Poolside Surveillance

I felt like a zombie at the Hamiltons' pool party. Fourth night in a row of staying up until 3 AM gaming'll do that to you. But there I was, floating in the shallow end with my eyes half-closed while everyone else screamed about something.

"Yo, Marcus! Earth to Marcus!"

Maya splashed water in my face. I blinked, sitting up way too fast. The world spun.

"Bro's basically undead at this point," Jayden called from the diving board. "Someone call the exorcist."

"I'm functioning," I protested, wiping chlorine from my eyes. "Mostly."

But that's when I saw her across the pool — Chloe, in that oversized band tee she always wore, sitting by herself and scrolling through her phone like the rest of us didn't exist. And suddenly, my alleged zombie state had absolutely nothing to do with sleep deprivation.

For three weeks, I'd been what the guys called a "low-key spy" — which mostly meant I'd memorized her coffee order (vanilla latte, extra foam), noticed she always wore mismatched socks, and knew she hung out at the library during lunch even though she could totally sit with the popular crowd if she wanted. The surveillance was accidental, really. I just... noticed things.

Now she was at this party, and I was cowardly floating in water instead of talking to her.

"You're being weird," Maya whispered beside me. "Again."

"I'm not being—"

"You're literally staring at Chloe while paddling in circles. It's creepy. Go say hi or literally anything else."

But before I could overthink it into paralysis, Chloe stood up and started walking toward the diving board. Jayden mouthed 'this is your chance' at me like a terrible hype man.

I swam over, dripping water everywhere, heart pounding like I'd just sprinted a marathon.

"Hey," I said, and wow, that was weak. That was really weak.

She looked up from her phone, and I could've sworn she was suppressing a smile. "Hey. You've been doing laps for an hour. You training for something?"

"Just... avoiding social interaction?" And then, because my brain had clearly given up: "Mostly."

She laughed. Not that polite fake laugh people give when they're being nice — a real one.

"Bold strategy." She sat on the edge of the pool, feet in the water. "Can I join?"

"Please. The more zombies the better."

We talked for two hours while the party raged around us. About teachers who assigned too much homework, about how neither of us understood why everyone pretended to like all the same stuff, about how exhausted we both were by, like, everything.

"So," she said, when the sun started going down, "does this mean you're going to stop being the guy who spies on me from across rooms?"

I nearly choked on air. "You—"

"You're not exactly subtle, Marcus." She was definitely grinning now. "But it's cute. Also, you're right about vanilla lattes."