Pool Party Zombie

The bass thumped through my chest as I stood by the snack table, nursing a lukewarm soda. I was technically at Maya's birthday party, but honestly? I felt like a zombie going through the motions. My social battery had died three hours ago, and I was just waiting for my mom to text that she was outside.

"Yo, Marcus! You gonna hit the pool or what?" Tyler called out, already shirtless and doing a cannonball that sent water everywhere.

"Maybe later," I lied, adjusting my glasses. I'd brought swim trunks, obviously. But the idea of stripping down and exposing my pasty self to the entire sophomore class? Hard pass.

That's when I noticed her — Lena, from my English class, sitting on the pool edge with her feet in the water, scrolling through her phone like she'd rather be literally anywhere else. Her cat shirt was slightly faded, and I remembered her telling me once that she had three cats at home.

I wandered over, trying to look casual and not like I was swimming upstream against my own anxiety.

"Parties are exhausting, right?" I said, sitting beside her.

She looked up, surprised, then cracked a smile. "Oh my god, yes. I've been hiding out here for twenty minutes. I think I've said 'hi' to like, four people, and two of them were May aunt."

We laughed, and suddenly the zombie feeling started to fade. We spent the next hour talking about everything — our weird teachers, her cats (one named Pancake, which is objectively hilarious), my failed attempt to keep a goldfish alive last summer (RIP Bubbles, you lived for two solid weeks).

"You know what's funny?" Lena said as the party started winding down. "I was literally just thinking about leaving, but now I'm kinda glad I stayed."

"Yeah," I said, feeling something weird and fluttery in my chest. "Me too."

Maybe parties weren't so bad after all. Or maybe it just took finding the right person to be a zombie with.