Papaya Sunset at the Fox House

Summer after sophomore year, I scored a job as a lifeguard at the Fox estate. Yeah, that Fox family — like, the kind whose last name is on buildings at our school. My friends called it my 'pyramid scheme moment,' like I'd climbed some social ladder, but truth was, Mrs. Fox just posted on Nextdoor and I was the only one who answered.

The pool sat in their backyard like a giant turquoise gem, and my job was basically sitting there making sure no one drowned while sipping complimentary LaCroix. Easy gig, except for Fox Junior — Chase, who insisted everyone call him 'just Fox' because his nickname from lacrosse had 'stuck.' He was senior year royalty, the kind of guy who walked through hallways like gravity owed him something.

First week, he emerged from the house holding a papaya like it was an alien artifact. 'Ever had one?' he asked, flopping onto the lounge chair next to mine.

'Nope,' I said, trying to play it cool even though my heart was doing that stupid fluttery thing.

He sliced it open with a pocket knife. 'My mom's on this health kick. Says it's got more vitamin C than oranges. Tastes like summer feels, though.' He handed me a wedge.

I took a bite. It was weirdly perfect — sweet but not too much, kinda like how I imagined California would taste if California were a fruit.

'Not bad,' I said.

'Yeah,' he said, and for a second he looked almost normal, not like the guy whose pep rally speeches made everyone roll their eyes. 'Hey, you're in Mr. Henderson's English class, right? The one who wrote that essay about—'

And just like that, we were talking. Really talking. About books, about how we both felt like impostors in our own lives sometimes, about how much it sucked that everyone expected us to have our futures mapped out at sixteen.

By August, the papaya thing became our ritual. We'd sit by the pool as the sun dipped below the trees, eating whatever exotic fruit his mom brought home from Whole Foods, talking about everything and nothing. My friends said I was part of his pyramid — another orbiting satellite around Chase Fox — but they didn't get it. He wasn't the sun. We were just two kids figuring out that maybe nobody had it together, not really.

On the last day of summer, he didn't offer me fruit. Just sat there quiet for a long time before saying, 'You know what the best part was? Not pretending.'

'Yeah,' I said, and I realized I'd never felt more myself than I did that summer, sitting by a pool I had no business being at, eating papaya with someone I'd thought was completely out of my league.

Some pyramids are worth climbing, I guess. Especially when you discover they were never pyramids at all — just regular people who happened to have cool houses.