest, legs swinging, pretending I know what socket size he just asked for.

“Half-inch,” he says again without looking.