Mall Zombies

Another Friday night at the food court, and I was fully zombie mode. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead like angry hornets while I slumped against the counter, my brain absolute mush from six hours of asking "you want fries with that?"

Maya bounced over, somehow still radiating energy despite working the shift next to me. "Bella! Oh my god, you will NOT believe what happened."

I blinked at her, slowly. "If it's another story about that customer who asked if we sell pizza at a taco stand, I'm gonna lose it."

"No, shut up, listen!" Maya grabbed my arm, her eyes huge. "My cousin's friend started selling this skincare line, right? And she made like three grand last month. THREE. GRAND."

I squinted at her. "That sounds like a pyramid scheme."

"It's NOT, okay? It's entrepreneurial opportunity!" Maya pulled out her phone, showing me a post with way too many fire emojis and before/after photos that definitely looked fake. "She said if I sign up now, I can be at the top of her pyramid – I mean, team structure. We could do it together!"

The words hung between us. Friend. She was my best friend since seventh grade, the person who'd held me when I failed my driving test, who I'd drunk-texted at 2 AM when things with my mom got bad. But she was also looking at me with those desperate eyes, and I knew she'd already sunk money into this.

"Maya," I said softly, "if you're making money, why do you have to pay to join?"

She deflated. The energy leaked out of her like a popped balloon. "Because... that's how you get the starter kit? And the training?"

The fluorescent lights seemed to buzz louder. I looked at her – really looked – and saw the exhaustion under her eyes, the way her uniform was rumpled, how she was working two jobs just to save up for a car her parents couldn't help with. We were both just zombies stumbling through late capitalism, and some days it felt like eating our own brains was the only way out.

"I'm not gonna do it," I said. "But I'll help you figure out how to get your money back if you can."

Maya's face crumpled for a second before she smoothed it out. "Yeah. Whatever. It's probably dumb anyway."

But she didn't delete the post. And later that night, I watched her in the breakroom, typing furiously on her phone, desperate and hopeful and completely human in a way that made my chest ache. Some pyramids were built with stone. Others were built with dreams. Either way, we were all just trying not to get buried.