Pyramid of Lies

Maya's palms were literally sweating through her denim shorts as she stood in front of the entire lacrosse team. Chase, the senior captain with that annoyingly perfect smile, had just invited her to the "party of the century" at his uncle's beach house.

"You coming?" He raised an eyebrow, and Maya knew this was her moment. Finally. After years of being the invisible girl in AP Bio, she was about to break into the pyramid of Wyndham High's social hierarchy.

"Totally," she said, channeling confidence she didn't feel. "Wouldn't miss it."

The night of the party, Maya squeezed into a bikini she'd bought with three weeks of babysitting money and let her older sister do her makeup. But when she arrived, the vibe was completely different than expected. Instead of beer pong and laughing teens, she found Chase and his crew sitting in a circle around—what?

"Bear with me," Chase was saying, gesturing to a whiteboard covered in circles and lines. "This isn't just skincare. It's financial freedom."

Maya's stomach dropped. A pyramid scheme. For skincare products. At a beach house with actual palm trees swaying outside the floor-to-ceiling windows.

"Your first month, you only need to recruit three people," Chase continued, his eyes intense. "Those three recruit three more, and suddenly you're making six figures. That's the beauty of the pyramid."

Someone in the back whispered, "Isn't this literally illegal?"

"It's MULTI-LEVEL MARKETING," Chase snapped. "Get it right."

Maya couldn't help it. She laughed. Not a giggle, but a full-on snort. The entire room turned to look at her.

"Sorry," she said, still chuckling. "It's just—I thought this was gonna be, like, an actual party. Not a cult recruitment session."

Chase's face turned crimson. But then someone else laughed. Then another person. Within minutes, the whole group was cracking up, and someone finally suggested they actually, you know, party.

As they moved to the patio under the palm trees, Chase caught Maya's eye. "You're cool," he admitted. "Wanna grab a drink?"

Maya smiled, realizing she didn't want to climb his stupid pyramid anymore. She was perfectly fine on the ground, thanks.

"Nah," she said. "I think I'll bear witness to whatever disaster happens next from right here."