Wednesday mornings during summer break had started feeling important to me in a way I still didn't fully know how to explain. By six-thirty, sunlight was already slipping through the windows of our house in Pasadena, turning the hardwood floors pale gold while the neighborhood outside slowly woke up around us.
I'd been awake for almost twenty minutes already. Not because I needed to be. My brain just refused to stay asleep once it remembered what day it was.
Wednesday. Practice day.
Summer break made volleyball feel bigger somehow. Now the entire day felt organized around volleyball. Everything before four o'clock just felt like waiting for practice to start.
I stayed in bed for a while holding my volleyball against my chest while replaying Monday's training again for probably the hundredth time already. My memories didn't really fade the way most people's seemed to. Whenever I focused hard enough, moments came back almost perfectly. The exact squeak sneakers made against the hardwood floor. The sound of Coach Daniel's whistle echoing through the gym. Mason complaining dramatically during conditioning. The angle of Ethan's shoulders before he swung cross-court during passing drills. The way Coach Mia shifted her feet before demonstrating defensive positioning.
Sometimes remembering things so clearly exhausted me. But lately, with volleyball, it mostly just made me happy.
Eventually I climbed downstairs carrying the volleyball automatically without even realizing I'd brought it again. Mom noticed immediately while standing near the stove making pancakes.
"You brought it to breakfast again."
I blinked and looked down at the volleyball under my arm like I'd genuinely forgotten it was there. "Oh."
Dad looked up from his coffee with a grin already forming. "At this point we should probably charge it rent."
"It helps me think."
"You're eating pancakes."
"That's when I think a lot."
Mom laughed softly while sliding another pancake onto a plate. The whole kitchen smelled like syrup, butter, and coffee while sunlight filled the room around us. Dad scrolled through work emails nearby while I sat on one of the stools bouncing my knee so aggressively my orange juice shook slightly every few seconds.
"You don't have Italian today," Mom reminded me while cutting strawberries. "That's tomorrow."
"I know."
"Then stop looking at the clock every thirty seconds. Practice is still hours away."
"I'm managing time efficiently."
Dad snorted into his coffee.
After breakfast, instead of staying home alone all morning, my parents took me with them to work. They owned a real estate company in Pasadena, and summer apparently turned everybody insane about buying houses. I still didn't fully understand why people suddenly decided June was the magical moving month, but according to Mom, families wanted to relocate before school started again in the fall.
Their office sat near Old Pasadena in one of those clean modern buildings with giant windows and cold air conditioning that always smelled faintly like coffee and printer paper. By now everybody there already knew me, which was dangerous because it meant I felt comfortable enough to ask questions constantly.
Especially to Sandra. Sandra was the front desk secretary and probably the only adult besides my parents capable of surviving my curiosity for extended periods of time.
The second we walked through the doors, she looked up from her computer and smiled immediately. "Well, if it isn't my most stressful employee."
"I'm not stressful."
"You asked me thirty-seven questions last week."
"I counted thirty-two."
Sandra pointed at me dramatically. "That right there is why you're stressful."
Dad laughed quietly while disappearing toward his office, leaving me completely unsupervised near the front desk for the worst possible amount of time.
Unfortunately for Sandra, I'd recently become interested in how houses actually got sold.
"So when somebody buys a house," I asked while leaning across her desk, "how long does escrow usually take?"
Sandra blinked once. "Good morning to you too."
"And why do some listings stay active longer than others?"
"Because not everybody buys houses immediately."
"But if pricing is statistically accurate—"
"Matteo."
"Right. Sorry." I paused for about three seconds. "What's the highest commission somebody's made this summer?"
Sandra physically leaned back in her chair and laughed.
By ten-thirty, I had already wandered through both my parents' offices, reorganized a bowl of business cards because they "looked inefficient," and accidentally listened to enough conversations about property values that my brain started storing housing market information for absolutely no reason.
The weird thing was that adults usually thought I wasn't paying attention because I was a kid.
But I heard everything.
Open houses. Mortgage rates. Pasadena inventory shortages. Clients arguing over countertops like national security depended on granite choices.
At one point Mom walked past the front desk and stopped after hearing me talking to Sandra again.
"…Why are you explaining market trends to my receptionist?"
Sandra pointed at me immediately. "He started it."
"I was asking questions."
"You asked if summer inventory fluctuations affected buyer leverage."
"That's a normal question."
"For a forty-year-old realtor maybe."
Around noon, Mom and Dad finally escaped the office long enough to take me to lunch nearby. We ended up at a small café with outdoor seating because California adults apparently believed eating outside was mandatory whenever weather existed.
I spent most of lunch talking about volleyball. Dad had made the mistake of asking what we worked on Monday. That turned into fifteen straight minutes of me explaining why younger players struggled with balance during first contact.
Mom eventually lowered her iced tea slowly. "You know most eight-year-olds don't discuss platform angles during lunch, right?"
"That sounds like a them problem."
Dad nearly choked laughing. By the time we finally drove toward Stormbreaker later that afternoon, nervous energy had already taken over my entire body again. My leg bounced constantly in the passenger seat while I checked the clock every few minutes even though we were already leaving early.
But this time, when we walked inside the gym, it didn't feel overwhelming anymore.
Monday had felt huge. Too loud. Too unfamiliar. Now the gym felt recognizable.
The second we stepped through the doors, I recognized everything immediately. Volleyballs bounced across multiple courts in overlapping rhythms while sneakers squeaked sharply against the hardwood. Coaches shouted instructions over drills, music played faintly overhead somewhere, and parents sat near the walls behind the glass.
More importantly, I recognized people now.
Charlie waved immediately from across the divider net while fixing her ponytail near the girls' court. Mason was trying to spin a volleyball on one finger again while Noah laughed at him. Ethan sat cross-legged against the wall drinking water from a giant bottle almost the size of his head. Owen, the other libero, looked dramatically miserable already even though practice hadn't started yet.
"I miss freedom," he announced while sitting beside his bag.
"You voluntarily signed up for volleyball," I pointed out.
"That's unrelated."
I didn't feel completely like a visitor anymore. Eventually Coach Daniel called everybody toward Court 4. Kids shuffled closer in uneven messy lines while coaches rolled carts full of volleyballs toward the sidelines.
"Today we're working on movement and first contact," Coach Daniel explained after crouching slightly closer to our height. "At your age, volleyball isn't about hitting hard yet. It's about control. Balance. Learning how to move correctly before the ball even gets to you."
Coach Mia demonstrated positioning afterward — knees bent, shoulders forward, small adjustment steps instead of giant movements. The explanations were simplified because we were kids obviously, but they were still real volleyball concepts.
And honestly, that was my favorite part. Understanding.
By the end of practice, kids sat exhausted near the sidelines pulling off kneepads and drinking water while parents slowly gathered around the courts. Eventually Coach Daniel called everybody together one more time.
"We'll finalize placements this week. Families will receive emails over the weekend with team decisions."
Immediately the atmosphere changed. Parents straightened subtly. Players looked around nervously.
"If selected," Coach Mia continued, "your emails will also include tournament schedules, practice expectations, travel forms, and uniform sizing information."
Tournament schedules. Travel. Uniforms.
The words alone made my chest tighten with excitement.
Dad eventually found me sitting against the wall while carefully removing my kneepads. "You okay?"
I looked up at him, and for the first time all day the nervousness inside me had softened into something steadier.
"…I think today went better."
Dad smiled immediately. "Yeah?"
This time I smiled back without hesitation.
"Yeah."