Goldfish Operations

My goldfish Steve was the only one who knew my secret. I'd perch on the edge of my bed, spilling my guts to his orange-speckled face while he did that vacant-mouth thing that said, "I'm listening, bruh. Continue."

"They think I'm this quiet library aide," I whispered, watching Steve circle his bowl. "But I'm actually the reason Tyler and Mia finally admitted they liked each other. I mean, someone had to drop those hints in their group chat, right?"

Being fifteen meant constantly operating in the gray area between who you were and who everyone thought you should be. Me? I was the background character in everyone else's movie. Until the cable thing happened.

It started when my dad hired me to help organize the basement. Found this ancient cable splitter—like, actual old-school TV cable—from before we upgraded everything. Being the curious type who'd watched too many spy movies, I rigged it up to my laptop. Something about signal interception, blah blah.

I wasn't trying to be creepy, okay? But suddenly I could see everything. The group chats, the "who's hanging where" messages, the fights happening in real-time across my entire grade's social ecosystem. I became the school's accidental information broker, subtly dropping truths that brought people together. Like how I convinced Sarah that Jordan wasn't actually ghosting her—he was just at his grandma's for the weekend and his phone died.

I felt powerful. Important. Like I finally had a purpose beyond "quiet kid who reads during lunch."

But then I saw something I shouldn't have. A message about how people only kept me around because I was "harmless." How my crush Chloe thought I was nice but "not really boyfriend material."

Steve watched me cry that night. His fishy gaze felt judgmental.

"What am I doing?" I asked him. "I'm literally spying on people instead of just... living my life?"

The next day, I disconnected the cable. Told Chloe I liked her face-to-face instead of through carefully planted group chat hints. She turned me down, but she smiled when she did it. Called me "brave."

Steve didn't care about my social status. He just wanted his flakes. And honestly? That was kind of freeing.