Poolside Apocalypse

The first thing I noticed about Tyler's house was the cable. Not the kind that brings Netflix to your bedroom, but an actual thick black cable snaking across the backyard like a disaster waiting to happen. Tyler claimed it was for his older brother's band setup, but honestly, it looked like something that would electrocute us all before the night was over.

I stood by the pool, chlorine stinging my nose, feeling like a total zombie. Three hours of sleep and way too much overthinking about whether Jordan would actually show up would do that to you. My reflection in the pool water looked ghostly—pale skin, dark circles, hair that I'd spent forty minutes trying to make look effortless. Spoiler alert: it didn't.

Then the baseball team arrived. Of course they did. Perfect hair, perfect abs, perfect lives. They took over the deep end like they owned the place, their laughter cutting through the awkward silence of everyone else. I watched Jordan glide over to them, my stomach doing that horrible twisty thing it does when I realize I'm nobody's first choice.

"Hey!" Tyler called from his porch, waving a baseball bat like a wizard about to cast a spell. "Zombie apocalypse simulation in five! Everyone pick teams!"

This was the thing about Tyler. While the rest of us were trying to act cool and detached, he was twenty-four seven pure chaos energy. I'd known him since we were six, when he'd convinced me that we could build a spaceship out of refrigerator boxes.

The baseball guys groaned. The girls Jordan had been talking to exchanged looks that clearly said what is this loser's problem. But I found myself moving toward Tyler, toward the cable still stretched across the grass like a tripwire for something interesting.

"You're on my team," Tyler said, tossing me a pool noodle. "We're going down, but we're going down swinging."

Jordan watched me from across the pool, something unreadable in their expression. And for the first time all night, I didn't feel like a zombie anymore. I felt like someone who'd chosen her weirdness over everyone else's expectations.

"Bring it," I said, hefting my pool noodle like a weapon.

Sometimes the apocalypse isn't the end of the world. Sometimes it's just the beginning of being okay with who you actually are.