Electric Blue Apocalypse

The first thing anyone noticed about me now was the hair. Gone was the boring brown—replaced by an electric blue disaster that my mom called "an act of domestic terrorism." I called it self-expression. My friends called it a cry for help, which, rude.

I stood in the corner of Jake's basement party, nursing a lukewarm soda, feeling like a zombie that had been resurrected solely to suffer through social interactions. Finals week had turned my brain into mush, and now here I was, watching people play beer pong with the intensity of professional athletes.

"Nice hair," a voice said.

I turned to find Julian—the Sphinx, as we called him behind his back. The guy never spoke in class, yet somehow knew everything. He had this way of looking at you like you were a riddle he was slowly solving.

"Thanks?" I said, because that's what you say when you're not sure if someone's being sarcastic. "My mom's still recovering."

He laughed, and it sounded like actual laughter, not the fake stuff everyone else did. "I like it. It's brave."

We ended up on the back porch, watching a lightning storm tear through the sky. The air smelled like ozone and teenage awkwardness. I told him about my goldfish, Captain Fin—how I'd won him at a carnival last summer, how he'd survived three near-death experiences, only to die the morning of my AP History exam because I forgot to feed him for a week.

"That's metaphorical as hell," Julian said, and I snorted soda out my nose.

"What?"

"We're all just fish in bowls, hoping someone remembers to feed us before we start floating." He paused, lightning illuminating his sharp profile. "But at least you dyed your hair. At least you did something."

Something about the way he said it—like I hadn't just wasted forty dollars on hair dye, but like I'd actually made a choice—made my chest feel weird. Not anxiety-weird. Something-weird.

"You ever feel like you're just going through motions?" I asked. "Like a zombie, but without the cool flesh-eating part?"

"Every day," he said. "But then I remember that zombies don't have electric blue hair."

He grinned, and for the first time all night, I didn't feel like the weird kid in the corner. I felt like someone who might actually be interesting.

"Touché, Sphinx."

"Touché, Blue."