Green Smoothie Summer

Maya stood at the edge of the pool clutching her phone like a lifeline. The water glimmered invitation, but the social pyramid of summer camp felt way more treacherous than any dive she'd ever attempted.

"You going in or what?" Keisha called from where she balanced on Tyler's shoulders, part of the precarious human pyramid forming in the shallow end. Everyone was watching. Again.

"Yeah, just... yeah." Maya slipped her phone under her towel and dipped a toe in. Cold. Refreshing. Not the end of the world.

Lunch afterward was its own battlefield. The camp's famous "health initiative" meant spinach everything. Spinach salad, spinach smoothies, even spinach brownies that tasted like sadness and betrayal.

"I swear," RJ said, poking at his spinach salad with the enthusiasm of someone performing an autopsy, "if I have to eat one more leaf of this grass, I'm actually gonna die."

"Drama queen," said Sasha, but she was secretly feeding her spinach under the table to the tabby cat that had been roaming the dining hall all week.

The cat—a scrawny, orange-striped thing with one ear that wouldn't stand up straight—had basically become everyone's emotional support animal. It appeared like clockwork every meal, judging them with those yellow eyes.

Maya had named him Pyramid because of the little triangular patch of white on his forehead, and because it was objectively hilarious.

"Pyramid's vibing with you today," Sasha said.

The cat was indeed sitting dramatically on the bench beside Maya, tail wrapped around his paws like he owned the place.

"At least someone appreciates me," Maya muttered, mixing her spinach smoothie with the determination of the deeply unhinged.

Later that night, cabin 4B sat in a circle on the floor, eating contraband chips Keisha had smuggled in.

"Okay, truth or dare," Tyler announced. "Maya, truth. What's your most embarrassing moment?"

Maya thought about it. Really thought about it.

"Last year," she said slowly, "I tried to be cool and drink a spinach smoothie every day for a week because I saw it on TikTok. I ended up in the nurse's office because my body literally rejected it."

"Wait," said Keisha, "you're the spinach incident girl? That went around our school. I thought that was a rumor."

"Nope. Very real. Very green. Very traumatic."

They were laughing. Not at her—with her. For the first time all week, the pressure in her chest loosened.

Pyramid the cat chose that moment to slip through the open window, leap onto Maya's lap, and begin purring like a tiny, judgmental motor.

"Okay," Maya said, scratching behind his ears. "Maybe this camp isn't totally terrible."

Tomorrow she'd actually jump off the diving board. But tonight, this was enough.