Orange Peel Summer

The summer heat pressed against my skin as I sat on the wooden dock, peeling an orange. My phone buzzed beside me—another notification that made me feel like everyone was watching, somehow. I'd been spying on Kayla's Instagram stories since school ended, watching her live her best summer life while I was stuck at my dad's lake house with terrible WiFi and a coaxial cable that barely worked.

The lake water lapped against the pilings beneath my bare feet, cool and dark. I tossed an orange slice into the water, watching it float away like my chances with Kayla.

"You gonna eat that or attack it?" Mia's voice made me jump. She lived next door, same age as me, with way more confidence than I'd ever have.

"Breakfast," I mumbled, feeling my face heat up. Mia had this way of making everything I did seem weird.

She sat beside me, dipping her feet in the water. "You're always on that phone. Spying on people?"

"No!" I lied, badly.

"Right." She smirked. "My brother says you're obsessed with Kayla from school. Says you're basically a private investigator at this point."

Great. Now everyone knew.

"Whatever." I pulled apart another orange slice. The citrus spray hit my nose, sharp and real.

"Wanna see something cool?" Mia stood up. "Follow me."

She led me into the woods behind our houses, past the cable box I'd tried fixing three times. The trail wound deeper until we reached a clearing with a massive oak tree.

"Look," she whispered.

A mama bear and two cubs were foraging near a stream, maybe fifty feet away. My heart raced.

"Don't worry," Mia said softly. "They're just here for the berries. But if you're quiet, you can watch."

We stood there, barely breathing, as the bears moved through the clearing. It was the most alive I'd felt all summer.

"Better than Instagram," Mia whispered.

She was right.

We walked back in comfortable silence, the orange sticky on my fingers, the image of those bears burned into my memory.

"You know," Mia said as we reached my dock, "Kayla's cousin is at the lake too. She's been asking about you."

My stomach did that teenage flip thing. "Yeah?"

"But honestly?" Mia grinned. "You should probably worry less about spying on people online and more about noticing what's right in front of you."

She walked away, leaving me standing there with my half-eaten orange, thinking maybe she wasn't talking about Kayla's cousin at all.

Later that night, I finally posted my own story—not a curated pic, just a photo I'd taken of the bear prints in the mud. Kayla viewed it first. But I found myself waiting to see if Mia would watch it too.

The summer felt different after that. Like maybe real life was actually better than whatever was happening on my screen.