Chapter 17 → “Good Days, Bad Days”

Chapter 17 → "Good Days, Bad Days"

June 2016 | Warsaw

Adrian was starting to understand something that felt both obvious and cruel:

Getting better didn't happen in a straight line.

One day, you caught everything. The next, you dropped the easy ones. One day, the swing felt smooth and crisp; the next, it felt like your bat was made of wet noodles.

It was starting to drive him crazy.

Two weeks into structured Wolves Juniors training, Adrian had stopped expecting it to be fun. That part was over. But what he didn't expect was how confusing it could be. He could almost feel improvement hovering in the air, like something he could almost grab—but every time he thought he had it, it slipped through his fingers again.

"Footwork, Adrian! Again!"

Coach Tomasz's voice cut through the warm afternoon like a blade.

Adrian jogged back to his starting spot, cheeks flushed, sweat dripping down the sides of his face. His socks were sliding down inside his battered shoes, and his right elbow still ached from that awkward fall during last week's infield drill.

Mateusz was already in position, crouched low behind an invisible home plate, pounding his glove with lazy confidence.

"You're thinking too much, rookie," Mateusz muttered, loud enough for Adrian to hear but quiet enough to stay under Coach's radar. "Just go get the thing."

Easy for him to say. Mateusz always made things look easy, popping bubbles between drills like catching was second nature.

Igor stood off to the side, glove tucked neatly under one arm, counting softly as usual. Sixty-four, sixty-five…

Adrian braced his feet. Coach swung the bat, slapping a sharp ground ball his way.

Move. Feet first. Stay low.

The ball skipped—sharp, fast, dirty—and before Adrian could react properly, it slammed into his shin with a sickening thwack.

Pain flared up his leg.

"I had that!" Adrian hissed, clenching his jaw as he limped toward the ball, scooping it up too late to matter.

"Again!" Tomasz barked from home plate, unbothered by the bruise already blooming under Adrian's sock. "Clean it next time."

Adrian wanted to scream. Instead, he trotted back to his mark, tossing the ball into Mateusz's glove, who caught it without blinking.

"Better next time," Mateusz said with a smirk, gum cracking between his teeth.

Adrian wasn't laughing.

That evening, Adrian collapsed on his bed, staring at the cracked ceiling like it held answers.

The window was open, letting in the faint hum of Warsaw traffic. His hands stung. His shin throbbed. He felt hollow inside, like someone had taken out his heart and replaced it with a balloon full of frustration, stretched thin and tight.

A soft knock at the door broke the silence.

It was Marek, leaning on the doorframe, arms folded, the smell of motor oil faint on his clothes.

"How was practice?" his father asked gently.

Adrian didn't answer.

Marek didn't push. He stepped into the room and sat on the edge of the bed, brushing dust off his jeans.

"Didn't go great?"

Adrian sat up slowly, wiping his sleeve across his forehead. "I'm not getting better."

Marek raised an eyebrow. "No?"

"I try. I try hard. But I'm still messing up grounders. I miss easy throws. Everyone's better than me."

"Everyone?"

"Mateusz catches everything. Igor… he counts ground balls like it's a game."

Marek chuckled softly. "Sounds like competition."

Adrian didn't find it funny. "It's not fair."

Now Marek's face changed—not angry, but sharper, more serious. "You think life's supposed to be fair?"

Adrian didn't answer.

Marek leaned forward, elbows on his knees. "Listen to me, synku. Fair doesn't matter. You don't have to be the best yet. But you do have to learn. Right now, you're learning what it feels like to be bad."

That hit like another grounder to the shin.

"But I don't want to be bad."

"Good." Marek smiled now, just slightly. "Now you're learning for real."

The next day, Adrian showed up early.

He got there before Mateusz's gum, before Igor's quiet counting. Before anyone. The sun wasn't even fully up yet, the light slanting low across the outfield like someone had left the sky half-finished.

Adrian dropped his bag by the fence, took off his shoes, and started running sprints in his socks.

His legs ached. His chest burned. He didn't care.

The easy days were over. This was going to hurt. But hurting was better than giving up.

One throw at a time.

One ground ball at a time.

Better next time.

Slowly, painfully, things began to change.

The missed throws didn't stop entirely—but they got rarer. Adrian's feet started remembering how to move before the ball arrived. His glove wasn't just decoration anymore. He even managed to start scooping the tricky hoppers that had eaten him alive in the first few practices.

"Not bad, rookie," Mateusz admitted one afternoon after a clean double-play drill.

Coming from him, that was practically poetry.

Igor still didn't say much. Still counted every rep under his breath like a calculator someone had forgotten to turn off. But after one particularly sharp stop, Adrian swore he saw the blond-haired shortstop give him the smallest of nods.

That felt better than a home run.

But it wasn't just practice where things shifted.

One night, back home, Marek caught Adrian in the kitchen, practicing his glove work with a tennis ball against the wall. The slap of leather echoed softly in the narrow apartment.

Marek leaned against the doorframe. "Good."

Adrian didn't stop. "Still missing too many."

Marek smiled faintly. "Not from where I'm standing."

For the first time, Adrian allowed himself to believe it.

Of course, it wasn't all progress.

Some practices were disasters. One sharp liner caught Adrian on the thumb, leaving his hand swollen for two days. Another ground ball popped up and split his lip. There were drills where he froze, and drills where Tomasz chewed him out in front of everyone, voice sharp, no mercy.

"You've got the feet, kid!" Tomasz snapped after one mistake. "Use them!"

Afterward, Adrian sat by the dugout, kicking pebbles into the dirt, feeling smaller than ever.

Mateusz flopped down beside him like a rock falling off a truck. "Told you. Bad days happen."

"Feels like it's more bad than good."

"That's 'cause you're noticing now," Mateusz said simply. "Means you're not just running around like a lost puppy anymore."

Adrian stared at him. "That's supposed to make me feel better?"

"Hey—I'm not the coach. I just catch the pitches." Mateusz blew another crooked bubble. "But you'll get it. You're stubborn. I like that."

For some reason, that made Adrian feel a little better.

It was after one of those mixed practices—half clean, half messy—that Adrian heard something new.

Coach Tomasz was talking with someone near the batting cage, voice low but carrying enough to reach the dugout if you listened carefully. Adrian didn't mean to eavesdrop, but the words caught him by accident as he untied his cleats.

"Kid's form isn't bad," the other voice said, thoughtful, not impressed but interested.

Adrian's heart jumped. Who was that?

He glanced up, trying not to look obvious, but only caught a glimpse of a man's back—older, taller than Tomasz, wearing a weathered windbreaker with a logo Adrian didn't recognize.

Tomasz grunted. "He's raw. Small. But there's something in him."

Adrian's pulse hammered. Were they talking about him?

Before he could even start pretending not to listen, Mateusz flopped onto the bench next to him, loud and distracting, snapping his gum loudly in his ear.

"Oi. Earth to rookie. You dead or what?"

Adrian blinked and shook himself back to the present.

"Not dead."

"Good. We've got more running to do next week."

Adrian flexed his sore fingers.

Better next time.

Always better next time.

End of Chapter 17