Orange Hat Signal

The orange beanie sat pulled low over my ears, my personal invisibility cloak. Freshman year at Northwood High had been three months of me trying to disappear into lockers and classroom corners. Main character energy? Not even close. I was more like an extra who kept accidentally walking into frame.

Then I lost my iphone in the cafeteria.

Not misplaced. Not left in a classroom. Someone had straight-up swiped it from my table while I was in the lunch line. The panic hit different—my entire life was on that thing. My contacts, my carefully curated playlists, the screenshots of texts I'd never actually sent to Jordan from AP Bio.

"Did you try 'Find My'?" Maya asked when I sat with her at our usual spot, looking like I might cry. Maya, who never wore anything but black and spoke in lowercase.

"Whoever took it probably turned it off already," I said, pulling my orange hat lower. "I'm doomed."

"Maybe not." She tapped something on her phone. "I see it. Someone's posting from your instagram. They're at the old water tower."

We should've told a teacher. Called my mom. Something responsible. Instead, we walked three miles in the cold, my orange hat basically a beacon that screamed "we're two freshmen who have no idea what we're doing."

The water tower loomed above us, all rusted metal and small-town danger vibes. Three seniors sat on the hood of a Honda Civic, passing around my phone like it was exhibit A.

"That's my hat," Maya said, pointing at my orange beanie where one of the guys, Trevor, had stuck it on his head. "And that's our friend's phone."

Trevor froze. The other two stopped laughing.

"Your friend's got terrible taste in music," Trevor said, but he was already sliding off the car hood. He pulled my phone from his pocket and my orange hat off his head. "We were just messing around. Found it in the bathroom, figured we'd wait for someone to claim it."

"By posting from it?" I said, surprised by my own voice. Steady, somehow.

Trevor shrugged, almost smiling. "Worked, didn't it?"

Walking home under streetlights, Maya linked her arm through mine. "That was actually kind of brave," she said. "You didn't even shake."

I pulled my orange hat back on, but not so low this time. "Maybe next time I'll even take it off."

"Baby steps," Maya said. "But seriously? Change your passcode. And maybe text Jordan already."

My phone buzzed in my pocket. New notification: Trevor_requests_to_follow_you.

I didn't accept. But I didn't delete it either.