Deep End Truths

Maya stood at the edge of Sarah's above-ground pool like it was a portal to another dimension. The water shimmered with that annoyingly perfect Instagram-filter look, while inside her iphone case, her group chat was already blowing up with party updates and occasional rants about who showed up wearing what.

"You coming in or what?" called Jake, effortlessly treading water like some swimming champion while the rest of us flailed like confused puppies.

Maya's golden retriever, Buster, had followed her to the party and was now parked by the pool fence, giving her those judgy eyes that said *I believed in you and this is how you repay me.*

The real problem wasn't the water. It was the pool deck's centerpiece – this bizarre sphinx statue Sarah's mom had gotten "on sale" from some estate sale. Its stone face seemed to stare directly into Maya's soul, questioning her entire existence. *What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon, and is currently having a panic attack by a suburban pool?*

"You good?" Jake had swum over, dripping water everywhere because some people have no concept of personal space.

"Yeah, just... admiring the sphinx." Maya winced. That sounded dumb even to her.

Jake laughed, actually laughed. "It's ridiculous, right? My little brother tried to feed it a hot dog last week."

Something about that broke the weird tension. Maya slipped into the water, and it wasn't terrifying. It was just water. The sphinx was still judging everyone, but that's what sphinxes do. Buster barked approvingly from the fence, probably just happy she'd stopped embarrassing herself.

Later that night, Maya posted a photo of the sphinx with the caption *guardian of deep thoughts and shallow ends* and got 47 likes, which was basically currency in her world. Sometimes the scary stuff wasn't actually that deep – it was just a weird statue by a pool, and sometimes you just had to jump in anyway.