Palm Sweats and Perfect Moments

Maya's palms were sweating. Like, actually dripping. She wiped them on her dress for the third time, leaving dark streaks on the navy fabric that she prayed no one would notice.

"You good?" whispered Jordan, nodding toward where Lucas stood across the room, looking unfairly good in that flannel he always wore.

"My hair keeps doing this weird flip-out thing on the left side and I'm pretty sure I have spinach in my teeth from lunch," Maya hissed back. "Why did I think eating a spinach wrap before the biggest party of the year was a good idea?"

Jordan laughed. "Your hair is fine. You're being dramatic. Go talk to him already."

Easy for Jordan to say. Jordan wasn't carrying around three months of built-up courage, ready to evaporate at any second. Maya wasn't even sure Lucas knew she existed. They'd shared exactly seven words since August: "thanks," "sorry," and "here" (when she'd dropped his pencil in chemistry).

She took a deep breath, smoothed her dress again, and started across the room.

Halfway there, her iPhone buzzed in her hand. A text from her mom: "Don't forget your grandma's tomorrow!"

Maya groaned internally. Of course her mom would choose NOW to remind her about family obligations. She quickly typed "got it" and—

Her phone slipped. Time seemed to slow down as it bounced off her palm, did this ridiculous little spin, and landed directly in the open punch bowl.

Splash.

The entire room went silent. Someone's music kept playing. Maya stood there, hand still out, as red punch dripped from her fingers.

And then Lucas was there, reaching into the bowl with his bare hand, fishing out her phone.

"Well," he said, shaking droplets of red punch onto the floor. "That's one way to make an entrance."

Maya's face burned hotter than she'd ever felt possible. "I—"

"You have a little punch on your nose," Lucas said, grinning. "And for what it's worth? I was totally going to come over and talk to you anyway."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I was just working up my own courage." He handed her the punch-soaked phone. "I'm Lucas, by the way. We've had chemistry together for, like, eight months."

"Maya," she managed, despite the spinach that was definitely stuck in her teeth and the punch dripping from her phone and her hair doing that flip-out thing on the left side. "And I'm never going to live this down."

"Probably not," Lucas agreed. "But at least it's memorable?"

He had a point.

Later, as they sat on the back porch step while her phone dried out on a paper towel, Maya learned that Lucas got nervous around people he liked too. That his hands sweated when he was anxious. That he'd been planning to talk to her since October.

Sometimes the most embarrassing moments became the best stories. And sometimes, you just had to dive in headfirst—even if that meant diving into the punch bowl.

Her palms weren't sweating anymore.