Lakeside Goldfish

The summer air hung thick with humidity as I stood at the edge of Blackwood Lake, clutching a glass bowl containing one very confused goldfish. "You're really doing this?" Maya said from behind me, already waist-deep in the water. "Carl's been my friend since third grade, okay? He deserves better than my mom's toilet."

I wasn't the only one making questionable life choices that summer. Jake, the senior whose every move seemed choreographed for Instagram, was teaching everyone padel on the cracked court near the cabins. The sport had erupted at our school sometime in April, and suddenly everyone was swinging paddles and calling each other "mate" in unconvincing British accents. I'd managed to avoid the trend until now, but peer pressure has a way of finding you, even at summer camp.

"You're literally freeing a pet fish into a lake," Maya pointed out. "That's not noble, that's just stupid."

"He'll be happier here."

"He'll be eaten in three seconds, you walnut."

She wasn't wrong. But Carl and I had been through a lot together—my parents' divorce, that time I accidentally dyed my hair green, the Great Pokémon Card Theft of 2017. Setting him free felt like the only way to close that chapter. The water was colder than I expected as I waded in, bowl raised like some weird trophy.

"Swimming!" someone shouted from the dock. "Last one in does cabin cleanup!" Bodies plunged everywhere, creating chaos on the water's surface. I took a breath and tipped the bowl. Carl flicked his tail once, twice, then disappeared into the murky depths.

"RIP Carl," Maya said solemnly.

Then we heard it—a twig snapped, followed by what sounded like something large moving through the woods. "Bear," whispered a counselor who'd appeared behind us. Everyone froze. The party vibe evaporated instantly.

We spent the next hour locked in the dining hall, watching from windows as wildlife officials tranquilized a very confused black bear that had wandered in, attracted by the smell of the padel tournament's snack bar. The bear was safely relocated. Carl was probably someone's dinner by then. And somehow, between the chaos and the cabin cleanup I definitely ended up doing, Maya and I started talking about everything that really mattered—how much we were drying junior year, how neither of us actually liked padel, how maybe the goldfish thing had been impulsive but also kind of brave.

"For what it's worth," she said as the summer sun finally dipped below the trees, "Carl probably appreciated the effort."