Poolside Geometry

I felt like a total spy, lurking behind the potted plant on the patio, phone clutched in my sweating hand. Three weeks of watching Kylie's stories, analyzing her captions, basically stalking her from a respectful distance. And now here I was at her party, wearing last summer's swimsuit because I couldn't afford a new one, feeling absolutely tiny next to everyone else's perfect aesthetic.

The pool glittered like someone had dumped actual diamonds into it, which was honestly a lot for a Saturday afternoon. Kids were everywhere—some playing chicken, some arguing about music, some existing with that effortless confidence I'd been trying to fake since seventh grade.

"Hey!" someone yelled. "We need more people for the pyramid!"

A human pyramid. In the pool. Because apparently gravity and chlorine and teenage insecurity were a great combination.

I was about to quietly disappear toward the snack table when someone shoved an orange floatie at me. "You're in, right?"

It was Tyler—Tyler who I'd had a crush on since he'd helped me pick up my dropped folders in the hallway last October. Tyler who had absolutely no idea I'd been lowkey watching his Spotify activity for months.

"Sure," I heard myself say, because apparently my mouth had decided to commit.

The orange floatie was enormous and ridiculous and I climbed onto it like it was a throne. Someone positioned themselves behind me, and suddenly we were building this wobbling, wet, ridiculous structure. Arms locked, legs braced, everyone laughing and slipping and practically dying.

"GO!" someone screamed, and we pushed off from the wall.

The pyramid held for exactly three seconds before collapsing in this explosion of water and limbs and laughter. I went under, surfacing to Tyler helping me up, his hair plastered to his forehead, grinning like this was the best thing that had ever happened.

"You good?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said, breathless. "That was actually kinda fun."

"Wanna do it again?"

I looked around at all these people I'd been watching from afar for weeks, scared to talk to them, scared they'd see through me. But here they were, just kids in a pool, trying to build something ridiculous and failing beautifully.

"Yeah," I said. "Let's do it again."

And for the first time all afternoon, I didn't feel like I was spying on everyone else's life. I was just in it.