Palm Secrets & Spy Games

Maya's palms were sweating — again. She wiped them on her ripped black jeans, checking her reflection in the cafeteria window. Her new undercut was growing out weirdly, the shaved hair at the nape of her neck now a fuzzy rebellion against her mother's constant disapproval. But that wasn't why her heart hammered like she'd just downed three espresso shots.

She was being watched.

For two weeks, someone had been liking her posts the exact second she posted them. Commenting with weirdly specific details about her day. Yesterday: cool song u were listening to in chem. She hadn't posted anything about chem class.

"You look like you're about to puke," said Rio, sliding into the seat across from her. Rio, with their immaculate curls and effortless gender-fuck style that made Maya feel like a messy try-hard.

"Someone's spying on me," Maya whispered.

Rio raised an eyebrow. "Again? Last week it was the government monitoring your broccoli consumption."

"This is real." Maya pulled up the comments. "Look."

Rio's expression shifted. "Okay, that's actually creepy. Hey, remember that pop-up palm reader setup by the gym for the weird carnival thing?"

"The 'Mystical Mondays' scam?"

"Yeah, but my cousin said she knew stuff she couldn't have guessed. Let's go."

The palm reader — a girl with neon blue hair and a nametag that said 'PROFESSOR VIBES' — took Maya's hand and traced the lines with surprising gentleness.

"You're waiting for something," Prof Vibes said. "And you're scared of being seen. But your hair says you want to be noticed."

Maya froze. Her undercut. The thing she'd done to stand out, to claim something.

"Your spy," Prof Vibes continued, "isn't who you think. Check your following list."

Maya's fingers shook as she opened Instagram. There, at the bottom: @ari____x_._. Ari, from her art class, who sat three rows back and never spoke. Whose posts were all charcoal drawings of people's hands. Including one post from yesterday: a drawing of someone's palm, with the caption "the lines say she's gonna figure it out."

Ari was at the next table over, sketching. She looked up, caught Maya's eye, and gave the tiniest wave. Then she held up her sketchbook. Inside: a charcoal drawing of Maya, undercut and all, looking fierce.

Below it: "not a spy. just an admirer. ur hair is sick btw."

Maya's palms stopped sweating. "Oh," she said.

"Told you," Rio grinned. "Professor Vibes doesn't mess around."

And maybe that was the thing about being seen — sometimes it wasn't scary. Sometimes it was exactly what you needed.