Poolside Pyramids

The ethernet cable lay tangled across my floor like a dead snake, a reminder that my internet had been dead for three days. Perfect timing for Jake's legendary pool party.

"You're coming, right?" Jake had texted. "Everyone's gonna be there."

Jake was that kind of friend — the one who made social climbing look like a pyramid scheme where only he profited. But he'd stuck by me through seventh grade when I got spinach stuck in my braces during picture day. So I owed him.

The pool party was exactly what I dreaded: too many people in too little clothing, all trying to look effortless while carefully calculating every move. Girls in perfect formations, creating human pyramids on floats. Guys posturing by the deep end, pretending not to notice.

I found myself wedged between the snack table and some guy named Chad who kept talking about his summer internship at his dad's company.

"So what're you into?" Chad asked, nodding toward a group playing beer pong with sparkling water.

"Binge-watching shows," I said, then immediately regretted it. "But my cable's out, so..."

"Lame." Chad drifted away toward someone more interesting.

I reached for a spinach artichoke dip, trying to disappear into the background. That's when I saw Jake — alone by the pool edge, phone in hand, looking exactly as out of place as I felt.

The social pyramid crumbled in that moment. Jake wasn't the peak I'd imagined. He was just another person trying not to drown.

I grabbed two sodas and made my way over.

"Hey," I said, sliding down beside him. "Wanna just... dip our feet in and talk about how weird this is?"

Jake's shoulders dropped. "Honestly? Yes."

We spent the next hour watching people perform their carefully rehearsed casualness, dipping our toes in the cool water, talking about everything and nothing. The cable could wait. The pyramid of social expectations could wait.

Sometimes the best parties happen on the edges, with a friend who's just as lost as you are.