Fox In The Water

Maya's brother called her a fox when she dyed her hair copper the week before freshman year. He meant it as a compliment — sleek, sharp, like she'd finally figured something out. But Maya mostly felt like a fraud.

That August night, though, everything felt possible.

She'd been sneaking into the community pool after closing for weeks. The swimming wasn't even about getting good at it anymore (she'd never make the team, not with actual athletes like Chloe breathing down everyone's neck). It was about being alone in the water, weightless, where nobody expected her to be anyone.

Until the night someone else was already there.

"You're gonna get caught," a voice said from the deep end.

Maya nearly swallowed pool water. Treading water near the ladder was Leo, who'd sat behind her in homeroom all of middle school, the guy who always smelled like peppermint and carried his skateboard everywhere like it was an extension of his body.

"You're here too," she shot back, treading water closer.

"Touché." He grinned, and wow, he had braces now. "I'm working up the courage to jump off the high dive. It's humiliating."

"Do it, I'll catch you."

"You're like five-foot-nothing."

"Five-two," she corrected. "And I'm surprisingly strong from carrying my dog everywhere. She's a chihuahua mix named Pickles, she has anxiety issues and refuses to walk on gravel."

Leo laughed. It echoed off the water.

"What about you?" he asked. "You afraid of the high dive?"

"No." Maya treaded water, suddenly aware of her stupid swimsuit with the goldfish pattern she'd gotten on clearance. "I'm afraid I'll get to high school and everyone will realize I'm actually boring. That I dyed my hair this crazy color and I'm still just... regular."

Leo considered this. He had nice shoulders, she noticed. Probably from skateboarding. Or from working at his parents' restaurant, where he spent whole weekends stirring giant pots of something.

"My parents make me eat spinach every morning," he said finally. "Like, actual raw spinach blended into smoothies. They say it's for energy, but I'm pretty sure it's punishment for something I did in a past life."

"That doesn't make me feel better."

"I'm getting there." He swam closer. "Yesterday I told them I'd rather drink literally anything else, and my dad said, 'Good, then you'll appreciate when we make it with kale instead.' And that's when I realized being scared doesn't actually matter. You still gotta show up and drink the smoothie."

"That's the worst metaphor ever."

"I'm fourteen, give me a break."

They treaded water in silence. The pool lights made weird patterns on the bottom. Beyond the fence, something moved — a dog, probably, or a cat. But when it stepped into the moonlight, Maya saw the pointed snout, the russet fur, the sharp eyes watching them.

"Is that a fox?" she whispered.

Leo looked. "Yeah. He's probably wondering why these two idiots are in a pool at midnight."

The fox dipped its head, like acknowledgment, then slipped away into the shadows.

"See?" Leo said. "Even the fox thinks we're overthinking it."

Maya's heart was beating so hard she could feel it against her ribs. "So what do we do?"

"We jump off the high dive," he said. "Together."

The ladder up seemed forever tall. The water below looked impossibly far. But Leo's hand was warm when he grabbed hers, and when they jumped, the fall felt like flying, like being exactly who they were supposed to be, even if just for one second.

They came up sputtering, laughing, tangled together in the deep end. Outside the fence, the fox watched from the darkness, and for the first time all summer, Maya didn't feel like a fake at all.