Poolside Goldfish

The neighborhood pool party was supposed to be chill, but my anxiety was doing laps in my stomach. Marcus—my best friend since seventh grade—had been acting weird all week, ghosting my texts then hitting me with "u busy?" at 2 AM like nothing was wrong.

Now here we were, his mom's ridiculous backyard pool shimmering under fairy lights, and he was brooding in the deep end like a mermaid who'd just discovered they were adopted.

"You good?" I called out, dangling my legs in the water.

"Debating whether to just grow gills and live down here," he said, surfacing with wet hair plastered to his forehead.

His sister Jennifer appeared behind us, holding up a plastic bag containing the saddest goldfish I'd ever seen—it had won at the carnival and was now basically living its best life in temporary housing.

"Mom says if you don't take care of Goldie McGoldfishface, it's going back to the store," she announced.

Marcus groaned. "I didn't even want it. That game was total bull—the guy basically handed it to me because I looked 'sad.'"

"You looked sad?" I raised an eyebrow. "Since when?"

"Since my parents started fighting about every single thing, including whose turn it is to remind me to take my vitamin D supplements because I 'clearly never go outside anymore,'" he mimicked his mom's voice perfectly.

I laughed, but it came out hollow. Marcus's parents had been divorced since we were fifteen, but apparently they'd found new ways to make things weird.

"Bro," I said, sliding into the pool beside him, "you can talk to me. That's kind of the whole friendship contract."

He stayed silent for a long moment, treading water. The goldfish bag bobbed on the lounge chair behind us.

"I think I messed everything up with Alexa," he finally said. "I told her I like her, and she said she 'doesn't want anything serious' then immediately posted a story with that Tyler guy from the soccer team."

I swore under my breath. "That's messed up. You're my friend and I'm objectively calling bull—that's crappy timing."

The goldfish swam in its tiny circles, completely oblivious to human heartbreak.

"Whatever," Marcus said, though his voice cracked. "At least I have Goldie McGoldfishface now. We can both be single together."

I bumped his shoulder. "We'll figure it out. Plus, my pool has better snacks."

He cracked a real smile. "Bet. But only if you stop ghosting me about that English project."

"Deal. Now help me save this fish before Jennifer accidentally sacrifices it to the pool gods."