Goldfish Thunder

The pool party at Jessica's was supposed to be chill, but my social battery was at 2% before I even jumped in. Everyone looked so effortless in their swimsuits, laughing at inside jokes I didn't understand, while I hovered near the snack table like a lost goldfish in an oversized tank.

"You gonna swimming or just stand there looking like you're calculating the water's pH?"

I turned to see Marcus — track star, freshman heartthrob, and apparently the person who'd rescue me from invisible status. His smirk was annoying, but his eyes were genuinely curious.

"I'm observing," I said, failing at sounding mysterious. "It's called strategy."

"Strategy for what? Avoiding fun?" Marcus splashed water at me.

I shrieked and scrambled backward, directly into Jessica's prize-winning carnival goldfish bowl that some genius had placed on a patio table. The bowl shattered. Gold scales everywhere. A tiny orange fish flopped on the concrete, gasping.

Everyone stared. My face burned hotter than July asphalt.

But Marcus didn't laugh. He dropped to his knees, gently scooped up the fish, and sprinted to the pool. "Emergency goldfish rescue!" he shouted like it was a legitimate sport.

The fish survived. Marcus dubbed it "Survivor Dave" and made me co-parent. We spent the rest of summer taking turns feeding Dave, accidentally training it to do tricks (it could push a tiny ping-pong ball — honestly), and eventually becoming actual friends.

"You're not like I thought," Marcus said one night, our bikes parked by the pond where we'd "released" Dave. He was looking at me differently now. "You're actually weird as hell. I like that."

Something else lit up in his expression. Something that made my stomach do that flippy thing, like lightning striking underwater.

"You too," I managed, though my voice came out weird.

We kissed as Dave swam away into the pond's murky depths, probably plotting his next great escape. Sometimes the most mortifying moments turn out exactly right.