Chloride Dreams and Curveballs

The summer I turned sixteen, my hair fell out in clumps. Not like, dramatic movie breakup clumps, but enough that my mom—ever the optimist—suggested I start taking this neon-orange vitamin gummy pack she'd found on TikTok.

"It's biotin, honey. And vitamin D. You're inside too much."

I was inside too much because I'd quit the baseball team three weeks before regionals. My dad still couldn't say "quit" without doing air quotes. Like I'd betrayed something sacred instead of just... burning out. The weight room, the protein shakes, the way Coach Henderson made us run windsprunts until someone puked. I'd stopped enjoying the crack of the bat sometime around freshman year, when sports stopped being about fun and started being about Scholarships and Capital Letters.

So there I was: hair thinning, former athlete, consuming gummy bears that tasted like artificial rage.

Then Zara noticed me at the pool. Zara, who'd sat behind me in bio since seventh year, who'd somehow dyed her hair a different color every month without ever looking like a disaster.

"Your hair's getting long," she said, sliding onto the lounge chair beside mine like she belonged there. Which she did. She belonged everywhere.

I dunked my head underwater to avoid answering. The chlorine burned my eyes in that familiar way that felt like coming home. When I surfaced, she was watching me with this expression I couldn't read.

"I heard about the baseball thing," she said. "My brother quit too. He said it was like eating the same sandwich every day until you wanted to die."

I laughed. Water dripped from my eyelashes.

"Exactly like that."

"So what now?"

What now. The question hung between us, shimmering like heat over pavement. I thought about my bedroom at home, the vitamin gummies on my dresser, the way my hair kept falling out anyway, like my body was rejecting everything I used to be.

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe I'll just... float for a while?"

Zara grinned, and it was the most genuine thing I'd seen in months. She pulled a bottle from her bag—bright orange, same brand as mine.

"Yeah," she said, swallowing one. "Me too. Me too."