Paparaoola & The Pool Party

Maya's stomach did actual backflips when she saw the invite screenshot. Jake Henderson's pool party. THE Jake Henderson, who sat three rows back in bio and always wore that faded black hoodie even when it was ninety degrees.

"You're going, right?" Chloe had texted. "Everyone's gonna be there. Even that sophomore girl with the cool hair."

Now Maya stood at the edge of Jake's backyard, holding her phone like it was a lifeline. She could already hear them — the splashing, the laughter, the distinct sound of people who were normal and comfortable and didn't overthink every single social interaction.

She spotted Jake immediately, of course. He was **swimming** laps with that easy confidence some people just had, cutting through the water like it was nothing. Meanwhile, Maya was still wearing her cover-up because taking it off felt approximately as terrifying as delivering a presentation in her underwear.

"Hey! You made it!" It was Chloe, emerging from the pool area with her hair wet and perfect. "Come meet people. Jake's mom made this weird fruit salad thing."

And that's when it happened. The moment that would live in infamy, retold at family gatherings for at least three generations.

Jake walked over, dripping wet, smiling that smile that made Maya's brain short-circuit. "Hey, I'm Jake. You're Maya, right? From bio?"

"Yeah!" she squeaked. "That's me. Maya. Bio. The class. That I'm in. With you."

Kill her now.

"Want to try some **papaya**?" he asked, gesturing to a fruit arrangement. "It's actually pretty good. My mom gets it from this specialty—"

Maya's brain, clearly offline, decided this was her moment to be interesting. To be the girl who was adventurous with food, who wasn't basic. "Oh my god, I LOVE papaya! I eat it literally all the time, it's basically my entire personality—"

She took a massive bite.

Her face did something involuntary. Something horrific. The papaya tasted like what she imagined a melon would taste like if it had gone through a divorce and stopped going to therapy.

"...It's an acquired taste," Jake said, watching her struggle to chew without crying.

"SO good," Maya forced out. "Literally amazing."

But then she really couldn't hold it in. The cough. The one that happens when you're trying to swallow something your body has categorically rejected. And suddenly Maya was sprinting away from the party, **running** toward the bathroom with a mouthful of chewed papaya like some sort of feral fruit bandit.

She spent seven minutes in there, staring at herself in the mirror, calculating how long she needed to wait before she could "go home" without it being weird. This was it. Her social life was over. She'd be known as Papaya Girl for the rest of high school. There'd be a variations.com profile about her failure.

A knock on the door.

"Maya? You okay in there?"

Jake.

She cracked the door open, prepared to accept her fate. "I'm so sorry. That was the most embarrassing thing that has ever happened in the history of—"

"Dude," he laughed. "Last month at Marcus's party, I accidentally ate a whole ghost pepper thinking it was a tomato slice. I cried in front of everyone. For like, twenty minutes."

Maya blinked. "Really?"

"My friends still call me Ghost Boy. It's terrible." He shrugged. "Anyway, I was gonna say — if you hate papaya, we have pizza. And my sister has those Takis that burn your tongue but in a good way."

Maya felt something inside her unclench. The knot that had been tightening since she'd seen that invite.

"Pizza sounds amazing," she said. "And Jake?"

"Yeah?"

"Never speak of this to anyone."

"Your secret's safe with me, Papaya Girl."

Maya rolled her eyes, but she was smiling as she followed him back to the party. Some things were worse than eating weird fruit in front of your crush. But some things — like finding out he was just as awkward as she was — were actually pretty sweet.

Even if papaya definitely wasn't.