Fox Eyes, Orange Skies

I'd been a spy since seventh grade. Not the cool kind with gadgets and secret missions—the cafeteria kind. The kind who watches from the corner table, memorizing who sat with who, who was fighting, who was flirting, all while pretending to be intensely interested in my spinach and feta wrap.

Lunch period was prime intelligence gathering. Today my subject was Fox.

Fox had transferred to Crestwood High three weeks ago, and nobody knew anything about them. Fox wore this beat-up orange denim jacket every single day—same one, never washed (probably). Messy dark hair that fell over one eye. They sat alone at the edge of the courtyard, always reading the same battered paperback, always eating an orange. Not like, a normal orange. They'd peel it with surgical precision, separating every segment, eating them one by one while looking at everything and nothing.

I'd been watching Fox for two weeks. My cat, Miso, judged me hard when I told her about it at home.

"You're being a creep," Miso's judgmental yellow eyes seemed to say as I poured my heart out about how Fox had glanced at me in the hallway yesterday and I'd almost walked into a locker.

"Whatever," I muttered. "It's research. For when we inevitably get partnered up in Bio."

My mom's spinach smoothie sat untouched on the counter. "Honey, you need to eat something green that didn't come from a bag," she'd said that morning, blender roaring.

"I'll grab lunch at school," I'd called back, grabbing my backpack.

Now, sitting at my corner table with my sad spinach wrap (why did I always pack the same thing?), I watched Fox finish their orange. Fox stood up, orange jacket blazing against the gray November sky, and—were they walking toward me?

No. Definitely not. I was imagining it.

Except they were. Fox stopped at my table.

"You've been watching me," Fox said. Not mean. Just... factual.

My face burned. "I—"

"I don't mind." Fox sat down across from me. "You're interesting to watch too."

My spinach wrap suddenly felt like the most fascinating object in existence. "I'm not."

"You are." Fox's eyes, dark and knowing, locked onto mine. "You notice things. Most people don't notice anything."

That afternoon, I texted Miso a photo of Fox's orange jacket.

"Research complete," I typed. "Subject acquired."

Miso sent back: 🦊🧡

Some spy I was. I'd been caught on my first mission.

And somehow, that was exactly what I'd wanted all along.