Green Between My Teeth

I became a professional spy at 3:47 PM on a Tuesday.

Not the cool, James Bond kind. The Instagram-stalking, five-depths-deep kind. I'd been watching Jordan's stories for weeks now — padel tournaments, weekends at the lake, perfect golden-hour photos. Jordan was everything I wasn't: confident, athletic, genuinely good at padel.

"You coming?" Maya appeared beside me at the country club entrance. "Tryouts are starting."

I nodded, already regretting everything. My mom had packed me a "power lunch" — spinach salad with walnuts. "It's brain food, Leo," she'd said. Now I had spinach stuck between my front teeth. I'd been trying to dislodge it with my tongue for twenty minutes.

Hot.

We walked toward the padel courts. The coach blew her whistle. "Alright everyone, pair up!"

Naturally, I ended up paired with Jordan.

"Hey," they said, bouncing a ball. "You Leo?"

"Yeah. Hi."

"You play?"

"My dad loves it." Not a lie. Also not an answer.

We started hitting. Jordan was effortless — smooth swings, perfect placement. I was overthinking every shot, my brain reciting every embarrassing thing I'd done since sixth grade. My racket hand sweated. My heart hammered.

And I still had spinach in my teeth.

We were down 4-1 when Jordan's water bottle tipped over, spilling across the court. "Oops, my bad." They laughed, easy and unbothered. "Hold up."

While Jordan grabbed paper towels, I caught my reflection in the club's floor-to-ceiling windows. The spinach. A tiny green wedge, right between my two front teeth. Visible from space.

I'd been playing with spinach in my teeth for forty-five minutes.

Something in me snapped. Maybe it was the heat. Maybe it was realizing I'd been so terrified of embarrassing myself that I'd spent the entire afternoon actually embarrassing myself.

I started laughing.

Jordan returned. "What?"

"I've had spinach in my teeth this whole time," I said, still laughing. "Like, the entire time."

Jordan squinted, then grinned. "Oh yeah. Totally."

"And you didn't say anything?"

"I thought you knew. It was kind of..." They shrugged. "Endearing?"

"Endearing?"

"Like you were too focused on the game to care." Jordan passed me a fresh water bottle. "Also, I double-faulted three times. We're all disasters here."

We finished the match. We lost. But something shifted — the tightness in my chest loosened. The spy-observing, hyper-aware version of me stepped back, and just me showed up.

Afterward, Jordan texted me: "Same time next week? Bring your own spinach this time."

I typed back: "Only if you promise to keep double-faulting."

Sometimes the coolest thing you can do is stop trying to be cool at all.