Bad Hair, Broken Cable

My hair looked like I'd stuck my finger in an electrical socket, which wasn't far from the truth. The cable dangling from the ceiling had frayed exactly three weeks ago, and my DIY repair attempt with electrical tape and prayer had clearly failed. That's how I found myself — hair standing straight up like I'd seen a ghost, frayed cable sparking ominously above my head — waiting for Mia to arrive.

"You're not fixing that before she gets here?" My mom leaned against the doorframe, frowning. "And you've got spinach in your teeth."

"Mom, stop." I spun toward the mirror. Sure enough, a bright green fleck from lunch was stuck front and center. I scrubbed it away, heart racing. Mia was the kind of girl who smelled like vanilla and actually knew how to contour. I was the guy who couldn't even manage basic cable maintenance.

The doorbell rang. My stomach did that thing where it simultaneously tried to escape through my throat and drop out of my body entirely.

"Hey!" Mia breezed in like she owned the place, hair somehow perfect despite the humidity. "Ready for our study session?"

"Yeah, just let me..." I gestured vaguely toward the ceiling, where the cable had chosen this exact moment to decide it was done with my nonsense. A shower of sparks rained down. I threw myself in front of her, arms out. "So! How was your day?"

Mia blinked. Then her eyes traveled up to my hair, still defying gravity thanks to my earlier electrocution attempt. Then to the cable. Then back to me.

And then she laughed. Not mean-girl laughter — the real kind, where she actually had to sit down.

"Oh my god," she wheezed. "Your hair. Did you get shocked by that cable?"

"Maybe?"

She was still giggling. "You're such a dork."

"Is that... good or bad?"

Mia stood up, walked over to me, and poked my hair. It made a weird static-crackle sound. "It's definitely good. My ex tried way too hard to be cool. You just... get struck by lightning and don't even care."

"I care. I care a lot."

"Sure you do." She pulled a notebook from her bag. "So. History project. You want to do it on the invention of cable management, or should we pick something boring like the Industrial Revolution?"

I grinned, and for the first time all day, I didn't check the mirror to see if another piece of spinach had betrayed me.

"Boring is good," I said. "Boring is safe."

"Safe." She raised an eyebrow. "Where's the fun in that?"

The cable above us gave one final, dramatic spark, like punctuation on her point. We both laughed.