Papaya at Midnight

My parents finally left me alone for the weekend, which obviously meant inviting everyone over. The cabin smelled like pine and bad decisions by Friday night.

"Anyone want this?" Maya held up a papaya like it was an alien artifact. "My mom's weird health phase."

"Pass," said Liam, who'd been subtly flexing his arms all night. "Real men eat protein."

"Total bull," Zoe rolled her eyes, but I caught her glancing at his biceps. "You're just trying to impress Chelsea."

Chelsea, whose Instagram had gained three thousand followers since Thursday, stared at her phone like it contained the secrets to the universe. Meanwhile, I was discovering that papaya tastes like soap mixed with sadness.

Around 2 AM, after we'd watched six zombie movies and told stories that were 10% true and 90% dramatic embellishment, something crashed outside.

"Bear," someone whispered, and suddenly we were all thirteen again, clutching kitchen knives and peering through blackout curtains like idiots.

"Bears don't rattle like that," I said, though my voice shook. "And we're literally in the suburbs."

Then the back door started opening.

"ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE," Maya screamed, throwing a papaya at the door.

It hit my brother square in the forehead.

"WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU," he yelled, fruit dripping from his face. "I came home early because MOM said I couldn't stay at dad's and YOU SAID I could use the cabin—"

We stared at him. Then at each other. Then we started laughing so hard we couldn't breathe.

By dawn, we were huddled under blankets, exhausted and weirdly bonded. Chelsea wasn't checking her phone. Liam wasn't flexing. And somehow, between the papaya incident and my brother's arrival, we'd stopped performing.

"Worst weekend ever," Zoe said, but she was smiling.

"Yeah," I agreed, feeling something unclench in my chest. "Pretty perfect though."