Green at the Country Club

Max's first mistake was agreeing to play padel with the country club kids. He'd never even held a racquet before, but when Sophie asked—well, asked with that casual glance that made his stomach do gymnastics—suddenly he was a padel pro.

"You ever play?" Tyler asked, picking at a piece of spinach stuck in his braces. Tyler was built like a refrigerator and moved with the confidence of someone who'd never had a single uncool day in his life. They called him The Bull, which Max found ridiculous until he watched the guy charge across the court.

"Oh yeah, totally," Max lied. "All the time."

The game was a massacre. Max's coordination apparently went on vacation the moment he stepped onto the court. He tripped. He whiffed. He somehow managed to hit the ball directly into his own forehead, which sent Sophie into such a fit of laughter that Max decided to count it as a win.

Afterward, everyone migrated to the pool area. This was worse. Max hadn't brought a swimsuit, so he stood there in his street clothes like a chaperone while everyone else cannonballed into the water. Sophie surfaced beside the pool's edge, water dripping from her hair, and patted the concrete beside her.

"Sit. You're making me feel awkward just standing there."

Max sat. They talked. It was actual conversation, not the panic-inducing kind where his brain went blank and he forgot how to English properly. She liked obscure indie bands and hated mint chocolate chip ice cream, which was objectively wrong but endearing.

"I have something for you," she said suddenly, reaching into her bag. "Won this at the carnival. Three throws, three wins. The guy running the booth looked like he wanted to cry."

She pulled out a plastic bag containing a single goldfish swimming in frustrated circles.

"His name is Lance," she said. "I can't keep him—my mom's allergic to everything with more than two legs. You want him?"

Max stared at the fish. It stared back with an expression of profound goldfish disappointment.

"Lance," Max repeated. "Like... Lance Armstrong?"

"No, like the guy who sold him to me. Also a champion. Look, do you want him or not?"

"Yes," Max said, because of course he did. "Lance is coming home with me."

The Bull wandered over, dripping pool water everywhere. "What's that?"

"A fish. His name is Lance."

"Weird." Tyler considered this. "You know what's not weird? That triple-bogey you called a game."

"Hey, I never said I was good."

"Yeah, but you showed up." Sophie's hand brushed his arm, briefly. "That's what matters."

Max walked home with a plastic bag of water and a fish that cost three carnival throws and exactly as much dignity as he was willing to sacrifice. His phone buzzed: a text from Sophie. A real text. Not a group chat thing.

Lance the goldfish swam beside him on the nightstand, a witness to everything.

Tomorrow, Max would worry about being cool. Today, he'd just be the guy who carried a goldfish home from the country club, with Sophie's number saved in his phone and spinach stuck between two teeth that nobody had bothered to tell him about.