Goldfish Summer

Zoey's palms were sweating. Again.

She wiped them on her shorts, wishing she'd stayed home scrolling through TikTok instead of coming to Kayla's pool party. But her mom had insisted. "You're fifteen, Zoey. You need to stop acting like a goldfish with no memory and actually make some friends."

Ouch.

Now she stood by the deep end, watching everyone else swimming, laughing, splashing. Normal people stuff. Meanwhile, Zoey was overthinking everything, like why she'd worn this bikini that felt two sizes too small.

"Hey, you coming in or what?"

Zoey jumped. It was Marcus, the fox-eyed junior who'd transferred to their school last month. He had this way of looking at people like he knew stuff about them. Stuff they hadn't even figured out themselves.

"Maybe," she said, because saying "I'm actually having an existential crisis" seemed like too much information.

Marcus grinned. "Your loss. The water's perfect."

He dove in, surfacing near the ladder where Kayla and her squad were taking selfies. Zoey watched, feeling that familiar twist in her chest—not quite jealousy, not quite loneliness, just... being on the outside of something everyone else seemed to understand naturally.

Then Marcus swam back to her side.

"You know what this party needs?" he said, slicking wet hair back. "A sphinx."

Zoey blinked. "A what now?"

"A sphinx. Riddles. Mystery." He treaded water, looking annoyingly confident. "Your turn. What's something that's everywhere but nowhere? Everyone talks about it but nobody actually sees it?"

"Vibe," she said immediately.

Marcus laughed—actually laughed, not那种 fake chuckle he gave Kayla's friends. "Okay, that's literally the most correct answer possible. You're good at this."

Something shifted. Maybe it was the way his eyes crinkled when he smiled. Maybe it was realizing she'd made him laugh without even trying. But suddenly the swimming pool didn't feel so terrifying.

"Your turn," Zoey said, stepping closer to the edge. "What riddle do foxes ask themselves?"

Marcus pretended to think. "How did I get so charming?"

"Wrong," she said. "The real answer is: why am I still swimming alone when the most interesting person at this party is standing right there?"

The silence stretched. Then Marcus's face did this thing where it broke into something real, something unpolished.

"Touché," he said softly. "Touché."

Zoey sat at the pool's edge, feet dangling in the water. For the first time all summer, her palms weren't sweating.

Sometimes growing up meant realizing the riddles weren't as complicated as you thought.