Chlorine and Confidence

The orange bathing suit had seemed like a good idea at Target. Bright, bold, maybe-gonna-impress-Jordan energy. Now, standing at the edge of Sarah's pool party, I felt like a human traffic cone.

"Yo, Maya! You gonna jump or what?" Tyler called from the pool, doing that annoying thing where he splashed water everywhere like a caffeinated dolphin.

I tugged at the straps. "Yeah, just warming up my chilly muscles."

Chill. I could be chill. I'd totally been chill since kindergarten, except for that time I cried because my goldfish died and that other time I accidentally told Mrs. Henderson she looked like a walrus.

"Maya!" Jordan waved from the deep end. My stomach did that thing where it forgot how to organ. He was wearing navy trunks and his hair was wet and he was smiling and I was approximately seven seconds away from passing away.

I took a deep breath and—

Wait.

Something felt wrong. Not nervous-wrong, but actual wrong. I ran my tongue across my front teeth.

No. Nonono. Absolutely not.

Fresh spinach from the lunch place I'd eaten at before coming here. The spinach from the "it'll give you energy for your presentation" salad Mom had packed. The spinach that was currently decorating my braces like microscopic green Christmas lights.

I had been walking around for twenty minutes. Talking to people. Smiling. With spinach in my teeth.

Death was the only acceptable option. I would simply evaporate into the atmosphere.

"Maya?" Jordan swam closer. "You good?"

The universe had officially declared war on my social life.

I made the executive decision to die. I would drown myself in this suburban pool. It would be a noble sacrifice. They'd name a bench after me: MAYA CHEN, 1997-2023, VICTIM OF GREEN LEAFY VEGETABLES.

I did the only logical thing.

I cannonballed.

The water rushed up around me, chlorine stinging my eyes, and for three glorious seconds, I was underwater where no one could see my spinach or my burning face or my extremely questionable orange swimsuit. Then I surfaced, spluttering, hair plastered to my forehead like a wet rat.

Jordan was laughing. Not mean laughing. Actual laughing.

"What?" I demanded, wiping water from my eyes. "Don't look at me, I'm a disaster."

"You got spinach in your teeth," he said, and then, "It's kinda cute though."

I paused. "What's cute? The spinach or the disaster?"

"Both." He grinned. "Also, that orange suit? It looks really good on you."

Later, after I'd scrubbed my teeth in Sarah's bathroom until my gums threatened to file a formal complaint, I sat on the pool edge with Jordan. We talked about AP Physics and his weird obsession with vintage video games and how neither of us understood why everyone treated homecoming like it was the Olympics.

"You know," Jordan said, "I was nervous to come today."

"You?" I raised an eyebrow. "Mr. Social Butterfly?"

He shrugged. "I only came because I heard you'd be here."

The sun dipped lower, turning the pool water gold and pink. My orange swimsuit didn't feel so ridiculous anymore. The spinach was gone. Jordan's arm brushed against mine.

Some days, you cannonball into chaos and somehow, impossibly, you don't drown. You just learn to swim.