Goldfish in the Orange Lightning

The basement party smelled like cheap body spray and desperation. I clutpped my red solo cup like it was a lifeline, watching Jordan make everyone laugh with some story about getting detention. Again.

I was seventeen and somehow still didn't know the rules.

"Hey, you good?"

I jumped. Maya stood there, wearing this vintage orange windbreaker that somehow looked cool on her. Her hair was messy in that intentional way I could never pull off.

"Yeah. Just... thinking."

"About what?"

"Everything. Nothing. How Jordan is literally a human lightning bolt of social energy and I'm like... the person holding the wall up."

Maya laughed, but it wasn't mean. "Dude, same. I'm just better at faking it."

We ended up on the back porch, watching a storm roll in. The sky kept flashing, like someone was taking pictures of our awkward moment. Lightning streaked across the clouds—purple and white and suddenly everything felt dramatic and important.

"What's your deal?" I asked, feeling brave for once. "Like, actually."

Maya pulled this small sphinx figurine from her pocket. "My grandma gave me this before she died. Said I should be mysterious, keep people guessing. But honestly? I'm just tired of pretending to have it all figured out."

The sphinx had this knowing smile, like it was in on some cosmic joke.

"We're all just guessing," I said. "Like, remember seventh grade? I thought I was deep because I wrote poems about my pet goldfish dying. Now I realize—goldfish have a three-second memory. That fish didn't even know I existed."

Maya cracked up. "Okay, but that's low-key tragic though, right? We're all just swimming in circles, forgetting everything, thinking we're profound."

Thunder rattled the porch. Another flash of orange-tinted lightning from the streetlights made everything look like a photograph from the seventies.

"Maybe that's the point," Maya said, tucking the sphinx back into her pocket. "We're all just messy and confused and trying to look cool while doing it."

She reached out and squeezed my hand. Just for a second. But it felt like lightning, like something I'd remember even if I was a goldfish.

"You're not faking it as hard as you think," she said.

I watched her walk back inside, orange windbreaker bright against the dark house. Maybe growing up wasn't about figuring everything out. Maybe it was just about finding the people who knew they didn't know anything either.