Goldfish in the Deep End

Maya stood by the edge of the pool clutching her phone like a lifeline. The water glittered deceptively calm, but inside, everything churned. Her mom's ridiculous oversized sun hat sat perched on her head—a beacon of uncoolness in a sea of perfect bikini bodies.

"You coming in or what?" Jake called from the deep end. Jake, who'd barely acknowledged her existence since middle school, was suddenly swimming laps like he owned the place.

Maya's stomach did that thing where it simultaneously dropped and rose. Because here was the problem: she'd had spinach in her smoothie at lunch—like, a ridiculous amount for health reasons—and the dental hygienist in her head was screaming that something was absolutely stuck between her teeth.

Which meant she couldn't open her mouth. At all.

So instead of calling back something witty and chill, she just stood there like a goldfish caught in a net, mouth opening and closing in tiny terrified gasps.

"Earth to Maya," Jake said, swimming closer. "You okay?"

Her brain short-circuited. This was it. The moment. Jake was actually talking to her, really looking at her, and she was going to respond by flashing him a beautiful wall of green leafy vegetable residue.

She took a step backward and her flip-flop caught on the wet concrete.

The world tilted. The hat flew off. She went under.

Water rushed everywhere—up her nose, in her ears, wrapping around her like a drowning blanket. For three seconds, she just sank, letting the muffled silence swallow her. Better this than the spinach humiliation, right?

Then something grabbed her wrist and hauled her up.

She broke the surface gasping, water streaming down her face, and there was Jake, looking concerned and somehow more real than she'd ever seen him.

"You good?" he asked. "That was pretty epic."

Maya wiped her face and laughed, this weird tiny sound that escaped without permission. "I'm amazing. Just taking a fully intentional swim. Fully."

Jake grinned. "You're weird, Maya. I like that."

She opened her mouth to respond and then remembered—the spinach. But Jake was already turning away, calling someone else over. And for the first time all night, Maya didn't care about the leafy green catastrophe waiting to happen. She dove back into the water, hat-less and breathless, finally swimming.