Cable Summer

I spent the whole summer riding shotgun in my dad's van, hauling spools of coaxial cable to people's houses while my friends were at the beach posting aesthetic sunsets. "Tag along with me," Dad said. "Good experience." Yeah, right. Good experience for social suicide.

By August, I'd mastered the art of looking invisible whenever anyone from school rolled past. But then Jordan Rivera walked by while I was wrist-deep in somebody's outdoor junction box.

"Hey, Cable Girl," he called, and I wanted to dissolve into the asphalt.

Then his face broke into this grin that made my stomach do backflips. "Actually, that's kind of sick. My parents' TV's been out for weeks."

Next thing I knew, I was at Rivera's house, which was basically a mansion compared to my apartment. His friends were over, and suddenly I wasn't Cable Girl anymore—I was the tech expert. I fixed their connection in like ten minutes while they hovered around like I was performing surgery.

"You're coming to the lake party tonight," Jordan announced, not asked. And for the first time all summer, I didn't make up an excuse.

The swimming hole was this hidden spot everyone knew except somehow me. The water was black and perfect, ringed by trees that swallowed the twilight. I stood there in my one-piece that looked like something a third grader would wear while Jordan's friends emerged from the water like dolphins, their skin glistening.

Then I saw it—a fox, its coat bright as fire, watching us from the ridge. It vanished into the shadows like something that knew secrets we didn't.

"You coming in?" Jordan called from the middle of the lake.

I dove in before I could chicken out. The shock of cold water hit me like a truck. When I broke the surface, gasping, everyone was laughing, but not mean laughing. Joining in laughing.

Then lightning cracked the sky open—a spiderweb of white across the darkness. One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three—BOOM. The thunder shook through my chest cavity.

"Storm's rolling in fast," someone said, and we scrambled out, grabbing towels and phones, running back through the darkening woods while raindrops started falling like they'd been holding their breath forever.

Jordan ran beside me. "Hey," he said, breathing hard. "Thanks for fixing the cable. My dad's been working nights, he's been too tired to deal with it."

"No big," I said, but it felt big.

"Actually," he said, "I was wondering... maybe you could teach me how that stuff works?"

I didn't become popular overnight. The fox never came back. But that fall, when I walked into high school, Jordan waved at me in the hallway, and for the first time, I didn't feel invisible.

Sometimes the things that make you different are exactly what make you worth noticing. You just have to dive in.