Friday Night Hat Trick

Maya pulled the brim of her dad's vintage fedora lower, hoping it would somehow make her invisible. The hat was ancient and ridiculous—exactly why she'd grabbed it when panic hit at 7:42 PM—but at least it covered the forehead that had broken out exactly three days before freshman year's biggest party.

Her iphone buzzed in her pocket. Sarah's house party, #rager, IS ON.

Maya's stomach did that awful flip-flop thing. She'd spent forty-five minutes perfecting her eyeliner, but now she stood frozen on Sarah's front porch, cat-cowardly as ever. Inside, she could hear bass thumping and people shouting over music that was definitely too loud for 10 PM.

"Hey! You coming in or what?"

It was Jake—actual Jake, who sat behind her in English and whose smile made her brain short-circuit. He was holding a red cup and looking at her hat with amusement, not mockery.

"Uh, yeah. Just... thinking."

"About the hat?" He grinned. "It's working for you."

Maya felt her face burn. She'd bear the embarrassment later. Right now, she followed him inside.

The party was chaos in the best way. People were dancing, someone had brought a cat (why? no one knew, but it was sitting on the kitchen counter like it owned the place), and somehow Maya found herself in a circle of people playing never-have-I-ever while nursing a sprite.

"Never have I ever..." Jake looked right at her. "...texted my crush by accident."

Maya's iphone lit up in her hand. A text from an unknown number: hey this is maya from english, sorry this is random but

She froze. She'd sworn she deleted that draft. The one she'd typed at 2 AM and never meant to send, except apparently her phone had other ideas because it was now sitting in Jake's notifications.

Jake's phone buzzed. He read it. Then he read it again.

"That was random," he said, smiling.

"I'm so sorry," she started. "I can explain—"

"You're good." His eyes were bright. "Actually, I was hoping you'd say something. Eventually."

The cat jumped off the counter and landed in someone's lap. Someone screamed. Maya laughed so hard her fedora fell off.

"Keep the hat," Jake said, picking it up. "It's lucky."

Her phone stayed in her pocket the rest of the night. Sometimes the best connections happen offline.